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Cities Without Borders
An anonymous reader writes "There is a very interesting article about Cities Without Borders in the latest issue of Mindjack. The author, Paul Hartzog, argues that we are seeing the emergency of 'global cities' concentrating command-and-control functions for the global economy. For instance, the increasing importance of certain cities such as New York, London, Tokyo, Frankfurt, Sydney or Miami shows they not only support complex webs of businesses but also participate in a global network for the production and distribution of finance and capital. This is just one example. You should read the original article to see if you agree with the author -- or not."
If location doesn't matter. Then why is everyone getting ripped off from real estate cost.
Im reminded of school history lessons as a kid, full of stories of once great cities, now deserted because the rivers or trade routes that suported them changed. This is the same sort of thing, those cities are important because of the information that flows through them. How easy these days is it for information to change where its located? In the past a river would take hundreds of years to change its course. Nowdays, that cultural river can change a great deal in mere decades. How long ago was it that Miami was just a holiday spot?
I think the points made the artcile are quite intuitive and obvious. Rather, it is the context of formulation of the subject at hand that makes the way we think about cities as entities interesting. Any geographical entity, be it a city, state, or nation state, are essentially borderless. The spatial ontology of such geographical entities is predicated on the artificially constructed boundaries that are set in order to structurally delimit the start of an entity and the end of another. Such borders, however, are non-existent when it comes to social and cultural forces that span across multiple geographic entities. When the internet and the world wide web emerged, such boundaries were rendered virtually meaningless. People can transcend geographical borders and visit faraway places half way across the globe in the comfort of their homes. Like I said, most of this is already quite intuitive to all of us who participate in activities on the internet on a daily basis. The most interesting points that are highlighted by the article, however, have to do with how the globalization trend affects the global economy. It isn't farfetched to consider the internet as its own geographical entity.
As our economy depends more and more on services, people will tend to clump together to reduce travel costs and maximize convenience. The digital outsourcing trends that we see now don't fight this: they just link the clumps (ex: Bangalore to NYC). It's easier now to get services away from the city network, but still easier to get them within the network.
I first thought of Civilization (Sid Meier's) where you have to acquire city walls to protect your fellow citizens from invaders...
Once you get a proper air defense system, these become obsolete.
But no, it just looks to be more about the demise of ruralship and the slow disappearing of intermediate management : info no gets directly from the ground up and vice versa.
Trolling using another account since 2005.
Actually the trend is going in reverse. Telecommuting / telepresence means you don't need to be in the city.
Being in the city used to be useful for acquiring the extremely valuable commodity of trust. Personal relationships. Now, I can trust Larry Lessig (at least on Copyright law critique) because I know where he stands on those issues. We are on opposite sides of the planet. I also trust Warren Buffet as a source of information on investment issues. He's in Nebraska.
Warren B. might not take my calls but Larry probably would. And they're are plenty of 'mini' Warrens around.
I have no reason to visit Frankfurt or any of those other places.
I find that as I interact with people from all over the world, on forums, and newsgroups, and in online games (my EQ guild had Canadians, and Australians, and French, and a few others, for example), the notion of countries, like "The United States", just doesn't seem that relevant any more.
I'm starting to feel that basically the world consists of here (basically, where the people I interact with outside the net are) and everywhere else. When I deal with someone who is not here, it doesn't matter to me if they are in Texas or New York or France. That the first two of those are in the same country as I and the third is not seems a silly distinction to make.
Like many other things in life, if it's worth trying and even if it's not, we've tried it in California. We already have a city without borders, we call it Los Angeles.
Joking aside, even as an idea or culture, one could argue that Los Angeles is world wide.
Nonsense. This is an age-old concept. Rome and Alexandria were both large hubs of commerce, setting the value of the $currency, and trade went on between the cities. London and Paris in centuries past traded. This is the same damned thing that's been going on for millenia: people congregate into larger groups of habitating individuals, and they become a "city". Having a larger wealth of human resources, they naturally become a focal point in all trade. People in outlying communities around these cities use the city culture and economy to suppliment their livelyhood in various manners, getting goods from "far off" places (whether it's the tribe 100 miles to the north that has the nice beads, or Hong Kong's finest... whatever) through proxy of their local city.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
As economies move more and more toward services and not manufacturing, the countryside-- with scattered factory towns, resource locations (coal, iron), and certainly agrarian regions atrophe their youth to the capital metropolis.
I have seen this firsthand in London, where real estate prices continue to climb, while the Northern England and certainly Scotland prices are stable or slightly falling.
I saw this happen in Seoul, where there is currently a property bubble on the south side of the Han river, while villages south toward Pusan are growing more empty every year.
I am currently watching this happen in Tokyo, where every new building is full of "one room" apts catering to newcomers draining out of the countryside, and the towns on the far side of the island are nothing but grandmas and grandpas growing rice.
