The Asian Megacity Region: A Conceptual Approach (The Urban Book Series) 3030426483, 9783030426484

Table of contents :
Foreword
Preface and Acknowledgements
Contents
Abbreviations/Acronyms
List of Figures
List of Tables
1 Introduction
1.1 Perspectives and Purpose
1.2 Book Structure
References
2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview
2.1 Views and Trends
2.1.1 Demographic and Structural Shifts: A Global View
2.1.2 Growth and Shrinkage
2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives
2.2.1 The Megacity: Some Definitional Issues
2.2.2 Regional Variations in Population Growth and Economic Development: A Brief Overview
References
3 From Megacity to Megacity Region: Is an Asian Paradigm Emerging?
3.1 Introduction
3.1.1 The Megacity Region and the Mega-Urban Region
3.1.2 Conceptual Complexities: Labels and Definitions
3.2 Through the Lenses of Scholars: Asian Megacities and Their Regions
3.2.1 Asian Mega-Urban Regions—A Novel Approach
References
4 Asian MCR: Urban-Rural Interface and Multidimensionality of the Spread Region
4.1 Introduction
4.2 The Urban-Rural Dynamics—From Divide to Interface
4.2.1 Conceptual Dilemmas: Urban? Rural?
4.2.2 Urban-Rural Linkages: Some Considerations
4.2.3 Peri-urban and Peri-urban Interface: A Regional Focus
4.2.4 Spread Region and Urban-Rural Interface
4.2.5 Spread Region and desakota
4.2.6 How Unique Is the Asian Megacity Region?
4.3 Sustainable Development Through a Multidimensional, Interdisciplinary, and Color-Coordinated Lens
References
5 Scale and Where the Three Prongs Can Meet
5.1 The Concept of Scale in Geography: Foundational yet Confounding
5.1.1 Shifting Thoughts and Integrative Focus
5.2 Where the Three Prongs Meet
5.2.1 Core and Extent: Two Components of the Megacity Regional Frame
5.2.2 In Recognition of the Diverse Spaces of the Megacity Region
5.2.3 Observational Scale: An Example of Where the Three Prongs Can Meet
References
6 The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical Exploration
6.1 Introduction
6.2 The Geographies of the NCR
6.2.1 A Brief Background
6.2.2 Regional Profile and Planning Objectives
6.2.3 Some Research Perspectives
6.3 Dynamics of the URI in the Spread Region of the NCR, Delhi: An Empirical Exploration
6.3.1 Research Design, Purpose, and Methodology
6.3.2 Results and Discussion
6.4 A Closing Comment
References
7 Concluding Thoughts
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Governance and the Asian MCR
7.3 Data Issues and the Asian MCR
7.4 Urban-Rural Interfaces, Sub-scalar Spaces and a Vision for Future Discourse on Sustainability
References
Erratum
Correction to: D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1
Index

Citation preview

The Urban Book Series

Debnath Mookherjee

The Asian Megacity Region A Conceptual Approach

The Urban Book Series Editorial Board Fatemeh Farnaz Arefian, University of Newcastle, Singapore, Singapore, Silk Cities & Bartlett Development Planning Unit, UCL, London, UK Michael Batty, Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, UCL, London, UK Simin Davoudi, Planning & Landscape Department GURU, Newcastle University, Newcastle, UK Geoffrey DeVerteuil, School of Planning and Geography, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK Andrew Kirby, New College, Arizona State University, Phoenix, AZ, USA Karl Kropf, Department of Planning, Headington Campus, Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, UK Karen Lucas, Institute for Transport Studies, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK Marco Maretto, DICATeA, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Parma, Parma, Italy Fabian Neuhaus, Faculty of Environmental Design, University of Calgary, Calgary, AB, Canada Vitor Manuel Aráujo de Oliveira, Porto University, Porto, Portugal Christopher Silver, College of Design, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA Giuseppe Strappa, Facoltà di Architettura, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Roma, Italy Igor Vojnovic, Department of Geography, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA Jeremy W. R. Whitehand, Earth & Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK

The Urban Book Series is a resource for urban studies and geography research worldwide. It provides a unique and innovative resource for the latest developments in the field, nurturing a comprehensive and encompassing publication venue for urban studies, urban geography, planning and regional development. The series publishes peer-reviewed volumes related to urbanization, sustainability, urban environments, sustainable urbanism, governance, globalization, urban and sustainable development, spatial and area studies, urban management, transport systems, urban infrastructure, urban dynamics, green cities and urban landscapes. It also invites research which documents urbanization processes and urban dynamics on a national, regional and local level, welcoming case studies, as well as comparative and applied research. The series will appeal to urbanists, geographers, planners, engineers, architects, policy makers, and to all of those interested in a wide-ranging overview of contemporary urban studies and innovations in the field. It accepts monographs, edited volumes and textbooks. Now Indexed by Scopus!

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/14773

Debnath Mookherjee

The Asian Megacity Region A Conceptual Approach

123

Debnath Mookherjee Department of Environmental Studies Huxley College of the Environment Western Washington University Bellingham, WA, USA

ISSN 2365-757X ISSN 2365-7588 (electronic) The Urban Book Series ISBN 978-3-030-42648-4 ISBN 978-3-030-42649-1 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

For Shibnath & Annapurna Mukherjee and Anil Hari & Juthika Chatterjee with love and respect

Foreword

In 1950, there was only one megacity, New York. A half century later, depending on your regional definition of Asia and on the bounding of the megacity region, there were three in the West, four in Central and South America, and ten in Asia. Now, less than two decades later, there are close to fifty, around thirty of them in Asia alone! Over the decades, some megacities have become monster cities, two or more times the population size-limit set for megacity status, and covering vast areas. Due to this enormous momentum shift in global mega urban development trends, this book on the Asian megacity region is not only fitting, but also brings together key topical interests of the author from a lifetime of research, and serves as his literary capstone after an extraordinarily long and productive academic career spanning more than six decades. Because they are such fascinating phenomena, large urban agglomerations in general and megacities in particular—the latter being a more recent designation as a superior urban class—have been a fertile area for urban research for several decades. Population size, composition, land coverage, and the growth and function of these cities, as well as appropriate planning approaches to cater for the different history-specific socio-economic conditions in which they developed, have remained prominent themes in academic and professional discourse ever since Herbert Wells, Lewis Mumford, Constant Doxiadis, and Jean Gottmann pioneered intellectual inquiry in this field of research. In this book, the author attempts to find common ground but also draws distinctions between views of researchers on the composition and evolution of mega-urban development trends in Asia and other parts of the world. He recognises the general shift in planning thinking away from singular cities towards the wider and more deliberate multifaceted scrutiny of environmental and sustainability concerns of core cities and their surrounding hybrid urban-rural activity fields or spread-regions, all of which, together form the megacity region. Highlighting the need for a shift in emphasis from short term goal setting which serves mainly self-interests to a more broad-based, holistic, long term approach aimed at greater sustainability, the book suggests a tri-pronged approach to sustainable development of megacity planning in Asia. This approach draws the vii

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Foreword

reader’s attention, first to the complexities, intricacies, and hybridity of rural-urban character and spatial relationships within the city-region; then to the multidimensionality of the concept of sustainability; and finally to the need for a paradigmatic shift in Asia towards the regional thinking of megacity scale in the First World. The simultaneous incorporation of these three facets, according to the author, is essential for sustainable development planning in Asia. Individually, none of the approaches are new, but emphasising the simultaneous potential impact of his tri-pronged process on development planning thinking in Asia, adds new value. The author joins other researchers who agree that scale is a key-aspect of megacity research. To fully comprehend commonalities in the composition and functioning of megacities and to better grasp the intricacies, complexities, and transitional nature of their social, cultural, and economic make-up more than single megacities need to be studied. Where the megacity region begins and ends is a critical issue in megacity analysis and planning. Starting with a comprehensive coverage of the unravelling of the meaning of the term scale in the literature, and linking the multidimensionality of the term to the original meaning and subsequent additions to the meaning of the term megacity region prompted the author to suggest that not only the megacity region, but a larger than the narrow definition of the megacity region needs to be taken into consideration in Asian megacity planning and research. The author does not try to provide final answers in the book about the definition of the megacity region. But, by distinguishing between core cities and their spread regions, and adding the idea of appropriate graining of analysis, he provides just enough to allow for the spawning of new ideas about a more appropriate bounding of megacity regions. One such promising idea might be the integration of Constant Doxiadis’ kinetic fields, John Friedmann’s urban fields and Brian Berry’s daily urban systems to accurately define the activity limits or boundaries of both core cities and spread regions of megacity regions. Viewing megacity regions as special case urban systems—dense constellations of hierarchically arranged socially and economically linked city nodes—each node surrounded by hinterlands of varying width and density of urban/rural character, and each interacting more with nodes within its own constellation than with others in other constellations within the daily commuting limit of the urban system representing the mega region allows for the simultaneous incorporation of core cities and spread regions in polycentric, even polynodal urban structures, spatially bounded by daily social and economic kinetic fields. Manie Geyer Emeritus Professor and former Director of the Centre for Regional and Urban Innovation and Statistical Exploration Stellenbosch University Stellenbosch, South Africa

Preface and Acknowledgements

The intricacies of space-people relationships have always fascinated me. From the small town nestled in the foothills of the Himalayas where I grew up, to the big city of Kolkata, India, where I pursued higher education, to the college town in the American South, where I continued graduate studies, I have been an avid student and rapt observer of the urbanization process. The complexities of growth dynamics and development issues, and their spatial implications for human habitats across the regions and countries of the globe, captivated me. In ensuing decades, in my roles as a teacher and ongoing student of urban geography, I continued to observe the many facets of the urban transformations taking place in Asia and elsewhere in the rest of the world. To my mind, the rise of the megacities, and the consequent changes in their surrounding landscapes, epitomized this transformation. The cities of Asia, distinctive as they had been in the past, were fast becoming ubiquitous ‘megacities’, the land around them evolving into complex growth-spread territorial city-regions depicting changing dynamics of hybrid urban-rural traits, linkages, flows, and functions. Observing the unique rural-urban hybridity and transient character of the Asian megacity region (MCR) firsthand—through literature, discussions with scholars, planners, and citizenry at numerous international conferences, as well as visits to many countries across the globe, including Asia, over the years—it became evident to me that a coherent, comprehensive, and distinctly Asian approach to sustainable development was essential. However, definitional and conceptual ambiguities, lack of commonly used scalar frameworks, piecemeal and/or sectoral approaches, city-centric outlooks, and top-down or macro-regional planning were getting in the way of achieving a coherent study approach in development. Even though a more inclusive, flexible, dialectical, and inter-, cross-, multi-, and trans-disciplinary attitude was emerging in the literature, it was not being reflected in practice. Upon retirement after over five decades at Western Washington University, I finally had time to pause and consider how to capture these dilemmas and trends into a coherent approach. Thus, the idea of this volume was born. I think of this as a meta-study, and to share some of my ideas with the readers in fields within and beyond geography who are interested in a sustainable future for the Asian MCR. ix

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In this volume, I treat the Asian MCR as a conceptual entity, as distinct from the geographically diverse individual megacity regions of Asia. This book is designed to serve students of geography, as well as other fields of social science, and I hope that it will be of special interest and value to professionals and researchers interested in policymaking, planning, and development studies in the context of the Asian MCR. There is no way I can acknowledge all—colleagues, students and friends alike— who helped shape my thoughts and provided inspiration and support in preparation of this volume; I remain in their debt. I thank Juliana Pitanguy, Carmen Spelbos, Pranay Parashuram, Ritu Chandwani and others in the Urban Series team at Springer for their interest, encouragement and patience. My special thanks to Ms. Pitanguy and Ms. Spelbos, who, between them, offered seamless guidance and ready assistance on matters large and small throughout the manuscript preparation process. My sincere thanks are due to the anonymous peer reviewers commissioned by Springer who provided valuable feedback and thoughtful suggestions. My colleagues, staff members and former students at Western Washington University have been a continual source of encouragement and inspiration; I am grateful to them all. I am especially indebted to Steve Hollenhorst, Dean of Western’s Huxley College of the Environment, for his consistent support. I thank Diane Knutson, Department Manager, for her positive ‘can do’ attitude and unstinting help. Eugene Hoerauf, former staff cartographer and manager of the Spatial Analysis Computer Laboratory at Huxley, helped with locating the data and the initial drafting of the NCR, Delhi base maps. Jonah White, my former graduate student and currently a doctoral candidate at Michigan State University, rendered invaluable assistance in dataset compilation and analysis, as well as preparation of illustrations. Mark Pederson, Instructor in our department, helped locate and format some data sets. With minor exceptions, the final illustrations for the volume were drawn by Adriana Varchetta, former graduate student, while Stephan Freelan, GIS Specialist and Assistant Director, Huxley Spatial Institute, WWU, offered technical guidance. I thank them all. My special thanks to Western’s library personnel for their assistance and patience with my endless requests over the years. I recognize with gratitude the extraordinary support I received from: Rupesh Gupta, Assistant Professor, Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar College, Delhi University, Raj Kapoor Sharma, Superintending Engineer, Irrigation and Waterways Department, Government of West Bengal, India, Gautam Ghosh, Deputy Director General, National Informatics Centre (NIC), Ministry of Electronic and Information Technology, Government of India, Purnendu Mukherjee, Scientist-E and Additional Director (Retired), and Arup Chattopadhyay, Scientist-E, Additional Director, National Institute of Electronics and Information Technology (NIELIT), Ministry of Electronic and Information Technology, Government of India. They helped me in multiple ways, including joining me in my ongoing quest for data, engaging in many sessions of insightful discussions, and introducing me to a number of educators and planners in the field of developmental planning. To all of them, I owe a special note of thanks.

Preface and Acknowledgements

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Finally, I do not know how to express my gratitude to every single member of my family—immediate and extended, near and far, for their support. Their love and encouragement endured all through the process of research and writing over the years. I hope Nikhil, Neha, Arin, and Avi understand that their ‘Dadu’ did his best to be at every piano performance, kayak race, soccer game, and swimming lesson. Sati read the entire manuscript throughout the writing phases, with a critical eye for coherence and clarity in presentation. Her enthusiastic belief that the book had something important to contribute has been a source of motivation during the writing process. And finally, Supriya has been my compass ever since joining my life’s journey over fifty years ago. This project has been no exception. Her involvement, from the very initial exploration of the research idea to navigating the manuscript through complex paths to completion will remain immeasurable and fathomless. Bellingham, USA

Debnath Mookherjee

Contents

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1 1 9 11

2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1 Views and Trends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.1 Demographic and Structural Shifts: A Global View . . . . 2.1.2 Growth and Shrinkage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives . . . 2.2.1 The Megacity: Some Definitional Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2.2 Regional Variations in Population Growth and Economic Development: A Brief Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1 Perspectives and Purpose 1.2 Book Structure . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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3 From Megacity to Megacity Region: Is an Asian Paradigm Emerging? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.1 The Megacity Region and the Mega-Urban Region . . 3.1.2 Conceptual Complexities: Labels and Definitions . . . . 3.2 Through the Lenses of Scholars: Asian Megacities and Their Regions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.1 Asian Mega-Urban Regions—A Novel Approach . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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43 43 44 49

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4 Asian MCR: Urban-Rural Interface and Multidimensionality of the Spread Region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2 The Urban-Rural Dynamics—From Divide to Interface . . . . 4.2.1 Conceptual Dilemmas: Urban? Rural? . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.2 Urban-Rural Linkages: Some Considerations . . . . . .

