Urbanization process has been relatively rapid in some less developed regions since 1950, such as sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern and Western Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean. Among all, Eastern Asia region had experienced the most striking urbanization increase, especially during the last 20 years (“The Speed of Urbanization”, 2018). In the next three decades, it is estimated that Asia will contribute over 60 percent of the increase in the world’s urban population, with an expected total urban population over 2.6 billion by 2030, particularly in population giants like China and India (“Urbanization Takes on New Dimensions”, 2001). With such rapid population growth, these regions or countries will face many challenges, which includes increasing economic opportunities for urban dwellers, improving transportation infrastructure and housing, providing social services and benefits, maintaining a comfortable living condition, and developing effective systems of governance and management (“Urbanization Takes on New Dimensions”, 2001). Although, to some extent, the challenges of urbanization that countries need to face are the same for everywhere. However, there are several distinctive features in Asia due to its massive populations and make issues become more troublesome.
First of all, is the time issue-it happens so fast (“Urbanization Takes on New Dimensions”, 2001). Statistically, the share of the urban population in Eastern Asia more than tripled in the past 65 years, rising from 18 to 60 per cent between 1950 and 2015; while a similar change in the more developed regions required about 80 years, between 1875 and 1955 (“The Speed of Urbanization”, 2018). That is to say, for some cities in the developed countries in the West, such as London, Toronto and New York, urbanization is a gradual progress that took longer period so that cities had enough time to adjust. In contrast, in developing Asian cities, intense urbanization is taking place within a few short decades. This extremely rapid urbanization growth has required the governments to cope with a large volume of urban increase in a very limited time (“Urbanization Takes on New Dimensions”, 2001), which is difficult since administrations, management, institution and finance cannot be developed well as needed to confront such huge socio-economic demands. Secondly, is the predominance of megacities. According to the UN’s World Urbanization Prospects, 16 out of 24 the world’s megacities will be located in Asia. It is worth talking about that the urban development trend here: most urban dwellers will remain live in smaller cities and towns, and urban hierarchy will be determined while these larger cities emerge. The urban structure will be shown as a city core at the center and surrounded by secondary cities; which this pattern also have shown in North American cities (“Urbanization Takes on New Dimensions”, 2001). Therefore, an urban sprawl formed and it will continuously grow if governments cannot do anything about it. Thirdly, is the problem of uneven globalization across cities and regions. Some cities like Seoul and Shanghai have successfully integrated into the global economy and becoming leading international cites, while the other cities that are heavily dependent on domestic economies experience a much slower development. For these cities, they face greater challenge in terms of poverty and opportunity creation (“Urbanization Takes on New Dimensions”, 2001).
Case of China
Now we take a close look at the case of urbanization in China, which is interesting to discuss about since China’s urbanization progress has been viewed as unique: it is neither identical with the developed economies nor following the same path of developing countries (Chen, Liu, & Tao, 2013). In the past 30 years, China’s economy has grown explosively, which is a key pushing forward the urbanization process. In 1950, only 13% of people in China lived in cities. However, after 60 years, this number had grown to 45%. Up to today, 25 of the world’s largest 100 cities are in China. Urbanization, in turn, reshaps both the physical environment and the cultural fabric of China (Seto, 2016). For example, the issue of pollution and huge city demands on the environment, as well as opportunities and innovations and improving efficiency of energy usage caused by high density living conditions.
Like mentioned earlier, some challenges are globally identical, such as the problem of pollution. However, it has greater impacts for developing countries like China as their economic development often highly relies on industrial output. China obviously had tradeoffs between economic boom and environment. Years ago, images of Chinese cities in haze or under heavy smog captured whole world’s’ attentions. According to a report done by the China’s Ministry of Environmental Protection in 2014, it reflected that only 8 of 74 monitored cities met air quality standards (Hernandez & Andres, 2015). Such serious air pollution is associated with intense usage of coal energy, which are used to generate electricity, power industrialization, and heat homes. It’s clear that coal energy did creat socio-economic benefits for millions of people but also has led to environmental degradation and air-polluted city environments.
The environment in which we live in has, as a matter of fact, slowly depleted. The population of the human race has only increased over the centuries, and is the main cause of this occurrence. Margaret Thatcher, delivered a speech on November 9, 1989 in which she persuaded the United Nations to protect the earth at all costs from human activities, or else vital ecosystems and the overall health of the planet would have an inescapable outcome. An important point she argued was that the emission of carbon dioxide being exposed into the atmosphere was having negative effects on the environment. Today, the usage of electricity, fuels, and transportation increases this exposure into the air. In fact, air pollution is sometimes indirectly situated when consumers buy products that require transportation and energy. As a result, most of this air pollution is caused by the burning of these fossil fuels required for oil, gas, coal and other materials in order to produce electricity and power for cars. Surprisingly, just one average family causes 65 tons of carbon dioxide to be transferred into the air. Consequently, cold regions are experiencing warm weather, melting ice caps and causing disruptions in the surrounding seas. But as the article, The urban transformation of the developing world stated, the world’s populations’ growth should be 1.74 from 2000 to 2024 with 86% of these numbers to occur in cities and towns. From 1950-1974, these numbers were still fairly low. Urbanization has to be accounted for into the degradation of the environment because it is precisely these urban cities that create a greater demand for natural resources. With that being said, this poses the question: What impacts does urbanization have on a secluded species in the deep waters of Alaska, specifically, Gorgonian corals, and is this species even affected at all by the forces of humanity?
The Cycle of Urbanization: Global Perspective
To begin, there needs to be a concrete understanding as to why urbanization occurs in order to clarify how carbon dioxide ends up floating in the air. As mentioned before, with more towns and cities, there are bigger demands for supplies including: energy, oil, coal, and gas that require assistance from earth’s essentials. Immigration is a huge factor contributing to urbanization that increases the overall fertility of many cities all around the world. Accordingly, urbanized cities provide a vast majority of opportunities including education, healthcare, and entertainment services that influence people to migrate. Although the lower class might have a lower chance to obtain education, their options are still vastly more available than those in the rural community. Moreover, urban populations have many more cars than rural populations per capita. In 2050, there would be 5.3 billion cars in the world, all requiring vast amounts of energy. Undoubtedly, the necessity for all of these raw materials to carry on with people’s daily lives, converts into environmental defects, specifically in the ocean. To that end, these changes go as far as to reaching the deep waters of Alaska.