My point: Tokyo, London, Seoul, Paris, New York, and perhaps Sydney will continue to see strong local economies, while their surrounding areas stagnate. Meanwhile, manufacturing-based economies like China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Germany, Brasil, and perhaps Vietnam will see distributed development as factories seek cheap land and cheap raw materials.
davejenkins.com |
Saskia Sassen, professor of Sociology & author of "The Global City" is used as an authority in TFA. This post is not a slam but more of a critique of her as a lecturer.
.RAM file - Real Player required) Yes I attended this as it was mandatory but I was there with an open mind. We were required to attend and then discuss it at the next class meeting with our fellow students and our Senior Sem. professor.
As a graduate of RIT, it was mandatory to take Senior Seminar which is RIT's attempt to enrich the student with timely lectures from authorities in a field. The topic of Senior Seminar is on globalization, human rights, and citizenship.
You can find all the lectures online at http://www.rit.edu/~gannett/Archived.html (might I add that there are some really great lectures available) and you can specifically you can find Professor Saskia Sassen's lecture from December 13, 2001 Globalization or Denationalization? Economy of Policy in a Digital Global Age. (
The class, including the professor, agreeded that she is too far out into the fringes of her studies of sociology and thus is unable to effectivly communicate her thoughts to those in attendance. Our professor, he too a professor in the field of sociology, was both disgusted and outraged in regards to her lecture. Disgusted that she can not reach students and perhaps make them question why & how globalization changes our lives. Outraged that we had to listen to over an hour of uninterpretable socio-politic-economic mishmash of ideas. I came away from that lecture with nothing. I will wholly admit that I am not a peer of hers nor am I well versed in any social science. Perhaps I am way out of my element and all of us students in attendance are not the pinnacle of sociology & research like she is, but I was dumbfounded that I could walk away from a lecture and gain nothing.
Maybe she is a great authority on the topic of globalization, but her delivery on that topic left us feeling ill. Since we suffered through her lecture, I wonder if she really is an authority on globalization since many educated students and some of her peers were unable to discover it for themselves. If Sassen's lecture is measured against Marshall McLuhan's quote "The Medium is the Message", then Sassen's message becomes bunk.
For a critique of her book, see Amazon.com customer reviews.
That must be a first
The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness.
Location matters depending on one thing - the quality of local government.
Take North Korea for instance - it isn't that different from South Korea, and yet the people in North Korea are dying of hunger.
The only difference between the North and South Korea(s) isn't location, but rather, the governments that run the two places.
Even within a country, you can find that people of different classes congregate into different areas, and that is largely the effect of governments.
People paying hefty premiums for the real estate in High Class Area for many reasons - of course, the "High Class" does sound nice. But other than that, better schools, better security, better connections, et cetera do add up.
In slums area, like in shanty towns, people often don't even have to pay for the real estate they occupy, but they DO pay for the effects of CRIME, little or no chance of schooling, rampant joblessness, and so on.
All those can be and would be addressed effectively if you have a good government.
The Philippines as well as Myanmar were RICH COUNTRIES in Asia. Today, the people of both countries are suffering because of the failure of their respective governments.
On the other hand - we can see the rise of China - whether you agree or not, the present government of China is "better" in some ways, as compare to the past - and that allows the people of China to have a chance to move foward, and many do.
By the same token, the government of United States of America is failing, and we can see the effects - dropping standards of living, growing deficits, the exodus of jobs, the rising crime rates, and so on.
City Without Borders is just an idea. Cities such as New York City won't be in the list of City Without Borders for long, if New York City continues to be ruled by bad governments.
Other newcomers from South America or Asia or Europe may take its place, simply because talents will flock to places with good governence. And with the concentration of all those talents, miracles happen.
That's all.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
..."Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?". "well I dont know about anyone else . But I came from my room. I'm a kid with big plans and I'm going outside! See ya later!" "Say, who the heck is Paul Gaugin Anyway" Sorry, couldnt help myself - Calvin and Hobbes (still missed)
"You should read the original article to see if you agree with the author -- or not."
You do realize this is slashdot, don't you?
And btw, aren't anonymous readers actually anonymous cowards around here?
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
- Digital culture is potentially global culture. We find theatre productions from London, like "Les Miserables", becoming mega-hits on Broadway in New York City.
- The city scenes in the first Matrix film were shot in Sydney, the second in San Francisco, and yet on-screen they constituted an architecturally homogenous unidentifiable "global city."
- The increasing globalization of production creates a "global culture" that is cosmopolitan and robust in its diversity.
- Balancing this trend, however, we find a resurgence in international arts. Films like "Amelie" succeed because they inflect the emerging global culture with a local or regional cultural flavor.
- In addition, Chow Yun-Fat is not only a successful Chinese actor, but more importantly a successful global actor.
Each generation thinks that their time is the most important moment in history. It is the hubris of our species, and it leads us unfailingly to make bad decisions about the future, thinking we know more than our predecessors and as much as our successors. This is why each generation laughs at its ancestors and is laughed at by its descendants.Italian operas have been performed all over the world for centuries. What is different? Nothing.