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73 73 81 82 83

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Contents

4.2.3 Peri-urban and Peri-urban Interface: A Regional Focus 4.2.4 Spread Region and Urban-Rural Interface . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.5 Spread Region and desakota . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2.6 How Unique Is the Asian Megacity Region? . . . . . . . . 4.3 Sustainable Development Through a Multidimensional, Interdisciplinary, and Color-Coordinated Lens . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Scale and Where the Three Prongs Can Meet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 The Concept of Scale in Geography: Foundational yet Confounding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.1 Shifting Thoughts and Integrative Focus . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2 Where the Three Prongs Meet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.1 Core and Extent: Two Components of the Megacity Regional Frame . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.2 In Recognition of the Diverse Spaces of the Megacity Region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.3 Observational Scale: An Example of Where the Three Prongs Can Meet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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6 The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical Exploration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2 The Geographies of the NCR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.1 A Brief Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.2 Regional Profile and Planning Objectives . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.3 Some Research Perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3 Dynamics of the URI in the Spread Region of the NCR, Delhi: An Empirical Exploration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3.1 Research Design, Purpose, and Methodology . . . . . . . . 6.3.2 Results and Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4 A Closing Comment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Concluding Thoughts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.2 Governance and the Asian MCR . . . . . . . . . . 7.3 Data Issues and the Asian MCR . . . . . . . . . . 7.4 Urban-Rural Interfaces, Sub-scalar Spaces and for Future Discourse on Sustainability . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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a Vision . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

Erratum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

E1

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

Abbreviations/Acronyms

CBDR EIP FAO GoI MCR MUR NCOU NCR NCR-D NCRPB PU PUI RUI SEZ SR SWOT TCPO UFRD UNFCCC URI WBGU

Common but Differentiated Responsibility Eco-Industrial Park Food and Agriculture Organization Government of India Megacity Region Megaurban Region National Commission on Urbanization National Capital Region National Capital Region, Delhi National Capital Region Planning Board Peri-Urban Peri-Urban Interface Rural-Urban Interface Special Economic Zone Spread Region Strength Weakness Opportunities Threats Town and Country Planning Organization Urban Function for Rural Development United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Urban-Rural Interface German Advisory Council on Global Change

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List of Figures

Fig. 2.1

Fig. 2.2

Fig. 2.3

Fig. 2.4

Fig. 4.1 Fig. 4.2 Fig. 4.3 Fig. 4.4 Fig. 5.1 Fig. 5.2 Fig. 5.3 Fig. 6.1 Fig. 6.2 Fig. 6.3

The demographic divide (Source Adapted from United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Urbanization trends across continents, 1950–2010; projected to 2050 (Source Adapted from United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) . . . . . . . . . Asian megacities: spatial pattern and population size, 2015, 2030 (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . a Number of Asian megacities by region, 2000–2030. b Population size of Asian megacities by region, 2000–2030 (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Theoretical ideas: an illustration (Source Adapted from Potter 2014) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The spread region of the MCR: a conceptual sketch (Source Author) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Conceptual dimensions of sustainability (Source Reproduced from Allen and You 2002) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The green and brown planning perspectives: an illustration (Source Reproduced from Allen and You 2002) . . . . . . . . . . . The ‘meanings’ of scale (Source Reproduced with permission from Sheppard and McMaster 2004a, b) . . . . . . . . The MCR: a bi-scalar conceptual sketch (Source Author). . . . Where the three prongs meet: a conceptual schema (Source Author) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The National Capital Region (NCR) of India: Location (Source NCRPB 2005; Census of India 2011) . . . . . . . . . . . . Administrative boundaries within the NCR (Source NCRPB 2005; Census of India 2011) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Urban-rural interface: conceptual models (Source Author) . . .

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List of Figures

6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7 6.8 6.9 6.10

Fig. 6.11 Fig. 6.12 Fig. 6.13 Fig. 6.14 Fig. 7.1

a–d Component score maps, 2001 (Source Author) . . . . . . . . Cluster nesting map, 2001 (Source Author) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Salient attributes of nested clusters, 2001 (Source Author) . . . a–d Component score maps, 2011 (Source Author) . . . . . . . . Cluster nesting map, 2011 (Source Author) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Salient attributes of nested clusters, 2011 (Source Author) . . . a–e Component score maps, 2001–11 changes (Source Author) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Cluster nesting map, 2001–11 changes (Source Author) . . . . . Salient attributes of nested clusters, 2001–11 changes (Source Author) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agricultural workers, 2001, 2011 (Source GoI) . . . . . . . . . . . aRoad accessibility, 2001, 2011, bRoad networks, 2001, 2011 (Source GoI) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A vision for the future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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173 175 176 178 179 180

. . 182 . . 188 . . 189 . . 190 . . 191 . . 215

List of Tables

Table 2.1

Table 2.2

Table 2.3

Table 2.4 Table 4.1 Table Table Table Table Table Table Table Table Table

4.2 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7 6.8

Table 6.9

Growth patterns: selected megacities, % change (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Number and population change of megacities by regions, 2000–2015, and projection to 2030 (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Urban and megacity population of Asia by regions, 2000, 2015, and 2030 projection (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) . . . Selected megacities of Asia: GDP growth, 2008, with projection for 2025 (Source Hawksworth et al. 2009) . . . . . . Contextualized definitions of peri-urban interface (PUI): some examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Desakota and spread region: a subjective interpretation . . . . Research parameters and rationale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Selected variables, definitions, and data sources. . . . . . . . . . . Component structure, 2001 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Component structure, 2011 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Component structure, 2001–11 change. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agglomeration schedule 2001–11 change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Mean values of component scores, 2001–11 change . . . . . . . Urbanization patterns and trend, NCR, 2001, 2011, and 2001–11 change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Growth rates of DMA Centers and Priority Towns, 1991–01 and 2001–11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

..

26

..

31

..

32

..

39

. . . . . . . . .

90 100 166 167 172 177 181 184 185

. . . . . . . . .

. . 186 . . 192

xix

Chapter 1

Introduction

Abstract Within the global urban-rural dynamics, Asia is distinguished by the rapid growth of its giant cities, which are transforming their erstwhile non-urban and urbanizing hinterlands and giving rise to individual city-regions. This unique growthspread areal entity—the Asian megacity region (MCR), a distinct urbanization phenomenon—is the focus of this volume. I see the MCR as a single system entity, one which is urbanizing the landscape around a core megacity, and is characterized by varying ‘urban-rural interfaces’ (URI) that span the entire region and evolve over time. I treat the MCR as a conceptual entity, distinct from the geographically diverse individual megacity regions of Asia. The argument inherent in this work is that the Asian MCR deserves more attention, in particular from the perspectives of sustainable development, than it has historically been accorded. Moreover, concerns such as conceptual and definitional ambiguities, conflated use of different scalar configurations of city-regions, data issues, fragmented governance, and the dearth of a unified multidimensional focus in city-regional planning will need to be addressed to optimize our understanding of the Asian MCR. These themes are touched on in this introductory chapter as I state the spirit and purpose of my endeavor, propose a three-pronged approach, and note that an application of this approach, an illustrative empirical analysis of the National Capital Region-Delhi (NCR-D), concludes this volume. Keywords Asian megacity region (MCR) · National Capital Region-Delhi (NCR-D) · Three-pronged approach · Sustainable development

1.1 Perspectives and Purpose A significant shift in the global demographics occurred at the dawn of the twentyfirst century, when, for the first time in history the number of ‘urban’ dwellers exceeded ‘rural’. Discourse and debate on themes such as the growing obsolescence, limitations, misleading tenor, or redundancy of the so called rural-urban definitional, sectoral, or functional divide, dichotomy, or continuum notwithstanding (e.g., Koppel The original version of this chapter was revised: Typographical mistakes have been corrected. The erratum to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_1

1

2

1 Introduction

1991; Tacoli 1998, 2003; Cohen 2004; Montgomery 2008; Champion et al. 2004; Champion and Hugo 2004), the fact remains that this evolving transformation of the human habitat in recent decades is occurring at many fronts, bringing forth issues and concerns virtually non-existent in centuries past. Specifically, transformations in pace, scale and momentum taking place in both urban and rural environments are contributing to foundational structural changes in settlement systems all across the world, and considering the rapid growth of its giant cities, having especially momentous consequence in Asia. Not only is urbanization expanding at a rapid pace, as measured in increases in urban population relative to the total population, but the scale of the change, as measured by the absolute number of urban population, is unprecedented (Cohen 2004, p. 27). The momentum, as evidenced in the rate of change in the degree of urbanization, appears to have shifted from More Developed Countries (MDCs) to Less Developed Countries (LDCs), so that countries in the developing world are urbanizing at a faster rate than before. A process of structural change in the urban settlement system is also taking place across the world: In addition to changes within the urban hierarchical structures, the monocentric dominance of the giant cities of yesteryear is giving way to more polycentric, and increasingly polynodal, urban settlements. While some developed countries are beginning to observe a state of stagnation or even a ‘shrinkage’ of their largest centers (Oswalt and Rieniets 2006; Richardson and Nam 2014), most megacities in the developing world are proliferating at an unprecedented pace (UN Report 2015). Concurrently, smaller urban centers— including the secondary cities almost at the threshold of gaining megacity status, as well as those at the very bottom of the hierarchical structure with arguably dubious urban characteristics—are rapidly emerging in developing countries. There are major regional variations in this trend; but Asia—at the forefront of the developing world— is witnessing rapid changes both in its rural-urban dynamics, as well as in its urban settlement structures.1 Asia, the land of paradoxes and similarities, divergences and convergences, is undergoing an urban (and consequently rural) transformation of historical significance that varies by almost all indicators of urbanization (e.g., degree, intensity, nature, pace, and scale) across the continent, even as common motifs emerge out of the heterogeneity.2 As we consider those commonalities, it is helpful to remember a colorful analogy offered by Aprodicio Laquian (2005): “Despite the differences…., 1 The

phrases, ‘rural-urban’ and ‘urban-rural’ are used interchangeably throughout the volume. somewhat tangential to the topic at hand, I cannot resist including the following observation by Koppel (1991) for its insightful and thought-provoking contribution to our understanding of Asia. In questioning the traditional rural-urban dichotomy, Koppel noted some of what he saw as the “antonymous pairs” of convergence and divergence taking place simultaneously in Asia: “(1) converging material cultures coexisting with diverging ethical-religious cultures; (2) converging ‘commercialization’ of economic relations coexisting with diverging social and political foundations of exchange; (3) converging patterns of social practice coexisting with diverging patterns of cultural interpretation; (4) converging patterns of class formation and political expression coexisting with diverging patterns of economic organizations and social movement; and (5) converging patterns of human settlement and material culture coexisting with diverging patterns of social community and historical consciousness.” “The rural-urban dichotomy can certainly array the processes

2 Although

1.1 Perspectives and Purpose

3

however, they [mega-urban regions] do share a number of characteristics, in much the same way that apples and oranges (or mangoes and mangosteens) can all be classified as fruits.” Laquian observed four such Asian mega-urban regional commonalities: (a) population size (< 10 m to > 26 m), (b) outward spread to adjacent urban-rural areas and sometime linkages to ‘urban fields of other city regions’, (c) ‘socioeconomic, cultural and political dominance on their national and regional hinterlands’, and (d) “… a pattern of organizing economic and social space so that they all have a densely developed mega-city core and an extended metropolitan region—and some of them, a megalopolitan form as well” (2005, p. 23). One can think of a few other components as corollary to the above. For example, in general, Asian nations are exhibiting a growing interest in extending developmental planning beyond jurisdictional boundaries of the cities into surrounding regions, and a simultaneous concern that the planning be sustainable. And here lies another crucial commonality, one that is at the heart of my approach to the Asian megacity region (MCR) as a conceptual entity: the emergence of intrinsically urban-rural hybrid spatial entities that are manifesting themselves through morphological, functional, economic, and sociocultural transformations. Referring to John Friedmann’s concept of ‘urban field’ and Terrence McGee’s desakota, Laquian, in a later publication, explicitly noted this specific commonality in a statement distinguished by its utter simplicity: “… the fields of influence of mega-urban regions encompass both urban and rural areas” (2011, p. 305). While some of these common, interwoven threads that run through Asian urbanization discourse are in the tangible territory of urban-rural demographics, the rest— attitudinal changes towards urban-rural divisions, optimal regional configurations, and urban sustainability—are perhaps more in the intangible realm of human mindsets and environmental awareness, best discernible through literature and planning efforts. Arguably, it can be expected that changes in the first have brought, and will continue to bring about changes in the other areas in the form of mindsets of stakeholders (setting off a cyclical process), and that pragmatic considerations will prevail over ideological differences. For example, it can be expected that the growth of the large Asian cities, as observed in regional context, with their increased complexities in form and function and the expansion of their areal extent, with relentless encroachment into the rural landscape—with both concurrent and emerging complications and consequences— will continue to shift the thinking process of Asian academicians and planners. Instead of thinking of cities as singular bounded spatial entities, the focus will shift to the regions surrounding the cities—the ‘city-regions’—opening the narrower focus of city planning to fully embrace the complex dynamics and associated socioeconomic and ecological/environmental responsibilities inherent in city-regional planning. In addition, faced with a multitude of unsustainable prospects such as a persistent tide of rising population, severely constrained and dwindling resources, and urban expansion into the rural hinterlands, exacerbated by the human propensity to support myopic referenced in the pairs, but in doing so do ‘rural’ and ‘urban’ become metaphor ically translucent lenses diffusing considerably more light than they focus?” questions Koppel (1991, p. 49)

4

1 Introduction

visions and immediate or sectoral interests over a more holistic, long-term approach, the importance of urban regional sustainability as a research subject and a planning goal will continue to gain momentum in the developing world. And importantly, from my perspective, it can be expected that the Asian megacity region (MCR), which I conceptualize as a single system urbanizing landscape around a core megacity, will receive the attention it deserves from researchers and planners interested in sustainable development. This last expectation—the focus on the Asian MCR as a conceptual entity, as well as an evolving phenomenon—and a holistic approach to this spatiotemporal concept, is at the core of this volume. Having said this, I feel it is important to clarify two points for the reader. First, throughout the volume, the term ‘megacity region’ (MCR) is used in singular form to denote its use as a concept, as distinct from the geographically diverse individual megacity regions. Beyond a basic background discussion in Chap. 2 comparing the diverse patterns of megacity growth among the Asian regions, and the empirical study of one particular MCR in South Asia in Chap. 6, discussion in this volume does not pertain to the individual megacity regions of Asia. And second, by using the nomenclature ‘Asian megacity region’, I do not, and in truth cannot, presuppose, claim, or imply a continent-specific uniqueness for the Asian MCR at this time. As will be discussed, much of our view of the principal characteristics of the Asian MCR is based on inferences from observations of other scalar entities within or beyond Asia. My purpose is to draw attention to the fact that this scalar variation of the Asian city-region deserves much more concerted attention from researchers, planners, and social scientists in general than it has been accorded in the past. Discussions on conceptual and definitional ambiguities, interchangeable/conflated use of different scalar configurations of city-regions, data issues, and need for a unified multidimensional focus on urbanization beyond the megacities of Asia—in other words, much of what this volume is all about—all converge on the megacity region (MCR). A comparison of the Asian MCR with non-Asian-specific MCRs is beyond the scope of this volume. Rather, it is on the backdrop of the Asian MCR that my conceptual approach, as introduced below, is formulated. Among the many distinct, yet interrelated strands of discourse that run through the literature, three facets can be discerned that I consider to be of especial relevance. Those three elements help us to define a holistic approach to understanding the dynamics of an evolving city-regional environment, especially from the standpoint of sustainable planning in context of the developing world. Together, they form the conceptual foundation of my work in this volume, and that for want of a better descriptor, I think of as a ‘tri-pronged’ approach. First, this paradigm acknowledges the unique identity of the interactive and transitional rural-urban landscape, an intrinsically mixed urban-rural territory, variously conceptualized both in terms of form, as well as process, under different labels (such as ‘peri-urban’, ‘urban field’, ‘desakota’, ‘desakotasi’, etc.), each with different ascribed attributes depending on the locales of the territories (e.g., developed or developing world, in global or regional contexts) and/or the perspectives of the researchers. Based on my own perspectives and biases, my conceptualization of this

1.1 Perspectives and Purpose

5

hybrid territory is of a growth-induced ‘spread-region’ (SR) around the megacity core, primarily representing one urban system, and experiencing what can perhaps be described as varying shades and levels of ‘urban-rural interfaces’ (URI) spanning the entire region and evolving through time. Integrally related to this, the second part of the three-pronged approach underscores the importance of an interdisciplinary3 and collaborative approach to the inter-relational dynamics of multiple socioeconomic, political, ecological/environmental and other (context-specific) dimensions in sustainability considerations that, although at the core of urban-regional sustainability literature, often fails to be implemented in practice. The third and final facet explores spatial and temporal variations that are likely to take place within the scalar extent of such a hybrid region. Within this prong, the many ‘meanings’ of scale will need to be recognized and incorporated in city-regional discourse, as appropriate. A dualistic and inclusive approach to scale, incorporating pertinent elements in scale’s physical/ecological, as well as its evolving/constructed/representational/discursive and other aspects, will need to be explored and utilized in any pursuit of regional sustainability. Given a standard taxonomy of scale, it can be hoped that readily accessible data for spatial markers such as population characteristics, settlement types, and space-specific resources can be utilized for spatial entities as long as they are uniformly used across intra-national and international boundaries. The evolving, discursive, relational elements of scale, as discussed and debated in the human and ecological geographic fields, on the other hand, might be expected to reflect some of the likely temporal and spatial variations within and across a given megacity region. Such variations (potentially pointing to changing sub-scalar patterns) should yield valuable information on the dynamics of the intra-regional commonalities and differences that, in turn, can be expected to inform more efficient sustainability planning. I believe the integration of these three elements into a coherent approach is critical for sustainable planning within the Asian megacity region (MCR). That the three prongs are intrinsically interlinked is perhaps incontrovertible. But, while there is ample support in the literature for advocating, or adopting, each of these individual strands, to my knowledge, efforts to combine the three into a cohesive approach—especially in context of the megacity regions of Asia—are still wanting. The current project is driven by my strong belief in this conceptual interconnectedness in the Asian megacity regions, especially from the standpoint of planning and policymaking, and—equally important in my estimation—from the point of view of empirical research. I am well aware that the approach, as envisioned and described in this volume, may be judged as overly simplistic. No doubt such a critique is justifiable for many reasons, not least of which is my (intentional) conceptual disengagement with underlying (urban, developmental, planning) processes and jurisdictional, governance and other complex econo-political issues. Consideration of these processes and issues, important as they are, are nonetheless beyond my 3 The terms interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary, cross-disciplinary, multi-disciplinary and such, each

with their own individual and obvious connotations, are used interchangeably in this volume.

