Book Notes
229Environment and Urbanization ASIA, 1, 2 (2010): [227][228][229] However, most critical factors for introducing these innovations are a healthy municipal revenue base and good urban governance. In this context, this book has examined the costs of key urban services and identified governance issues. It is based on rich field data from six cities. The book has estimated marginal costs of providing urban services in India. Then, it has estimated total expenditure required for ensuring a certain level of services and compared it with present level of expenditure. Finally, it has identified financial and institutional challenges in introducing urban reforms in the country.In response to urban problems, the government launched a reform-linked urban infrastructure investment project, Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM). The states and urban local governments accessing the JNNURM must complete a total of 22 reforms during the 7-year mission period. The book has described various reforms under JNNURM. It has also identified innovative management practices like municipal bonds, private sector participation and community participation in financing of services. Findings of the study strongly suggest that over and above the issue of finances, institutional and functional overlap of responsibilities are also responsible for poor delivery of the urban services. The book provides very important and useful insights into costs and governance issues of urban delivery systems in urban India. It is unfortunate that it did not adequately cover the issue of urban services for the poor.
Explosive growth of cities raises a question about how the increasing concentration of population in urban areas will change the world. Based on two decades of fieldwork, the author argues that cities are the medium for change. The book is divided into three parts. These parts deal with Urban Revolution, City Adrift and Strategy for Urban Planet, respectively.In the book, Brugmann describes the urban revolution in small cities like Machala (Ecuador), Tiruppur (Tamil Nadu, India), Irwine (California) and others influencing the world. Many things were influenced by cities globally even before the Internet. Scale, density and association cluster together, bring cost efficiencies and investments, and this leads to global urban growth. Recent World Development Report 2009 also presents similar views. The Dharavi slum in Mumbai is a good example. It has very high density leading to low transport cost, high utilization of property, close linkages with suppliers and retailers, and so on. It also has close urban associations. Today, Dharavi has global business linkages.Brugmann proposes total transformation in city planning and management systems. He argues that city systems grow organically not by technical planning. In days of market-driven development, urban policy makers should create commercial opportunities so predictable that they rally a city's private interests to support necessary market disciplines and reforms and have stable alliance. Avoiding a crisis on urban system requires that we design cities as efficient productive systems that are governed by communities with strategic purposes.This book is the outcome of a multi-disciplinary international team and presents the findings of an empirical study on urban governance in Indian metropolises. The core of the book is the result of many years of research to find heuristic value and an irenic vision in case of urban governance and social relationship in four metropolitan cities: Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Kolkata. The objective of the book is to describe and analyze urban governance through the study of decision-making processes pertaining to the supply and demand of collective goods and services in these four Indian metropolises. In order to assess the reality of the decentralization process which is in principle at the heart of the new configuration and the sectorial case studies supplemented, the city studies focuses on the relations between three levels of government: Centre, State, Municipal Corporation. These studies lay emphasis on some major counter-currents, such as the increasing metropolization of urban management, the means given to elected state and national representatives to act locally and the role that the judiciary is taking over on this matter. The book is divided into two parts: Themes India has to improve its urban areas to achieve objectives of economic development. As huge investment is required in India's urban sector, it has to look for innovative approaches for financing urban services.
Explosive growth of cities raises a question about how the increasing concentration of population in urban areas will change the world. Based on two decades of fieldwork, the author argues that cities are the medium for change. The book is divided into three parts. These parts deal with Urban Revolution, City Adrift and Strategy for Urban Planet, respectively.In the book, Brugmann describes the urban revolution in small cities like Machala (Ecuador), Tiruppur (Tamil Nadu, India), Irwine (California) and others influencing the world. Many things were influenced by cities globally even before the Internet. Scale, density and association cluster together, bring cost efficiencies and investments, and this leads to global urban growth. Recent World Development Report 2009 also presents similar views. The Dharavi slum in Mumbai is a good example. It has very high density leading to low transport cost, high utilization of property, close linkages with suppliers and retailers, and so on. It also has close urban associations. Today, Dharavi has global business linkages.Brugmann proposes total transformation in city planning and management systems. He argues that city systems grow organically not by technical planning. In days of market-driven development, urban policy makers should create commercial opportunities so predictable that they rally a city's private interests to support necessary market disciplines and reforms and have stable alliance. Avoiding a crisis on urban system requires that we design cities as efficient productive systems that are governed by communities with strategic purposes.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.