Saskia Sassen (ed.): Global Networks, Linked Cities (2002)

In her pioneering book The Global City, Saskia Sassen argued that certain cities in the postindustrial world have become central nodes in the new service economy, strategic sites for the acceleration of capital and information flows as well as spaces of increasing socio-economic polarization. One effect has been that such cities have gained in importance and power relative to nation-states.

In this new collection of essays, Sassen and a distinguished group of contributors expand on the author’s earlier work in a number of important ways, focusing on two key issues. First, they look at how information flows have bound global cities together in networks, creating a global city web whose constituent cities become “global” through the networks they participate in. Second, they investigate emerging global cities in the developing world-Sao Paulo, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Mexico City, Beirut, the Dubai-Iran corridor, and Buenos Aires. They show how these globalizing zones are not only replicating many features of the top tier of global cities, but are also generating new socio-economic patterns as well. These new patterns of development promise to lead to significant changes in the structure of the global economy, as more and more cities worldwide are integrated into globalization’s circuitry.

Includes contributions from:Linda Garcia, Patrice Riemens, Geert Lovink, Peter Taylor, David Smith, Michael Timberlake, Stephen Graham, Sueli Schiffer Ramos, Christoff Parnreiter, Felicity Gu, David Meyer, Pablo Ciccolella, Iliana Mignaqui, Eric Huybrechts, Ali Parsa. Also includes six maps.

Keywords and phrases
global cities, Mexico City, Mercosur, Buenos Aires, telematics, Sharjah, Beirut, Sao Paulo, Iran, Brazil, Bandar Abbas, maquiladora, Kish Island, optic fiber, Tokyo, nomic, Lujiazui, Abu Dhabi, Argentina

Publisher Routledge, 2002
ISBN 0415931630, 9780415931632
368 pages

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Howard Rheingold: Tools for Thought: The History and Future of Mind-Extending Technology (1985)

“The digital revolution did not begin with the teenage millionaires of Silicon Valley, claims Howard Rheingold, but with such early intellectual giants as Charles Babbage, George Boole, and John von Neumann. Rheingold tells the story of what he calls the patriarchs, pioneers, and infonauts of the computer, focusing in particular on such pioneers as J. C. R. Licklider, Doug Engelbart, Bob Taylor, and Alan Kay.”

Publisher Simon & Schuster, 1985
ISBN 9780262681155

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Howard Rheingold: The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier (1993)

“In this book, Howard Rheingold tours the ‘virtual community’ of online networking. He describes a community that is as real and as much a mixed bag as any physical community andmdash;one where people talk, argue, seek information, organize politically, fall in love, and dupe others. At the same time that he tells stories about people who have received online emotional support during devastating illnesses, he acknowledges a darker side to people’s behavior in cyberspace. Indeed, contends Rheingold, people relate to each other online much the same as they do in physical communities.”

Publisher Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1993
William Patrick Book series
ISBN 9780201608700, 0201608707
ix+325 pages

Interview with author (Katie Hafner, WELL, about 2nd edition, 2000)
Reviews: Geert Lovink (Mediamatic, 1993), John Stimson (Social Science Computer Review, 1995), P.A. Dee Southard (Social Science Computer Review, 1995), Douglas B. Hindman (J Applied Communications, 1996), Scott London (c.1993), Ian Goodwin (Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture, 2004).
Analysis: Fred Turner (Technology & Culture, 2005).

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