ABSTRACT

A significant body of research contrasts Asian urbanization with that of the West. The chapter first reviews underlying driving forces that, taken together, are creating differences in urban environmental experiences. It focuses on implications from this perspective in terms of managing urban environments. The chapter explores the impacts of globalization on the urban environmental transition. It explains the peculiarities of the Asian experience and point to promising new ways of planning. Globalization is the broadening, deepening, and accelerating of worldwide interconnectedness, with growing flows of trade, investments, people, and information. The contemporary wave of globalization has facilitated a period in which those developing countries linked to the global economic system have experienced extraordinary periods of growth. Telescoped and compressed urban environmental transitions require different thinking about urban management: Western solutions may not be applicable to current Asian realities.