schmoozy space Mark Szpakowski's szpace blog

O'Reilly Radar blogs Stewart Brand's A World Made of Cities (cf also his recent Environmental Heresies article). Some quotes:

Cities are humanity's longest-lived organizations (Jericho dates back 10,500 years), but also the most constantly changing.

Every week in the world a million new people move to cities.One of the effects of globalization is to empower cities more and more. Communications and economic activities bypass national boundaries.

One-sixth of humanity, a billion people, now live in squatter cities ("slums") and millions more are on the way. Governments try everything to head them off, with total failure. Squatter cities are vibrant places. They're self-organized and self-constructed.

I think a large-scale, long-term environmental strategy for urbanization is needed, two-pronged. One, take advantage of the emptying countryside (where the trees and other natural systems are growing back fast) and preserve, protect, and restore those landscape in a way that will retain their health when people eventually move back. Two, bear down on helping the growing cities to become more humane to live in and better related to the natural systems around them. Don't fight the squatters. Join them.