Sustainable and Innovative “Arrival -City!
Doug Saunders points out in his book “Arrival City” that one-third of the world population (more than 2 billion people) move from rural to urban areas. The process of migration takes place in an Arrival City: It’s a space which changes our future radically in positive or negative sense. Those spaces are suburbs, slums or immigrant quarters in established cities located in developed, emerging or developing countries. If properly comprehended and executed by engaged stakeholders such as NGOs, these peripheral enclaves transform the fortunes of the families of migrants and refugees as well as the established city itself positively. If not properly handled or the urbanization mismanaged, those Arrival Cities develop to breeding grounds of violence, revolution, terrorism and war. The history shows that politician and stakeholder in their thoughtlessness failed to account the impact of inflowing migrants.
It seems to the author that the impact of migration from rural to urban areas is not considered properly in the 17 SDGs respectively to create sustainable (smart) cities (SDG 11).
Source: Arrival City, How Migration in History is Reshaping Our World, Doug Sounders, Random House Books. German Edition: Arrival City, Über alle Grenzen hinweg ziehen Millionen Menschen von Land in die Städte. Von ihnen hängt unsere Zukunft ab.
Roland Leithenmayr, VFV
NGO Committee on Sustainable Development Vienna 