6

1 Introduction

current purpose, which is to share a simple and common-sense approach to start a conversation, one that, I believe, may make a difference. I believe in its ‘feet on the ground’ do-ability precisely because of its simplicity. Initially, I undertook this work with a two-fold purpose. The first involved the utility and synergistic potential of the three facets of the model. The second involved an attempt to embed the basic principles of this model into an empirical exploration of one of the megacity regions of Asia, with the hope of extending the scope of comparative and/or generalizable research in the future. As noted below, a third purpose, borne out of hours of futile efforts and dashed hopes due to data scarcity issues, soon emerged. Adopting a concerted/collaborative, cohesive and holistic approach for planning, policy and research on such a complex and consequential phenomenon such as urbanization is a challenging task, especially in the developing world. Many factors, including conceptual ambiguities, lack of scalar uniformity, limited availability of and/or accessibility to appropriate and reliable data at appropriate spatial and temporal scales, and the many socioeconomic, political, and other issues, often complicate such efforts. For example, discussions about the sustainability concept in general, and megacity/mega-urban-related urban-regional sustainability in particular, are fraught with discrepant concepts, interpretations, and measurement criteria, often depending on the disciplinary backgrounds, interests (vested or academic), philosophic orientations, and even social and economic stakes of the persons, groups or agencies participating in the discussion. Instead of comprehensive and cohesive approaches towards sustainable planning at appropriate geographic locations and scales, urban policies are often marked by fragmented, piecemeal approaches with sometimes conflicting goals or viewpoints held by policy makers, a state of affairs often exacerbated by fragmented jurisdictions and governance issues. This status quo is much lamented, and the need for a multi-dimensional comprehensive outlook strongly advocated by many. However, the academic discourse in scholarly journals and books—with some exceptions—has not generally translated to a cohesive research agenda, and is not reflected in individual research foci of the numerous empirical studies on urban issues in the Asian context. As a result, in the data-deficient research environment in many Asian countries, empirical research—potentially one of the most powerful tools in the hands of the planners and policy makers, as well as the foundation for theory building and testing—has often been relegated to the researchers’ shelf, with limited and transitory value, instead of in planners’ and policy makers’ tool boxes for effective policy decisions. This is a topic that is close to my heart as will be evident throughout the volume. However, there are other developments that are encouraging. In contrast to the First World focus on city regions of earlier decades, literature on megacity- and mega-urban regions in the recent years is showing a higher level of inclusivity, and an awareness of the current urban dynamics in, and future possible trajectories for, the developing world. This is heartening as a sign of a universal broadening of focus, noticeable even in works not exclusively centered on the Third World. I view this trend with much hope but also some caution. The hope, perhaps involving a leap of faith, is that by such inclusion, theoretical groundwork for urbanization

1.1 Perspectives and Purpose

7

and planning may finally become more context-specific and more attuned to urban dynamics unique to the individual continents or regions of the world, Asia in this case. I believe that this trend, in conjunction with the heretofore unprecedented interconnectedness among and within world regions due to globalization, augurs well for more effective and collaborative sustainable developmental planning approaches for city regions, megacity regions and megaregions of the future. The caution is that it is more easily said than done; for this trend to be more meaningful than varied adaptations of ‘cookie-cutter prescriptions’ for the Third World, it must be based on firm context-specific empirical foundation(s). That, by itself, is problematic because such an approach requires a metaphorical ‘balancing act’. On one hand, the evolving urban dynamics of these scalar and other variations of the city-regions in the developing nations will need to be studied and understood in their individual city, regional, and country-specific contexts; on the other hand, concurrent attention must also be paid to—what I think of as the three C’s—comparability, collaboration, and comprehensive focus in the academic and planning fields for effective trans-regional and global policies and planning purposes that transcend contextual specificity. My thinking on this issue is simple. Given that empirical research, in the context of the city-regions in the developing world, is fraught with many obstacles, we will need to make the best use of all available resources, including both theoretical insights and pragmatic considerations. Even a cursory glance across the enormous and evergrowing empirical research (and planning) literature in Asia, for example, informs us that whereas the literature on urban sustainability is replete with arguments for a multi-dimensional, holistic approach in urban planning and problem solving, the efforts to address it are usually undertaken from limited, typically uni-dimensional perspectives. One reason for this gap between the ideal and the actual may lie in the dearth of the readily accessible and reliable data sets required for a holistic regional approach, but the other reasons may be traced to the continuation of a sectoral stance in city-regional planning, governance and resource allocation for the rapidly transforming landscapes around the megacities of Asia. The above, in a nutshell, is at the heart of this volume. Even as I note the occurrences of some of the definitional and conceptual ‘fuzziness’ prevalent in the literature and critique data issues through its pages, my intent is not to dwell on the negative, but, on the contrary, to acknowledge and applaud the positive by joining in the current shift in urbanization discourse towards more holistic thinking about urban regional sustainability issues in context of Asian megacity regions. As an academician and an ardent student of urbanization for over six decades, I have been an interested observer of the complexities of urban phenomena as they have unfolded in disparate contexts, locales, and times. It is from this vantage point, that I share some of my perspectives and contemplations in search of an approach in this volume. I offer my views on some of the themes that I find germane to sustainable developmental planning of Asian megacity regions, but purposefully refrain from delving deeply into their individual intricacies. There is already an extensive literature that considers such themes and sub-themes in-depth. Further perusal of those is not the purpose of this work. Rather, this volume is one of reflection and contemplation, and, as will become evident, one of entreaty as well. Except for occasional and brief forays into the related literature

8

1 Introduction

on a topic or two in the spirit of sharing writings that I especially enjoyed reading and that helped shape my thinking, I try to stay out of such exercises. My intention is to look for consensus or commonalities amid the debates, discourses, arguments and counter-arguments in geographic inquiry—Purcell’s (2003) evocative ‘islands of practice4 ’—to inform and round out my approach, an effort that can perhaps be described as pragmatic. Instead of a more city-oriented, fragmented, and sectoral approach to planning that continues to prevail in many Asian regions, I humbly suggest that planners and practitioners pay closer attention to urban-rural sustainability issues from a scale/space-based, multi-dimensional, trans-urban, city-regional perspective. My intent is to share some of my decidedly subjective perspectives on an appropriate approach to these topics, concluding with an explorative empirical exercise. My hope is to start a conversation, one that will engage academics and practitioners within and beyond geography and planning. More specifically, my intent is to center this conversation on Asian megacity region (MCR) as related to, but distinct from, the one on the megaurban region, which is dominating the current discourse. My interest is in the Asian MCR as a concept; individual Asian countries or megacity/megaurban regions are neither my forte nor my focus; the brief discussion on basic urbanization-related themes in the Asian context (in Chap. 2) are intended only to serve as a backdrop for the rest of the volume. As mentioned above, this volume concludes with an application of some of the basic elements of my proposed tri-pronged approach to a mixed urban-rural landscape in an important megacity region in Asia. The National Capital Region (NCR) in India has been one of the first and foremost examples of extensive regional planning efforts in South Asia, whereby a planning region around a massively growing core city was created by carving out territories from voluntarily cooperating neighboring states. Thus, it is an almost perfect laboratory for such an exploratory venture. However, lack of accessibility to appropriate data at the appropriate scalar level of my investigation posed a formidable challenge, and gave rise to the third purpose of this project: to draw attention to the difficulties in reconciling theoretically grounded approaches with the data constraints that researchers often face in practice in the developing world. Over the years, numerous scholars worldwide have clamored for reliable, comparable, and pertinent data at appropriate levels, and a number of researchers facing similar obstacles in the Asian context in the recent years have joined them. From my standpoint, the significant impediments that paucity of data can impose on the optimality of a research project was brought home to me once again in course of this work. As such, I would like to entreat all stakeholders to pay serious attention to this pressing need and to come up with creative solutions in a determined and collaborative spirit. To collect, process, and make accessible appropriate data sets for researchers and planners, as well as to determine the nature of ‘what is appropriate’, will need to be recognized as a requisite step toward making space-based informed

4 In

his article on scalar issues, Purcell (2003, p. 329) proposes that “…islands of practice are not constructed of theoretical differences so much as they are the result of methodological practice” and suggests collaborative research as one way to bridge the islands.

1.1 Perspectives and Purpose

9

decisions towards sustainable planning and policy making for the Asian megacity regions.

1.2 Book Structure Following this brief introduction, the chapters are organized as follows: Chapter Two: In this chapter I paint a broad-brush backdrop for the rest of the volume. Following a brief look at the shifting trends in the so-called urban-rural balance of the world population based primarily on UN data, I focus on the Asian megacities by noting some problematic definitional issues that affect the comparability of such data. An overview of the diverse patterns of megacity growth and individual population and economic development (GDP) projections rounds out this chapter. Chapter Three: In context of the current and projected proliferation of the Asian megacities and their transformational reach into the surrounding territory, a common understanding of the evolving ‘megacity region’ (MCR) is needed in order to initiate a meaningful conversation on a coherent research and planning agenda for sustainable development. This does not appear to have happened yet. Even in the West, where the concept of city-region was born and matured, it has been characterized by a gamut of different interpretations and nuances as per inter- and intra-disciplinary orientations. Partly as a corollary to this diversity, definitional ambiguities and overlaps on scalar and other variations of the city-region have further impeded a common understanding of the city-regional dynamics. Following a discussion of these, and a few other related issues, I take a look at the evolving city-regional character of Asia through the respective lenses of a small number of scholars and researchers in the last few decades, taking note of their unique perspectives and research initiatives that have relevance for the Asian MCR. Chapter Four: Profound socioeconomic and environmental repercussions of the growing megacities in the Asian MCR on the rural, semi-urban, and urbanizing territories around them, have stoked academic, political, planning, public, and other interests in pursuing sustainable development strategies for the city-region. However, non-standardized definition of ‘urban’, a lingering city-centric outlook, and complexities of the rural-urban dynamics of flows, linkages and interfaces in the hybrid, changing, and spatially uneven ‘spread region’ within the MCR, make it difficult. Additionally, conceptual contrasts and differing approaches to sustainability, for example, green and brown agendas, have also impeded success of such pursuits. Here, I present the first two prongs of my tri-pronged approach that relate to these issues. In this vein, I discuss some of the conceptual shifts from rural-urban divide to rural-urban and peri-urban interfaces (PUI), and from a primarily economistic to a multidimensional approach to sustainable development, as revealed in the literature. I offer a working definition of the ‘spread region’ of the MCR from the standpoint of urban-rural interface (URI), which characterizes this space. And finally, I advocate implementation of a coherent, ‘color-coordinated’

10

1 Introduction

and multidimensional approach to examining the uneven spaces of the URI in the spread region at disaggregated scales, for effective planning and research purposes. Chapter Five: The importance of scale in research and planning for the MCR in the developing world is no longer debatable. This is especially true in the current era of globalization and technological advances transforming traditional scalar hierarchies and creating multiple spatialities. The a-spatial, network-based, representational, and discursive roles of scale are also becoming increasingly more consequential. I see scale as the third prong in a coherent tri-pronged approach to sustainable development in the Asian MCR that should be used in conjunction with the other two prongs, as discussed in the previous chapter. I recognize that scale remains a confounding concept, although a paradigmatic shift towards conceptual inclusivity by reconciling its many facets, seems to be taking place in the literature. In this chapter I offer an overview of this shift, followed by a brief look at the framework of the MCR from a bi-scalar perspective, and, given the need to recognize the diversities among (and within) the spaces in the MCR, conclude with one example of how elements of the three prongs can converge into a coherent approach for sustainable planning. Chapter Six: The National Capital Region (NCR) in India is one of the first and foremost examples of extensive regional planning efforts in South Asia, created with the goal of containing the growth of the core, while controlling and regulating the development of the surrounding region for sustainability. A hybrid and evolving urban-rural region, the NCR can thus be considered a laboratory for both theoretical and empirical exploration. The uneven urban-rural linkages, flows and traits, produced by exogenous and endogenous forces, that characterize the urban-rural interface of the city-region are widely acknowledged; calls for holistically examining these, at localized or micro-scales for targeted planning purposes, are rising. In this chapter I incorporate aspects of my tri-pronged approach—the concurrent consideration of multidimensionality, urban-rural interface (URI) and scalar variations—in an exploratory study at a disaggregated observational scale representing both urban and rural elements. I observe intra-regional variations and changes in urban-developmental patterns within the NCR vis-à-vis the NCR planning objectives. Principal Component and Cluster analyses are used to observe static structural patterns in 2001 and 2011, as well as changes that took place between the two periods. In each model, results reveal distinct clusters, with intra-group similarities and inter-group differences in traits indicating mixed success of the NCR plan. The results also underscore the potential applications of my approach for sustainable developmental planning for the Asian MCR. Chapter Seven: In this concluding chapter, I reiterate the primary focus of the volume, the Asian megacity region (MCR), while stressing the need for an interconnected approach to its urban-rural domain for research and sustainability planning. I share my conviction that, in order to be effective, the three facets of my approach need to be pursued in tandem. I make brief comments on governance and data issues, two of the themes that implicitly or explicitly became clear in this work. I note elements of my empirical study of the NCR, Delhi to support

1.2 Book Structure

11

calls for sub-scalar examination of city-regional spreads for localized strengths and needs, representing varied urban-rural attributes, linkages, flows, functions and processes for informed developmental planning. And finally, I share my vision for a synergistic relationship between research, planning (including governance and jurisdiction) and discursive realms: a perpetual cyclical relationship of process and outcome, shaping and being shaped by elements inherent to each realm as well as to the central concept of sustainable development of the MCR through time and space.

