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This book illustrates the importance of global cities for world politics and highlights the diplomatic connections between cities and global governance. While there is a growing body of literature concerned with explaining the transformations of the international order, little theorisation has taken into account the key metropolises of our time as elements of these revolutions. The volume seeks to fill this gap by demonstrating how global cities have a pervasive agency in contemporary global governance. The book argues that looking at global cities can bring about three.

Global city-thinking has, in the past years, had a very real pull on society. Global cities seem an unavoidable fact of everyday world affairs. This volume gathers a forum that integrates the extensive set of disciplinary dimensions to which the interdisciplinary concept of the global city can help to tackle the policy challenges of today's metropolises. Its chapters are drawn from viewpoints including the cultural, economic, historical, postcolonial, virtual, architectural, literary, security and political dimensions of global cities. Tasked with providing a rejoinder to the global city scholarship from each of these perspectives, the authors illustrate what twin analytical and practical challenges emerge from juxtaposing these stances to the concept of the 'global city'. They rely not solely on theory but also on sample case studies either drawn from long-lived global cities such as New York, Shanghai and London, or emerging metropolises like Dubai, Cape Town and Sydney.

Cover; Half Title; Title Page; Copyright Page; Contents; List of figures and tables; List of figures; Foreword; Acknowledgements; 1. Introduction: a time for city leadership; 2. Exploring city leadership: catalysts of action; 3. The shape of leadership: actors and structures; 4. Setting priorities: local leadership in a global world; 5. Setting directions: leadership and strategic urban plans; 6. Conclusion: a search for better city leadership; Appendices; References; Index

Leading Cities is a global review of the state of city leadership and urban governance today. Drawing on research into 202 cities in 100 countries, the book provides a broad, international evidence base grounded in the experiences of all types of cities. It offers a scholarly but also practical assessment of how cities are led, what challenges their leaders face, and the ways in which this leadership is increasingly connected to global affairs.

Arguing that effective leadership is not just something created by an individual, Elizabeth Rapoport, Michele Acuto and Leonora Grcheva focus on three elements of city leadership: leaders, the structures and institutions that underpin them, and the tools used to drive change. Each of these elements are examined in turn, as are the major urban policy issues that leaders confront today on the ground. The book also takes a deep dive into one particular example of tool or instrument of city leadership – the strategic urban plan.

This book examines the role of technology in the core voices for International Relations theory and how this has shaped the contemporary thinking of 'IR' across some of the discipline's major texts. Through an interview format between different generations of IR scholars, the conversations of the book analyse the relationship between technology and concepts like power, security and global order. They explore to what extent ideas about the role and implications of technology help to understand the way IR has been framed and world politics are conceived of today. This innovative text will appeal to scholars in Politics and International Relations as well as STS, Human Geography and Anthropology. Carolin Kaltofen is Research Associate in Science Diplomacy in the Department of Science, Technology, Engineering and Public Policy at University College London, UK. Madeline Carr is Associate Professor in International Relations and Cyber Security in the Department of Science, Technology, Engineering and Public Policy at University College London, UK. Michele Acuto is Professor of Global Urban Politics in the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning at the University of Melbourne, Australia.--

Intro -- Contents -- Notes on Contributors -- Chapter 1 Conversations on Technology and IR -- Abstract -- A Dialogue on Technology and the Role of a Discipline -- Rediscovering IR's Affair with Technology -- An Intergenerational Dialogue -- Debating Tech at the Heart of IR -- A Field Report on the Technologies of IR -- Chapter 2 Theory Is Technology -- Technology Is Theory -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 3 A Double-Edged Sword? Blayne Haggart in conversation with Susan Sell -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 4 Everyday Tech: In Search of Mundane Tactics Michele Acuto in conversation with Saskia Sassen -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 5 Curiosity, Criticality and Materiality Can E. Mutlu in conversation with Mark B. Salter -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 6 The Meta-Power of Technology -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 7 Culture, Diversity and Technology -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 8 Experts, Matters and Actor-Networks -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 9 From Nuclear Weapons to Cyber Security: Breaking Boundaries -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 10 Technologies of Violence -- Abstract -- Chapter 11 Postinternationalism on Technology, Change and Continuity -- Abstract -- Chapter 12 Technology: From the Background to Opportunity -- Abstract -- Works Referenced -- Chapter 13 'New Technologies': Questions of Agency, Responsibility, and Luck -- Abstract -- Works Referenced.

Introduction: Empowering Cities; Simon Curtis/ 1. - 1. The Meaning of Global Cities: Rethinking the Relationship between Cities, States and International Order; Simon Curtis/ 16 . - 2. The Common Sense of Global City 'Actorness' in Contemporary World Politics; Kristin Ljungkvist/ 32 . - 3. A Networked Urban World: Empowering Cities to Tackle Environmental Challenges; Sofie Bouteligier/ 57 . - 4. An Urban Affair: How Mayors Shape Cities for World Politics; Michele Acuto/ 69 . - 5. Globalization, Governance and the Production of Urban Socio-Ecological Space; Nik Janos and Corina Mckendry/ 89 . - 6. The International Activities of Canadian Cities: Are Canadian Cities Challenging the Gate-Keeper Position of the Federal Executive in International Affairs?; Emmanuel Brunet-Jailly/ 107 . - 7. Municipal Bonds and Global Power; Mark Amen/ 132 . - 8. Johannesburg: Financial 'Gateway' to Africa; Elizabeth Cobbett/ 151