Las ciudades del Sur global han ganado representatividad en las discusiones internacionalesacerca de gobernanza y sostenibilidad. Esto parece apenas lógico considerando que la mayoríade la población mundial habita en ellas. En particular, Medellín ha recibido bastante atencióngracias a una serie de intervenciones urbanas que han sido vinculadas con el mejoramiento de diferentes aspectos de la calidad de vida de sus habitantes. En este artículo discutimos cómo se materializa la gobernanza y cómo toma diferentes formas, de acuerdo con las condiciones y actores específicos en cada caso. Adicionalmente, exploramos el caso de Juan Bobo, un proyecto piloto de consolidación habitacional llevado a cabo en la ciudad de Medellín. A través de este caso buscamos entender cómo la gobernanza toma forma en condiciones de informalidad ycómo se pueden lograr combinaciones funcionales de estilos de gobernanza para solucionar algunos de los problemas que aquejan a los barrios autoconstruidos de la ciudad.
This article studies five Swedish cities, their membership in international city networks, the different motivations for such membership, and their administrations' expected and perceived benefits. Particular focus is put on sustainability, environmental technology, and municipal companies as potential beneficiaries of such network membership. This study is motivated by the fact that city networks can potentially contribute to global sustainability goals by accelerating the diffusion of innovations, giving members access to bidirectional information flows, improving the user-producer relationship, and providing legitimacy in the potential recipient regimes. The study relies on a documentation review, the collection of data from the websites of the studied cities and numerous international city networks, and interviews with city officials responsible for international city networks. It was found that four of the five studied cities are active members of international networks for sustainability, but also that there are large gaps between the two largest cities and the rest when it comes to the number of memberships and the geographical outreach they have through the networks they belong to. Some city officials claim that it is easier to be active in national networks than in international networks, due to time requirements and coordination among so many members. However, city officials see benefits for their municipal companies when they are members of international networks, and these companies are usually independent when it comes to choosing and administering their memberships. It was found that it is difficult to measure direct benefits from network membership, and link improvements in the studied cities to participation in a particular network (with the exception of groups created for a specific infrastructure project, reported as "networks" by the administrations). In addition, there is no apparent direct correlation between membership and diffusion of environmental solutions from municipal companies. However, the administrations expect indirect benefits such as gaining legitimacy and access to milieus where they can share information and best practices, which could lead to the improvement of both local and global environmental conditions. ; Funding agencies: Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems (VINNOVA); Swedish Energy Agency; Tekniska Verken AB
Introduction-This report is based on structured literature reviews and brainstorming sections on governmental export promotion initiatives for environmental technology in selected countries. It is intended to answer two fundamental questions: why governments intervene to promote environmental technology export and how this intervention is actually executed. These questions emerged in-light of two general challenges: 1) the lack of vivid scientific insights with robust theoretical underpinnings on governmental efforts to promote environmental technology export, 2) the necessity to diffuse environmental technology across borders based on the facts that some environmental technologies have a pressing demand in countries other than their home origin and that most emerging economies are now facing environmental challenges which have long existed in many developed countries. Approach-A structured literature review which covered public export promotion agencies and export credit agencies in the top three environmental technology exporting countries (Germany, USA, and Japan); Scandinavian environmental technology competitors to Sweden (Finland, Denmark, Norway); other European competitor (Austria) and China as an emerging exporter was employed to identify governmental export promotion initiatives. For a deeper insight Austria, Denmark and Sweden were purposively selected for an analysis into their public ''action'' plans to promote environmental technology including exports. The empirical findings were then discussed in brainstorming sections using theories and best practices to come out with conclusions, some recommendations and further questions. Findings-The economic justification for government involvement in export promotion is based on the theory of asymmetric information and other market failures. The market has so far not shown enough signs of inherently diffusing environmental technologies to the desired societal level, thus the need for government intervention. Governmental intervention for environmental technology export promotion are organised by one or a combination of the following in the reviewed countries: by prioritized target countries; by prioritized environmental technologies; by alternative services (information, financial, training and education, trade and mobility related programs); by firm size (large vs. small) and by firm stage in internationalization. With regards to specific action plans, crosscutting focus remains on support for small and medium enterprises; strategies in Austria and Denmark to promote environmental technologies in aggregation focus on policy information provision to enterprises whiles technology and business development is given priority in Sweden. Concluding remarks-The report concludes with some remarks and further questions to stir up the debate and understanding on governmental initiatives for environmental technology export promotion. Highlights include 1) the recommendation for the provision of more detailed market information to export oriented firms recognizing the importance of externalities involved in gathering such information by private firms, 2) the need for mutual collaboration between governmental export promotion agencies and their initiatives which could be confusingly large within a country and 3) a hybridization of focus on policy instruments and technology & business development in-line with the complex ecosystem of interactions between market information and the innovation of environmental technologies. Further questions-Several questions remain to be answered. Among them include: 1) Which theories could be used to justify governmental intervention through export promotion of environmental technologies? 2) What, When and How to measure the effectiveness of such governmental export promotion initiatives and 3) How the inherent characteristics of environmental technologies have (or should) influence their export promotion remain to be answered. ; Megatech
As cities have become home for 50% of the world"s population, urban systems have definitely caught public attention. The urban metabolism can be improved by transforming their linear behavior into a more circular one. This paper is based on a project initiated by the Division of Environmental Technology and Management at Linköping university, financed by Vinnova: Megatech. The aim is to study the megacities of Cairo and Mexico City in order to understand some of the problems they are facing. By improving their energy and material flows behavior, these megacities can benefit from the reduction of their dependence on fossil fuels and virgin materials; the protection of part of their social, economic and productive systems from external factors (e.g. political drawbacks, shortage/distribution problems, international prices); an increased effectiveness of their planning activities–as they would be based to a large extent on their own resources–and the reduction of their environmental burden. An in situ study will take place with the participation of local stakeholders. Information about environmental problems will be collected and potential solutions will be analyzed and suggested. A tentative model is presented, showing how the reinsertion of the outflows into the urban system could benefit these cities" overall environmental performance. ; Megatech
The world is facing a tremendous challenge with its current urbanization trend. In particular, two types of cities–i.e. emerging and transitional–are of interest given their rapid population growth and the subsequent pressure put on its infrastructure and logistics and on its surrounding environment. This can represent huge business opportunities for companies in Sweden, where population growth has stabilized and a lot of these problems have been already addressed. At the same time, the host city can benefit from the solution of some of their problems and a push towards a more sustainable development. In this article, the key dynamics for successful up-scaling and diffusion of environmental technologies in emerging markets are analyzed based on a case-study. The identification of key local stakeholders, such as governmental and non-governmental institutions (NGOs), intermediary institutions, industry representatives and academia was the raw material for a first round of interviews. The latter, provided an insight of what are the barriers to success, having in mind the specific social and economic context of the venue and its inhabitants/government's perceptions of their current environmental situation. ; Megatech
