a little into something significant.
The image of Fleet Street in London transformed into a place for people (Figure I.5) is actually a depiction of what is required to cut our carbon emissions and adapt the city to the inevitable consequences of climate change. That is the opportunity we have, to deliver a far more liveable city. However, we have to cut our energy use and we have to switch to renewable energy – fast – to solve the climate crisis; everything else in this book is to help protect us further into the future.
Figure I.5 Left: Fleet Street today. Right: A reimagined Fleet Street. (Source: © WATG (Wimberly, Allison, Tong & Goo) and Pixelflakes.)
I always loved the expression “When you are hanging on by your fingernails, you don’t go waving your arms about”. This is the delicate balance of the city ecosystem. The time has come for cities to find a way of drawing attention to climate action – while still hanging on!
The clock is ticking. On the Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change7 carbon clock, at time of publication, the carbon budget will be depleted in 6 years, 9 months, 2 days, 21 hours, 17 minutes, and 19 seconds, after which limiting climate change to a 1.5°C increase will no longer be possible (Figure I.6).
Figure I.6 Mercator Research Institute’s countdown to limit the global temperature increase to 1.5°C. (Source: https://www.mcc-berlin.net/en/research/co2-budget.html.)
Flow of the Chapters
To position this book, I wanted to include a little bit about the history of cities, a short journey through time, the historical make-up of life in our cities, and what has driven society through time. I wanted to position the trust we should place in cities to deal with the existential threat of climate change because of their ability to innovate and create working outcomes. The book will show the basic premise that urban life is more carbon efficient, and so the role of cities in retaining their growing populations will be critical to reaching our global climate goals and to continue the shift from their traditionally wasteful existence to a highly efficient one. How can the ideas they generate be applied across other cities and what will it take to make it happen?
In Chapter 1, The Ambitious City, Peter Boyd first reminds us that the city is where the ambitious in society have congregated for centuries; and that this ambitious leadership is what is needed more than ever to solve society’s environmental challenges. It sets out a case for high ambition to be twinned with high clarity, proposing a bold and clear definition of what “Net-Zero” could mean to lead cities in a just transition to sustainability. It covers a definition that could include considerations of scope, of emissions reduction trajectory, of Paris-Agreement compliance, and even a cumulative approach to emissions that could help restore equity between the Global North and Global South. It concludes with considering the need for urban leaders to appreciate and embrace systems thinking if we are to manage this transition successfully – realizing how all the complex issues and opportunities outlined in subsequent chapters can and do connect.
In Chapter 2, The Civilized City, I take us through a historic journey to how we arrived at the modern city. The chapter looks at how cities have evolved, and how they have coped with the economic, social, and environmental challenges through time and how this shaped local governance. It seeks to explore and explain why this has positioned the modern city to be able to respond to the climate crisis while protecting the key liveability factors that govern our daily lives. It identifies some of the mechanisms needed to manage this transition and restore the balance.
In Chapter 3, The Emerging City, Professor Austin Williams examines the extraordinary rise of China, from a peasant economy a generation ago to one of the world’s leading economies today. China’s development has been unprecedented in world history, with around 850 million people lifted out of poverty in just 40 years, according to the World Bank. By contrast, the chapter compares the successes of China with the continuing plight of Malawi in central Africa – a country that remains in penury, with the limited chance that it will rise from its position near the bottom of the World Economic League Table.
While China can now take advantage of its wealth to reform its productive activities to provide better environmental conditions for its citizens, Malawi has the opposite experience. Its economic conditions are being mandated by others outside its control, with environmental conditions set by unaccountable global institutions, which ensures that Malawi will remain in a state of underdevelopment.
While China is the world’s largest producer of renewable power, leading in solar, wind, batteries, and hydropower, it still cannot shake off the image of an environmental pariah. Malawi, on the other hand, is an ally. It is feted as a member of the Commonwealth of Nations and yet its lack of development – prioritizing the protection of its sacrosanct environment at the expense of modernization – is enforced by a neocolonial relationship to its supranational paymasters.
In Chapter 4, The Sustainable City, Patricia Holly Purcell sets out the path of the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and looks at the universal challenges and the irrefutable truths that numbers bring to all cities. In 2015, the UN adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which includes the 17 SDGs accompanying the Paris Agreement, which aims to limit global warming to 1.5oC. The SDGs are unique in what Patricia refers to as their “universal applicability”, enforcing that all countries, whether they be north or south, rich or poor, have a responsibility to implement and achieve these goals. But the SDGs are also unique in the way they emphasize the important role cities play.
Numbers literally make a city and are what separates it from any other inhabited area. Patricia also examines urban agglomeration and how cities have a special responsibility to be sustainable and the steps taken to improve linkages between local and international governance levels.
In Chapter 5, The Vocal City, Amanda Eichel and Kerem Yilmaz identify that the 2015 Paris Agreement cemented climate change as one of the most important existential threats of our time and thus reinforced the importance of collective action “to address and respond to climate change, including those of civil society, the private sector, financial institutions, cities and other subnational authorities”. Recognizing cities and the voice of cities in diplomacy was the culmination of a nearly 30-year effort from advocates, city networks, and cooperative initiatives.
There are, however, limits to what cities and the community that supports them can do alone. Even where cities have political will and available political, financial, and human resources, they face fundamental limits to their ambitions. And, in areas where cities can address climate change, they cannot achieve the economies of scale and transformative outcomes obtainable by national governments or through provincial/regional action. The voice of cities must better connect with the capabilities, skills, and learnings from other levels of government, as well as outside perspectives, to deliver action that both is locally appropriate and ensures the most impactful outcomes. This must include investing in the city/metro area and the city/region as part of an all-encompassing system, which simultaneously respects