Ocean Acidification: Biological Perspective
As fossil fuels burn and other human activities continue, there is a major pH change in the ocean which is termed Ocean Acidification. As carbon dioxide is absorbed by the ocean, there are stronger responses in accordance with other substances that produce hydrogen ions due to an initial reaction with water, that then forms carbonic acid, and has the effect of making the ocean more acidic. The oceans have consumed about 500 billion tons of carbon dioxide since the Industrial age. Hence, ocean acidification takes away important key features that aid the marine animals living in the deep waters of Alaska. The consequences on marine life are the extinction of certain species due to the results in slower growth rates and weaker defense in their adaptive shelters. Moreover, as acidity gets high enough, ocean water becomes corrosive and harms the sea animals in dissolving their own bodies. The rise of acidity in the ocean decreases carbonate, which is a substance used by tens of thousands of marine species to form shells and skeletons. A particular species that is in danger of this process are the gorgonian corals of Alaska. Corals in Alaska are very special due to how unfairly unnoticed they are, and due to their deep inhabitants away from the sunlight. Surprisingly, there are more species of some corals deep in the waters then there are in the surface. Gorgonian corals live in a cold, dark environment with low inputs of nutrients and lower vision between their predators. These organisms grow very slowly, and have fairly low metabolic rates compared to organisms living on the surface. In addition, the environmental stability of the deep sea over long time periods are hypothesized to have reduced the tolerance of deep-sea gorgonians to environmental extremes or in other words the changes through the loss of more tolerant genotypes from their ancestors, thereby decreasing the potential for adaptation to future ocean acidification. Likewise, gorgonian corals have an even higher vulnerability because they are endemic, which means that these species are native to a restricted place. Furthermore, this particular species has a skeleton that consists of protein and calcium carbonate that allow it to grow and spread. But with increasing ocean acidification reaching these shallow waters, conditions become worse and fatal for this species. Consequently, this results in negative impacts on gorgonian growth, metabolism and survival, and sooner or later, these corals may become extinct. Though some may think that the surface waters are the most affected by the emission of carbon dioxide resulting from increasing urbanization, deep waters are equally affected with the bigger disadvantages they contain and their complex environment.
People may argue that ocean acidification affects surface waters the most. It is true that surface waters are more exposed to anthropogenic carbon dioxide than deep waters. However, a study made in Japan found that there has been decreased oxygen concentrations in very deep waters. As organic matter decomposition in these waters leads to more CO2 accumulating, the pH decreases. Surprisingly, this study revealed that the deep waters of Japan are 27% more acidic than the surface waters. Though this may not be occuring in the deep waters of Alaska, it can be confirmed from this study that the deep waters can be indeed affected by ocean acidification and not just the surface waters, as people may think. Also, another counter argument would be that not all species in the deep waters of Alaska are affected so this may not even seem like a problem at all. Some deep sea animals are able to sustain the pH levels changing as researchers found in the Gulf of Alaska, for example, fish living in the deep sea were able to survive a whole month in an acidic environment. However, other species such as sea crabs living in the deep were unable to sustain the acidic environment in which they were living in. And most importantly, the central species of this research, deep sea corals, are extra vulnerable to this exposure and these corals hold many living marine animals which are more essential to the overall ocean cycle.
Conclusion
Humans are exerting a massive influence in the oceans with unforeseeable and potentially catastrophic consequences if anthropogenic carbon pollution continues to occur in oceans. Though urbanization may look like a positive change in population growth, it is important to take into consideration the effects a big city or town may have on the environment if no action is taken to prevent the loss of species.Though gorgonian corals are just one of the many species that live in the deep waters of Alaska, just one out of thousands should be a red flag for hundreds more that can be affected with a potential extinction of these corals. Knowing that these species are already intaking toxic chemicals and having negative changes to their environment; as Margaret Thatcher persuaded the nations, it is time for the people to take action before it is too late.
The environment is constantly changing and evolving. Our response to these drastic changes are what makes the future of the earth and living. Whatever decisions we make, will be crucial as a lot is at stake. So I would like to take the side of the approach where we would make small and incremental changes based on only what we know for certain will come, in other words playing it safe. Many may argue that playing safe is not ideal, however in my opinion, there’s a lot at stake, and we’ve already made many alterations to the environment, specially causing negative impacts to accelerate. So we need to be very careful and weigh our options before taking any new step.
An example that comes to my mind is that, how urban sprawl has been affect the environment and how urban sprawls effects to the environment are being completely overlooked. Urbanization has been taking place all of the world at a rate that we are no longer being able to control. Even if we say that urban areas are only taking a little bit of the space on earth, the impacts it has been having is immense. Urbanization is mainly caused by the migration and industrialisation. Both are correlated. Cities are trying to grow their economies, which has led to the industrial revolution late in the 1800’s. Urban sprawl leads to several environmental degradations such as rise in air pollution, water pollution, decline of biodiversity or loss of habitat, over use of land, and lastly the quality of life (Wilson & Chakraborty, 2013).
We need to be able to understand the impacts of urban sprawl and also the main reasons why urban sprawl is happening. Urban sprawl is most likely to happen, and is inevitable. We cannot stop it however we can try our best to shift it or spread it out. We need to come up with concepts that are feasible both economically and environmentally. One such idea is of smart cities and how it will be beneficial for urbanization. Smart cities are also referred as resilient cities or eco cities (Jong et al, 2015). Creating a sustainable city from the beginning before migration starts in an area, or even once urbanisation has occurred, educating the people to live in the smart cities.
Although the main idea of smart cities is to put its people first, it is a big investment in the people as these people will create a sustainable environment for the future generations. Our lives revolve around cities, our work, our homes and our schools, all are in cities. The idea of moving to cities is seen as stepping up in life and doing better. So in order for us to protect our cities we need to have a solid guideline for the people to follow and create livable conditions and as well as protect the environment from degradation. Access to clean water, proper sanitation, all fall under protection of the environment.
To solve global environmental change, it is not a day’s work. We have already done enough damage and now we need to think wisely and take decisions that are in favour of the environment and the people.
Wilson, B., & Chakraborty, A. The Environmental Impacts of Urban Sprawl: Integrating New Evidence and Emergent Issues.
Bhat, P. A., ul Shafiq, M., Mir, A. A., & Ahmed, P. (2017). Urban sprawl and its impact on landuse/land cover dynamics of Dehradun City, India. International Journal of Sustainable Built Environment, 6(2), 513-521.
Wilson, B., & Chakraborty, A. (2013). The environmental impacts of sprawl: emergent themes from the past decade of planning research. Sustainability, 5(8), 3302-3327.
Alberti, M. (2005). The effects of urban patterns on ecosystem function. International regional science review, 28(2), 168-192.
Kummitha, R. K. R., & Crutzen, N. (2017). How do we understand smart cities? An evolutionary perspective. Cities, 67, 43-52.
