Culture
Advice to Aspirational Mega-Cities
They are our future. Here's what we need to do to make sure America's regions stay on track.
By 2030, two out of every three people worldwide will live in cities. If cities are surpassing corporations as the principal economic organizing units of our time, mega-cities — clusters of great cities, which in many cases cross national boundaries — are on track to replace nation-states as the world's most important global political units.
At the Aspen Ideas Festival last Friday, I asked former Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley if he thought mega-cities were here to stay. He reminded me that political power resided in city-states for centuries, and that cities were built on water to facilitate trade. Now that we have air travel, interior cities are becoming much more important.