How to Build a Global City: Recognizing the Symbolic Power of a Global Urban Imagination

In How to Build a Global City, Michele Acuto considers the rise of a new generation of so-called global cities―Singapore, Sydney, and Dubai―and the power that this concept had in their ascent, in order to analyze the general relationship between global city theory and its urban public policy practice.

The global city is often invoked in theory and practice as an ideal model of development and a logic of internationalization for cities the world over. But the global city also creates deep social polarization and challenges how much local planning can achieve in a world economy. Presenting a unique elite ethnography in Singapore, Sydney, and Dubai, Acuto discusses the global urban discourses, aspirations, and strategies vital to the planning and management of such metropolitan growth.

The global city, he shows, is not one single idea, but a complex of ways to imagine a place to be global and aspirations to make it so, often deeply steeped in politics. His resulting book is a call to reconcile proponents and critics of the global city toward a more explicit engagement with the politics of this global urban imagination.

Michele Acuto is Professor of Global Urban Politics in the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning at the University of Melbourne. He is the author of Global Cities, Governance and Diplomacy and coauthor of Managing Cities at Night and Leading Cities. Follow him on X @MicheleAcuto.