De Jong, M., Joss, S., Schraven, D., Zhan, C., & Weijnen, M. (2015). Sustainable–smart–resilient–low carbon–eco–knowledge cities; making sense of a multitude of concepts promoting sustainable urbanization. Journal of Cleaner production, 109, 25-38.
Urbanization refers to the population shift from the countryside to towns and cities. It is the process by which towns and cities are formed and how existing ones become larger as more people begin living and working in central areas in hope that they will enjoy a better standard of living. The United Nations predicts that about 86% of the developed world and 64% of the developing world will be urbanized by 2050. This equates to approximately 3 billion urbanites, much of which will occur in Asia and Africa.
Urbanization is considered to be the most important factor to make environmental change. Urbanization driven by economic growth tends to have deep environmental consequences. Many studies show that the urbanization that is being taking place around the world has been unplanned, uncontrolled and environmentally unfriendly. And this is a problem. This transforms the existing concerns at local level (such as drainage problems), towards a regional level (such as river pollution) which ultimately causes problems globally via marine pollution.
One of the major challenges that we humans face in today’s expanding city life is environmental degradation. Urban population have no option but to interact with their environment. While doing so they change their environment through their consumption and usage of resources such as food, water, energy, and land. And in turn, this polluted environment affects the quality and overall health of the people. The ever increasing population and demands of urban lifestyle has led to poor air and water quality, lack of sufficient water, waste-disposal problems; and high energy consumption.
Energy consumption for cooking, heating, electricity, vehicles and industries is increasing day by day despite the huge advancement in technology. And this increased consumption of energy is more than likely to have disastrous environmental effects. The high emission of Sulphur dioxide and smoke caused from industries and factories is highly dangerous. The burning of fossil fuels such as coal and petrol to generate electricity is on the rise which not only increases the air pollutants but also the greenhouse gas emission. This leads to the formation of smog. Cloudiness and fog occur more frequently and precipitation of acid rain increases. This increases the chance of water pollution and floods. The greenhouse gas is ultimately responsible for global warming and climate change. Another dangerous aspect of urbanization is deforestation. While deforestation increases air, water and soil pollution; it also affects the wildlife which in turn disturbs the whole ecology and ecosystem.
So, Is urbanization environmentally beneficial or destructive? This is the million-dollar question. While we can have long debates and endless discussions on it, there however doesn’t seem to be an alternative in this day and age. The relationship between urbanization and environment is not always directly proportional though. Big urban cities do not always create greater environmental problems as long as they are properly planned and managed; and small urban towns can also cause big problems if there is lack of proper management. This means the behavior, consumption of resources and living patterns of humans define what kind of an environmental impact will take place and not just the size of urbanization. Hence strong and proper scientific city planning will be essential in managing these difficulties as the world’s urban areas continue to rise.
As stated by sociologist Gideon Sjoberg in 1965, the development of a city is dependent on the following three requirements: “good environment with fresh water and a favourable climate, advanced technology; which will produce a food surplus to support nonfarmers, and a strong social organization to ensure social stability and a stable economy” (Urbanization, n.d.). As cities develop according to the factors indicated above, the movement of persons from the lesser developed areas into the greater developed city centres is inevitable. The movement of these persons from rural areas to the more urban and city areas is referred to as urbanization and the following review of literature will discuss one of the major issues arising out of urbanization, as it inevitably has a grave impact on crime.
Ideally this movement of persons occur for the purpose of job acquisition or simply in order to experience, attain and eventually live a much better life. Urbanization illustrates the effects of the grouping and forging of linkages within the social, political and economic relationships of various cities. With this being said, the occurrences and effects of urbanization would definitely vary from one city to another, with each city yielding its own specific resulting behaviour in response to the effects of urbanization. As stated by Jalil & Iqbal (2010), urbanisation from an economic standpoint is good as it “facilitates achievement of economies of scale and thus promotes growth of industries and development in the economy”. Conversely however, social ills such as crime and violence are also encouraged and tend be greater in the larger, more populated and urbanized cities, thus lending to a negative social stand point experienced in these areas.
In the article Explaining Urban Crime (n.d.), the Conflict, Subcultural and Social Disorganization theories are used to assist in the understanding of why urban areas are more crime prone than its rural counterparts. These theories explore the issues of income inequality, the impact of violence and poverty subcultural norms and values, and also the relationship between the characteristics of cities and neighbourhoods and how it influences crime. According to Ladbrook (1988) in his study of crime and urbanization in Japan, “there are three sociological explanations for why rates of conventional crime are higher in urban areas than in rural areas.” Firstly, the degree to which urbanization and population density are related, secondly, the increase in the migration/ immigration and population growth within the urban areas and finally, the greater proportions of younger persons that are present in urbans areas therefore affecting the demographical ratio between rural versus urban areas.
Increases in urbanization and population density would have occurred during periods such as the Industrial Revolution. The greater development of industries, job opportunities, new technology and infrastructure encouraged persons to move from rural to urbans areas, resulting in spikes in populations, such as in London, from 550, 000 persons to 7 million persons by the end of the 1900s (Urbanization, n.d.). In other European countries such as such as France, urbanization has resulted in the development of various project-like communities such as the Banlieues, where unemployment, poverty, immigration, violence and crime rates are much higher than those in the more rural areas of the country. In her October 22, 2015 article, Chrisafis highlights the woes that are still currently being undergone by residents of the Banlieues, even long after riots and instances of civil unrest would have occurred to highlight the constant inequalities faced by the residents, trapping them into continuously living a life of fear and constant criminal occurrences.
Similarly, on the Western side of the globe, studies of urbanization and by extension segregation has also suggested that crime rates are directly impacted as a result of the increase in urbanization and segregation. In their study, Shihadeh & Maume (1997) state that “segregation is a structured form of inequality that generates high crime rates in ways similar to that of other forms of inequality.” Further to this, the study conducted by the authors sharpens the relationship between criminal activity in the black community with respect to the centralization of the urbanized inner-city communities with mainly minority African-Americans as residents. The study goes on to illustrate, that there is indeed a positive relationship between geographically centralized city areas and the rate of black homicides as the unique and specific structural set up of these areas lend towards the continued execution of crimes.
