Cities have led the way to combat climate change by planning and implementing climate mitigation and adaptation policies. These local efforts go beyond national boundaries. Cities are forming transnational networks to enhance their understandings and practices for climate policies. In contrast to national governments that have numerous obstacles to cope with global climate change in the international and national level, cities have become significant international actors in the field of international relations and environmental governance. Global Cities and Climate Change examines the translocal relations of cities that have made an international effort to collectively tackle climate change. Compared to state-centric terms, international or trans-national relations, trans-local relations look at policies, politics, and interactions of local governments in the globalized world. Using multi-methods such as multi-level analysis, comparative case studies, regression analysis and network analysis, Taedong Lee illustrates why some cities participated in transnational climate networks for cities; under what conditions cities internationally cooperate with other cities, with which cities; and which factors influence climate policy performance. An essential read to all those who wish to understand the driving factors for local governments’ engagement in global climate governance from a theoretical as well as practical point of view. Lee makes a valuable contribution to the fields of international relations, environmental policies, and urban studies.

This book shows how city and metropolitan regional governments working in tandem with national governments can change the way we think about responding to climate change.

Climate change is one of the most significant global challenges facing the world today. It is also a critical issue for the world’s cities. Now home to over half the world’s population, urban areas are significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions and are vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Responding to climate change is a profound challenge. A variety of actors are involved in urban climate governance, with municipal governments, international organisations, and funding bodies pointing to cities as key arenas for response. This book provides the first critical introduction to these challenges, giving an overview of the science and policy of climate change at the global level and the emergence of climate change as an urban policy issue. It considers the challenges of governing climate change in the city in the context of the changing nature of urban politics, economics, society and infrastructures. It looks at how responses for mitigation and adaptation have emerged within the city, and the implications of climate change for social and environmental justice. Drawing on examples from cities in the north and south, and richly illustrated with detailed case-studies, this book will enable students to understand the potential and limits of addressing climate change at the urban level and to explore the consequences for our future cities. It will be essential reading for undergraduate students across the disciplines of geography, politics, sociology, urban studies, planning and science and technology studies.

This book provides the latest knowledge and practice in responding to the challenge of climate change in cities. Case studies focus on topics such as New Orleans in the context of a fragile environment, a framework to include poverty in the cities and climate change discussion, and measuring the impact of GHG emissions.

How Los Angeles, Hong Kong, and China deal with such urban environmental issues as ports, goods movement, air pollution, water quality, transportation, and public space. Over the past four decades, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, and key urban regions of China have emerged as global cities—in financial, political, cultural, environmental, and demographic terms. In this book, Robert Gottlieb and Simon Ng trace the global emergence of these urban areas and compare their responses to a set of six urban environmental issues. These cities have different patterns of development: Los Angeles has been the quintessential horizontal city, the capital of sprawl; Hong Kong is dense and vertical; China's new megacities in the Pearl River Delta, created by an explosion in industrial development and a vast migration from rural to urban areas, combine the vertical and the horizontal. All three have experienced major environmental changes in a relatively short period of time. Gottlieb and Ng document how each has dealt with challenges posed by ports and the movement of goods, air pollution (Los Angeles, Hong Kong, and urban China are all notorious for their hazardous air quality), water supply (all three places are dependent on massive transfers of water) and water quality, the food system (from seed to table), transportation, and public and private space. Finally they discuss the possibility of change brought about by policy initiatives and social movements.

Climate Change and Cities bridges science-to-action for climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts in cities around the world.

David Miller presents a compelling case that significant progress can be made at the local level by duplicating the actions of nine leading cities around the world.