References Champion A, Hugo G, Lattes A (2004) Toward a new conceptualization of settlements for demography. Popul Dev Rev 29: 277–297. Version of record online January 27, 2004 Champion T, Hugo G (eds) (2004) New forms of urbanization: beyond the urban–rural dichotomy. Ashgate Publishing Limited, Aldershot Cohen B (2004) Urban growth in developing countries: a review of current trends and a caution regarding existing forecasts. World Dev 32:23–51 Koppel B (1991) The rural-urban dichotomy reexamined: beyond the Ersatz debate? In: Ginsburg N, Koppel B, McGee TG (eds) (1991) The extended metropolis: settlement transition in Asia. Honolulu, University of Hawaii Press, p 47–70 Laquian AA (2005) Beyond metropolis: the planning and governance of Asia’s mega-urban regions. Woodrow Wilson Center Press, Washington, DC Laquian AA (2011) The planning and governance of Asia’s mega-urban regions. Population distribution, urbanization, internal migration and development: an international perspective, UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs Population Division. United Nations, New York, pp 302–322 Montgomery MR (2008) The urban transformation of the developing world. Science 319:761–764 Oswalt P, Rieniets T (eds) (2006) Atlas of shrinking cities. Volume 1: International research. Hatje Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern-Ruit, Germany Purcell M (2003) Islands of practice and the Marston-Brenner debate: toward a more synthetic critical human geography. Prog Hum Geogr 27:317–332 Richardson HW, Nam CW (eds) (2014) Shrinking cities: a global perspective. Routledge, London Tacoli C (1998) Beyond the rural-urban divide. Environ Urbanization 10:3–4 Tacoli C (2003) The links between urban and rural development. Environ Urbanization 15:3–12 United Nations (2015) U.N. population division: DESA. World Urbanization Prospects. The 2014 Revision. United Nations, New York

Chapter 2

Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

Abstract In this chapter, I paint a broad-brush backdrop for the rest of the volume. Following a brief look at the shifting trends in the so-called urban-rural balance of the world population based primarily on UN data, I take a look at the Asian megacities by noting some problematic definitional issues that affect the comparability of such data. An overview of the diverse patterns of megacity growth and individual population and economic development (GDP) projections rounds out this chapter. Keywords Asian megacities · Megacity region · Urbanization trends

2.1 Views and Trends In the history of the development of human settlements, homo-sapiens have become homo-urbanus, John Grimond (2007) famously said. The effects of this transformation on our environment and our future have become subject to much debate and discussion amongst people from all walks of life. There exist few undisputed, unitary views on the identity, process, and spatial outcomes of what is or ought to be considered urban. However, despite definitional differences, conceptual ambiguities, and ideological divergences, the intricacies of the processes and patterns of urbanization, and indeed the future of humankind have become among the most important topics for academic research, as well as crucial planning and policy considerations in the wake of the ‘Urban Century’. It is well understood that geographic ‘space’ provides a basic foundation upon which urbanization occurs. The pace and scale of urbanization occurring in this space shape the patterns of territorial forms that may turn out to be the incubators for, and (arguably) the determinants of, the eventual quality of life trajectory for people living in and around these forms at various stages of urbanization. In the dynamics of this spatial transformation, change in the proportion of urban population to the total population, and growth of population living in urban areas—in terms of a country, a designated region, or any other spatial entity—illustrates the quantitative aspects of urbanization, whereas qualitatively this process is accompanied by a whole gamut The original version of this chapter was revised: Typographical mistakes have been corrected. The erratum to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_2

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of changes in the environment, and the way people live, work, think, and manage the environment (Eisinger 2006). The global impact of urbanization, real and/or perceived, on global environmental changes, in the production and consumption of resources, as well as in the ‘improvement’ or ‘decline’ in the overall socioeconomic conditions of people and habitat, has provoked much debate and discourse on the issue of the optimality of urbanization. While there is a clear consensus on the need for efficient management of resources for now, as well as for future generations in order to be sustainable, there are often significant differences in how to achieve sustainability, how we view the impact of urbanization, and what shape we anticipate the future of urbanization to take. Implicit and explicit expressions of these differing and often ambivalent views with all their nuances permeate the literature on urbanization. An article by Bloom and Khanna (2007) takes note of some of the views that often separate the so-called ‘urban optimists’ from the ‘urban pessimists’. Projection of a rapid rise of the urban population to sixty percent of the global population within the next decade and a half has raised serious concerns about the dynamics of growth in terms of human viability and environmental sustainability, and has fueled much discussion on conceptual, ideological, and policy differences. In contrast to pessimists’ concerns about issues such as environmental degradation, inequitable quality of life, and diseconomies of scale, the optimists’ views are bolstered by the positive developments readily attributable to urbanization. The optimists argue that urban correlates, as indicated in demographic features (e.g., population concentration, density), economies of scale (e.g., production, trade), and sociopolitical capital (e.g., education, skills) undoubtedly generate prosperity. The accrued benefits, as per the optimists, can be witnessed at individual levels or at collective national levels of developmental indicators, reflecting relative changes from a low rural to a high urban state of development. They claim that higher economic development promotes international connectivity, fostering growth and development, and diffusing knowledge and skills amongst peoples and societies of varied global geographies. On the other hand, the adverse effects of urban growth, as observed in over-crowding, pollution, slums, loss of natural habitat, and a variety of other current and potential environmental (as well as sociocultural and other) degradations, are considered by the pessimists as among the ‘significant’ costs of urbanization. It is perhaps ironic that the elements of urban growth or development today that are currently motivating urban optimists, maybe the very same ones that can lead to the adverse outcomes tomorrow feared by pessimists. The surge of enthusiasm motivating the optimists favoring urbanization seems to have ebbed somewhat in view of modern trends. The pessimists, in the meanwhile, have drawn global attention for their observations on the negative aspects of urbanization. In the current state of urban evolution, the future path of a sustainable model (Bloom and Khanna 2007) may include two interrelated elements: First, given the inevitability of urban growth and the fact that Less Developed Countries (LDCs) generate most growth from within their national urban systems, a concerted approach involving targeted improvement in social sector planning (in fields such as education, empowerment of women, small family, and health care system), and planning in the physical sector (e.g., infra-structural provisions, accessibility to), would yield

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tangible benefits in the improvement of urban living conditions. Second, a decentralization approach to planning and management of resources, focusing on partnerships at appropriate sub-national levels in cooperation with local stakeholders, would be essential in attaining sustainable urban development al objectives. It is likely that changes in global urbanization, along with projections for its future trajectory, have either changed, or cemented many of the long-held views, but it is also evident that such changes have challenged many preconceived notions and opened up new frontiers in research and planning. In Asia, the rapid and diverse growth trends of megacities and the complex multi-layered and readily observable repercussions of such growth on the surrounding regions have brought many of the heretofore relatively ignored issues vis-à-vis the city regions into sharper focus. Following a brief look at current trends in global urbanization, I will focus on the Asian megacities by noting some problematic definitional issues that affect the comparability of UN data. An overview of the diverse patterns of megacity growth and individual population and economic development (GDP) projections will round out this chapter. As mentioned in the introduction, the brief discussions and overviews as offered in this chapter, are intended to serve only as a general backdrop for the themes discussed in the rest of the volume.

2.1.1 Demographic and Structural Shifts: A Global View Despite its overly simplistic (and somewhat contested) nature, the graph created by the UN Habitat endures as one of the most ubiquitously present visual clichés of our time, signaling the inexorable progress of global urbanization. The so-called ‘demographic divide’ depicts a gradual increase of the world urban population, finally overtaking the rural at the dawn of the current millennium, and projected to rise unabated into the near future (Fig. 2.1). Although this depiction, based on the UN report on World Urbanization Prospects (2015), is effective as a stark reminder of our changing habitat from the standpoint of sustainability, its interpretation needs to be tempered with practicality. It has drawn criticism and caution on several grounds, the most persuasive warnings being the increasing inadequacy of the traditional urban-rural dichotomy, the imprecise and diverse definitions of urban population threshold, and the continued reliance on such definitions by member countries (Cohen 2004, p. 3; Satterthwaite 2002, pp. 283–284). The consideration that “the line between urban and rural is to a certain extent arbitrary and culturally bound” (Cohen 2004, p. 3) further leads us to question the validity of the UN portrayal of the demographic divide on a global scale. However, dramatic projections/prognostications aside, there is no denying the fact that the world is urbanizing at an exceedingly rapid rate, as well as in scale. Following his reflection that “[p]erhaps too much emphasis is given to the fact that the world’s population became more than half urban in 2008”, Satterthwaite (2002) said, “But what is beyond doubt is the fact that the world is becoming increasingly urban, as most of the world’s economic production and most new investment is now concentrated in urban areas – as has been the

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Fig. 2.1 The demographic divide (Source Adapted from United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision)

case for many decades” (2002, p. 284). There is an additional and undisputed, albeit unsurprising, fact to this ‘rural’ to ‘urban’ transformational trend: Given divergent socioeconomic, historical, and political conditions, urban-rural dynamics across the globe are neither uniform nor universal; there are, and will continue to be major regional variations in the intensity and nature of this process. The belief that theories of the urban evolutionary path, involving demographic and structural shifts—developed in the context of the First World—are universally applicable has been challenged by unfolding urbanization trends in the developing world in the last few decades. Also, it can be argued that trajectories for the future as projected by agencies are far from definite; if nothing else, we know that world events are often unpredictable. Emergent, sometimes unforeseen developments in the global arena, such as political upheavals, ethno-social conflicts, and natural and man-made disasters have often upset the predictable social, demographic, and developmental determinants that have propelled or accentuated these regional variations at divergent spatial scales. However, even taken with reservation and interpreted with a dose of caution, the UN reports are valuable as indicators of general trends. For example, as highlighted in a set of the ‘key facts’ reported in the recent U.N. document “World Urbanization Prospects” (2014), a broad trend pertaining to regional population concentrations and urban settlement hierarchies is evident in the modern global urbanization process including the aforementioned shift towards the LDCs. Asian and African regions, home to nearly 90% of the world’s rural population continue to urbanize faster than other global regions and appear to be at the forefront of this trend. Figure 2.2 points to the relative rapid urbanizing of the Third World, as compared to Europe and North America in the post-WWII era, with projections into the middle of the current century.1 As per the UN projection (2014), this pattern of continuing growth and 1 In relying on the UN data for future projections, one should heed the cautionary note against taking

that as “absolute truth rather than as simply indicative of general broad trends” (Cohen 2004, p. 25). Bocquier (2005, p. 219) noted, “[t]he conclusion is that UN projections may overestimate the urban

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Fig. 2.2 Urbanization trends across continents, 1950–2010; projected to 2050 (Source Adapted from United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision)

regional concentrations will remain unabated, with a likely concentration of around 90% of 2.5 billion new urban dwellers in these regions by 2050. As compared to its counterparts in the developing world, Asia seems to be poised to take an impressive stride forward in its rate of urbanization in the not-so-distant future. As McGee (2017) noted, “…almost 60% of all global urban growth occurring between 2010 and 2050 [will take place] in Asia, much of it located in the extended urban space of large mega-urban region”. Observing structural changes in the urban settlement systems on a global scale, there are some common and predictable basic trends: a gradual shift from monocentric to more polycentric and/or poly-nodal2 forms of settlement configurations, a population for the year 2030 by almost one billion, or 19% in relative term. The overestimation would be particularly more pronounced for developing countries and may exceed 30% in Africa, India, and Oceania”. 2 Although they are often used almost interchangeably in the literature, there are, arguably, some inherent conceptual differences between polycentricity and multinodality. Here is one view: “[…] [A] spatially polycentric development [can coexist] with a continued functional monocentricity, or show signs of multinodal urban configurations emerging around the core city akin to the American doughnut profile. In the first scenario, although the settlement structure shows a polycentric trend, overall the core city may retain its monocentric dominance; monocentricity as referred in this context pertaining more to the economic dominance of the core city over the satellites than the spatial configuration of the urban settlement. In the second scenario, the core city would have lost its dominance whilst the satellites become more dominant and independent of the former. More interaction may now take place between the (former) satellite cities than between them and the (former) core city. Moreover, to complicate matters further, once the distinction between different layers of economic and social activities is made, the city-cluster could reveal features of monocentric dominance on one or more layers and multinodality on others. For example, in terms of financial services it could remain monocentric, whilst it has already moved towards multinodality in other spheres” (Mookherjee et al. 2014, p. 198; emphasis in original).

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sharp increase in the number of megacities in the developing world, and a concurrent rise in the number of near-stagnant or shrinking cities, the last occurring primarily in developed nations. In the context of Asia, however, the observable trends are more complex and can be somewhat perplexing at times. For example, on one hand, while the growth and proliferation of megacities have emerged as among the most distinctive features of Asian urbanization, a concurrent ascendance of small and medium centers can also be observed in the same time period, and often within the same national or regional scale. Small settlements of less than 0.5 million size group, home to nearly 50% of all urban dwellers dot Asian urban landscapes, while only 12% of urban dwellers live in megacities of over 10 million population. Contrary to common perception, only a little over 10% of the Asia and Pacific region’s urban population actually lives in megacities. The region’s urban population is predominantly found in medium sized and small cities, and it is in these cities that the region’s urban transition is unfolding. This is a critical trend and dynamic in the region. (UN Habitat 2015, p. 12)

This trend is expected to continue in the coming decades. Urban population is expected to be distributed to ‘urban areas of all sizes including quite small market towns or administrative centers that might contain less than a few thousand inhabitants’ (Hardoy et al. 2001 as cited in Cohen 2004). It has also been contended that “[m]ost urban growth over the next 25 years will not take place in megacities at all but will occur in far smaller cities and towns” (Cohen 2004, pp. 24–25). And mid-sized, ‘middleweight cities’ (from around 150,000 to 10 million) are expected to assume an increasingly important role in global economic growth (e.g., Cadena et al. 2012). However, these observations, apt and timely as they are, do not negate or diminish the fact that at present large cities continue to be a dominant force in the Asian urbanization scene famously described as “the [Asia and the Pacific] region’s powerhouses in terms of economic growth and transformation” (UN Habitat 2015 2015, p. 56). Because of the sheer weight of their population size and the concurrent ascendance of secondary cities to the megacity level at an unprecedented rate combined with the multi-focal regional, national, and international influence exerted by these cities, it can be expected that the megacities of Asia will perhaps increasingly demand our attention for the foreseeable future.

2.1.2 Growth and Shrinkage The study of urbanization is marked by phases of growth and decline of cities as related to activities initiated by humans (e.g., built-up locational attributes, climate change), as well as natural catastrophes such as cyclones and earthquakes. It is well recognized that the growth dynamics of the megacities and their significant impact on settlement structures and territorial forms and functions in the peri-urban region are experienced in varied scales and intensities around the globe. In a recent publication, Atlas of Shrinking Cities (2006), Rieniets notes,

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Throughout most of histories, phases of shrinkage were as much a part of the development of cities as phases of growth….. . (O)nly with the start of industrialization in Europe was the growth of cities defined by long and intense growth. (2006, p. 30; emphasis added)

However, urbanization entered a new epoch in the second half of the twentieth century. The post-WWII period witnessed a shift in urban growth from developed industrial to developing nonindustrial countries. This shift introduced a new research frontier in global, particularly emphasizing regional growth, as well as changes within the urban structures and systems across the countries of the world. In the context of structural change, the larger cities—historic sites of economic and developmental centers in the global urban scenes—show two distinct patterns: a drastic increase in the number of megacities in developing countries, and simultaneously a significant rise in the number of ‘shrinking cities’, primarily in developed countries. In general, during the post-WWII period worldwide political stability, decolonization, and a variety of developmental approaches, mostly centered on metropolises and large city regions created an aura of prosperity as reflected in the rise of the megacities in the developing world. Asia has been at the forefront of this trend. At the same time, some Asian countries initiated a policy of ‘decentralization and suburbanization’ that had shaped the spatial forms of cities and regions in economically developed industrial countries which are now beginning to influence Asian patterns of urbanization. Although studies of growth and decline of cities, in light of a host of factors—economic, sociopolitical, and environmental—are emerging in the literature (see for example, Richardson and Nam 2014; Oswalt and Rieniets ed. 2006), a lack of comprehensive theoretical evaluation of urban structural changes based on robust empirical investigations limits our knowledge of this evolving phenomenon. Unlike the rapid rise of urbanization in the second half of the twentieth century, in the twenty-first century, urbanization is predicted to turn into “mixed patterns,” as globally the cities of the developed and developing countries begin to show “both expanding and shrinking” traits (Richardson and Nam 2014, p. 6). These traits are not new; rather, they reaffirm cyclical changes observed and/or theorized in the evolutionary process of urban development.3 What is new however, is our approach to

3 Although

beyond our current focus, for the interested reader there exists a wealth of literature exploring the urban concentration and deconcentration processes, as conceptualized in various stages of urbanization, suburbanization, polarization reversal, counter-urbanization, reurbanization and such that have relevance to the Asian urbanization. As a starting point, an edited volume by Geyer and Kontuly (1996) offers a broad overview of the field, refers to relevant works, and/or offers a number of original articles by ‘leading scholars in various disciplines.’ Some of the collected or referred works, with their focus on ‘urban agglomerations’ (e.g., Klaassen et al. 1981; Klaassen and Scimemi 1981; van den Berg et al. 1982) and on ‘spatial dispersion’ of population from the core region in developing countries (e.g., Richardson 1980) have special relevance in the current context. A ‘differential urbanization’ model theorizing successive stages of concentration and deconcentration, as conceptualized by Geyer (1989), developed by Geyer and Kontuly (1993), and empirically examined in both developed and developing world context by a number of researchers in a special issue in TESG (2003), including Mookherjee (2003), and Mookherjee and Geyer (2011), may also be of interest in this context. [Cited works are presented in the Reference section.]