In the 2002 study compiled by Brennan-Galvin, she noted that urbanized areas were occupied by approximately 54 percent of the world’s population, with North America ranking as having the most persons inhabiting urbanized locations. Further to this, in 2008, studies completed by the United Nations Population Division, have illustrated that among the more developed world countries including North America, Australia and New Zealand, urbanization levels have surpassed 80 percent, with some developed countries such as Europe having lesser urbanized areas with a rating of 72 percent. Another important bit of results attained by this study, highlighted that among the world’s more developing countries, Latin America and the Caribbean has an even higher urbanization rate than that of Europe, with a rating of 78 percent. This high rate of urbanization for Lantin America and the Caribbean, is significant for many counties located here, especially for Trinidad and Tobago. One of the more highly urbanized areas of Trinidad and Tobago is located in East Port of Spain, where “the most common expression of the urban violence phenomenon has manifested in the hot-spots” (Seepersad & Williams, 2012). Over the past two decades, violence and criminality in hot-spots has grown exponentially, with the homicide rate well surpassing that of the global average (34.362 per one hundred thousand inhabitants versus 10.763), and a regular day walking along the streets of East Port of Spain can result in an individual unfortunately being held at knife/ gun point and robbed of their belongings (Seepersad & Williams, 2012).
What does this mean for the world? What does this mean for the rates of crime in these countries? Firstly, the 2008 United Nations Population Division study goes on to predict that the population in the world’s more urbanized areas will reach as high as 70 percent overall by 2050. As a result of these significantly higher rates expected in the future, the social and economic stability of these urbanized centres may be threatened by the constant and continuous influx of not only job seekers, but due to the harsh political and war-prone landscape experienced in various countries around the world presently, there will also be the continued and possible increased movement of immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers. Jalil & Iqbal (2010) states that as a result of the overall lower population density in the more rural areas, the commission of crimes and the respective criminals associated with them would have a lesser chance of hiding themselves because persons are more familiar and have more close-knit relationships in these areas. Conversely, the opposite fact will hold for more urbanized areas, as there are fewer chances of recognition and arrest due to increased lack of familiarity. As such, the argument regarding the increase of crime coupled with the increased urbanization of locations would hold.
As is customary with the study of all socioeconomic phenomena, solution-based conclusions are generated to assist current and future researchers, policy makers, law enforcers and members of the society as a whole in understanding the cause and effects of the various factors investigated. In this case, as suggested by Ladbrook (1988), one method to control intense levels of urbanization, is for policy-makers to begin increased establishment of industrial centres in the more rural areas. This will allow for greater population movement control which in turn would allow for the control and possible reduction of crime in the urban city centres. Another method of crime control via the control of urbanization, as suggested by Gendrot (2001) is to have the collective efforts of the local authorities, police department, educators, human services, non-profit organizations and the local housing and sport authorities work together to prevent crime by the implementation of required social and economic assistive frameworks (as cited in Gumus, 2004). In addition to the implementation of the methods suggested, further studies should be conducted in significantly urbanized areas that have continuously reflected low crimes rates. Countries such as Hong Kong, Switzerland and New Zealand are revered as the safer and more crime free locations of the world, yet they are just as urbanized, modernized and technologically savvy as the rest.
As stated by sociologist Gideon Sjoberg in 1965, the development of a city is dependent on the following three requirements: “good environment with fresh water and a favourable climate, advanced technology; which will produce a food surplus to support nonfarmers, and a strong social organization to ensure social stability and a stable economy” (Urbanization, n.d.). As cities develop according to the factors indicated above, the movement of persons from the lesser developed areas into the greater developed city centres is inevitable. The movement of these persons from rural areas to the more urban and city areas is referred to as urbanization and the following review of literature will discuss one of the major issues arising out of urbanization, as it inevitably has a grave impact on crime.
Ideally this movement of persons occur for the purpose of job acquisition or simply in order to experience, attain and eventually live a much better life. Urbanization illustrates the effects of the grouping and forging of linkages within the social, political and economic relationships of various cities. With this being said, the occurrences and effects of urbanization would definitely vary from one city to another, with each city yielding its own specific resulting behaviour in response to the effects of urbanization. As stated by Jalil & Iqbal (2010), urbanisation from an economic standpoint is good as it “facilitates achievement of economies of scale and thus promotes growth of industries and development in the economy”. Conversely however, social ills such as crime and violence are also encouraged and tend be greater in the larger, more populated and urbanized cities, thus lending to a negative social stand point experienced in these areas.
In the article Explaining Urban Crime (n.d.), the Conflict, Subcultural and Social Disorganization theories are used to assist in the understanding of why urban areas are more crime prone than its rural counterparts. These theories explore the issues of income inequality, the impact of violence and poverty subcultural norms and values, and also the relationship between the characteristics of cities and neighbourhoods and how it influences crime. According to Ladbrook (1988) in his study of crime and urbanization in Japan, “there are three sociological explanations for why rates of conventional crime are higher in urban areas than in rural areas.” Firstly, the degree to which urbanization and population density are related, secondly, the increase in the migration/ immigration and population growth within the urban areas and finally, the greater proportions of younger persons that are present in urbans areas therefore affecting the demographical ratio between rural versus urban areas.
Increases in urbanization and population density would have occurred during periods such as the Industrial Revolution. The greater development of industries, job opportunities, new technology and infrastructure encouraged persons to move from rural to urbans areas, resulting in spikes in populations, such as in London, from 550, 000 persons to 7 million persons by the end of the 1900s (Urbanization, n.d.). In other European countries such as such as France, urbanization has resulted in the development of various project-like communities such as the Banlieues, where unemployment, poverty, immigration, violence and crime rates are much higher than those in the more rural areas of the country. In her October 22, 2015 article, Chrisafis highlights the woes that are still currently being undergone by residents of the Banlieues, even long after riots and instances of civil unrest would have occurred to highlight the constant inequalities faced by the residents, trapping them into continuously living a life of fear and constant criminal occurrences.
Similarly, on the Western side of the globe, studies of urbanization and by extension segregation has also suggested that crime rates are directly impacted as a result of the increase in urbanization and segregation. In their study, Shihadeh & Maume (1997) state that “segregation is a structured form of inequality that generates high crime rates in ways similar to that of other forms of inequality.” Further to this, the study conducted by the authors sharpens the relationship between criminal activity in the black community with respect to the centralization of the urbanized inner-city communities with mainly minority African-Americans as residents. The study goes on to illustrate, that there is indeed a positive relationship between geographically centralized city areas and the rate of black homicides as the unique and specific structural set up of these areas lend towards the continued execution of crimes.
