Reconstructing Regional Politics: Special Purpose Authorities and Municipal Governments GCP-03-01

I argue in this brief essay that the tendency of scholars to focus on city governments has meant that urban scholarship has missed the most dynamic politics driving urban development for decades – the emergence of institutions that often dwarf the fiscal, administrative, and political capacity of general-purpose governments. Unless these institutions are taken into account, most of the development occurring within urban regions cannot be explained or even accounted for.

Read more »

Can Chicago Make It As a Global City? GCP-00-2

Is Chicago an international city? Of course it is. It has been ever since the second half of the nineteenth century: (1) when it was British bond investments that funded the rail lines to open the prairies and the west to the New York port; (2) when midwest corn and wheat began to supply Europe's bakeries; and (3) when new techniques of curing and refrigeration permitted the delivery of Chicago's meat to distant and even foreign markets.

Read more »