Cities in a World Economy

Saskia Sassen is the Robert S. Lynd Professor of Sociology and co-chair of The Committee on Global Thought at Columbia University (www.saskiasassen.com). She is the author of Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global Assemblages (2008), A Sociology of Globalization (2007), and The Global City (1991), and editor of Deciphering the Global: Its Spaces, Scales and Subjects (2007). Her books have been translated into 22 languages. She is the editor of the volume on urban sustainability in the new 14-volume Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (2006), for which she coordinated a network of researchers and activists in 30 countries.

Preface to the Fifth Edition
Preface to the Fourth Edition
Preface to the Third Edition
Preface to the Second Edition
Preface to the First Edition
List of Exhibits
Chapter 1. Place and Production in the Global Economy
Note
Chapter 2. The Urban Impact of Economic Globalization
The Global Economy Today
Strategic Places
Conclusion: After the Pax Americana
Notes
Chapter 2 Appendix
Chapter 3. National and Transnational Urban Systems
Global Patterns of Urbanization
Urbanization in Africa Today
Urbanization in Asia Today
Impacts on Primate Systems: The Case of Latin America and the Caribbean
Impacts on Balanced Urban Systems: The Case of Europe
Transnational Urban Systems
Global Cities and Immigration
Global Cities and Diasporic Networks
A Politics of Places on Global Circuits
Conclusion: Urban Growth and Its Multiple Meanings
Notes
Chapter 3 Appendix
Chapter 4. The New Urban Economy: The Intersection of Global Processes and Place
From the Keynesian City to the Global City
The Multiple Circuits of the Global Economy
The Specialized Differences of Cities Matter: There Is No Perfect Global City
Urban/Rural Specificity Feeds the Knowledge Economy
The Global City as a Postindustrial Production Site
Producer Services
The Formation of a New Production Complex
Corporate Headquarters and Cities
An Emerging Global Labor Market
Conclusion: Cities as Postindustrial Production Sites
Notes
Chapter 4 Appendix
Chapter 5. Issues and Case Studies in the New Urban Economy
The Development of Global City Functions: The Case of Miami
The Growing Density and Specialization of Functions in Financial Districts: Toronto
The Concentration of Functions and Geographic Scale: Sydney
Competition or Specialized Differences: The Financial Centers of Hong Kong and Shanghai
Making New Global Circuits in Energy and Finance: The Gulf States
An Old Imperial City in Today’s New East–West Geopolitics: Istanbul
Globalization and Concentration: The Case of Leading Financial Centers
Why Do Financial Centers Still Exist in the Global Digital Era?
In the Digital Era: More Concentration Than Dispersal
Conclusion: The Space Economy of Centrality
Notes
Chapter 5 Appendix
Chapter 6. The New Inequalities Within Cities
Transformations in the Organization of the Labor Process
The Informal Economy
The Earnings Distribution in a Service-Dominated Economy
The Birth of Global Slums
The Restructuring of Urban Consumption
Conclusion: A Widening Gap
Notes
Chapter 7. Global Cities and Global Survival Circuits
Women in the Global Economy
Localizing the Global
The Other Workers in the Advanced Corporate Economy
Producing a Global Supply of the New Caretakers: The Feminization of Survival
Conclusion
Notes
Chapter 7 Appendix
Chapter 8. The Urbanizing of Global Governance Challenges
Cities as Frontier Spaces for Global Governance
Bridging the Ecologies of Cities and of the Biosphere
When Finance Hits Urban Space
When Pursuing National Security Is the Making of Urban Insecurity
Notes
Chapter 9. A New Geography of Centers and Margins
Summary and Implications
The Locus of the Peripheral
Contested Space
References and Suggested Reading
Index
About the Author