Within a few decades, seventy per cent of the world's population will live in cities. Large urbanised areas will increasingly act as engines of economic, social and cultural development. The density of activities in urban areas may intensify environmental, logistical or social problems, but, on the other hand, it also offers more opportunities for solving them. Global urbanisation is a process whose course and implications are not yet well understood. How can the economic, social and cultural vitality of cities be strengthened and how can conflicts remain manageable? What determines the success of cities and how can governments, companies, citizens, knowledge institutions and civil society organisations jointly contribute to it? Processes of urbanisation provide a fruitful overarching starting point to develop new and pioneering social science, economic, technical and historical research in conjunction.
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The implications of urbanisation are relevant to alpha, beta and gamma research and combinations thereof. In the alpha domain, there are questions concerning relationships between city and culture in a broad sense, including themes such as citizenship and participatory democracy. In the beta domain, they may concern the urban climate, urban metabolism or greenery in the city. In the gamma domain, questions of social cohesion and the city as a source of cultural and technological innovations are of interest. But there are also numerous subtopics that transcend this tripartite division, such as mobility, health and liveability in the city. In the question of the implications of urbanisation, the connection between local phenomena and global processes plays a major role. Important for this question is design research that can underpin concrete decisions on urban development and also help generate future images of the ideal city. In the background, more normative questions, such as those about rural versus urban values or questions concerning the aesthetics of the city, play a role here. Furthermore, much urban research provides the opportunity to link action research in neighbourhoods and districts as well as research for city councils with theoretical questions on ideal urban development. This also includes the further elaboration and critical reflection on new concepts for urban development including: smart cities, green cities, sustainable cities, sharing cities, and hackable cities.
