ABSTRACT
The focus on the specialized differences of cities allows us to capture the variable effects of economic globalization and of the current financial crisis on diverse types of global cities. This chapter discusses some of global governance challenges that become concrete in cities. It focuses especially on the structural transformations that have given cities a whole new role in national and in global economies and that have fed their specialized differences. It concludes with a discussion of the characteristics of the current financial crisis and what this means for global cities. The network of global cities has expanded as more and more firms go global and enter a growing range of foreign national economies. Urban leaderships and urban activists have had to deal with issues long before national governments and inter-state treaties addresses. The potential for urbanizing particular aspects of global governance takes on new significance in the context of the major geo-political trends.