In the 2002 study compiled by Brennan-Galvin, she noted that urbanized areas were occupied by approximately 54 percent of the world’s population, with North America ranking as having the most persons inhabiting urbanized locations. Further to this, in 2008, studies completed by the United Nations Population Division, have illustrated that among the more developed world countries including North America, Australia and New Zealand, urbanization levels have surpassed 80 percent, with some developed countries such as Europe having lesser urbanized areas with a rating of 72 percent. Another important bit of results attained by this study, highlighted that among the world’s more developing countries, Latin America and the Caribbean has an even higher urbanization rate than that of Europe, with a rating of 78 percent. This high rate of urbanization for Lantin America and the Caribbean, is significant for many counties located here, especially for Trinidad and Tobago. One of the more highly urbanized areas of Trinidad and Tobago is located in East Port of Spain, where “the most common expression of the urban violence phenomenon has manifested in the hot-spots” (Seepersad & Williams, 2012). Over the past two decades, violence and criminality in hot-spots has grown exponentially, with the homicide rate well surpassing that of the global average (34.362 per one hundred thousand inhabitants versus 10.763), and a regular day walking along the streets of East Port of Spain can result in an individual unfortunately being held at knife/ gun point and robbed of their belongings (Seepersad & Williams, 2012).
What does this mean for the world? What does this mean for the rates of crime in these countries? Firstly, the 2008 United Nations Population Division study goes on to predict that the population in the world’s more urbanized areas will reach as high as 70 percent overall by 2050. As a result of these significantly higher rates expected in the future, the social and economic stability of these urbanized centres may be threatened by the constant and continuous influx of not only job seekers, but due to the harsh political and war-prone landscape experienced in various countries around the world presently, there will also be the continued and possible increased movement of immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers. Jalil & Iqbal (2010) states that as a result of the overall lower population density in the more rural areas, the commission of crimes and the respective criminals associated with them would have a lesser chance of hiding themselves because persons are more familiar and have more close-knit relationships in these areas. Conversely, the opposite fact will hold for more urbanized areas, as there are fewer chances of recognition and arrest due to increased lack of familiarity. As such, the argument regarding the increase of crime coupled with the increased urbanization of locations would hold.
As is customary with the study of all socioeconomic phenomena, solution-based conclusions are generated to assist current and future researchers, policy makers, law enforcers and members of the society as a whole in understanding the cause and effects of the various factors investigated. In this case, as suggested by Ladbrook (1988), one method to control intense levels of urbanization, is for policy-makers to begin increased establishment of industrial centres in the more rural areas. This will allow for greater population movement control which in turn would allow for the control and possible reduction of crime in the urban city centres. Another method of crime control via the control of urbanization, as suggested by Gendrot (2001) is to have the collective efforts of the local authorities, police department, educators, human services, non-profit organizations and the local housing and sport authorities work together to prevent crime by the implementation of required social and economic assistive frameworks (as cited in Gumus, 2004). In addition to the implementation of the methods suggested, further studies should be conducted in significantly urbanized areas that have continuously reflected low crimes rates. Countries such as Hong Kong, Switzerland and New Zealand are revered as the safer and more crime free locations of the world, yet they are just as urbanized, modernized and technologically savvy as the rest.
Many people in the world live in slums where conditions such as inadequate living space, dirty drinking water, and poor sanitation prevail. It is anticipated that if rural people continue moving into towns, the global slum populace will double. Research shows that many rural dwellers in developing nations move to towns and as cities struggle to accommodate the high growth, the rural residents often end up living in slums that are already teemed.
Main body
Urban areas act as potential instruments for the financial and social development of a state but if these areas become crowded, then they become centers of poverty and deprivation. This rapid and hectic urbanization leads to competition for the available necessities and this poses a great challenge to humanity in terms of safety and security. It is, therefore, clear that when towns become crowded, the downsides associated with urban life exceed the benefits.
The reason why rural residents keep moving to urban areas has not yet been established. Research shows that rural residents find more job opportunities and hope to get higher salaries in towns. However, other experts argue that only skilled newcomers are capable of getting well-paying jobs and illiterate rural residents often end up in informal business activities such as collecting compost for reprocessing. Such business activities have low profits and very few workers are able to expand their businesses. This explains why many overcrowded towns are undergoing urban growth in the absence of job growth.
The question of whether governments should control the number of rural residents moving to towns has been debatable for a number of years. Many governments, in an attempt to reduce problems associated with urban life, have restricted people’s migration to towns by controlling the speed of urban growth. Some nations use household registration principles while others directly assist rural dwellers with finance for economic development. Experts say that limiting migration to towns reduces strain on urban areas and protects rural areas from languishing as the most innovative dwellers leave.
City governments all over the world are concerned with making their towns greener and more appealing. Although greening urban areas is quite costly, it offers big payoffs. For instance, energy-effective buildings are cheaper to operate and give towns cachet as bases for improved technology and design. Greening also enables urban areas to attain wider social objectives by making town dwellers be friendly.
There has been a constant debate over the best approach to alleviate poverty in slums. The practice of clearing slums has been contentious in both developed and developing nations. The approach of urban upgrading should be adopted in towns since this helps advance services offered to slum residents. This approach is cheaper and focuses on advancing infrastructural services such as water supply, hygiene, and electricity.
Conclusion
It should be recognized that improving people’s way of life in urban areas is crucial. Policymakers should put up with the fact that urbanization is inexorable and should thus put every effort into making it more constructive. Research shows that rural residents are vulnerable since they cannot provide for themselves and their families while in the rural areas. As a result, nations need to reorganize their development principles since the globe is urbanizing. These principles should focus on specific issues in order to ensure that rural people have better lives in the city.
Affirmative action, according to Messerli (2010), can be conceptualized as the preferential treatment of minorities in various aspects in the society. Sometimes, affirmative action can be government policy. For example, the government may decide that a certain percentage of racial minorities or women should make up a minimum percentage of college or employment admissions. The following are some of the arguments supporting and opposing affirmative action in employment and college admission:
Arguments for
Messerli (2010) argues that diversity is a desirable trait in every aspect of human society. However, given the nature of society, this can not take place if things are left to chance. As such, to ensure diversity in college admissions and employment, affirmative action should be encouraged. Affirmative action is also important in breaking stereotypes in society. For example, there might be a stereotype of the effect that women can not perform in certain fields.
Affirmative action in employment may prove this stereotype wrong. Minorities in the United States of America and other societies have been oppressed for a very long time. It is only fair for the community to do something to compensate for this oppression. Affirmative action comes in as a form of compensation, an effort to right the wrongs committed against blacks, women, and other minorities for a very long time in the society.
Arguments Against
There are those who are of the view that this action, as much as it is aimed at correcting discrimination in the society, instead of results in reversed discrimination (Messerli, 2010). For example, instead of the blacks now been discriminated against, majorities such as whites are discriminated against on the basis of their majority status. Affirmative action also waters down minority achievement (Messerli, 2010). For example, in an affirmative society, a woman who succeeds in a certain career might have their success attributed to affirmative action, regardless of the fact that they might have worked hard for it.