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the crucial issues and challenges we face both within and among countries in managing the emerging phenomena, with growing environmental degradation raising deep concerns about urban sustainability. Analysis of gains and losses of the population as symptoms of ‘growth’ or ‘shrinkage’ relates to the measurement of concentrations of people at a given point of time on a given scale. For example, if a policy of urban decentralization from a monocentric to polycentric development is successfully adopted within a given city region to encourage population dispersion from the core to the outlying region, it might result in the “shrinking” of the core city while “growing” the population of the secondary cities of the region. Thus, the conceptualization of the spatial scale and/or subscale would be a key factor in assessing urban growth and decline in any study of the dynamics of urban structural change. Globally the traits of this expansion or shrinkage in the urban structure are observable at various scales, from local to national. However, the scalar changes pertaining to city regions, especially the evolving regions around the fast-growing giant cities, are of special significance in developing countries. A recent volume edited by Richardson and Nam (2014), bringing together contributions from diverse geographical and disciplinary perspectives, and analyzing the dynamics and management of shrinking cities has heightened interest in this phenomenon. The traditional approach to the assessment of urbanization, particularly in the context of larger Asian cities, has largely focused on the phenomenon of urban growth in evaluating how to manage, promote, encourage, or discourage growth. However, two essays in the volume illustrate urban shrinkage patterns, knitting together local factors with global forces under the divergent sociopolitical and economic systems of China and India, the two most populated countries in the world. Even though the study frames of the two countries are different, the structural changes incurred through the growth and decline of their cities offer a window to understanding the urbanization process in the Asian context. It can be argued that while the growth and decline features of individual cities over time can be a sequential process, an agglomeration of cities, when viewed at a regional frame over the same time span, may exhibit concurrent phases of growth and decline. By looking beyond the designated urban centers into the total peri-urban and rural landscape of a given region over a given time frame, a continuous process of transformation (from morphological to social, cultural, jurisdictional, and political) as manifested in growth and shrinkage of individual entities can be observed. The observations that a “city’s growth is not monotonically positive” (He 2014, p. 152), and that the issue of shrinkage “is not even on the radar screen of urban policy” (Ganapati 2014, p. 173) underscore the need for special attention to both growth and shrinkage aspects of urban evolution, at different scales, in order to devise and implement sustainable urban development programs and policies. Growth and shrinkage of cities represent two sides of the urban sustainability coin. Management of both requires innovative approaches and a new vision including a culture of motivation, participation, and cooperation of public and private stakeholders. This growth and shrinkage trend pertaining to the megacity regions—a phenomenon related to the modern urbanization process—has not historically been a research priority in Asia. The clarity of the emerging pattern now makes this trend an

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important part of the urban development studies agenda. At a regional level, for example, differential patterns of growth and concentrations in urban centers raise questions such as: Does such urban process promote socioeconomic and other forms of equity by balancing the spatial distribution of population, or does it intensify inequity? Does it accelerate or hinder environmental degradation? We cannot ignore the importance of questions such as these to a deeper understanding of the urbanization process, especially for designing sustainable city-regional landscapes inclusive of urban and rural traits, which transcend the traditional urban jurisdictional framework. In the context of Asia, the dynamics of contemporary global economic forces, interwoven with the socioeconomic and institutional development planning of individual countries, have led to a variety of concentration patterns of settlements and activities at an array of diverse scales.4 Below are snapshots of three such scales— national, regional, and city-specific—in the context of three major Asian countries. Dramatic urban change on the national scale, in China, is noted by Pacione (2004). His illustration of the urbanization pattern during the Maoist era (1947–77) shows the effects of governmental controls on migration of people, location of activities, and the relative isolation of China from the global economy. In his opinion, these developments led to the country’s rather low level of urbanization and the “inward” urban concentrations from the coastal to the inland regions. However, during the post-Mao era, the urbanization process accelerated due to relaxations in government controls, as seen in the ‘introduction of economic reforms and the open-door policy in 1978’ (2004, p. 32). At the regional scale, in India, the National Capital Region (NCR) portrays the effects of a policy of redistribution of urban growth within the capital city region of Delhi, following the longstanding ‘balanced development’ approach of Indian planning through various public and private sector initiatives and cooperation. Arguably, the net effect is seen in the decline of growth in the Delhi urban core relative to the other urban centers within the NCR (Mookherjee et al. 2015). The example of Tokyo, also observed at a regional scale, illustrates how a capital city can foster urban growth without ‘decentralization from the central city while actively participating in the global economy’ (Pacione 2004). “De-regulation” measures and “internationalization” of financial markets have been major forces in Tokyo’s urban development. On the city scale, the growth of the largest cities of the globe has varied significantly in time and space. Based on an interesting technique, an analysis of the 100 largest cities from 1960 to 2010 (Swerts and Denis 2015) shows three distinct groups: (1) The first group comprised 38 cities, whose respective weights relative to the top 100 cities, decreased during this period. These cities, which the authors considered to have ‘completed their urban transition’, were primarily located in North America and Europe. But this group also included nine Asian cities with ‘sharply slow growth’ (four of which were in Japan). (2) 50% of the second, ‘vigorous class’ of cities, whose ‘weight […] increased’ during this period, were located in Asia, mainly in China, India, and South Korea; another 40% cities in this group were in South America. 4 For

a fascinating historical overview, see Yeung, YM (2011) Rethinking Asian Cities and Urbanization: Four Transformations in Four Decades. Asian Geographer 28: 65–83.

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(3) The third group comprising 11 cities, ‘characterized by a huge and fast expansion of their industrial concentration’ and with ‘very sharp’ and ‘stronger’ growth as compared to the other ‘large’ cities, were located in Africa, Middle East, and Asia, the last housing six of the eleven cities. These findings offer a window onto global trends in modern urbanization, especially in terms of the development and changes of urban structural frames of LDCs. This pattern of urbanization, together with growth and development at higher hierarchical levels, can be broadly attributed to globalization, which led to a wide range of developmental initiatives resulting in significant rises in economic production, expansion, activities related to trade and commerce, and accelerated connectivity among larger cities. This was accompanied further by parallel national development schemes of various sorts, especially in the post-colonial LDCs, which by focusing on larger cities and their adjoining areas, affected the urbanization process. “Cities,” as the UN Report (2014) notes, “are important drivers of development and poverty reduction in both urban and rural areas as they concentrate much of the economic activity, government, commerce and transportation, and provide crucial links with rural areas and across international borders” (p. 3). Overall, developmental strategies, policies, and programs have amplified research interest in city growth and regional population spread, as well as changes in the hierarchical structural orders of settlement systems. The expansion of the growing urban footprint of these cities into urbanizing territories, blurring the rural-urban divide, and portraying complex spatial and sectoral dimensions has started gaining recognition in the last decades (Tacoli 1998), but, perhaps arguably, has not yet gained the full attention it deserves. Discussions and debates on this phenomenon ought to be a continued priority among urban scholars as the classic mosaic of urban and rural environmental components are being altered in favor of a newly emergent urban-rural interface-oriented regional landscape pattern.

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives The “… megacity region approach—the ‘megacity’ and its ‘region’—is a distinctly Southeast Asian phenomenon, determined by city population and the sprawling urban form”, observed Harrison and Hoyler (2015, p. 13). Peter Hall (1999) referred to the megacity as “a new eastern Asian urban form”, noting that the term originated in Eastern Asia in context of areas such as ‘the Pearl River Delta and Yangtze River Delta in China, the Tokaido (Tokyo-Osaka) corridor in Japan, and […]’5 (2011, p. 18). Regional specificity aside, it can perhaps be said that for different reasons, both Southeast Asia (the conceptual home of desakota) and East Asia (gaining global 5 From

the standpoint of a conceptual distinction between the ‘single-system’ megacity region and the ‘multi-system’ megaregion or mega-urban region, as proposed by Harrison and Hoyler (2015) and discussed in the next chapter, it is interesting that the examples offered by Hall (2011) appear to fit the latter term better.

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prominence for its megaregions) represent aspects of the Asian face of one of the most fascinating urbanization phenomena encountered in the developing world. Although it is true that megacity growth patterns have been more vigorous and consequential in some regions of Asia than others, megacities and their different regional manifestations (e.g., megacity regions or megaregions) can perhaps be more appropriately considered to be an Asian phenomenon. However, even while attributing ‘Asian-ness’ to this phenomenon, it is important to guard against over-generalization. The following observation, made by Laquian well over a decade ago, equally resonates today (2005, p. 23): Even a cursory examination of the main features of Asian mega-urban regions reveal that they make up a complex mix of varied settlements due to the historical, economic, cultural, and technological factors that have influenced their development. Because of this complexity, it would be a mistake to lump together all the Asian cities in a homogeneous mass. (emphasis added)

Laquian stressed the importance of taking notice of the regional dynamics of these cities, for example, differences between East Asian and South Asian cities. “Taking into consideration the commonalities and differences of the various Asian megaurban regions…, I have categorized them [presumably the central cities of these mega-urban regions] into four types,” he said, and went on to describe them as (1) technologically advanced East Asian cities, (2) the megacities of China, (3) the primate cities of Southeast Asia, and (4) the South Asian cities (2005, pp. 24–25; italics in original). The two, apparently somewhat contradictory observations—that the ‘megacity and its region’ is a distinctively Asian phenomenon, and that there are distinct regional differences among the megacities and their regions—taken together, symbolize to me the Asian urban scene. Both of these observations are well worth remembering as, following a discussion of some definitional irregularities, we take a look at the distribution and growth patterns of Asian megacities.

2.2.1 The Megacity: Some Definitional Issues In view of the proliferation of the large metropolitan centers in the second half of the twentieth century, their dominance in the national and regional economies and their increasingly global interconnections, these urban giants—the ‘megacities’—have assumed a special significance. Rowe (2014) reports, The extraordinary compaction of humanity into megacities is having profound repercussions for the world’s resources. Megacities, according to the UN Population Division of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), ‘are where the pressures of migration, globalization, economic development, social inequality, environmental pollution, and climate change are most directly felt’. (2014, p. 29)

The megacity is a unique entity in the urban hierarchical system. As observed in many changing traditional Asian rural societies, growth-impacted regions around

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megacities often evolve into a mixed rural-urban environment that lacks cohesive traits of either the rural or the urban, and instead displays a heterogeneous mix of people and activities. Megacities, individually or collectively with other cities of various sizes and functions, have vast transformative power. It has been said that megacities are not simply larger versions of large cities. “From the large city to the megacity, there is a quantum leap rather than a difference of degree. Whether the concern is spatial planning, waste management, collective infrastructure or transport the solutions appropriate to a megacity cannot just be scaled up from those—imperfect as they are—designed for and implemented in less gigantic urban units,” noted Dogan in the back page of a special issue on MegaCities in the International Social Science Journal (2004; emphasis added).6 Given this consequential stature, it stands to reason that in order to have a true understanding of the Asian megacities, they should be defined with a commonly accepted set of criteria, to be measured by standardized data across all countries of the continent. Unfortunately, this is not the case. In-depth academic and theoretical discussions in the literature often do not go far enough to aid the regional planner, policymaker, or empirical researcher in search of tangible operational tools. For example, even as the megacity term has become ubiquitous in urban and planning literature, consistency of use of the designation megacity (along with other terminologies relating to the hinterlands of the core city or cities, such as megacity region, megaregion etc.), as well as the data collection methods/measurements for comparative purposes leave much to be desired. Inconsistency in the designation of areal boundaries and unreliability of data are two major impediments to the study of megacity patterns in Asia (Kraas 2007). Criteria used to define the megacity have varied and the literature is replete with terms such as ‘primate’, ‘industrial’, ‘world city’, ‘capitalist’ etc., (e.g., see Rodriguez-Pose 2008, p. 1027) reflecting some of the dominant traits related to the perceived characteristics of megacities. Broadly, large size and multiplicity of functions are two dominant elements that define ‘megacity’ in the structural hierarchy of settlements in a country or region. The urban landscape of such a city typically spills over the boundary of the city’s corporate limit, reflecting another dominant ‘mega’ trait—that of sustained urban influence in the changing landscape around the core city. The term ‘megacity’ appears to have been first used by the United Nations in the 1970s7 based on a given minimum population threshold, originally 5 million, then 8 million to the current ten million, for a city or an ‘Urban Agglomeration’ (UA), as 6 The

thoughtful essays presented in this issue did ample justice to its avowed purpose of taking “stock of the megacities and their distinctive features” from the perspectives of global (network) and internal dynamics. However, despite the theme centering on megacities, I found no explicit definition or concrete criteria for defining the ‘megacity’ that would be of operational use. The term ‘giant city’ was most commonly used to describe ‘megacity’, along with such terms as ‘world city’, ‘capital city’, ‘global city’ etc. that appeared to have been used almost interchangeably throughout the issue. 7 Per Wikipedia, November 2016, “[O]ne of the earliest documented uses [of the term megacity was] by the University of Texas in 1904 [Hemisfile: Perspectives on the Political and Economic Trends in the Americas,” 5–8. Institute of the Americas. 1904. Accessed November 20, 2016].

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives

25

per data provided to the UN by individual countries. However, as widely recognized by now, this is problematic because Urban Agglomeration is not taken as a standard spatial entity; the data for this category is derived from varied geographic entities as designated by individual countries, such as municipality, city, urbanized area, etc., which can be bewildering at times. An arbitrary selection of five megacities of over 10 million population size from 1950 to 2010, with projections to 2020 as reported by the United Nations (2014), demonstrates this lack of comparability not only among countries, but sometimes even within temporal data sets for the same country (Table 2.1). Note the varied geographical areas and/or terms for UA, as used in four countries: Major Metropolitan Areas or MMA (Japan); ‘urban areas …meeting the criteria such as contiguous built-up areas, being the location of the local government, being a Street or Having a Resident Committee’ (China); ‘functional urban area’ (Indonesia); and ‘urban agglomeration’ (India). To make matters more interesting, Census figures for Tokyo refer to different MMAs in different years. For Guangzhou, the areas for 1982 and 1990 appear to differ from those in the 2000 and 2010 censuses, in Jakarta, the ‘functional urban area’ criterion does not appear to apply to 1990, and for Delhi, the areas for 1950 and 1970 are not specified. A 2009 study by Forstall, Greene, and Pick analyzed how variations in ‘concepts and geographic definitions’ ‘yielded different population totals’ for the twenty largest cities of the world. Their comparison of different geographical definitions (e.g., ‘agglomerations’, ‘metro areas’, and ‘urban areas’) from different data sources (e.g., United Nations Population Division, Demographia, The World Gazetteer, and World Atlas) demonstrated anomalous results in the ranking and size of the cities. The authors attributed ‘varying reference dates’ for some of the differences, but made another important observation: …the primary reason the lists differ is that they disagree on the geographic definitions of the various urban areas. For example, their population data may refer to the area’s main city, to its built-up area, to its metropolitan area, or to some other geography. At least six different types of geographic area are represented [city proper; administrative area larger than city proper; urbanized area or urban agglomeration; urbanized area using administrative boundaries; and provincial-level municipality]. (2009, 279)

This finding itself is revealing, but more to the point, Forstall et al.’s (2009) analysis of the 2003 UN list of Urban Agglomerations found evidence of the discrepant use of these definitions under the common umbrella of ‘Urban Agglomeration’, which is used in the UN to report data on Asian megacities. In this section, I have noted some of the problems associated with the definitions of megacities and the discrepancies in the United Nations data as reported by individual nations. In the next section, I offer a short overview of the regional variations in megacity growth patterns in Asia based on the same data sets. This sequence of discussion—the first part questioning the validity of the second—is rather ironic. If the data are not comparable and if we cannot trust the general applicability of the data, how can we rely on the observations based on them? I have not found an answer that is entirely satisfactory to me. As the 2015 UN Habitat report states, despite the data-related and definitional issues, the reports do remain useful for observation of general trends in city growth.

