Blog

This blog is a space for knowledge-sharing, opinion, advocacy and debate, both between UCLG members and the wider international local and regional government community. Contributions and comments are welcome from anyone who is interested in how sub-national governments can make the world a better place for their citizens.

Read on to discover the most varied, up-to-date and innovative initiatives of local governments and their partners from across the globe.

How Medellín revived itself: Fast growth in a verdant valley
How Medellín revived itself: Fast growth in a verdant valley
Blog
Urban Agenda - 09/04/2014
Gerard Martin is one of the leading scholars of Colombia’s cities, particularly Medellín and Bogota. He’s the former director of the Colombia Program at Georgetown University’s Center for Latin American Studies. He’s also the author of Medellín. Tragedia y Resurreccion. Mafia, Ciudad, Estado. 1975-2012, which comes out in a second Spanish edition this month. (+)
Raphael Obonyo
Nairobi's Emerging Cities Dilemma
Blog
Inequalities, Access to basic services - 04/04/2014
By Raphael Obonyo. Kenya, like countries across the globe, must contend with the challenges of rapid urbanization. The dramatic spike in youth unemployment, slum populations, and poverty rates in recent years is cause for alarm, but the government has yet to tackle the issue. If Kenya’s rapid urbanization is left unmitigated. (+)
Climate change action in cities: Tokyo's carbon market policy
Blog
Access to basic services - 24/03/2014
Four years ago, Tokyo implemented a cutting-edge policy focused primarily on emissions from 1,400 of the most energy-hungry of those office buildings. By and large, it’s worked: Building owners targeted by the program have slashed power consumption and reduced their emissions by 23 percent below a baseline level. (+)
Intermediary Cities in the new urban agenda
Blog
Intermediary Cities, Social Inclusion, Urban Agenda, Habitat III - 14/03/2014
Today, it would be impossible to conduct an in-depth analysis of the urban phenomenon without taking into account the role of intermediary cities, defined here as cities with less than 1 million inhabitants. In reality, these cities, at both local and regional level, account for over 50% of the global urban population. (+)
Principles for a Positive Urban Future
Blog
Culture, Economic development - 19/02/2014
By Paul James, Professor at the Institute for Culture and Society, University of Western Sydney, Australia, and a writer on globalization and social theory. He is Director of the United Nations Global Compact Cities Programme, a UN International Secretariat with offices in Sydney, Melbourne and New Yorkprovide guidance for Metropolis/UCLG thinking on the urban vision. (+)
Citiscope
In Mexico, a city’s scar becomes its most prized park, La Línea Verde
Blog
Urban Strategic Planning, Access to basic services - 17/01/2014
Source: www.citiscope.org Aguas Calientes, Mexico- Jessica Lopez, a four-year old with a shy smile, has suffered severe chronic asthma attacks since she was born. Her condition always worsened in the fall, when dust rose up from the abandoned fields that bordered her family’s modest one-room... (+)

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