Small Cities: Urban Experience Beyond the Metropolis(Questioning Cities)

Until now, much research in the field of urban planning and change has focused on the economic, political, social, cultural and spatial transformations of global cities and larger metropolitan areas. In this topical new volume, David Bell and Mark Jayne redress this balance, focusing on urban change within small cities around the world. Drawing together research from a strong international team of contributors, this four part book is the first systematic overview of small cities. A comprehensive and integrated primer with coverage of all key topics, it takes a multi-disciplinary approach to an important contemporary urban phenomenon. The book addresses: political and economic decision making urban economic development and competitive advantage cultural infrastructure and planning in the regeneration of small cities identities, lifestyles and ways in which different groups interact in small cities. Centering on urban change as opposed to pure ethnographic description, the book’s focus on informed empirical research raises many important issues. Its blend of conceptual chapters and theoretically directed case studies provides an excellent resource for a broad spectrum of undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as providing a rich resource for academics and researchers.

Table of Contents:
1. Conceptualizing Small Cities Part 1: The Political Economy of Small Cities 2. On the Dynamics of Ambivalent Urbanization and Urban Productivity in Port Louis, Mauritius 3. Temp Town: Temporality as a Place Promotion Niche in The World’s Furniture Capital 4. Jumping Scale: From Small Town Politics to a ‘Regional Presence’? Re-Doing Economic Governance in Canada’s Technology Triangle 5. Tourism in a Reluctantly Small City-Island-Nation: Insights From Singapore Part 2: The Urban Hierarchy And Competitive Advantage 6. The Festival Phenomenon: Festivals, Events and the Promotion of Small Urban Areas 7. Gentrifying Down the Urban Hierarchy: ‘The Cascade Effect’ in Portland, Maine 8. The Re-Construction of a Small Scottish City: Re-Discovering Dundee 9. Urban Myth: The Symbolic Sizing of Weimar, Germany Part 3: The Cultural Economy of Small Cities 10. Garden Cities and City Gardens 11. Small Cities for a Small Country: Sustaining the Cultural Renaissance? 12. Creative Small Cities: Cityscapes, Power and the Arts 13. Rethinking Small Places – Urban and Cultural Creativity: Examples from Sweden, the USA and Bosnia-Herzegovina Part 4: Identity, Lifestyle and Forms of Sociability 14. Caudan: Domesticating the Global Waterfront 15. De-Centring Metropolitan Youth Identities: Boundaries, Difference and Sense of Place 16. Small City - Big Ideas: Culture-Led Regeneration and the Consumption of Place 17. Afterword - Sizing Up Small Cities

About the Author :
David Bell is Senior Lecturer in Geography at the University of Leeds Mark Jayne is a Lecturer in Human Geography at the University of Manchester.