1. (325) Major Metropolitan areas (M.M.A.) are defined by the Statistics Bureau of Japan. Census figures for 2005 and 2010 refer to the Kanto M.M.A.; figures from 1990 to 2000 are based on the Keihinyo M.M.A., and figures from 1960 to 1985 are based on the Keihin M.M.A. As a reference, the population of Tokyo-to was estimated at 12.1 million persons and of the Tokyo Ku-area at 8.1 million in 2000

2. (93) For the 1982 and 1990 censuses, the data reflect all residents of urban areas of the city. For the 2000 and 2010 censuses, the population of the city is composed of population in all urban areas of ten city districts (Liwan, Yuexiu, Hanzhu, Tianhe, Baiyun, Huangpu, Panyu, Huadu, Nansha, Luogang) meeting the criteria such as contiguous built-up areas, being the location of the local government, being a Street or Having a Resident Committee

Tokyo, Japan

Guangzhou, China

3,119

196

7,147

9,726 129

175 14,081

21,935

9,630

97

126

18

16,618

25,703

10,323

12,458

18

17

7

30

19,230

29,348

11,298

15,174

38,323

16

14

9

22

1

10.7

2.2

4.2

1.1

30.6

(continued)

expected

1,055

158

109

213

3

expected

2020/Proportion of country population residing in “City” (%)

Karachi, Pakistan

3,531

8,175

9,620

38,001

expected

% change 5 years

1,369

170

99

13

expected

expected

2020

Delhi, India (4)

3,915

3,072

36,834

% change 5 years

2015

1,452

47

40

% change 20 years

Jakarta, Indonesia (3)

1,542

32,530

2010

1,049

107

% change 20 years

Guangzhou, China (2)

23,298

1990

11,275

% change 20 years

Tokyo, Japan (1)

1970

1950

City/Country

Table 2.1 Growth patterns: selected megacities, % change (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision)

26 2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

2015

% change 5 years

2020

% change 5 years

2020/Proportion of country population residing in “City” (%)

No notes on data

% change 20 years

Karachi, Pakistan

2010

4. (318) Data for 1991, 2001 and 2011 refer to the urban agglomeration that is not restricted to state boundaries (National Capital Territory). Contiguous suburban cities and towns, such as Faridabad, Gurgaon, and Ghaziabad are included in Dehli. The capital is New Delhi. The population of New Delhi was estimated at 249,998 in the year 2011

% change 20 years

Delhi, India

1990

3. (319) Data refer to the functional urban area, that is, contiguous areas which are consistently urban in character as indicated by levels of population density, economic functions and facilities. Jakarta covers five municipalities (kotamadya): Jakarta Selatan, Jakarta Timur, Jakarta Pusat, Jakarta Barat, and Jakarta Utara. Data for 1990 does not refer to the functional urban area. Appropriate estimates were derived by using the ratio of the population in the functional urban area to that of the population in the relevant municipalities as derived from the 1980 census

% change 20 years

Jakarta, Indonesia

1970

1950

City/Country

Table 2.1 (continued)

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives 27

28

2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview The shortcomings of the UNDESA figures are acknowledged, especially where these concern future projections based on the national data from ‘less than very recent’ census rounds. In this report, this data has therefore been used only for general trend recognition purposes and the associated broad policy-sensitive messages that can safely be derived from them. (UN-Habitat 2015, p. 10; emphasis added)

It can also perhaps be argued that such comparability pertaining to exact population size and growth within the respective administrative boundaries of megacities, while highly desirable, is not entirely feasible. As many researchers have noted, city boundaries are often ‘under-bounded’, that is to say, there is often a lag between formal changes in the city boundaries and the irregular settling of population adjacent to the city or around the city limit, as urban population continues to spill over the city’s corporate boundaries, extending urban and urbanizing features into surrounding territories. Immediately following his description of projected growth rates for a number of ‘megacities’ in Asia, Laquian (2011, p. 302) added, The population figures for the mega-cities mentioned above are based on official country definitions confined to formal political boundaries. However, it is now increasingly recognized by researchers and government authorities that the actual “urban field” of economic, social and technological influences of mega-cities extends way beyond their formal boundaries.

And, in the State of the Asian and Pacific Cities 2015 (UN-Habitat 2015), we see this recognition: Cities are no longer bounded entities. Through their geographic expansion, it is increasingly necessary to look not only at the municipal area but also at the wider urban agglomeration, irrespective of administrative boundaries. As urban populations grow, urban areas are expanding beyond their borders through both formal and informal means, often absorbing smaller settlements in their growth path.

Both are important observations worth remembering as we take a look at the megacities of Asia.

2.2.2 Regional Variations in Population Growth and Economic Development: A Brief Overview Adhering to a threshold population (such as 10 million) as the sole criterion for defining megacities can be highly contestable on the ground that it oversimplifies a complex phenomenon (e.g., Laquian 2005; Parr 2005). Kraas (2007) comments that ultimately “…it is futile to fight over a fixed definition of megacities, as any setting of minimum/maximum value is subjective and thus open to debate”. Noting that the ‘favored terminology to describe [the rapidly growing] places is megacity’ Smith (2004, p. 408; emphasis added) said, “[…] the term, emphasizing the massive scale of these places provides no theoretical leverage. While perfectly adequate in descriptive terms, it can be conceptually confounding if we assume urban similarities based on sheer size.” However, Smith also suggests that approaches focusing on ‘distinctive regional patterns’ (such as those taken by Gugler 1996 as cited in Smith 2004),

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives

29

while more nuanced, lack in theoretical ‘direction’. Although I agree with the logic behind these thoughts, I feel that despite the understood limitations, a universal or at least a region-based,8 adoption of a population threshold makes megacity growth phenomena across divergent spatial (and administrative) scales more comparable for both academic and planning/policymaking purposes, at least at initial stages of analysis. Population data on megacities over time are easily and universally available, thanks primarily to the UN Habitat publications. Despite the noted reservations regarding the accuracy of the UN data, most of the observations below are based on the self-same data sets. These sets are likely already familiar to the reader on account of their ubiquitous presence in the literature; nonetheless, they are useful for a broad and basic overview of the population growth and distribution patterns of the Asian megacities—as a backdrop for our discussions in the rest of this volume. Per the 10-million population threshold criterion, Asia houses close to 60% of the world’s 31 megacities (Fig. 2.3); ten more cities are projected to grow into this rank by 2030, ‘all located in developing countries’ (UN World Cities in 2016), six of which are in Asia. The number of Asian megacities almost doubled, from nine at the turn of the century, to 17 in fifteen years’ time, and is projected to be 24 in another fifteen years (as per UN projection) (Fig. 2.4a). This trend, as well as the uneven distribution of the megacities across regions (Fig. 2.4a; Table 2.2), while not surprising, is noteworthy. Also noteworthy are the projections for the relatively rapid rise of some of the larger urban centers, in the Southern Asian region, which are approaching a threshold population of 10 million. These include Chennai and Hyderabad in India and Lahore

Fig. 2.3 Asian megacities: spatial pattern and population size, 2015, 2030 (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) 8 This qualifier is warranted because of

the validity of the argument that by the 10 million megacity population threshold rule, many cities around the world with significant national and international presence, would be left out.

30

2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

Fig. 2.4 a Number of Asian megacities by region, 2000–2030. b Population size of Asian megacities by region, 2000–2030 (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision)

in Pakistan. In terms of sheer population size, by 2030 the total megacity population of the South Asian region is projected to catch up with, then surpass (albeit barely), that of the currently ‘exploding’ Eastern Asian region (Fig. 2.4b; Table 2.2). Despite the projected decline in growth rate of the three established megacities of Dhaka, Delhi, and Karachi (Table 2.3b), the total megacity population growth rate for the Southern region in 2015–2030 is projected to increase to 89% from the 62% change observed during the 2000–2015 period, reflecting the projected addition of the two megacities in India and one in Pakistan. This is in contrast to Eastern Asia, where the reversal in the projected growth trend to 25% in 2015–30 (from 94% in the 2000–15 period) suggests that the four giant cities of the region may have reached a saturation point. The shift appears to be primarily driven by the projected negative growth for Tokyo and Osaka, and a significant slow-down (from about 100% and 70% to 36% and 30%, respectively) projected for Beijing and Shanghai (Table 2.3a). This trend is especially notable when compared to other parts of Asia (Tables 2.2 and 2.3a–d). For example, even with Bangkok (Thailand) and Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam) joining the

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives

31

Table 2.2 Number and population change of megacities by regions, 2000–2015, and projection to 2030 (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision) Number of megacities

Urban population of megacities

2000

2015

2030 Projection

2000

Asia (49)

9

17

24

142,705

Eastern Region (7) China, Japan [2]

4

8

9

77,231

Southern Region (9) Bangladesh, India, Pakistan [3]

5

6

10

65,474

Southeastern Region (11) Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand [3]

0

2

4

Western Region (17) Turkey [1]

0

1

1

Asian regions: countries (Number)/Countries with Megacities [Number]

2015

2030 Projection

% Change 2000–15

293,460

457,176

106

56

150,113

188,009

94

25

105,914

200,177

62

89

–

23,269

52,296

–

14,164

16,694

–

% Change 2015–30 projection

125

18

Central Region (5) [0]

ranks of Jakarta (Indonesia) and Manilla (Philippines), Southeastern Asia will only house one-sixth of the projected 24 megacities of the continent, and five percent of the total megacity population of Asia. Istanbul (Turkey) will continue to be the only so-called ‘megacity’ among the 17 countries of Western Asia, while Central Asia (not shown), comprising the five countries of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan will continue to be far behind in urban growth. Per UN projection, the urban population for the Central Asian region, as far into the future as 2050, is likely to stay below 50 million. It is sobering to remember that informative as they are, the growth paths and rates of growth for megacities across the diverse urban landscape of Asia, as noted above, are grossly inadequate for an understanding of the developmental dynamics of the peoples, societies, and economies involved, and of the environmental consequences of population changes. Also, the patterns and projections of megacity growths and their regional orientations and differences, as noted in the thumbnail sketches presented above, ignore the ‘very clear sub-regional differences,’ as noted in The State of Asia and Pacific Cities, 2015 (UN Habitat 2015, p. 20). Although this observation is made in the context of population growth, it is equally applicable to almost all aspects of the Asian urbanization phenomenon. A sub-regional level analysis is not undertaken in this volume. The fact is that despite regional and sub-regional differences, Asia is becoming increasingly urban, adding a significant number of megacities, as well as growing the ranks of secondary cities and smaller (but ascending) urban centers within the megacity’s regional settlement system. The Asian urbanization

(8)

–

(6550)

18,660

Tianjin, China

Shenzhen, China

Kinki M.M.A. (Osaka), Japan

2.95

(1.04)

2.21

13,959

Shanghai, China

20,238

10,749

11,210

23,741

12,458

–

Guangzhou, Guangdong, China

20,384

13,332

(1.24)

1.61

(7863)

Beijing, China

982,410

Chongqing, China

(4)

10,162

Megacities

12.21

Urban population: 2015

(7556)

632,396

(a) Eastern region

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2000

Chengdu, China

Urban populations: 2000

Asia: regions and megacities

2.06

1.09

1.14

2.42

1.27

1.36

2.07

15.30

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2015

8.46

(64.11)

–

70.08

–

(69.55)

100.59

55.35

Percent change of population: 2000–2015

19,976

12,673

14,655

30,751

17,574

17,380

10,104

27,706

(9)

1,207,794

Urban population: 2030

Projected

1.65

1.05

1.21

2.55

1.46

1.44

0.84

2.29

15.57

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2030

(continued)

−1.29

17.90

30.73

29.53

41.07

30.36

(33.72)

35.9

22.94

Percent change of population: 2015–2030

Table 2.3 Urban and megacity population of Asia by regions, 2000, 2015, and 2030 projection (Source United Nations, DESA, World Urbanization Prospects, 2015, The 2014 Revision)

32 2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

Urban populations: 2000

34,450

77,231 (91,644)

420,685

(5)

10,285

–

–

15,732

–

Asia: regions and megacities

Tokyo, Japan

Megacity Total

(b) Southern region

Megacities

Dhaka, Bangladesh

Bangalore, India

Chennai (Madras), India

Delhi, India

Hyderabad, India

Table 2.3 (continued)

3.74

–

–

2.44

15.56

12.21

5.45

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2000

(8,944)

25,703

(9,890)

10,087

17,598

(6)

624,430

150,113 (157,669)

38,001

Urban population: 2015

(1.43)

4.12

(1.58)

1.62

2.82

(21.38) 17.00

15.30

3.87

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2015

63.38

–

–

71.10

48.43

94.37 (63.80)

10.31

Percent change of population: 2000–2015

12,774

36,060

13,921

14,762

27,374

(9) 10

875,188

188,009

37,190

Urban population: 2030

Projected

1.46

4.12

1.59

1.69

3.13

22.87

15.57

3.08

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2030

(continued)

(42.82)

40.29

(40.76)

46.35

55.55

40.16

25.24

−2.13

Percent change of population: 2015–2030

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives 33

Urban populations: 2000

13,058

16,367

10,032

–

65,474

199,681

(0)

Asia: regions and megacities

Kolkata (Calcutta), India

Mumbai (Bombay), India

Karachi, Pakistan

Lahore, Pakistan

Megacity Total

(c) South-Eastern region

Megacities

Table 2.3 (continued)

(4.99)

15.56

–

2.38

3.89

3.10

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2000

(2)

301,579

105,914

(8,741)

16,618

21,043

14.865

Urban population: 2015

7.72 (13.21)

17.00

(1.40)

2.66

3.37

2.38

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2015

51.03

61.76

–

65.65

28.57

13.84

Percent change of population: 2000–2015

(4)

403,284

200,177 UN

13,033

24,838

27,797

19,092

Urban population: 2030

Projected

22.87 (10 Citi)

1.49

2.84

3.18

2.18

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2030

(continued)

33.72

89.00

(49.10)

49.46

32.10

28.44

Percent change of population: 2015–2030

34 2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

Urban populations: 2000

–

(9,962)

–

–

–

117,108

(0)

Asia: regions and megacities

Jakarta, Indonesia

Manila, Philippines

Krung Thep (Bangkok), Thailand

Thành Pho Ho Chí Minh (Ho Chí Minh City), Vietnam

Megacity Total

(d) Western region

Megacities

Table 2.3 (continued)

(7.47)

–

–

(4.99)

–

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2000

(1)

177,952

23,269 (39,837)

(7,298)

(9,270)

12,946

10,323

Urban population: 2015

7.96

7.72 (13.21)

(2.42)

(3.07)

4.29

3.42

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2015

51.96

–

–

–

(29.95)

–

Percent change of population: 2000–2015

(1)

232,170

52,296

10,200

11,528

16,756

13,812

Urban population: 2030

Projected

7.19

13.00 12.97

2.53

2.86

4.15

3.42

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2030

(continued)

30.47

124.75 (31.27)

(39.76)

(24.36)

29.43

33.798

Percent change of population: 2015–2030

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives 35

Urban populations: 2000

(8,744)

(8,744)

Asia: regions and megacities

Istanbul, Turkey

Megacity Total

Table 2.3 (continued)

(7.47)

(7.47)

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2000

14,164

14,164

Urban population: 2015

7.96

7.96

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2015

(61.99)

(61.99)

Percent change of population: 2000–2015

16,694

16,694

Urban population: 2030

Projected

7.19

7.19

Megacity population as % of region’s total urban: 2030

17.86

17.86

Percent change of population: 2015–2030

36 2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives

37

landscape is fast-changing. Faced with this reality, one cannot help but ponder the future implications. What will be the regional consequences of such growth paths? The reputation of megacities as ‘engines of growth’ that drive the economic prosperity of growing megaregions and claim a sizable share of national (and international) economic activity, along with the consequent economic clout of these megaregions, is well recognized in the literature. No further substantiation seems necessary to prove the veracity of such a claim, although researchers continue to find innovative approaches to add to the universality of this argument (e.g., Florida et al. 2008). The questions that come to mind are not whether the megacities drive economic prosperity, but rather, at what rates? In other words, what are the projected trajectories for economic growth for individual megacities (and for evolving megacity regions)? Are they going to align with, or deviate from predicted population trends? Indeed, the paramount question implicit in these queries is ‘how are the growth trajectories of megacities going to shape and alter their expanding regions? Again, an adequate exploration of these questions would require delving into complex and intertwined issues (and the much-needed datasets) that are well beyond my current focus. Nonetheless, I briefly engage in two exercises with two objectives: First, to take a quick look at the projected economic trajectories of the Asian megacities en masse as compared to their global counterparts, and second, to do the same specifically for the twenty-three cities that had either attained megacity status by 2015 or are projected to do so by 2030 (Table 2.3a–d). Towards this end, followed by many (futile) hours of data-sifting from many individual sources with often contradictory or mismatched information, I relied on the dataset on GDP presented by Hawksworth et al. (2009) of the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) group, along with their observations on the trends, as the best option9 for such an examination. Regarding the first objective, observations and data offered by the authors on the basis of three aspects of GDP, namely, GDP size, average real GDP growth (% per annum), and percent cumulative real GDP growth (all as in 2008 and as projected for 2025) in context of 151 urban agglomerations worldwide10 (2009, pp. 31–34), offer some interesting insights. In rankings by GDP size (2009, pp. 24– 25), researchers observed the ‘dominant trend for the emerging economy cities [was] to rise up the rankings’. While they found Shanghai (rising from 25th to 9th ranking) and Mumbai (from 29th to 11th) to be the ‘largest climbers’ among the ‘top 30 urban agglomerations by estimated GDP in 2025’, four of five ‘notable new entries’ into the top 10 tier’ (Istanbul, Beijing, Delhi, Guangzhou)—were from Asia. In addition, seven of eight smaller cities, viewed as ‘notable climbers’ because of their impressive 9 In

spite of the two different projection periods (2015–30 for population in the UN dataset and 2008–25 for GDP, in PricewaterhouseCoopers), and a few mismatches due to typographical errors among tables (e.g., Tables 3.6 and 3.10 on the base year), this source was selected for several reasons: While they primarily relied on the UN data, they also utilized data from other sources to come up with their estimates, meticulously noted the sources, discussed their relative reliability or lack thereof, explained their methodology in detail and claimed to add new data to their estimates as they became available. 10 The UAs were selected per the criterion that they “should encompass the top 100 ranked by GDP in both 2008 and 2025…” (2009).