Modern skyscrapers are designed more for efficiency than uniqueness, and with few exceptions are not terribly distinctive. Just because my city can be photoshopped to look like another one does not make me more a "citizen of the world."
What an asinine statement. My grandfather could walk into a store 50 years ago and buy a Japanese radio as easily as an American-made one. Did it make him more culturally aware?
Films like "Amelie" succeed because they are well-made and entertaining despite the subtitles, not because of them.
Mark Twain was an international star as well. So was Benjamin Franklin. Chow Yun-Fat is not a different species, just a different breed.
Come on, people; we have thousands of years of history to draw upon here. Can't we muster some perspective? Read Ecclesiastes--there is nothing new under the sun.
It probably isn't news.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
There are a dozen cities in Asia (yes I know Australia is not Asia) globablly more important than Sydney ("the gateway to Woomera"). Sydney is a great place to (begin a) holiday, but except for the fact that it has a somewhat unique location, it is unexceptional from a business standpoint. You might raise the same objection about Miami, but given how much south / central american money passes through there, I can see a reasonable case being made for Miami. Sydney is not defensible as a top global business city unless you use the criterion "best of each continent", in which case they forgot McMurdo station off that list.
You should read the original article to see ...
Oh no, it won't work here.
And you accuse somebody else of spouting bunk? References or statistics, please, for your assertion that, umm, "most people would find highly dubious."
During the "days of the British empire", most people lived isoliated agrarian lives. This includes the people in the British Empire itself. The percentage of commerce that involved trade beyond a regional scale was probably far less than 5 or even 1% when viewed over the population of the earth as a whole.
This morning I had cheese made in Holland and France, an orange grown in Spain, some orange juice from Florida, and some crackers from Norway for breakfast on bowl made in China. I'd have to have been an aristocrat to achieve this at the height of the British Empire.
This article reminds me of the kinds of articles that were written in the early '90s about the fall of nation states and the emergence of a cosmopolitan information economy due to that newfangled internet thingy. Well I'm glad the days of millenarian doom and gloom are over and that we will go back to '90s optimism. (yes the world is a mess, but it was bad back then too. Remember it gets worse before it gets better) Now all I want is my VR helmet.
Sounds a lot like the theory of The Global Village from 1962
Underholdning.info
As is so often the case when reading academic articles, it's hard to determine whether I agree or disagree with the author. I do, however, disagree with the notion that the concentration of economic power in cities is some sort of new or increasing phenomenon. Cities have always been, essentially, points of concentration of economic power. Concentrated economic power might even be the defining characteristic of cities.
Many years ago, access to and control of natural resources such as salt or fish or arable land or water was the reason a city might develop. Today, access to man-made resources such as communications infrastructure, various markets, or even tax policies may be more important than natural ones. But the fact remains that different localities provide different operating environments, some of which are more advantageous to a given business than others. Place, therefore, still matters.
Why indeed?
English speaking? Proximity to water? Same timezone as the burgeoning Asian markets, yet Anglo-friendly for multinationals wanting to build their presence in Asia.
If you consult some studies from people who have actually the phenomenon of the 'Global City', you'll find that Sydney meets the criteria, whereas, for example Singapore (trotted out as the 'real' Global City in the region) is better described as a 'city state'.
Sydney has established itself as the leading Australian city in world city terms (Baum,1997; Stimson, 1995). It is the major international air hub, is the most important financial centre and, during the growth in Asian economies, extended its role tobecome a location for many transnational corporations wanting to service south eastAsia.
With your final comment - you come off sounding like you have "Tall Poppy Syndrome". Your city not on the list hey?
Jobs, from factory jobs to computer jobs are automated out of existence. Jobs also disappear when profit rates fall and capital investment falls (that's cyclical though). Supposedly jobs automated out of existence magically reappear as new jobs paying the same or higher wage. Keynes didn't think so, and despite the rhetoric, the US government and "business community" doesn't think so either.
If these jobs don't reappear, then why has unemployment stayed basically the same throughout the entire industrial revolution? I would guess that 90% of the jobs that were done in 1800 have been automated out of existence, so why isn't 90% of the workforce unemployed?
Mod down posts with a "Free Mac Mini/iPod" sig, they're spam!
printf("Goodbye cruel world!\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b\b");
Unfortunately for them, their own plans are about to lead them to cultural ruin. Bush's plan to provide High Speed internet to the nation should be read as what to him would seem akin to the Rural Electrification Project. Where the idea was, lets get power to the people out in the farms so they will be more competive and produce more. That sort of backfired. They got used to the power and started wanting more. More TVs, DVD, Fancy cars and the lowly Banana.