Busing: Benefits and Criticism
Busing can be viewed as another form of affirmative action in the school system (Lindsey & Beach, 2008). This practice can be conceptualized as assignment and transportation of students to schools across districts in efforts to reverse the effects of racial segregation in schools in the United States of America (Lindsey & Beach, 2008).
It is my belief that busing was a bad idea from the beginning. This is despite the fact that there are some benefits derived from it. For example, busing makes efforts to effectively integrate students in schools and ensure that there is adequate representation in these schools. In the past, there was de jure segregation in some parts of the country, which was perpetrated by de facto segregation in other parts (Lindsey & Beach, 2008). Busing came in to correct this imbalance.
However, these benefits fail to outweigh the criticisms leveled against busing. This is given that the costs of this practice are more than the benefits. For example, many people strongly feel that this practice has eliminated community pride and support towards their neighborhood schools. This is given the fact that they feel outsiders have invaded their area. Many parents and teachers have reported disciplinary problems on their charges, and they attribute this to busing. This is especially so given the fact that most parents feel their children are being bused to dangerous neighborhoods.
Social Movements and Collective Behavior
Barker (2007) views a social movement as what he refers to as a string of controversial acts and campaigns waged by ordinary people to stake collective claims on other people in society. Riding on this definition, it is a fact beyond doubt that I have been part of social movements in the past. For example, my attachment to social networking sites such as Facebook, Skype, and others can be viewed as my efforts, consciously or otherwise, to be part of social movements.
My experience on Facebook meets the definition of my actions been part of a social movement. Charles Tilly, cited by Barker (2007), gives three elements of a social movement that qualifies my Facebook attachment as part of it. One of them is the campaign, where it is argued that social movement entails an organized and sustained covert or overt actions that can be viewed as collective claims towards the authorities in the society (Barker, 2007).
Many youths, including me included, have used Facebook and other sites to come together and fight for their rights or emancipation from the authorities (parents, teachers, governments, and others). A social movement should also use repertoire, which can be viewed as political actions. On Facebook, youths have formed a formidable political vehicle that makes them a force to reckon within the society. All of these factors make my engagement on the Facebook part of involvement in social movements.
Sustainable Urbanization and Future Generations
Urbanization has been one of the major characteristics of 21st Century society. Urban centers are growing very fast as the majority of people migrate to the cities. This has brought up the issue of sustainable urbanization (Lindsay & Beach, 2008). People ask themselves whether it is possible to urbanize while maintaining the quality of life for humans by saving the forests, the environment, and other resources for future generations.
It is my belief that sustainable urbanization is possible for future generations. This is given the fact that despite the challenges presented by urbanization, the development also has many opportunities that can be harnessed for the benefit of future generations. This can be achieved through several practices. One of them is compactness. This is whereby authorities try to make cities compact and densely developed.
Such compacted cities rely less on vehicles, and as such, air pollution is avoided. Another way of attaining sustainable urbanization is completeness. This is whereby the cities are made more complete. In a complete city, people are able to work and shop and do other things near their homes. As such, there is no need to commute. This reduces energy consumption and air pollution, among other benefits.
References
Barker, M. (2007). Conform or reform? Social movements and the mass media. International Journal of Radical Mass Media Criticism, 12(7), 39-45.
Lindsey, L. L., & Beach, S. (2008). Sociology. 3rd ed. New York: Pearson Education Inc Publishers.
The history of human kind has been one of movement, migration and settlement. While humans for most part of their history have lived in villages and subsisted mainly on agriculture, the rapid pace of modernization has shifted this emphasis from the rural background to an urban landscape. This has resulted in rapid urbanization which has led to underdevelopment, a concept, the veracity of which is being examined in this essay. The essay develops the argument by first examining the popular sociological theories of Dependency and the World system. It also examines the counter-urbanization theory of Neo-populism to give the contrarian view.
The essay finds a direct link of urbanization with underdevelopment. The essay through examples of the developing world and the developed world establishes the linkage between rapid urbanization and underdevelopment in both; the cities as well as the outlying peripheral areas. The author of this essay opines that urbanization alone is not responsible for underdevelopment but that a wide range of other factors such as Climate, Climate change, misconstrued government policies, social, moral and ethical parameters are also responsible for underdevelopment
The essay offers an original thought on utilizing the Boyd OODA loop to explain the problems of urbanization and underdevelopment. The essay concludes by finding credence for the two and three tier system theories but finds the neo-populist theory impractical. Underdevelopment however can be mitigated if the states evolve a holistic comprehensive plan that can be implemented in an optimum spatial and temporal time frame.
Rapid Urbanization and Underdevelopment
The history of human kind has been one of movement, migration and settlement. These settlements occurred due to a number of factors such as changing climate, population growth, and search for better living conditions or in some cases conquests for ‘God, Glory or Gold.’ Nevertheless, human societies continued to evolve, formulating sociological systems that regulated their lives and brought in stability. While humans for most part of their history have lived in villages and subsisted mainly on agriculture, the rapid pace of modernization has shifted this emphasis from the rural background to an urban landscape. The United Nations in 2007 had estimated that over half the world’s population were living in urban areas. This rapid urbanization has had its concomitant effect on the overall development of the states. Empirical evidence suggests that rapid urbanization has led to greater prevalence of underdevelopment which this essay aims to examine through the prism of sociological theories and the extant socio-economic factors.
Underdevelopment occurs when the complete socio-economic resources of a state or for that matter a region are not utilized optimally. It has often been theorized, especially, by Marxist thinkers that Capitalism encourages the empowerment of the few over the many and that resources get exploited to enrich the cities and not the rural countryside. This resulted in a ‘dependency’ in which the urban center dominated “the extraction and terms of utilization of the resources of the immediate hinterland (Flangan, 1993, p. 119)”. Thus the urban centers became the dominant core while the outlying hinterland became the underdeveloped areas.
