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« World cities: living and working together »

Michel Destot, Député-maire de Grenoble, président de l'AMGVF

Every day, 18,000 people all over the world move to the city… Globalisation has transformed the way we interact, accelerated migratory movements, facilitated mobility and promoted the immediate circulation of information and ideas. Major cities and metropolises across the world are becoming more and more interdependent, and are driving economic, financial and human flows, which are breaking free from space and time constraints. The metropolisation process, which forms the backdrop to these changes, spells progress for humanity insofar as it opens up a whole range of opportunities.

Major cities and their agglomerations are focal points of innovation and research; they play host to the head offices of banks and multinational companies, as well as to executives, the professions and all « top city jobs ». The effects of globalisation can be seen, above all, in the development of business districts and competitiveness clusters in urban areas, which have become epicentres of wealth accumulation on a worldwide scale.

However, although cities are places of unbridled possibility, they are also a hotbed of contradictions. All over the world, new social classes are emerging, poor or immigrant populations are concentrating in urban neighbourhoods and more and more « shantytowns » are appearing. In France, the geography of poverty has totally changed. Whereas, thirty years ago, poverty mainly occurred in the elderly and rural populations, it is now affecting young, urban people, often from immigrant or single-parent homes.

Over the last twenty years, new « urban cultures » such as rap, skateboarding, rollerblading and slam poetry have emerged as a result of race mixture and urban expansion. More than fifty different nationalities rub shoulders in some « world » or « global » cities; the Greater London population includes up to 300 nationalities. Nevertheless, despite the remarkable development of transport networks, some city-dwellers have never left their city or their neighbourhood and do not have access to all the opportunities available in a world city.

Major cities and metropolises have become seed beds of social change. The challenge facing big city mayors today is to control and « humanise » globalisation, the impact of which is essentially urban. It is vital that we create the conditions for sustainable economic growth that respects natural resources such as air and water; we must also think about what the post-carbon city should be like, find a path to true coexistence and provide appropriate living conditions to all, in order to build the bedrock of the future cosmopolitan society.