The upshot was that the young started to abandon the farms in droves. As they did the cheap labor of the farm children was replaced by cheap labor from immigrants. The old cycle was that the Farm would be inherited by the children of the farmer and next generation would take over. As the found new jobs as computer programmers and got MBAs they let their parents sell of the old family farm to large agro businesses. Large Farms got larger and Cities got bigger.
Wiring the rest of the county will give reason for companies to relocate to cheaper parts of the US and bring good jobs to town who's main income was the local speed trap. If your a Conservative Rural Republican in a Red State, visions of selling farmland to city slickers for housing and commercial parks must seem like heaven. Voting for Bush was voting your pocketbook.
Now here comes the other side of the coin. Unlike mining towns of the 19th and early 20th Century you really can't lock people in. Your neigbors will undercut your housing deals because they all got buckets of land and nobody to grow whatever.
City Slicker Programmers and the upper skilled workforce are not Conservative Rural Republicans, There those damn Blue State Liberals. They eat fish RAW!!!!, A lot of them aren't even from the USA, most dress like they were extras in that confusing movie The Matrix. As Techs and Tech businesses move to the boondocks they will turn the red states blue.
Right now the current FUD is that Liberals don't respect people with Faith. The fact is that the rural people can't afford to break the back of the liberal technology complex. Ever wondered why Strict harsh and very communist China hasn't stompped all over Hong Kong? China needs Hong Kong more then Hong Kong needs China.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
Israel, small and poor? Compared to who? Israeli GDP per head is about $19,800, Palestine $830. Who are you trying to kid?
Now the cash market has become all electronic, yes the market place may exist in a building on the outskirts of Frankfurt, but the financial centre is no longer there. Much of the trading is actually taking place in London and Frankfurt becomes relegated to backoffice clearing and settlement operations.
What I'm trying to say is that whilst the market place is important, it could be quickly established elsewhere. Where the customers are becomes more important.
Essentiaally it means there is a movement towards a single financial centre serving a group of timezones.
See my journal, I write things there
I was working from home in the US and recently moved to the middle east. I still have the same job thanks to broadband internet and VoIP telephony. Cost of living here is much less, and it's nice to have the same US salary.
Excellent.
"...because they think Jesus...."
You express exactly the polarized thinking that a big city produces. Couldn't be that all us fly-overs are thinking individuals that have opinions and values (both valid) that differ from you, could it? No. It's got to be that we are unthinking, stupid, or duped.
Sorry, little man, you need to look for the mass of the iceberg yourself.
I read an interesting book several years ago, Revolt of the Elites, that is very much on topic. The author argues that a global economy represents the breakdown of the nation state as the central political-economic unit, as the global economy encourages a cosmopolitan mindset among those at the top who benefit from it.
While I don't agree that this represents "a threat to democracy" (just the opposite in my opinion), I think the book is very perceptive.
quiquid id est, timeo puellas et oscula dantes.
Lay off already. You don't need to spin for a while. Kerry's gone and won't be back. Go back to blaiming Bill Clinton, it's more entertaining. To claim NY is anti-semitic or anti-Israel is surreal. You have bought some strange extremest spin.
... (hopefully you can fill in the rest)
The phrase 'fly over country' is indicative of insecurity that over TV'ed 'right wingers' get while watching Leo DeCaprio cavort with models.
And what's with the hatred of the French? That's like me hating Southerners except I don't: Seems like most of them (like most of everyone) are cool. Most New Yorkers have little to do with your hatred except we don't vote like you. And we get screwed on Homeland Security Funding, but that's another post.
New York City, speaking as a native, has an advantage, to me, over much of the country, including Hollywood, in that you don't need to drive everyday. Other than that, we're a huge amount of people trying to make the same kind of living that every one in the 'Red States' are trying to make, and some of us try to take advantage of being surrounded by a huge amount of people.
The article, (did you RTFA?) had as one of it's few interesting points a nice shout out to slashdot. The centralization and future of the super-city is an interesting topic not really addressed.
>>thinking of themselves as New Yorkers first and Americans second...
Always have. You will find that in Italy, too, which is a country sort of next to France with, IMHO, really good food.
I'm a New Yorker
I pledge allegance to the flag
I am a citizen of the world, my religion is doing good.
Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it.
"We might find individuals thinking of themselves as New Yorkers first and Americans second, or Parisiennes first and French second."
That is what is happening now. It is also the reason that New Yorkers and Parisiennes are looked upon so poorly by others in their own countries.
How is this at all new? It's the story of human civilization, since the first of our great cities, such as Ur an Babylon.
VOS/Interreality project: www.interreality.org
Hmm. Maybe it has something to do with the type of government and economic system.
Israel: Parliamentary democracy, capitalism.
"Palestine": Tinpot terrorist dictatorship, kleptocracy.
Naaaaaw, that's got nothing to do with it. It's all the fault of teh 3vil J00Z!
