Rahiman, Riya; Lipietz, Barbara; Brand, Kobie; Hughes, Sara; Rangwala, Lubaina; Waud, Alexa; (2021) Urban Dynamics for Environmental Action. In: United Nations Environment Programme and United Nations Human Se, (ed.) Global Environment Outlook for Cities-GEO for Cities: Towards Green and Just Cities. (pp. 21-40). United Nations Environment Programme and United Nations Human Settlements Programme: Nairobi, Kenya.

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Abstract

Urban growth and urbanization processes have accelerated globally, especially in the last 45 years (United Nations Population Fund [UNFPA] 2007; United Nations 2019a). This has improved the quality of life of many people. Urban life provides some groups with access to better jobs, better services like drinking water and sanitation, better education, housing and health care, resulting in longer life expectancies (Vardoulakis and Kinney 2019). For others, however, urban life is characterized by the challenges of poverty and inequality, congestion, poor health and feelings of isolation or dislocation. Significant portions of the urban population still struggle to access the basic services required for a dignified human life (Satterthwaite et al. 2020) and feel trapped within harsh living conditions. At the same time, urbanization, along with biodiversity loss, ecosystem degradation and pollution, are central drivers of environmental change (United Nations 2019b and see chapter 3). As highlighted in the GEO-6 report, urban inequality and environmental sustainability are deeply intertwined. This report argues, so are their solutions. This chapter, along with chapter 3, sets out the context through which deep urban transformation objectives and pathways can be understood. It outlines the deeply rooted and persistent challenges of inequality, pollution, environmental degradation, resource depletion and biodiversity loss faced by the majority of cities. All these problems have intensified in recent decades, despite global, national and local efforts to facilitate sustainable urban transitions. Rising to the challenge of necessary urban transformations first requires us to identify and understand these persistent challenges, referred to here as “lock-ins”. For the purposes of this chapter this term is defined as complex, structural barriers that are deeply rooted in the political economy and the governance web particular to each city and that, combined, contribute to ”business-as-usual” urban planning visions and practices. Effectively, lock-ins refer to sociopolitical and behavioral processes that lead to physical lock-ins of energy use and carbon emissions in built infrastructure and urban form, biodiversity loss, ecosystem degradation and pollution. This interconnected set of lock-ins is ultimately slowing down the pace of urban transformation. This account of the systemic failures to deliver transformation – or at the very least to slow the pace of change in most cities (section 2.3) – is developed after a description of larger global urbanization trends (section 2.2). These trends include the diversity of cities and urban areas in terms of population, size, urbanization, their relationship to the environment and ecosystems, and their varying capacities to respond to the growing and interconnected challenges of urbanization in the twenty-first century. In particular, many of the rapidly urbanizing cities of the Global South are poorly equipped to deal with these challenges. They are also the most affected by deepening inequality, the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation. Most cities are currently on unsustainable trajectories. This contributes to multiple dimensions of ecological, social and economic damage, although this can take different forms, with different impacts and in ways that are yet to be fully grasped. Finally, the chapter explores ways in which a growing number of cities are already experimenting with transformative actions to overcome intersecting sociopolitical, behavioural and physical lock-ins, positioning them as drivers of environmentally sustainable, low-carbon, resilient, healthy and inclusive futures (section 2.4). This section shows that disruption to “business as usual” can occur on different scales, can come from multiple sources and agents, and is often pioneered by singular, even small catalytic actions, as is explained in more detail in chapter 5. However, for the large-scale systemic change that is urgently called for and described in chapter 4 to happen, local authorities and urban communities will need support and must share risks beyond their boundaries. Setting and maintaining cities on transformative pathways will mean reinforcing networks of learning and support, from the level of key communities all the way to national governments.

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