38

2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

rank-climbing projections, were from Asia as well. Clearly, as per the PwC report, a shift in terms of GDP size is expected to take place towards emerging economies in general, and towards Asia in particular. According to Hawksworth et al., “[a]n even clearer way to see the shifts in global economic weight towards the emerging markets is to look at ranking by projected economic growth between 2008 and 2025” (2009, pp. 25–26; emphasis added). To this end, they examined two indicators. First, in the context of the projected average real GDP growth % pa, they observed that there were “no advanced economies represented in the top 30 fastest growing cities”. With the exception of five cities from five African countries, all of the remaining 25 cities in this ‘fastest growing’ group came from Asia, of which two Vietnamese cities11 were projected to take the top two positions; nine were from China and twelve from India. The dominance of the so-called secondary cities (on the verge of attaining the 10-million population threshold of megacity status) in this group is noteworthy not only from the perspective of their rising economic importance in the megacity regions in the developing world, but also from the standpoint of the shift(s) in hierarchical structure that have been theoretically advanced and empirically explored in both the developed and developing world.12 In examining the second indicator of GDP growth, Hawksworth et al. (2009, p. 26) compared the projected ‘percent cumulative real GDP growth’ of sixteen ‘megacities’. Half of this group, from seven emerging economies (China, India, Brazil, Turkey, Mexico, Argentina, and Russia), were ‘projected to rack up cumulative GDP growth’ approximating 70–197%, as opposed to growth of about 35% for the advanced group of eight cities from USA, UK, France, and Japan (p. 26). Regarding the second objective, information on the twenty-three Asian urban centers (Table 2.4) were extracted from the list of 151 cities (2009, pp. 31–34). My focus is not on their rankings in absolute GDP size, as much as on their trends of growth as projected for 2008–25. From that perspective, the projected slowing down of Tokyo and Osaka-Kobe, two of the Asian economic powerhouses of global significance in terms of GDP size, is interesting. While ranked at the top two in 2008, and projected to maintain these ranks in 2025 in terms of GDP size, in terms of percentage changes, they are projected to be at the lowest end (34% and 20% respectively) among Asian megacities, by a substantial margin. In terms of real GDP (per annum) during the 2001–25 period, at the projected 1.7% and 1.1% respective growth rates, their rates of growth per this indicator are much lower than those of the rest of the 22 cities in the group. This is especially noticeable in comparison to the relatively higher growth rates evident in Eastern Asia (as represented by China) and to a somewhat lesser extent, in the Indian sub-continent. That the projection of a slide in rank in economic performance for Tokyo and Osaka-Kobe appear to correspond to the significant slow-down in population growth rates in the 2000–15 period, with

11 Hanoi

and Ho Chi Min City. way of observing this phenomenon, through the differential urbanization model, has been briefly noted in a footnote in Sect. 2.1.2.

12 One

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives

39

Table 2.4 Selected megacities of Asia: GDP growth, 2008, with projection for 2025 (Source Hawksworth et al. 2009)

Asia: regions and megacities

Estimated GDP ($bn at PPPs)

Change in GDP (2008–2025)

Growth rate: real GDP (% pa: 2008–25)

2008

Change ($ bn at PPPs)

Rate

Rankinga H => 6.6 L =< 5.5 M=In between

19.9

1.7

L

33.94

2025

% Change

Eastern region: megacities Osaka-Kobe, Japan

417

500

83

Tokyo, Japan

1479

1981

502

1.7

L

Beijing, China

166

499

333

200.6

6.7

H

Chengdu, China

33

100

47

142.4

6.6

H

Chongqing, China

57

170

113

198.2

6.6

H

Guangzhou, China

143

438

295

206.2

6.8

H

Shanghai, China

233

692

459

196.9

6.6

H

74

218

144

194.5

6.6

H

119

241

122

102.5

4.2

L

Tianjin, China Shenzhen, China Southeastern region Bangkok, Thailand Jakarta, Indonesia

92

231

139

151.0

5.5

M

149

325

176

118.0

4.7

L

58

181

123

212.6

7.0

H

182

367

185

101.7

4.2

L

Dhaka, Bangladesh

78

215

137

175.6

6.2

M

Bangalore, India

69

203

134

194.2

6.5

M M

Manila, Philippines Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Western region Istanbul, Turkey Southern region

Chennai, India

66

191

125

189.3

6.5

167

482

315

188.0

6.4

M

58

170

112

193.1

6.5

M

Kolkata, India

104

298

194

186.0

6.4

M

Mumbai, India

209

594

385

184.0

6.3

M

Karachi, Pakistan

78

193

115

147.4

5.5

M

Lahore, Pakistan

40

102

62

155.0

5.6

M

Delhi, India Hyderabad, India

a The

cut-off points between the high, medium, and low rankings (column 7) are subjectively ascribed.

40

2 Shifting Urban Dynamics: An Overview

a projection for negative growth rates for 2015–30 period as seen in Table 2.3a,13 is interesting. Compared to the substantially higher (actual and projected) growth rates of the megacity population in the Eastern and Southern Regions of Asia for corresponding periods, this trend is of some significance, especially when viewed with the demographic transition trends of the respective countries in these regions. Demographic changes are likely to result in shifts to changes in the level of production and consumption of resources. A higher population growth rate can be expected to lead to expansion of the working age population. This in turn will result in higher rates of income generation, thus increasing demand for a wide range of consumer goods and services (McKinsey Global Institute 2011). All such outcomes are clear considerations for sustainable planning for Asian megacity regions. In the opening statement of an interesting paper on the different stages of the so-called demographic dividends,14 Ahmed et al. (2016) of the World Bank Group states: “Demographic change and development is a two-way relationship. Demographic change affects key intermediate outcomes of development […], and these intermediate outcomes, in turn, influence demographic change”. As the authors have shown, both India and China, the two most populous countries of the world, are at two successive stages of demographic transition in the middle of the spectrum of development.15 India, at the early demographic dividend stage, demonstrating a continued rise in working age population, and China, at the late demographic dividend stage, with a declining share of such (but with fertility rates still above replacement level), have the potential to harness the power of these dividends. In contrast, for certain developed economies in Asia, including Japan, at the post-demographic dividend stage, fertility rates have already fallen below replacement levels, with implications for future growth. Obviously, these demographic transitional patterns have huge significance for megacities and their surrounding regions. Even the rudimentary data on the actual and projected population growth and economic development (per GDP) of megacities, as presented in this section, point to uneven regional developmental patterns and projected growth paths among the giant cities (and, by inference, the city regions) of Asia. Obviously, any noticeable trends will need to be interpreted with caution, as many factors can be related to the observed patterns. Numerous studies have explored the interconnections between historical and cultural issues in urban regional development patterns, policies, and programs. These issues, in concert with a host of endogenous and exogenous forces (primarily related 13 The disparate projection periods between the population (2015–30) and GDP (2008–25) data sets are obviously problematic, precluding an effective comparison. 14 The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) has variously described demographic dividend, e.g., ‘[t]he demographic dividend is the accelerated development that can arise when a population has a relatively large proportion of working age people coupled with effective human capital investment (UNFPA, April 2016). 15 For a detailed discussion, including the typology of countries within the spectrum of stages (ranging from pre-demographic dividend to early demographic-, late demographic-, and postdemographic dividend stages), the criteria for determining the stages, and an overview of literature on developmental implications (shaping, and being shaped by, the dividends), see, Ahmed et al. (2016).

2.2 Megacities and Megacity Regions: Some Asian Perspectives

41

to globalization and technological advances), as well as rising Asian regionalism, are among the factors that may explain these mixed demographic and economic situations and their future projected trajectories. Irrespective of the causes, the consequent changes in the status quo underscore the importance of sustainable planning for rising megacity regions and the megaregions that house these cities.

References Ahmed SA, Cruz M, Quillin B, Schellekens P (2016) Demographic change and development: a global typology. Policy Research Working Paper, 7893, World Bank Group. http://econ. worldbank.org Bocquier P (2005) World urbanization prospects: an alternative to the UN model of projection compatible with the mobility transition theory. Demographic Res 12:219–236 Bloom D, Khanna T (2007) Urban revolution. Finance Dev 44:9–14 Cadena A, Dobbs R, Remes J (2012) The growing economic power of cities. J Int Aff 65(2):1–17 Cohen B (2004) Urban growth in developing countries: a review of current trends and a caution regarding existing forecasts. World Dev 32:23–51 Dogan M (2004) Four hundred giant cities atop the world. Int Soc Sci J 56:347–360 Eisinger A (2006) Urbanization. In: Oswalt HP, Rieniets T (eds) Atlas of shrinking cities. Ostfildern, Hatje Cantz, pp 28–29 Florida R, Gulden T, Mellander C (2008) The rise of the mega-region. Camb J Reg Econ Soc 1(3):459–476 Forstall RL, Green RP, Pick JB (2009) Which are the largest? why lists of major urban areas vary so greatly? Tidjschriftvoor Economische en Sociale Geografie (TESG) 100:277–297 Ganapati S (2014) The paradox of shrinking cities in India. In: Richardson HW, Nam CW (eds) Shrinking cities: global perspectives. Routledge, London Geyer HS (1989) Differential urbanisation in South Africa and its consequences for spatial development policy. Afr Urban Q 5:276–292 Geyer HS, Kontuly TM (eds) (1996) Differential urbanization: integrating spatial models. Wiley, New York Geyer HS, Kontuly TM (1993) A theoretical foundation for the concept of differential urbanization. Int Reg Sci Rev 17:157–177 Grimond J (2007) The world goes to town: a special report on cities, The Economist, May 7 Gugler J (1996) The urban transformation of the developing world. Oxford University Press, New York, NY Hall P (1999) Planning for the mega-city: a new Eastern Asian urban form? In: Brotchie J, Newton P, Hall P, Dickey J (eds) East West perspectives on 21st century urban development: sustainable Eastern and Western cities in the new millenium. Ashgate, Aldershot, pp 3–36 Hall P (2011) Looking backward, looking forward: the city region of the mid-21st century. In: Neuman M, Hull A (eds) The futures of the city regions. Routledge, London, pp 15–29 Hardoy JE, Mitlin D, Satterthwaite D (2001) Environmental problems in an urbanizing world: finding solutions for cities in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Earthscan Publications, London Harrison J, Hoyler M (2015) Megaregions: globalization’s new urban form?…….. Hawksworth J, Hoehn T, Tiwari A (2009) Which are the largest city economies in the world and how might this change by 2025? PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), UK Economic Outlook, November 2019, London, pp 20–34 He SY (2014) When growth grinds to a halt. In: Richardson HW, Nam CW (eds) Shrinking cities: global perspectives. Routledge, London Klaassen LH, Bourdrez JA, Volmuller J (1981) Transport and reurbanisation. Aldershot, Gower

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Klaassen LH, Scimemi G (1981) Theoretical issues in urban dynamics. In: Klaassen LH, Molle WTM, Paelinck JHP (eds) Dynamics of urban development. St. Martin’s Press, New York Kraas F (2007) Megacities and global change in East, Southeast, and South Asia. ASIEN 103:9–22 Laquian AA (2005) Beyond metropolis: the planning and governance of Asia’s mega-urban regions. Woodrow Wilson Center Press, Washington, DC Laquian, AA (2011) The planning and governance of Asia’s mega-urban regions. In: Population distribution, urbanization, internal migration and development: an international perspective. UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs Population Division, United Nations, New York, pp 302–322 McKinsey Global Institute (2011) Urban world: mapping the economic power of cities, March 2011 McGee TG (2017) The international encyclopedia of geography. In: Richardson D, Castree N, Goodchild MF, Kobayashi A, Liu W, Marston, RA (eds). Wiley Mookherjee D (2003) Differential urbanization model: the case of a developing country, India 1961–1991. TESG/J Econ Soc Geogr 94:34–49 Mookherjee D, Geyer HS (2011) Urban growth in the national capital region of India: testing the differential urbanization model. TESG: J Econ Soc Geogr 102(1):88–99 Mookherjee D, Geyer HS, Hoerauf E (2014) Delhi and its peripheral region: perspectives on settlement growth. In: O’Donoghue DP (ed) Urban transformations: centers, peripheries and systems. Ashgate, UK, pp 197–206 Mookherjee D, Geyer HS, Hoerauf E (2015) Dynamics of an evolving city-region in the developing world: the National Capital Region of Delhi revisited. Int Plann Stud 20:146–160 Oswalt HP, Rieniets T (eds) (2006) Atlas of shrinking cities. Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern Pacione M (2004) Changing cities—a global framework. In Pacione M (ed) Changing cities: international perspectives. IGU Urban Commission and Strathclyde University Publishing, pp 3–35 Parr JB (2005) Perspectives on the city-region. Reg Stud 39:555–566 Richardson HW, Nam CW (2014) Shrinking cities: a global perspective. Routledge, London Richardson HW (1980) Polarization reversal in developing countries. Pap Reg Sci Assoc 45:67–85 Rodriguez-Pose A (2008) The rise of the ‘city-regions’ concept and its development policy implications. Eur Plan Stud 16:1025–1046 Rowe M (2014) Megacities. Geographical, pp 28–35 Satterthwaite D (2002) Urbanization in low- and middle-income nations in Africa, Asia and Latin America. In: Desai V, Potter RB (eds) The companion to development studies, 3rd edn. Routledge, London, New York, pp 279–285 Smith DA (2004) Global cities in East Asia: empirical and conceptual analysis. Int Soc Sci J Mega-Cities 181:399–412 Swerts E, Denis E (2015) Megacities: the Asian Era. In: Singh RB (ed) Urban development challenges, risks and resilience in Asian megacities. Springer, Tokyo, pp 1–28 Tacoli C (1998) Beyond the rural-urban divide. Environ Urban 10:3–4 van den Berg L, Drewett R, Klaassen LH, Rossi A, Vijverberg CHT (1982) A study of growth and decline. Pergamon Press, Oxford UN Habitat 2015 (2015) The state of the Asian and Pacific cities. United Nations, New York UNFPA (2016) Sub-national estimates of human capital indicators: localizing investments for the demographic dividend. United Nations Population Fund Poster. April 2016. https://www.unfpa. org/resources/sub-national-indicators United Nations (2014) UN population division: DESA. World urbanization prospects: the 2014 Revision, Highlights. United Nations, New York United Nations (2015) UN population division: DESA. World urbanization prospects: the 2014 revision. United Nations, New York United Nations (2016) World cities 2016 report. United Nations, New York Wikipedia (2016) Hemisfile: perspectives on the political and economic trends in the Americas. Institute of the Americas. 1904, pp 5–8. Accessed 20 Nov 2016 Yeung, YM (2011) Rethinking Asian cities and urbanization: four transformations in four decades. Asian Geographer 28(1):65–83

Chapter 3

From Megacity to Megacity Region: Is an Asian Paradigm Emerging?