But they live in "refugee camps"! Yeah, yeah, what-the-fuck-ever. I know we westerners are supposed to think of tents and mud when we see the term "refugee camp", but take your green goggles off and just look at the damn place. "Refugee camps" of 100,000 people, featuring roads, water, brick and mortar construction, and that have been there for 30 years... anywhere else on the planet, those are called cities. (Of course, in states with functioning market economies - as opposed to terrorist kleptocracies - there's something to do in those cities other than figure out new ways to kill the Jews, but there we go on the GDP per capita front again. Guess when Saddam stopped paying $25K per suicide bomber, the only economic activity in "Palestine" really crashed.)
Fun exercise: Divide the subsidies from the US to Israel, and from the UN and European states to "Palestine" by the respective populations the two countries.
OK, so I suppose "Palestine" isn't subsidized by the EU or the UN on the grounds that all the money ends up in Switzerland under the control of some French chick. But unless you believe Yasser's AIDS-wracked corpse underwent a last-minute conversion to Judaism last week, you're gonna have a hard time convincing anyone (except possibly the Muslims) that teh 3vil j00z are behind it.
And to stay on topic. I love NYC, but... fuck Hollywood.
This is true not simply because of weapons of mass destruction and their proliferation -- but because of pandemics such as AIDS.
Packet switching protocols, such as IP, were originally developed to allow decentralization of critical communication infrastructure during the cold war. It's just incredibly stupid to not only continue to shove people into cities but to make a vision of the future based on "cities without borders".
Seastead this.
...I can tell you there is nothing better. For the past 5 years, I get up in the morning, get a cup of coffee, scratch my butt, sit down at my computer, and I am "at work." Our primary office site is 300+ miles away in Houston.
Logistical issues are infrequent and minor, usually comfortably and efficiently addressed by FedEx or UPS.
Telecommuting is not the wave of the future, it is the reality of now--at least for me.
Ignorance is curable, stupid is forever.
The nice thing about Pol Pot is that despite the fact that he decided to empty the cities of Cambodia in a totally stupid way, there haven't been enough movies made about his stupidity to program the populace into knee-jerk bigotry against reasonable ways of emptying the cities.
Seastead this.
Sorry, had to jump in here, even though I'm not the original poster. I'm struggling to not comment on the fact that this was modded "insightful" when it is completely wrong. In actual fact, the global economy was indeed more globalized during the latter days of the British empire than it is now; capital outflow from the UK has never recovered to the same level (as a percentage of GDP) as it was in 1914. In addition, no country (yes, including the US) has ever had as high a rate of capital outflow as was achieved by the UK before the First world war. Also, you really need to check your history books - during the "days of the British empire" I think you'll find that most people in the UK were living in cities. (certainly far more, as a percentage of population, than in the US). Whilst you're there, read a history of the East India company, or any book about corporatism, to see what globalisation really was about back then.
Well done on your breakfast, but it's nothing new; certainly a member of the Eurpoean middle classes at the beginning of the 20th century could have done the same.
Dan.
From the OED:
Emergency:
1. The rising of a submerged body above the surface of water; = EMERGENCE 1.
2. a. The process of issuing from concealment, confinement, etc.; = EMERGENCE
In the last two US elections the pseudo-libertarian free market "Right" has willingly gone over to the side of big intrusive government, massive debt, onerous laws, putting fundamentalist Christian ideology ahead of science, and alieanating overseas allies (and their markets). Your actions speak so loud I can't hear what you "really stand for" at all.
0 1 - just my two bits
Yo Tackhead! Are we trying to start a flamewar now? I've spent more than a few months over the past few years in Israel/Palestine, and I'm guessing you haven't. Ignorance hasn't stopped Americans speaking their minds in the past, and there's no reason why it should now. Thanks for that. While it's possible to get work as a refugee camp dweller in the West Bank (unlike in Lebanon where refugees are barred by the government from being doctors for example) it's pretty unlikely. If you have brains, 5 years ago you'd work construction or catering or tourism in Israel (the Jordanian economy is pretty closed to West Bankers these days). Now Israel is closed to "undesirables" those jobs have gone to Philipinos, and the smart refugee is trying to find job security any place they can. In practice, this means NGOs, local government, healthcare, education. All that needs education, and if you have it, your chances of getting a US visa go right up.
If you read my original post you might notice that I didn't mention "jews" or "J00Z" anywhere. Antisemitism is becoming a serious problem on my continent, and fuckwits like you screaming antisemitism at the drop of the hat are not improving matters.
What I think this article missed is that a lot of the "big money" does things like travel much of the year to avoid taxes. These folks are more likely to be found in places like Aspen or some of the nicer carribean resorts than cities. What really drives the cities are jobs that are located in cities for traditional or political reasons(i.e the New York Stock Market-the various political jobs in Washington DC). People with serious money have _choice_ and they usually don't for the most part choose to hang out in cities. Maybe some cites are doing better in the global economy-but with increased communication eventually the functions in those cities will move to someplace cheaper.
