SASKIA SASSEN AND HER BOOK THE GLOBAL CITY CONCEPT

1. SASKIA SASSEN
THE GLOBAL CITY CONCEPT
DONE BY,
M.SNEHA
M.ARCH 1ST SEM

2. INTRODUCTION
 BORN ON JAN 5TH 1947 IN
NETHERLANDS
 DUTCH-AMERICAN
SOCIOLOGIST
 MARRIED RICHARD
SENNETT
 KNOWN FOR STUDYING
GLOBALISATION &
INTERNATIONAL
MIGRATION

3. BOOKS
 THE GLOBAL CITY: NEW YORK, LONDON, TOKYO
 THE MOBILITY OF LABOR AND CAPITAL. A STUDY IN
INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT AND LABOR FLOW
 CITIES IN A WORLD ECONOMY
 LOSING CONTROL? SOVEREIGNTY IN AN AGE OF
GLOBALIZATION
 GLOBALIZATION AND ITS DISCONTENTS. ESSAYS ON THE
NEW MOBILITY OF PEOPLE AND MONEY
 GUESTS AND ALIENS
 TERRITORY, AUTHORITY, RIGHTS: FROM MEDIEVAL TO
GLOBAL ASSEMBLAGES
 ELEMENTS FOR A SOCIOLOGY OF GLOBALIZATION
 EXPULSIONS: BRUTALITY AND COMPLEXITY IN THE GLOBAL
ECONOMY

4. THE GLOBAL CITY
INTRODUCING A CONCEPT
 Key to Sassen's concept of the global city is an emphasis on
the flow of information and capital
 Cities are major nodes in the interconnected systems of
information and money
 Wealth that flows facilitate financial institutions, consulting
firms, accounting firms, law firms, and media organizations
 She states that: THE DYNAMICS OF THE GLOBAL CITY ARE
DRAMATICALLY DIFFERENT THAN THOSE OF THE GREAT
CITIES OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
 Sassen emphasizes the importance of creating new
conceptual resources for making sense of urban systems and
their global network

5.  The geographic dispersal of economic activities
that marks globalization, along with the
simultaneous integration of such geographically
dispersed activities, is a key factor feeding the
growth and importance of central corporate
functions.
 These central functions become so complex that
increasingly the headquarters of large global firms
outsource them: they buy a share of their central
functions from highly specialized service firms.
SHE ARGUES FOR SEVEN FUNDAMENTAL
HYPOTHESES ABOUT THE MODERN GLOBAL
CITY:

6.  Those specialized service firms engaged in the
most complex and globalized markets are subject
to agglomeration economies.
 The more headquarters outsource their most
complex, unstandardized functions, particularly
those subject to uncertain and changing markets,
the freer they are to opt for any location
 These specialized service firms need to provide a
global service which has meant a global network of
affiliates ... and a strengthening of cross border
city-to-city transactions and networks

7.  The economic fortunes of these cities become
increasingly disconnected from their broader
hinterlands or even their national economies.
 One result of the dynamics described in hypothesis
six, is the growing informalization of a range of
economic activities which find their effective
demand in these cities, yet have profit rates that do
not allow them to compete for various resources
with the high-profit making firms at the top of the
system

8. Sassen's conceptual architecture maintains a place
for location and space:
 Global cities are not disembodied, and the
functioning of their global firms depends on a
network of activities and lesser firms within the
spatial scope of the city and its environs.
 Sassen believes there is space for political contest
between parties over the division of the global
surplus
 Hugely important subject for everyone who wants
to understand the dynamics and future directions of
the globe's mega-cities and their interconnections

9. CONCLUSION
 Most important for urbanists and economists alike,
is to envision economic mechanisms that can be
established that do a better job of sharing the fruits
of economic progress with the whole of society, not
just the elite and professional end of the
socioeconomic spectrum

10. Thank You
