With the advent of multinational corporations, the traditional urban service function has 'gone global'. In order to provide services to globalizing corporate clients, the offices of major financial and business service firms across the world have formed a network. It is the myriad of flows between office towers in different metropolitan centres that has produced a world city network. Through an analysis of the intra-company flows of 100 leading global service firms across 315 cities, this book assesses cities in terms of their overall network connectivity, their connectivity by service sector, and their connectivity by world region. Peter Taylor's unique and illuminating book provides the first comprehensive and systematic description and analysis of the world city network as the 'skeleton' upon which contemporary globalization has been built. His analyses challenge the traditional view of the world as a 'mosaic map' of political boundaries. Written by one of the foremost authorities on the subject, this book provides a much needed mapping of the connecting relationships between world cities, and will be an enlightening book for students of urban studies, geography, sociology and planning.
Author(s): Peter J. Taylor
Year: 2003
Language: English
Pages: 256
Book Cover......Page 1
Title......Page 4
Contents......Page 5
Preface......Page 10
Acknowledgements......Page 12
Prologue: the second nature of cities......Page 14
Relations......Page 18
Inter-city relations......Page 20
Back to basics......Page 44
Connections......Page 66
Networks of cities......Page 68
Geographies of connectivity......Page 83
City network analyses......Page 113
Configurations......Page 139
A mapping of services in globalization......Page 141
Mappings of cities in globalization......Page 161
Suppositions......Page 189
From past to present: a metageographical argument......Page 191
From present to future: reasserting cities?......Page 206
Appendix A Global service firms (the 'GaWC 100')......Page 227
Appendix B List of cities......Page 230
Bibliography......Page 233
Index......Page 243