.. been one since I was born, am lucky enough to be able to say that I have lived and worked and loved all over the planet, and I've been to a lot of different cities in my time. its all just like one big blur now, almost .. like one big matrix city, connected with tube-like structures that fly through space, a kind of 'space-warp' from one traincar/sidewalk to the next, which only a very few can afford, though many use.
.. or so it seems, anyway.
..
sometimes I can't help believe that all the problems in the world are just a big television show, because in places like Tokyo and Los Angeles and Prague, there are literally millions upon millions of people living together, just fine
One thing I've noted in the last 20 years at least, my life has definitely changed a lot thanks to the Internet. "HQ" is an e-mail address away, and even though its mostly only the 'technologically civlized' states that have access to the internet bubble, that is one large world.
errmm.. i mean, "city state".
you can really see/feel this in europe, or at least i do, anyway. to me, parts of western europe are like one big city-state, with sci-fi trainride interconnects in between large parks
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
The Interstate Highway System also helped bankrupt the railroad industry (which created more subsidies to keep that afloat), streetcar and mass transit companies (which were in turn broken up or taken over by the city, more subsidies), created urban sprawl and all its accutraments (strip malls, Wal-Marts). On the plus side it is now very easy to travel from Philadelphia to Boston in less than a day by car. On the negative it helped create massive urban sprawl, and (hence white flight and urban blight as so many left the city), it bancrupt the railroad industry and transit companies which put them in turn on government support and made intercity transportation significantly more difficult for those without cars (mainly city dwellers). Every time the government builds or subsidises something it tampers with the supply and demand curves and sometimes can through a whole economy off.
EMERGENCY! Global cities! This is not a drill! Sorry. Had to say it.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
Frankly the waves are getting weaker. Right - Left, who cares whose correct. However pour some sugar in a cup of coffee, you will have to stir it around to get it properly mixed. The bush vote was the last gasp for isolationist heartland America. Hollywood is a cultural acid to heartland values. Corparate money interests have no loyaties to Neocon values, if the left can raise the bid with the money from movies and technology like stem cell, the neocons will be shown the door like the crazy on the street corner with a "Doom is coming" sign who wanders into the NYSE.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
Evidently, I need a better dictionary. Sorry guys.
caritj.org
"World Cities" have been around for a long time, all the way back to the Roman Empire. Overcentralization was once a key part of the control system of kingdoms and empires.
Actually, finance is far less centralized than it used to be. There was a time within living memory when most major US companies were headquartered in New York. That's no longer the case. The international financial system, for most of the twentieth century, revolved around London and New York. Today, there are major financial centers all over the world. For a serious paper on the subject, see Rank Size Distribution of International Financial Centers.
Going against this trend is the centralization of power in the Washington DC area. For most of American history, there were few major businesses headquartered in the Washington area. That started to change some time during the Reagan administration, and now the Washington area is a major business hub, focusing on businesses which are defined by their relationship to federal regulation or spending.
Instead of looking at the dot-CON bubble as the exemplar of technical innovation, you should look at the Wright Brother's bike shop, the first computer (the ABC) built at an agricultural school in a small town in Iowa, the first supercomputer built by Seymour Cray on his farm with 25 assistants, only one of which had a PhD (a junior level programmer) and the desert workshop of Burt Rutan that built SpaceshipOne.
Seastead this.
As automation increases (and the productivity gains hoarded by the wealthy), and fewer and fewer people are required to do actually useful work, they are still SOCIALLY required to "work for a living", and so they adapt by creating new "bullshit economies" to keep busy and the consumption cycle going.
Imagine a world with advanced robotics (labor), nanotechnology (ultra-cheap manufacturing), and AI (services & even *gasp* creativity). No one would HAVE to work anymore, but socially there would still be an elitist hierarchy that would want to be at the top denying the fruits of an automated-production paradise to the breeding peons.
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Power to the Peaceful
I honestly dont know why people are still writing on topics that Alvin Toffler wrote about in 1969 with his wife. I mean, there was a movie made about his works...so its not as if it didn't gain attention...and as a movie, it would be able to hold attentions of americans better it seems. Its just future shock revisited.
Ah, the 'ripple-out' effect, which occurs over the boom-bust cycle. But the previous previous poster was correct in terms of the long-term trend.
Surely the cause of all this is the job subsidy, 'policy subsidy' and 'power subsidy' of large central governments located in these cities.
The short version: read the original poster's words. Note to patronizing twat (you): the "global economy" != "the british economy."
The longer short version: a deconstruction of each item of my breakfast showing how, while britain was a world-beating place at the turn of the century, it was nothing compared to today's england where a ferry, airliner, or eurostar arrives about every 23 seconds.
I also took you to task for claiming trying to equivocate "capital outflow as a percentage of GDP" with "globalization." I apologize for not being able to recreate this in my limited time.
Your idea that england was more globalized then is a cocktail party myth. Dressed up with a few carefully chosen facts you might be able to convince a literature reader somewhere, but that's about it.
