Urbanization is often touted as a solution to the world’s various ills. It’s been heralded as a fix for issues such as poverty, mass migration, and climate change. Cities will make our societies healthier and more productive. Cities will make us happy. Cities are our inevitable future—or so we’re told.
While cities can vastly improve the way we live, and many of these ideas are important, there are several myths caught up in the current hype. Claims that there is a “global shift” toward living in cities, that urban economies abound with productivity benefits for all, and that cities will continue to grow and prosper, are all misleading. By busting some of these myths, we can get to grips with the real pros and cons of cities, and the role they’re likely to play in our future.
1. We’re Entering the Urban Age
In 2008, the United Nations announced that, for the first time in human history, 50 percent of the world’s population lived in cities. Ever since, the statistic has been cited over and over as evidence of a global shift toward urbanization—the dawn of a new “urban age.” But these declarations disguise the many varied and diverging trends across the world’s different regions.
