ABSTRACT
Cities in the developing world have different levels of competitiveness and sustainability in spite of being classified in the same category. Cities began to form according to the availability of natural resources that could be exploited, and the infrastructure of that time consisted of roads and ports to facilitate transport of resources inside countries and then to the countries of colonizers. Cities expanded due to the rural-urban migration of individuals seeking more job opportunities, and most of them settled in the periphery. The concentration of people and economic activities in cities, in a few points of the territory and mainly in capital cities, contrasted with the existence of many small rural places throughout the countries with no plans for economic promotion, were the main factors defining territorial distribution. In Asia, cities had a similar pattern of socio-spatial segregation and, as in the case of Latin America, this has its roots in income inequalities.
