ユーロシティーズとEUの都市政策

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This paper deals with urban problems in the European Union from two aspects. One is the recognition and opinion on the urban problems by Eurocities, which was an organization of large cities in Europe. The second aspect is the correspondence from the side of the European Union. The EU has taken some measures to overcome the problems of cities, although there is no formal institution for large cities in the European Union as a supranational organization. Eurocities was established by six large cities in 1986, and now more than 110 cities participate in its activities as its members. It insists that large cities are the engine for the economic growth and sustainable development in Europe. It also strengthens the role of cities for the democratic processes in Europe, because they are the nearest institutions to citizens. Nevertheless many of them suffer from unemployment and social exclusion. European metropolitan areas should be regenerated and reactivated, if Europe wants to keep its presence in the globalization. Corresponding to the Eurocities, the European Union began with struggling with environmental pollution problems in urban areas such as air pollution, noise, wastes management and so on at the end of the l980s. But it strengthens economic and social problems of cities in its paper "Towards an urban agenda in the European Union", which was presented by the European Commission in 1997. The EU recognizes that advanced service activities are important for economic growth and thus for combating unemployment problems and that the quality of living conditions and environment is vital for attracting high-quality service industries including Research and Development activities. Built environment and cultural heritages are included to that as well as nature in the cities. Accessibility to core metropolitan areas and mobility within each area are also important. Inclusion of migrant minorities into the city life is unavoidable for the sustainable development. These urban problems were already recognized by Manuel Castells in the first half of the l990s. He uses two terms "the space of flows" and "the space of places" to point out the urban problems in European countries. According to Castells (1989; 1994), "the space of flows" means "functional logic of power-holding organizations in asymmetrical networks of exchanges", and "the space of places" means local identities. Eurocities or its member cities are trying to articulate "the space of places" or power to "the space of places" or culture. The information acquired from the EU as well as from Eurocities and the explanation by Castells are, however, not enough to understand the effort of individual European cities to articulate them. It is necessary to investigate the problems and policies of European cities more concretely on the basis of field researches.
法政大学の論文
2004-03-05

ユーロシティーズとEUの都市政策

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