ABSTRACT
Janet Abu-Lughod made seminal contributions to the study of urbanization in global perspective, primarily through her studies of “Third World urbanization” and through a series of classic monographs on urban development in Cairo, Egypt and Rabat, Morocco. The theme of “global cities” has captured the imagination of urbanists, but as author argues, much of this exciting literature has been remarkably ahistorical, as if contemporary trends represent a sharp break from the past, if not an entirely new phenomenon. As sites to satisfy the world’s burgeoning demand for consumer goods and services relocate to Asia, the hierarchy of global cities is being reconfigured and many new centers are being added. Only a few mountainous redoubts, some interior deserts in Africa, Asia, and Australia, and a handful of off-course islands lie temporarily beyond global reach, and their days are numbered.