Nobody doubts that Sydney is the leading Australian city. But to list Sydney before Shanghai, Hong Kong, or Singapore is comical.
Incidentally, both cities where I have a flat are on the list.
As the author of the mindjack article on Sassen's "Global Cities" concept, I must say I'm fascinated and delighted to see all the discussion.
Regardless of whether or not you agree with Sassen's basic premise, it does provide an interesting opportunity to muse on the effects of digital cultural production and reproduction.
My own theory of Panarchy is considerably different than Sassen's "Global Cities." Where we agree is that networks are on the rise, and old-fashioned power hierarchies are waning. All else is details.
I do think this transformation is something unique in human history.
Also the first President since 1916 (Woodrow Wilson) to win by such a small margin.
Note to insulting clown(you): Sorry, but I never equated the modern global economy to the British economy; a statistic was requested, I provided one. By any meaningful _relative_ measure, todays "global economy" is more protectionist, more regionised (EU vs. US vs. Asia) and less interconnected, then the global economy of 1914. What do you mean when you assert than England is more globalised now? It is probably more cosmopolitan, certainly more connected, but its economy is measurably less dependant on the fortunes of non-EU states. Hence, it is fair to claim that the pre-WWI world (were incidently, the British empire was the largest economic entity, and thus a fair proxy for the global economy THEN) was more globalised than todays world.
Dan
I'll admit the cities served a useful function at one time, but the key things they did are now replacable with technology just as technology is making them high risk locales.
Seastead this.
First off it seems that you want to trash everyone's regional values and desires in order to assume a super humanity state. Why do that? If the whole point of freedom is to be able to support diversity, then, why use that freedome to have a single culture smashing state.
In a sense, the current war on terrorism is a war of the "global culture" against insular local cultures. It's not talked about much, but I bet the prospect of McDonalds in Mecca rouses more anger in the mideast than does anything else.
Why build this state if we have a world of 6 billion drones all doing the same thing and having the same values? Why get rid of the nation state, or even the state or even the city for that matter.
The whole trend of technology is build to order anyway, and we can increasingly make whatever we want and with less people, so, there's not even particurlarly any economic reason to have the super state. Perhaps instead of the super state, we should be breaking up countries and trade pacts across the globe and having a world where we share intellectual property but not physical goods. That way, each culture can decide whether or not to participate.
Any action designed to bring about a single world culture is imperialism. You on the left can argue that your "imperialism" is for the good cause of saving the environment, but it's still imperialism. Given the choice between being a member state of some super world government, or having an all out nuclear war, I might actually prefer the latter to thin the human herd out rather than be subjugated to some pan-world government that has some french ass trying to tell me how to live.
This is my sig.
People paying hefty premiums for the real estate in High Class Area for many reasons - of course, the "High Class" does sound nice. But other than that, better schools, better security, better connections, et cetera do add up.
I don't know about you, but it seems to me that the FED and the IRS both have strong policies in place that encourage people to go into way more debt than they should and that is a big factor reguarding alot of high priced housing in the states.
Also, here in california, city government intentionally regulates, zones, and limits residnetial building to drive up property prices for the purpose of increasing the tax base, this is anything but the quality of local government.
If I mugged you for $1000 and invested it to return the proceeds of $1050 to all your loved ones and took the credit for it. Technically speaking you all as a group would be better off financially, but realisticly you would all be worse off - because you would have lost controll over your lives futures and destinies. This is the way it seems things are going in many US cities. We've built all this infrastructure, created a large economic base of stadiums, airports, roads, water supply, and convention centers - but eveything still gets worse.
Dry cleaners? OK, you got me there.
Seastead this.
You continue to lack the capacity to read the original premise. His claim was that the WORLD was more globalized. Your claim is that the BRITISH EMPIRE was more globalized.
Despite Britain's commitment to trade liberalism during the period, I strongly doubt this per the usual definition of "globalization", but nevertheless this is more or less an irrelevancy.
NOW PAY ATTENTION HERE:
For you see, when you make a claim about the GLOBAL economy, you have to talk about ALL COUNTRIES AND STATES; cherrypicking one particular outlier example to be a "fair proxy for the global economy" is dishonest and wrong. Full stop.
Thanks for the SHOUTING, but it is you who doesn't get it: What was true for the British Empire was also true for at least Western Europe, the United States, Australia, and certain parts of South America. Much the same as now, except with higher levels of direct investment, and without China's integration into the world economy.
Let me reiterate my claim simply, as it is clear you don't get it at all: Direct investment as a percentage of GDP is about the only statistic that is relevant when one talks about Globalization. It was higher pre-WWI than it is now, and this was also true for ALL developed nation states. Looking at capital flows globally (as a percentage of global GDP) it was higher then as well. Hence, more globalised then than now.
The British Empire before WWI was absolutely huge, and consisted of many countries which today receive far less foreign direct investment. There is nothing dishonest or wrong in taking it as a proxy.
