PEOPLE MOVERS
Urbanisation and migration
Remembering globalisation According to Anthony Giddens (1990, p.64), globalisation involves: “the intensification of worldwide social relations which link distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away and vice versa� Globalisation is an evolving process, not a thing that has happened
http://www.thevidaconsultancy.com/wpcontent/uploads/2013/03/London-NewYorkMatchmaking1.jpg
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To what extent does London promote post-national cultural identities?
Our journey
The pull of the global city
Post-national identities
The dynamics of London life
The squalor of slums
The globally economic city
World cities are not global purely because of their size, but their integration into the global economy and their cultural/political influence
They tend to be traditional/former industrial cities like New York, London, Paris and Tokyo
They are centres of transport – from ports to airports – and finance
Companies may have headquarters in each of these cities and they become centres for the investment and accumulation of capital
They are recognised as sites of innovation and creativity
They encourage ‘cosmopolitan attitudes’ and ‘post-national’ identities
Post-national identities
We defined cultural identities as “An identity is an individual’s identification with something external to them, normally an abstract or imagined idea (I am this)”
A national identity is where we identify with the nation
A post-national identity is where the locus of identity comes from sources other than nationhood
“In common sense language, identification
is constructed on the back of a recognition of some common origin or shared characteristics with another person or group, or with an ideal, and with the natural closure of solidarity and allegiance established on this foundation (Stuart Hall, 1996, p.14)
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Are you a Londoner?
City dynamics
Urban living has changed the structure of our shared social lives – the way cities are organised has a substantial affect upon our agency and lifestyles
City living tends to weaken cultural traditions, becoming places of cultural reinvention and transformation
The denser and more diverse the city the more options we have for expressing ourselves
The denser the city (more physical proximity) the more emotionally distant we seem to become (to strangers)
London: The post-national city? London promotes post-national identities by: 1.
2.
3.
Offering a wider range of cultural experiences Being alienating and individualising Being a location for a diversity of national cultures
Location does matter
Despite communication technology bringing about the ‘death of distance’, humanity thrives in cities because of their proximity to other people
The advantages of denser populations allow for better and more efficient public services
Workers tend to be much more productive and highly paid in bigger cities
Cities draw talented, and younger, people together and create greater connections and collaboration
The experiential city
Following a turn away from suburban lifestyles in the 1990s, increasingly cities are seeking to attract young professionals with money through the ‘experience economy’
These people are looking for an ‘experience’ or ‘lifestyle’ rather than safety, security and serenity
There are more differentiated cultural attractions: one of the big appeals of diverse cities like London is that there is ‘always something happening’
The city thus offers a wider array of cultures to identify with
What is the attraction of London, for you?
The alienating city
Sociologist Georg Simmel (1858-1918) argued that the stimulation of the city is too much for many people
To cope, we ‘tune out’ emotionally and physically, becoming isolated individuals amongst a sea of people
Alienated city dwellers are more individualised and less attached to traditional communities
Why don’t you talk to people on the tube?
Is London British? In the 2011 census: ‘White
British’ were 45% of the population (of total 60% white)
‘Asian’
made up 20%
‘Black’
13%
Cosmopolitanism 
Multiculturalism occurs when multiple cultures live in close proximity and each of these cultures has equal value

A cosmopolitan city embraces multiculturalism and rejects political and cultural distinctions: we are all one global community  Difference is
celebrated as part of a single humanity
Is it important for Londoners to feel British?
Does London promote postnational identities?
Urbanisation
At the beginning of the 19th Century, 97% of all people lived in settlements of less than 5,000 people
The world was 30% urban in 1950 but 50% urban by the early 21st century
By 2010 there were almost 200 cities of more than two million people and cities have absorbed 2/3rds of population growth since 1950
The UN predicts urbanisation levels of 66% by 2050
Crowding together
Urbanisation is not necessarily occurring because of a lack of land
All of humanity, each in a townhouse, could fit into an area the size of Texas (Glaesar, 2011)
Yet, five million more people join the crowded cities in the developing world each month, despite a lack of space and resources
Beyond the world city 
Megacities, those containing 10 million or more people, have been created as different cities become increasingly merged

There are 20 of these megacities, most of them in the developing world
What do you think are the top ten largest cities in the world?
Beyond the West
The underside of ‘mega-cities’ is the development of huge areas of urban slums
95% of all projected population growth is in urban areas of the developing world (Davis, 2006, p.2)
Approximately one billion people live in urban slums, with two billion predicted before 2050
Areas such as that between Rio and Sao Paulo in Brazil and in Western Africa (between Benin City and Accra) where 60 million people will cram into a strip of 600 kilometres, are sites of ‘mega-slums’
Urban areas in some countries, such as Ethiopia and Chad (both 99.4%) are essentially all slums and others like Mumbai (10-12 million), Mexico City and Dhaka (9-10 million) have huge slums populations
Urbanisation – a summary
The world is becoming increasingly urbanised, often around nodal ‘global’ cities
This urbanisation provides benefits to cities in the developed world through density and diversity that leads to ‘post-national’ cosmopolitan identities
Cities are also a site of social and cultural alienation
Urbanisation has also been a significant trend in the developing world and has led to the emergence of massive slums and a potential ‘surplus humanity’
Next week W EEK 12 SECURITY
W ELCOME HOME , HISTORY: R ESISTANCE , AND T ERROR + MODULE REVIEW
READING Fukuyama, Francis (1989) The End of History. The National Interest. http://www.wesjones.com/eoh.htm Zygmunt Bauman, Z., Bigo, D., Esteves, P, Guild, E., Jabri, V., Lyon, D. and Walker, R.B.J (2014) After Snowden: Rethinking the Impact of Surveillance. International Political Sociology, 8, pp.121144