The Two tier dependency theory was extended to comprise state relations wherein rich states grew richer at the expense of the poor states. The effects of this ‘dependency’ model according to some theorists, was that it led to large scale migrations within the country from rural countryside to the cities as also immigration of people leaving their poor countries for richer countries. This movement has been, in parts, a result of population pressures on the land. The UN’s World Report (2004) estimates that “world population is projected to grow from 6.1 billion in 2000 to 8.9 billion in 2050 (p. 4)”. Such rapidly growing population and land shortage in the rural areas according to Kitching (1989),” has led to an even more rapid process of urbanization (p. 74)”. The ill effects of urbanization are more visible in the third world than in the developed world. But such a conclusion is misplaced. The West faced very much the same problems that are being faced today in the developing world. When the Industrial revolution heralded a new age in Britain and Europe, it led to rapid urbanization. The cities became the magnate for the polity to gravitate to and consequently became choked. The sheer influx of human population outstripped the capacity of the cities to provide basic amenities leading to widespread scarcity of potable water, pollution and poor sanitary conditions leading to epidemics. This has been a historical trend right from the early days of industrialization where 19th century records show that “mortality rates in large cities appear to have been higher than the national average” (Leon, 2008, p. 3). The reasons why the Western countries were able to overcome the problems of underdevelopment so rapidly has been attributed to colonialism. European countries could source cheap labor, raw materials and sell their manufactured goods at competitive rates because of their colonies that provided the resources. Thus, the resources of lands almost three or four times the size of the imperial country were made available in the homeland that helped overcome the gap of urbanization and underdevelopment. Having had a head start on the road to modern economic development, the developed countries have managed to maintain the momentum till now, where the policies of free market, trade and globalization are showing their deleterious effect in the present global economic meltdown.
A large number of studies show that urbanization has been directly responsible for declining health standards in the ‘periphery’ because of the relative ease of providing better health care in the cities than in the far flung rural areas. Such studies and observations are true for the developing world. Better awareness and education offered by cities with their health awareness program make even the poor better aware of the health risks involved. “The higher rates of smoking in rural compared with urban areas in China and India (Leon, p. 4)” is a pointer in this regard.
Today, the two tier dependency theory is undergoing revision in the developed world as to its applicability. For example, within the developed world cities, underdevelopment is taking place within the cities. While rest of the ‘Big Apple’ is sufficiently affluent, the Bronx is decidedly underdeveloped with almost third world standard civil amenities. Not surprisingly, violent crime has spiraled in the inner cities leading to the formations of ‘gated communities’ for protection. Other than the gated communities, this rapid urbanization and its adverse effects have led to a ‘reverse migration’ where the suburbs are becoming the choice of abode of the people instead of the cities themselves. So in these cases, the ‘periphery’ is becoming more developed rather than less developed.
Yet another theory called the ‘World-System’ theory posits that the world system consists of the economically dominant, the underdeveloped and the intermediate semi-periphery states. This theory draws its strength from the example of the East Asian ‘Tiger economies’ that have prospered between the tussle of the rich and the underdeveloped countries. According to Ginsburg and Koppel (1991), Taiwan’s sustained growth with equity has been made possible because of “the effectiveness of both the population strategies and national development policies (p. 193)”. The same rationale is used to describe the prosperity of South Korea. Social theorists have argued that these intermediate periphery countries have been successful because unique geopolitical space had been created for them due to Cold War dynamics and thus they could exploit both the Blocs to their advantage. Political scientists have also used the logic that effects of urbanization in creating underdevelopment in a country also depends upon the type of political system in vogue in that country. According to their formulations, dictatorial regimes have had a poor record in aligning urbanization with underdevelopment leading to greater poverty. North Korea is the oft quoted example in this regard. Such a line of thinking is fallacious as it does not explain why the divide between the rich and the poor is so accentuated in democratic countries like India, and Brazil that hold the promise of being future economic giants but yet have oceans of underdevelopment riddling their respective landscapes.
In some cases, artificially enforced systems have kept the pace of urbanization low such as in South Africa during the Apartheid days. The White minority government had kept the majority black populations segregated and away from major cities. This led to low developments of the periphery but well developed ‘white only’ enclaves in South Africa’s major towns. However, when Apartheid fell, it led to rapid urbanization where “black people poured into the cities… placing enormous strain on urban infrastructure” (Louw, 2004, p. 181). These changes have accentuated the other ills of underdevelopment namely, unemployment, “lifestyles involving drug addiction, prostitution and alcoholism” (Nagle, 1998, p. 46). All major cities of South Africa have suffered from this rapid urbanization which has only increased social inequalities and violent crime rates.
The effects of urbanization have been more visible on island nations or islands because of the small land mass and limited resources that such geographical entities have. Rapid urbanization due to population growth has put tremendous pressure on resources that can be devoted. Citizens in search of work have moved from villages to cities which have not been able to keep up with the human influx. So rapid internal and external migration has also become a characteristic associated with rapid urbanization. The socioeconomic underdevelopment has also resulted in pronounced gender inequalities (Millenium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005, p. 672) amongst such communities with women mostly being the disadvantaged gender.
The undue emphasis on industrialization and urbanization has led many thinkers to evolve counter theories of development such as those propounded by Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, Michael Lipton and E F Schumacher. Their theories called Neo-populism holds that for a nation to develop requires holistic development of towns and villages alike. In India, Mahatma Gandhi fervently believed that the overall development of the country was only possible if the villages too developed on an equal footing. Nyerere held that since Tanzania was an agricultural country, agriculture and the rural landscape deserved more emphasis rather than the towns as Tanzania in any case did not have a sound industrial base. These theories despite their idealistic appeal have failed to evolve into practical systems as the steady march of globalization has favored urbanization over the development of the rural areas.
The narrative so far makes it appear that increasing population is the main cause for migrations and urbanization which is further leading to imbalances between the cities and the rural landscape. While the ‘Malthusian Trap’ is true in its context, there are many complex factors that interplay when one examines the issues of underdevelopment. Climate plays a major role in determining which parts of the world ‘have it easy’ and which have to go ‘the extra mile’. For example, the degree of difficulty for Sub Saharan countries to sustain agriculture cannot be considered same as those faced by Europe or America.
Culture too plays an important role in the dialogue of development. In the Indian subcontinent, it is culturally mandatory for a farmer to divide lands amongst his male heirs. Most land holdings in the subcontinent measure less than an acre as compared to a farmer in the American Midwest whose holdings stretch over the horizon. Since the land holdings are small, productivity declines, leading to farmers forsaking agriculture and migrating to cities in search for more paying jobs. Underdevelopment is therefore a natural corollary. Non-democratic states have experimented with resolving this problem by taking away the lands from the farmers and collectivizing them. The great ‘Collective Farms’ experiment of the erstwhile Soviet Union was a resounding failure as curbs on human free will anywhere in the world has been. Economists point to China’s success in this regards and point to their double digit growth. The Chinese success story is slowly but surely unraveling as more and more reports trickle out of the ‘Impenetrable Dragon’ regarding food riots, land riots and poor conditions of rural China. On the contrary, the Chinese model of economic development reinforces the thesis that rampant urbanization is causing underdevelopment on gigantic scales irrespective of what the UN development indices may tell the world. Kahn & Yardley (2007) report that “ambient air pollution (in China) alone is blamed for hundreds of thousands of deaths each year and nearly 500 million people lack access to safe drinking water” (¶ 3). The concept of ‘Development at any cost’ and ‘Capitalism with Chinese Characteristics’ is propelling China into an ecological, demographic and sociological maelstrom. In China’s case urbanization is just one symptom of underdevelopment. It is, in fact, the sum of many ill advised government initiatives.
