Summary Drawing on the case of the Olympics, and in particular on the role of London in securing, planning and administering the 2012 Summer Games, this article investigates how cities participate in world politics beyond the traditional avenues of the international system. Tracing how the planning of a sporting mega-event has been woven into London's international role as a global 'green' leader, the article seeks to shed some light on the diplomatic role of cities, as well as on how sport has been used in relation to city diplomacy and urban governance. The Olympics offer a unique window on the multi-scalar reach of these subnational authorities, allowing for substantial public diplomacy initiatives. Major cities such as London, as the article argues, can exert a pervasive diplomatic influence, and planning for sporting events can extend their capacity to link 'city diplomacy' with tangible impacts on everyday lives.
This essay sets up a comparison between two types of negotiating tactics: the first, aggregating strategies, aims at merging parties into the fewest number of sides to a conflict as possible, in order to diminish the number of war‐related divisions, and the second, disaggregating strategies, rests on the idea that "cross‐cutting cleavages" help moderate social conflict because they run against the construction of opposed identities. Much of the literature on intrastate conflict and rebellions supports the latter approach, but little comparative analysis on the social costs and benefits of the two types has, in reality, been carried out. By drawing lessons from the insurgencies in Aceh, Bougainville and, in part, the Solomon Islands, the article takes up an opportunity‐based spoilers' framework to analyze the strategies. It concludes that neither of the two can be identified as a "best method" if measured against sustainability and social impact, nor does one of them have a stronger effect on spoilers. In either case, the study underlines, there is an intrinsic value in long‐term peace processes as constituted by repeated negotiations and continuing interaction; likewise, there are webbing effects of war on peacebuilding scenarios as a process of multiplication of social cleavages occurs after conflict.
AbstractThe globalization of Sydney and its rise to world city status tell us a profoundly political story that presents critical challenges both in terms of local development and long‐term sustainability. Green is at the centre of this imagineering, which situates environmental sustainability at the core of Sydney's competitive and innovative edge. Yet the Harbour City, while rising to worldwide fame, has also been progressively troubled by wicked challenges that question its increasingly entrepreneurial and largely unproblematized approach to urban governance. At present, the metropolis has tackled these challenges by means of ad hoc solutions and policy‐making processes that, on deeper analysis, reveal little coordination beyond an impetus for growth as the driver of collective action at the urban scale. Due to the lack of a clear metropolis‐wide authority and the multiscalar nature of urban governance, the city has turned too much towards tackling sustainability within its urban dimension as a source of global competitiveness, while social polarization questions are steadily advancing to the forefront. It is time, I argue, for a Greater Sydney Authority.RésuméLa mondialisation de Sydney et son ascension au rang de ville mondiale racontent une histoire profondément politique où apparaissent des problèmes cruciaux, à la fois en termes de développement local et de viabilitéà long terme. Défini comme pivot de cet 'ingéniomaginaire' ou imagineering, le thème 'vert' place la viabilité environnementale au cœur de l'avantage compétitif et novateur de Sydney. Pourtant, tout en bâtissant sa renommée mondiale, 'Harbour City' a peu à peu rencontré des 'problèmes pernicieux' qui menacent son approche de plus en plus entrepreneuriale de la gouvernance urbaine, approche dont la problématique est largement ignorée. La métropole a répondu à ces difficultés par des solutions ponctuelles et des processus de décision politique qui, une fois analysés en profondeur, révèlent une faible coordination hormis l'élan en faveur de la croissance comme moteur de l'action collective à l'échelon urbain. En l'absence d'autorité métropolitaine claire et à cause des multiples échelons de gouvernance, la ville s'est trop intéressée à la durabilité dans sa dimension urbaine en tant que source de compétitivité mondiale, alors que des problèmes de polarisation sociale prennent peu à peu le devant de la scène. Il est temps que soit instaurée une 'Autorité du Grand Sydney'.
This article calls for greater attention to global cities in the study of world affairs so as to promote a more holistic reading of global governance as a multiscalar set of processes composed by overlapping spheres of authority. The article shows how international studies have been insufficiently sensitive to the strategic role of global cities and how they are capable of acting on the global stage by exerting network power. This sheds light on the multilayered governmentality of global governance from an urban perspective. Looking through a lens of global cities, it is argued, will enable theorists to connect macro processes to micro dynamics across a far wider spectrum of governance and political agencies.
