Urban theory describes the city formation phenomenon where economic priorities prevail to facilitate the city's propensity to generate and accumulate wealth. Such city formation involves some irreversible spatial investments, massive resource allocations and financial investments recoverable only if anticipated future income transpires. Consequently, it is a pertinent concept in urban planning. Though related, this is not to be confused with urban economics where economic principles and tools are applied at macro and micro levels. Urbanomics is to be understood as a paradigm to understand impact of the globalization process on urban development. Urban theory is an agglomeration of social theories - classical, neo-classical and modern. Reference to social theory assumes the indivisibility of political, social and economic forces. Sustainability is increasingly becoming the lynch-pin of urban studies with triple-line accountability given more emphasis though not necessarily translated to practice. Here, urbanomics, by default, renders environmental and social concerns to subservience.
Urban theory
Theoretical discourse has often polarized between economic determinism and cultural determinism with scientific or technological determinism adding another contentious issue of reification. Studies across eastern and western nations have shown that certain cultural values promote economic development and that the economy in turn changes cultural values. Urban historians were among the first to acknowledge the importance of technology in the city. It embeds the single most dominant characteristic of a city; its networked character perpetuated by information technology. Regardless of the deterministic stance, in the context of globalization, there is a mandate to mold the city to complement the global economic structure and urbanomics gains ascendancy.
The notion of urban’ is derived from ‘urbs’ which refers to the built city and ‘civitas’ which refers to feelings, rituals, and convictions that define urban life. It connotes a dialectic relationship between materialism and ideas. This can be related to the ‘sense of place’ that Bourdieu refers to as ‘habitus’. He makes reference to symbolic capital – an appropriation of how things should be; that can be individualistic or collectively expressed. This concept has been well received in urban theory. architects focus on symbolism, engineers on quality standards, urban planners on land use and zoning and landscape artists on aesthetics, environmentalists on depletion of natural resources and climatic consequences, social-cause groups on the economically marginalized and residents on saving suburbs from the degradation of neighborhood character. Symbolism has many facets but its cumulative capital does not provide a convincing wealth generation model as an alternative to prosper the city.
Economic sustainability
In fact, urbanomics can spillover beyond the city parameters. The process of globalization extends its territories into global city regions. Essentially, they are territorial platforms interconnected in the globalized economy. Some see global city-regions rather than global cities as the nodes of a global network. The rules of engagement are built on economic sustainability – the ability to continuously generate wealth. The cornerstones of this economic framework are the following ‘4C’ attributes: currency flow for trading, commoditization of products and services in supply chain management, command centre function in orchestrating interdependency and monitoring executions and consumerization. Unless, decoupling the economy from these attributes can be demonstrated; symbolic capital expressions as legitimate as they may be; must accept the domineering status of urbanomics.
Revisiting economic measurements
Arguably, the culprit of this economic entrapment is the high consumption lifestyle synonymous with affluence. The resolve may well be that ‘less is more’ and that true welfare lies not in a rise in production and income. As such, Gross Domestic Product is increasingly being questioned as inaccurate and inadequate. GDP includes things that do not contribute to sustainable growth and excludes non-monetary benefits that improve the welfare of the people. In response, alternative measures have been proposed such as the Genuine Progress Indicator and the Index of Sustainable Welfare - ISEW.