Elsewhere, the urbanization-underdevelopment linkage gathers weight especially in South East Asia. One typical example is Jakarta, Indonesia. This metropolis was the brainchild of Indonesia’s Army general Suharto who wished to create a world class capital second to none. Consequently, over 60% of the country’s resources were poured into making a glittering capital with its wide verdant roads and leafy residential areas with American style mansions dotting the Jakartan landscape. A study by Jakarta university revealed that high level of urbanization in East Jakarta “created a high level of unemployment with 53.44% value of contribution and 45.56% influenced by other factors (Effendi, 2006, p. 33) “.The effects on the rest of the country were disastrous. The ‘periphery’ suffered immensely and Indonesia, which in the early 1950s was considered as a prosperous nation became one of the poorest countries in South East Asia. Today with the return of democracy, the government is trying to redress some of the problems of unplanned urbanization.
Sao Paulo, Brazil mirrors the experience of much of South America. The rate at which the town grew into a Megapolis could not be matched by the infrastructure development leading to startling divide between the rich and the poor areas of the city. Underdevelopment in this case affected not only the city but also the ‘periphery’.
Morality and ethical behavior also impinge on the dynamics of development. The stability of rural life in any country depends upon family and community values. This value system has come under increasing strain due to globalization and intense competition for scarce jobs. The large rural families consisting of two-three generations living together have come to pass not only in developed countries but also in developing countries. Single parent households are becoming a norm and urbanization has further acted as a catalyst for the degradation of traditional values. Morality too has become more ‘relative’ with its adverse effects on the society at large. It therefore comes as no surprise that America has the largest prison population in the world which according to the U.S. Department of Justice Statistics (2008) is 2,299,116 prisoners held in federal or state prisons or in local jails (¶ 1).
Urbanization per se does not always lead to underdevelopment if it is supported by sound planning and execution. John Boyd’s famed OODA loop is a useful theory to explain the relationship between urbanization and underdevelopment. “This model, although originally applied to military situations, is also applicable to business and other competitive situations (Bridges, 2004, p. 2)”. The Observe, Orient, Decide and Act processes are a full fledged tool for sound planning and execution. Governments that observe the socio-economic conditions properly, giving sufficient time to Orient themselves with the associated problems of urbanization stand to gain. Having spent optimum time in the observation and orientation, the governments that take the right decisions for urbanization which includes holistic town planning, realistic future growth assessment and development of spare capacity stand to gain. Having carried out these three activities in sufficient time, going through with the execution and the implementation of the plan allows the governments the luxury of having a stable economy and society. The OODA loop with respect to urbanization has to be executed in the correct spatial and temporal terms. Oftentimes, sound economic policies and town planning schemes come to naught because either the authorities execute them in too short a time or take too long by which time the demographics and socio-economic imperatives of the state overtake them.
In conclusion it can be reiterated that rapid urbanization has significant linkages with underdevelopment. The sociological theories of ‘dependency’, two tier or three tier systems are quite valid. The counter urbanization theories though idealistic and appealing have little chance of success in this world of galloping globalization where inequalities and the divide between the rich and the poor is a fact. However, rapid urbanization is not the only reason for underdevelopment. There are many factors such as misconstrued state policies, climate and climate change, social, moral and ethical parameters that have their effect on the development of a state. Underdevelopment however can be mitigated if states evolve a holistic comprehensive plan that can be implemented in an optimum spatial and temporal time frame.
The questions of urbanization and the growth of megacities have raised the significant attention of many people recently. Today, it is already a well-known fact that more than half of the world’s population lives in cities with a predicted 90% that will be living in 2030. The trend towards globalization and city life now affects many developing countries.
However, even though this switch is beneficial for many people it also includes many issues, such as the rising number of slums, poverty, child labor, and criminality. This paper aims to explore urbanization and its consequences while analyzing two specific works pertained to the question of urbanization, urban poverty, and immigration.
The first work by Mike Davis is called Planet of Slums. It is a survey of the effects of urbanization on global poverty. According to the author, the growing number of cities today impacts the rising urban poverty in a form of slums. The are several reasons for that, such as “the neoliberal globalization since 1978”, the wrong actions of the World Bank and IMF, and “middle-class hegemony” (23). Davis also states that the cities “have become a dumping ground for a surplus population working in unskilled, unprotected and low-wage informal service industries and trade” (23). He insists that among the results of urbanization will be “rising inequality within and between cities of different sizes and specialization” (Davis 8).
In my opinion, Davis makes a furious analysis on the topic of urbanization and the rise of urban poverty. Perhaps, this strong statement can be explained by his Marxist’s critical views on the neoliberal ideology. The author looks at the core of urbanization while not being distracted by the complex urban processes and terms. He depicts that the gap between social and economic values of rich and poor continues to shrink over time. Davis states that are approximately 200.000 slums in the world and this number will significantly increase in the future. He sees slums as the world’s future, the cities that will be made not “out of glass and steel”, but rather “out of crude brick, straw, recycled plastic, cement blocks and scrap wood” (19).
The second work is the foreigner as Citizen from the book Democracy and the Foreigner by Bonnie Honig. The author focuses on the American immigrant myth and tries to depict major characteristics of the debate about immigration, citizenship, and the national identity of American society. According to her, the foreigner in America is “a supplement to the nation, an agent of national enchantment that might rescue the regime from corruption and return it to its first principles” (74). Among those principles are “capitalist, communal, familial, or liberal” (74). Thus, she does not ask a question about what problems immigrants might bring to the country but rather examines what issues they can solve.
Therefore, the author describes the term ‘foreignness’ as one of the most crucial and debatable topics of today’s world. Her work is important since it provides different perspectives on questions of immigration, nationality, and their inherent values. She understands the myth of American immigration and tries to examine it through the prism of democratic legitimation and national rejuvenation.
Overall, these two works show different perspectives on the concept of globalization, urbanization, and immigration. While the first work critically acclaims today’s neoliberal paradigm and asserts that the cities of the future will be slums, the second work states that foreigners can be beneficial for the society by saving it from corruption and increasing its capitalistic value.
Works Cited
Davis, Mike. Planet of Slums. London: New Left Review, 2004. Print.
Honig, Bonnie. Democracy and the Foreigner. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001. Print.