You seem to make the arrogant assumption that things today are somehow radically different from in the past. Putting things in CAPS doens't make them right.
Dan
Did you put parisiennes on purpose ? bad experiences from previous relationships ? ;)
#include "coucou.h"
Problems with your idea:
- No common definition of globalization seems to take this arbitrary strict economic view. Google "definiton of globalization" and the definition is almost universally defined in terms of movement of goods, services, and (especially) increased interconnectedness. To claim that the world was more interconnected in 1914 than it is today is absolute bollocks and you know it.
- "Percentage of GDP" fundamental problem. In the time of Abraham and Isaac, there was no GDP because there was no measurable economic activity--all there was was UNCOUNTED economic activity like housework and subsistnece farming. If in the first transaction abraham sold his cow to isaac, and abraham is to be considered of one nation and isaac of another, then by your definiton this was the world highlight of globalization since the entire 100% of GDP was direct investment. Anyboy with a brain can see why you need to be shouted at: SCALE MATTERS. I don't doubt at all that there was significant FDI (I think you meant FDI, not DI) at the turn of the century and that the british empire was in some ways revolutionary in terms of its economic liberalization, but you have to consider NOT THE PERCENTAGE, but the SUM of connectedness, international trade, information, capital, and personnel flows, and the role of global corporatios as a whole. In such, your argument is completely and totally indefensible. The British East India Company may have been a megalith of its time - so much so, that it may have affected up to as many as.. I don't know.. pick a generous number.. 25% of the world inhabitants in a given year at the height of its power. Coca cola alone probably reaches that number in a typical week. In the smallest indonesian island, you will find women washing their hair today with small packets of a PandG product.
Good luck with that masters thesis. It's an interesting one and if you squint your eyes just right, you might be able to fool yourself into actually believeing it. It also is a good reminder to the world that the global economy is not new and that people who lived before us had smart and interesting lives. But then to somehow try to twist this into saying that world globalization was higher back then crosses several lines into pure fantasy.Hey, yeah, somethine else to ponder...
Closed borders make sense today - you're not gonna get many doctors out of a population raised to see itself as nothing more than delivery mechanisms for suicide bombs - but why have they always been closed?
(Or is it that even if you're a relatively progressive monarchy, it's also politically advantageous to have not just one, but two scapegoats nearby?)
Of course scale matters for comparison in absolute terms, but if one wishes to compare "globalisation" between eras then one MUST pick a relative measure. In fact, anything ELSE is completely indefensible - it is plain nonsense to suggest that we look at the sum of economic activities at two different times. If we were to do this and look at the US we would immediately come to the conclusion that the US domestic economy circa 2000 is more "globalised" than the global economy circa 1900 because it meets all of your criteria: whilst its absolute (inflation adjusted) GDP is much larger, it is internally much more interconnected and its output is also far more diversified THAN THAT OF THE ENTIRE WORLD ECONOMY of around 1900.
In actual fact, the US (UK, Australian, etc.)economy of 1900 was more open to FDI, less protectionist, and much less regulated than it is now. Thus, a century ago, economies had already achieved the goals of the champions of globalisation today: free, unregulated movement of capital, goods, and services. I'm not suggesting that the average worker had a PC at home, was connected to a global network, and lived in an information nirvana, as you seem to be implying I'm doing. I *am* suggesting that you have fallen for a common fallacy, that you are refusing to accept a globalisation metric that is used by the IMF, and that your anecdotal arguments, such as the origins of your breakfast and the comparison of coca-cola (10% of UK GDP at the time, so in economic terms your point was incorrect anyway) are completely irrelevant.
I think that most liberal economists would agree with the statements I've made. You, however, seem to be inflicted with a myopia of the accident of your year of birth, and are content to believe the common viewpoint that everything is more globalised now.
And where did you get the idea that I'm doing a Masters from (FYI, I'm not), and what's that got to do with the discussion?
Dan
So much bullshit, let me count the ways.
I define globalisation to be the integration of national economies; I believe this is not "arbitrary nonsense", but a commonly accepted definition. Integration of national economies can be measured by FDI (as a percentage of GDP in order to track this through time). If you disagree (as you seem to be doing by suggesting that I'm engaging in sophistry), then please provide a meaningful alternative measure.
I claim that sustained FDI as a percentage of GDP was much higher in the past for the dominant national economies.
I conclude that by this measure, national economies were more interconnected 100 years ago then they are now.
As a corrollary I make the (weaker) claim that the hype surrounding globalisation is what leads people to believe that the conclusion above must be false. By not addressing my premise directly (other than saying, "sorry, aint buying it"!) you have re-enforced my belief in the validity of this claim.
If you are going to reply, please point out the fallacy in my argument, or refute my premise, rather than blindly directing a charge of BS against me. Ad hominem attacks on my supposed educational immaturity and/or academic background credit no-one, and I assure you that your assertions are quite wrong.
Dan