Welcome to the Urban Revolution: How Cities Are Changing the World

Brugmann, an urban development expert, argues passionately in favor of what he terms “urban advantage”— the unique constellation of economies and political life spawned by population density and sheer size of cities. According to Brugmann, urban advantage has been the catalyst for the great social and economic revolutions of the last century, including the end of the cold war. He reasons that higher population densities in eastern bloc cities made it easier for refuseniks, nationalists and artists to extend their organizational networks, and the geometric increase in communication made monitoring by the state all but impossible. More recently, urbanization has been creating new opportunities for indigent Third World populations across the globe, as seen in Dharavi, a Mumbai slum turned billion-dollar mercantile economy attracting waves of migrations from rural areas. The book’s examples of cities that have misunderstood or misused urban advantage (e.g., Detroit and Kuala Lumpur) are just as compelling as the success stories. Even if the text lacks the punch of good journalism, the book is replete with detail and compelling analyses. (June)