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The author compares urban reorganization over a period of three decades in New York, Paris, and London, asking why reorganization produces unanticipated consequences, how the process of reorganization can be understood, and, using cities as a type of organization, what can be learned about their behavior in comparative context. A model is presented that identifies the process and values of reorganization. This model illustrates that conflicting values often account for unanticipated consequences, that efforts to reconcile these values sometimes yield worsening (undermining) effects, and that changes in organizational structure can be a powerful tool in shaping priorities.

We use the adaptive cycle theory to improve our understanding of cycles of urban change in the city of Barcelona from 1953 to present. Most specifically, we explore the vulnerabilities and windows of opportunity these cycles for change introduced in the release (Ω) and reorganization (α) phases. In the two recurring cycles of urban change analyzed (before and after 1979), we observe two complementary loops. During the front-loop, financial and natural resources are efficiently exploited by homogenous dominant groups (private developers, the bourgeoisie, politicians or technocrats) with the objective to promote capital accumulation based on private (or private-public partnership) investments. In contrast, the back-loop emerges from Barcelona's heterogeneous urban social movements (neighborhood associations, activists, squatters, cooperatives and NGOs), whose objectives are diverse but converge in their discontent with the status-quo of conservation (the K phase) and their desire for a "common good" that includes social justice, social cohesion, participatory governance, and wellbeing for all. The heterogeneity of these social networks (shadow groups) fosters learning and social innovation and gives them the flexibility that the front-loop's dominant groups lack to trigger change not only within but also across spatial scale (local community-based, neighborhood, city) and time dimensions, promoting a cross-scale process of revolt and stabilization, also known as Panarchy.

Data on the reorg of gov in & outside of West German cities are presented. It is shown that in many areas the evaluations of their problems made up by the Germans differ little from those made by some observers to US metropolitan pol, but while Amer's have not chosen or are unable to act in a unified fashion upon these evaluations, the West Germans have acted. In some states, communes have been combined into single units of a minimum pop of 8,000. 3 federal states have proposed general reorg of their countries to produce larger units. Some cities, too, have been consolidated. The term "neighborhood gov" is used to describe the procedures the West Germans have developed to achieve some form of pol'al unit close to the citizenry of large cities. This concept is not new to Germany, but has been expressed. In nearly all states in which reorg of local gov is presently contemplated or in progress, the possibility of some form of neighborhood gov is being provided for the larger towns & cities. On Oct 5, 1965, the gov of the most populous state of the Federal Republic, Northrhine-Westphalia, established the Investigatory Commission for the Communal & State Reorg of the Land Northrhine-Westphalia. The Report of this Commission, entitled "The Reorganization of Cities & Towns in the Agglomerated Zones & the Reform of Counties" is discussed in detail. Then the reorg of the Bonn region is examined. A summary points out similarities between the US & West Germany, the breadth & relative ease of West German metropolitan reorg, the interrelatedness of regional, Ru, & metropolitan concerns, & the reconciliation of efficiency & localism. It is concluded that West German pol'al culture appears not as influenced by anti-Ur'ism as Amer pol'al culture. M. Maxfield.

Among the few Canadian provinces and American states which have effected major changes in the structure of local government in recent years is the province of Alberta. During the last fifteen years, rural local government in that province has been reorganized extensively. It is the purpose of this paper to describe the main features of the reorganization, to suggest why it took place, and to appraise briefly its effects and implications.Local Government Units in Alberta. The structure of local government in Alberta finds no counterpart elsewhere except in the other Prairie Provinces of Canada. In Alberta, the municipal district is a rural local government unit which is empowered and required by the provincial government to provide for local public works, public welfare, sanitation and health, and the protection of persons and property. Such a district levies the property taxes required to pay for these services as well as to pay the requisitions of school and hospital districts. Towns and villages within the boundaries of a municipal district are not under its jurisdiction; they are small urban incorporated municipalities operating under a special statute, The Town and Village Act. Cities are self-governing under separate charters. Thus a municipal district is peculiarly rural in character. It is governed by elected councillors, while a secretary-treasurer and office staff appointed by the council administer the district's affairs in accordance with the council's by-laws and the provincial statutes.The less-developed rural areas of the province are divided into improvement districts. These are administrative areas in which the provincial government performs the functions alloted to the elected councils and the administrative staffs in the municipal districts.

AbstractThe article considers where and how the silk industry was located in the urban space of Lyons. It also explores how the changing nature of silk production and manufacture influenced the institutional arrangements and physical character of the city. Several sub-periods are considered between the early seventeenth to the early twentieth century, each with different spatial logics largely defined by changes in the governance of the trade. This study offers new insights into how a dominant industrial activity reorganized the spaces of a major city and how the resulting social structure affected its spatial pattern. In so doing, space is accorded a more central role in understanding urban development, while recognizing that social, economic and political forces also modify this materiality. Historical Geographical Information Systems (HGIS) facilitate greater precision in terms of urban locations and thereby utilize written qualitative and quantitative sources more effectively.

A sample of registered voters in subUr cities & townships of the Grand Rapids, Mich metropolitan area were surveyed during the period in which the central city was attempting to persuade them to annex or merge, to determine att's to various proposals for reorganizing the area's gov'al services. Responses were cross-tabulated with opinions that water or other problems existed & on effectiveness & costs of local & central city gov's. Those who reported problems were only slightly more favorable to gov'al changes; in only a few cases was this relationship statistically signif. SubUr residents reporting problems were more inclined than others to accept solutions involving loss of identity; township residents reporting problems more inclined to accept unfamiliar & relatively unpredictable solutions than were other township residents. Rating of local gov's effectiveness showed no statistical relationship to attitude on gov'al change but att to central city gov'al effectiveness was a good predictor of attitude on annexation esp in the townships. The fact of incorp appears to be an important influence on such att's; township residents seemed to have accepted` the need for some change in local structure but preferred if possible to remain separate from the central city while subUr city residents appeared confident that their local gov's could handle whatever problems would arise in the near future. Modified AA.