Abstract Given the current and projected proliferation of Asian megacities, and their transformational reach into surrounding territories, a common understanding of the evolving ‘megacity region’ (MCR) phenomenon is needed to initiate meaningful conversation on a coherent research and planning agenda for sustainable development. This does not appear to have happened yet. Even in the West, where the concept of city region was born and matured, the discussion has been characterized by a gamut of different interpretations and nuances as per inter and intradisciplinary orientations. Partly as a corollary to this diversity, definitional ambiguities and overlaps on scalar and other variations of the city region have further impeded a common understanding of city-regional dynamics. Following a brief discussion of this and a few related issues, I take a look at the evolving city-regional character of Asia through the respective lenses of a small number of scholars and researchers over the last few decades, taking note of the unique perspectives and research initiatives that have relevance for the Asian MCR. Keywords Megaregion · Megacity region · City region · Desakota · Asia

3.1 Introduction The diverse growth and spread patterns of the giant cities of Asia, and their transformative influence over their surrounding regions, have posed significant challenges to the understanding and management of contemporary Asian urbanization. Over the last decades, large cities have continued to remain the primary foci for national and regional developmental activities from the standpoint of launching large-scale development schemes, subsequently strengthening national and global roles of cities, and making cities increasingly economically consequential. Simultaneously, the rapid transformation of the hinterlands around these urban giants is beginning to gain more research and planning attention from the perspective of growth management and sustainability, with the intention of preventing the unwanted consequences of The original version of this chapter was revised: Typographical mistakes have been corrected. The erratum to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_3

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3 From Megacity to Megacity Region: Is an Asian Paradigm …

rapid growth (UN-Habitat, 2016). Last, a new form of city region, usually comprising clusters of settlements of varied shapes and sizes around one or more dominant large urban center(s) in the midst of a hybrid landscape of non-urban and urbanizing spaces, is fast becoming a defining feature of Asian urbanization. It is also becoming more evident that in context of the growth and areal spread of the megacity’s reach into surrounding territory, a common understanding of this evolving ‘region’ is required in order to initiate a meaningful conversation that leads to the formulation of a cohesive research and planning agenda for a sustainable future for all. However, in my estimation, this has not happened yet. Ever mindful of the wealth of literature that has been generated in studies of the geographies of ‘regions’, I wish to point out that since neither ‘cities’ nor ‘regions’ have standard accepted definitional criteria, it is hardly surprising that despite the richness of the literature, conceptual definitions of ‘city regions’ continue to remain contested. Often, interchangeable uses of the terms convey different meanings to different researchers and readers, failing to relate to the purpose for which the ‘city region’ concept was initially formulated. This, in combination with the many variations in forms and processes related to city-regionality, and the varied scales and settings with all their developmental and other distinctions, makes Asian megacities and their regions an immensely fascinating, but rather confounding, topic of study. Even as the concept of city region was born and matured in the West, it has been characterized by a gamut of different interpretations and nuances per disciplinary and individual orientations. Partly as a corollary to this diversity, definitional ambiguities and overlaps on scalar1 and other variations of the city region have further clouded a common understanding of the city-regional dynamics. My contemplation of some of these issues is briefly offered in the following sections. I also take a look at the evolving city regions of Asia through the respective lenses of a small number of scholars, taking note of their unique perspectives on Asian city regions in the last few decades, including some novel research approaches undertaken in more recent years. These are among contributions that have influenced my own thinking over the years and that I believe to be of enduring value for future researchers and planners on Asian urbanization. My proposed tri-pronged approach to sustainable planning issues in the Asian megacity regions, as well as an empirical exploration of such an approach in the context of a specific Asian megacity region, will be taken up in the remainder of the volume.

3.1.1 The Megacity Region and the Mega-Urban Region That the influence of the megacities extends ‘way beyond their formal boundaries’ (Laquian 2011) and that ‘cities are no longer bounded entities’ (UN Habitat 2015) has become an almost universal conviction. Consequent to the growth and increase in number of ‘megacities’, the Western-derived concept of city region has been taking 1 Following

Sayre’s (2005) example, I note that I use the word ‘scalar’ as pertaining to scale.

3.1 Introduction

45

root in Asia, where city regions are beginning to assume different shapes and forms, often coalescing from city regions to ‘megacity regions’ to ‘mega-urban regions’ or ‘megaregions’, as especially observed in Eastern Asia. Of all the queries (‘what’, ‘where’, ‘when’, ‘how’, ‘who’, and ‘why’), facing someone fascinated by these various versions of Asian city regions—both as phenomena and as forms—my focus here is more on the ‘what’ and the ‘where’. Undeniably, these are basic, ‘lower order’ questions. Using Allen et al’s (1998) concept of region as a construction, Harrison and Hoyler (2015b, p. 11) consider the who, how, and why to be ‘central to future agendas for research’ (“…who is constructing mega-regional spaces, how are they constructing mega-regional spaces, and why are they constructing megaregional spaces”), with the intention of “moving debate forward from questions of definition, identification, and delimitation to questions of agency…[who or what], process…[how], and specific interest…[why]” (p. 230). The authors also caution against the ‘mistake of too much focus on the what and where of megaregions’ (p. 234). Their intervention in this respect is of immense importance, and the cruciality and interconnectedness of these questions for future research agendas, from both academic, planning, and policy-making perspectives, is irrefutable. Nonetheless, from the standpoint of the diverse and changing urban dynamics of the Asian urbanizing regions, significance of the other two inquiries, especially the what (what is a city region, megacity region, or megaregion?) that I somewhat equate with definitional parameters, should not be underestimated. Parenthetically, the importance and relevance of the where, both in context of the ‘mega[city]-regional spaces’ and the ‘spaces of the mega[city]-region’ along the lines of Schafran (2014), is also integrally related to my three-pronged approach, and will be discussed in the next chapter. As for the what: “Defining the parameters is important because it ensures that as researchers we begin with the same objects under our consideration,” noted Harrison and Hoyler (2015c, p. 237); to this I would add practical applications, planning, and policy decisions—defining the parameters is important for all of these reasons and more. But do we have such universally agreed upon definitions in the Asian context? The answer cannot be an unequivocal ‘yes’ or ‘no’; it can arguably point to the affirmative in context of certain parts of Asia (e.g., East Asia), and on certain scales (e.g., megaregion), but not on other parts or other scales (e.g., ‘megacity region’). As a matter of fact, as I delved into the predominantly Western literature to find answers to these basic questions in preparation for my current work, I came away with the notion that the ‘what’ question is yet to be fully resolved even in the West where the concepts of city regions and regionality have such long roots (the when?). And this I consider to be rather ironic—that historically, it was the diversity of the approaches (e.g., ‘form-dominant’, ‘function-dominant’, ‘global’, ‘networked’, etc.) to the ‘how’, ‘why’, and ‘who’ questions, that shaped, and are shaping, the answers to the ‘what’, producing the multi-faceted labels and definitions of these urban forms and/or phenomena. Even as the approaches themselves are beyond my scope, I believe that it is relevant to note some of the definitional issues. In my perusal of the Western city-regional literature I was also struck with both a basic simplicity and an immense complexity related to these wh questions: simplicity

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because of the underlying commonalities of the urbanization process and its forms, and complexity because of their intrinsic differences and massive analytical expanse. I know this is a paradoxical statement—I will try to explain. My perception of the simplicity was fueled by what I saw as the commonalities in some of the traits, functions, and genesis of the city-, megacity-, and megaregions and variations thereof.2 In course of my readings, there were many occasions when I came across narratives describing one or the other of these city-regional forms, that could have been interchangeably used for another (e.g., region, city region, megacity region, mega-urban region, or megaregion) with a high degree of accuracy.3 Ironically, however, this very factor—imprecise, but interchangeable use of the different terminologies (e.g., megacity region for city region, or megaregion) when a more precise definition is warranted for conceptual clarity—may have contributed to definitional ambiguities. The point is that there are underlying currents of agreement or incipient consensus on some of the core ideas and principles regarding the formation, function, and characteristics of the various versions of ‘city regions’, but that they are sometimes obscured by less than precise or conflated/overlapping use of terminologies. On the other side of the coin, the complexities, of course, are formidable. Our world has changed drastically in the last few decades; what may have perhaps been a relatively straightforward exercise in the earlier era, namely the conceptualizing of different variations of urbanizing, urbanized, and expanding city regions, today has become progressively more complex and nuanced. As Neuman and Hull (2011), editors of a volume of works by a ‘collection of disparate and polyglot scholars’ addressing the future of city regions from ‘spatio-temporal, relational, and governance perspectives’, observed: “[U]nderstanding the complexity of the contemporary city region and the forces that shape it has proven too much a challenge for a single mind or discipline” (2011, xxiii, emphasis added). Inevitably, a massive volume of literature has sprung up over the years offering a multitude of disciplinary, subdisciplinary, cross-disciplinary, and multidisciplinary perspectives, increasing the complexity of the topic. Among the diverse interpretations and theorizations leading to the coinage of different terminologies in recent years, a few that readily come to mind include ‘megacity region’ (Xu and Yeh 2011), ‘global city region’ (Scott 2001), ‘polycentric megacity region’ (Hall and Pain 2006), ‘megaregion’ (Florida 2008), ‘polynuclear urban region’ (Turok and Bailey 2004), ‘megaregion’ (Harrison and Hoyler 2015a; Ross 2009); and ‘polycentric urban region’ (Kloosterman and Musterd 2001; Bailey and Turok 2001). While addressing the same entity or phenomenon borne out of the dynamics of an urbanizing world, the diversity of so 2 The

word ‘some’ in the above statement is emphasized because of my belief that while there are commonalities in certain areas, there are intrinsic differences in other aspects of the forms, functions, and characteristics among ‘[smaller]city regions’ ‘megacity regions’, and ‘megaregions’. 3 There are ample examples in the literature to validate this statement; however, citing them would be a waste of time for the reader. It may be more interesting to mentally add (or change) the prefix(es) while reading some of the narratives to consider their interchangeability. For example, see Harrison and Hoyler’s (2015b, p. 10) apt insertion of [mega] to Allen et al’s (1998, p. 2) description of region.

3.1 Introduction

47

many interpretations and approaches has not made it easy for us to come to a common understanding. However, the often confusing and contradictory definitions of city regions (Davoudi 2008) and the ‘plethora of interpretations’ (Neuman and Hull 2011, p. xv) as encountered in the literature, are entirely to be expected; it may even be ventured that they should be welcomed, as besides presenting different perspectives, they may also engender ‘out of the box’ innovative thinking and approaches. I digress for a moment to make an observation in context of the above discussion: As I have felt many times in my work, faced with the complexities of diverse definitions, views, and interpretations, we often create our own mental images or models as per our own inclinations, opinions, attitudes, or disciplinary backgrounds that help to clarify and crystallize our thought process. Although used in a somewhat different context, and loosely interpreted, the eloquent description by Neuman and Hull (2011) resonated with my thinking: These differing conceptions, sometimes contrasting, sometimes complementary, have an underlying mental model or analytical frame. These models or ‘imagined spatialities’, simplify and synthesize our knowledge of processes of change, and can be expressed using images and metaphors captured in theories and concepts. (xvi)

And further, that “……… [t]he image may represent a concept, metaphor, story, rational structure to sediment complex realities in a simplified way in a mental model” (2011: xvii; emphasis added). McGee’s evocative imagery of an ‘amorphous and amoebic-like spatial form’ spreading into the mega-urban region (1995, p. ix), is an excellent example of this that closely parallels my own image of the Asian megacity region. Other images that have stayed with me: the ‘spreading pancake’ or ‘palm and fingers’ (Laquian 2005, p. 4; 2011, p. 303), the ‘wheel and spoke’ (Parr 2005), and the ‘octopus’ (Mookherjee et al. 2015, p. 156). However, I am also mindful of the caution voiced by the authors (Neuman and Hull 2011, p. xvii). As they noted, the models suffer limitations when ‘theoretical constructs’ and the ‘conveying image’ fall short of the reality, further “compounded by dogma packaged in disciplines and ideologies, which when properly understood are one and the same”. Still, a mental model may help us intuit a phenomenon that is difficult to articulate or quantify. Returning to the discussion at hand, the diversity of growth and spread patterns of ‘megacities’ poses significant challenges to the understanding and management of contemporary Asian urbanization phenomena. Given the population load of Asia alone, this may be one of the most complex and challenging tasks faced by mankind. Many Asian megacities are now on a path to global status. From the launching of large-scale development schemes to their increasing global involvement, many are, or are becoming, foci for national and regional developmental activities in an increasingly interconnected world. Simultaneous to this trend, the megacities have continued to extend their influence and their reach (both literally and figuratively) to their surrounding regions, thereby influencing and transforming them, connecting to and spreading beyond smaller urban centers into the spatially peri-urban, and the relatively pervasive rural areas characteristic of Asian regions. Concurrently, a socioeconomic and cultural transformation towards urbanism is taking place for the in situ population in the previously agrarian landscape. Subtle (and in some places

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3 From Megacity to Megacity Region: Is an Asian Paradigm …

relatively more pronounced) shifts from agriculture to manufacturing-oriented activities, as well as closer ties to family and friends residing in more urbanized places, coupled with the modernizing influences of technology and increased urban-rural mobility are all contributing to this transformation in varying degrees and intensities. Together, these processes (and the resulting features) can be said to be imparting a rather distinctive Asian cast to these city regions. Furthermore, they have already begun reshaping Asian regional dynamic in more than one way. An Asian perspective on the new regionalism is taking shape (e.g., Liu and Regnier 2003). And, with a gradual shift in centricity, many of these city- or megacity regions have started taking on more polycentric and/or poly-nodal configurations, some of which are coalescing into giant multi-system megaregions as observed in the East and Southeast Asian countries. That said, it is important to recognize that the use of many of the concepts associated with megacities, megacity regions, megaregions, and so on in Asia is fraught with similar complexities and ambiguities as in the West, where ‘city region’—arguably the foundational concept behind the other variations—has had a long root. Davoudi (2008) noted that the city region concept was incorporated in at least one early planning practice in the United States: “…as early as 1909, the Chicago Plan was already promoting a regional vision of the city that extended well beyond its administrative boundaries” (Simmonds and Hack 2000, as referenced by Davoudi 2008, p. 51). In the growing body of literature on city regions, almost all writings are prefaced with an account of the evolutionary history of the concept, within the Western context. In general, mention of the seminal contributions made by Patrick Geddes, Lewis Mumford, and Jean Gottmann and their coinage of terms such as conurbation and megalopolis are ubiquitous in the literature. Friedmann (1956) traced the development of the concept of city region to the concurrent contributions of McKenzie in 1935 and Christaller in 1933 during the Great Depression.4 Friedmann gave credit to McKenzie for developing and refining the idea of the ‘metropolitan region as a logical unit for planning’ and Christaller for providing a ‘new perspective for regionalism and regional structure’ (1956, p. 7). The concept generated attention through the next several decades as industrialization, and its modernizing effects on transportation and communication, continued to add richness to the concept. However, as Harrison noted (2007), interest in the city region, which had reached its ‘apex’ in the 1970s started to decline soon after, until the concept of city region fell to ‘relative obscurity’ in the 1980s. The concept has been revived, revitalized, and debated (e.g., Scott 2001; Parr 2005; Jonas and Ward 2007a, b; Harding 2007) from different disciplinary perspectives in more recent years. Many recent extensive and analytical overviews (e.g., Harrison 2015; Harrison and Hoyler 2015a; Harrison 2007; Davoudi 2008; Paasi et al. 2018) have traced the evolutionary pathways, as well as the many approaches to and intricacies in, the city region and city-regionalism concepts. Further examination of these evolutionary pathways, while intriguing, is beyond my current focus. 4 Bibliographic information on the works of McKenzie and Christaller, as cited by Friedmann (1956),

are presented in the Reference Section.

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3.1.2 Conceptual Complexities: Labels and Definitions Many scholars have offered diverse conceptualizations or terms to express their views on what a city region is. As numerous writers have observed, this proliferation and overlap of concepts and terms (e.g., functional urban regions, polycentric metropolitan region, extended metropolitan region, global cities, world cities, and many others) is confusing. However, it is not unexpected; complexities and ambiguities in conceptualizing a complex morphological and functional entity, such as the city region, are often foundational to the process of coming to terms with how we view such an entity and understand its integral parts. Prevailing works by major contributors to the field point to a common focus or core that often underlies diverse perspectives. Rodriguez Pose (2008, p. 1027) observed that while the presence of a core city linked by functional ties to a semi-urban and rural hinterland appears to be the ‘essence’ or the ‘minimum common denominator of virtually all definitions of a city region’, this definition is often ‘modified’ by divergent conceptualizations of both the core and the hinterland. Hoyler et al (2008a, p. 1055) describe approaches that consider polycentricity the ‘core characteristic’ of an ‘extended urban region…but tend to diverge in their specific meaning and regional scope’: Different attempts have been made to handle these extended urban regions analytically, and a number of labels have been used to denote the identified new metropolitan forms (also Taylor and Lang, 2004); for instance, multi-core metropolis (Hall, 1999), polycentric urban regions (Kloosterman and Musterd 2001), global city-regions (Scott, 2001a), Zwischenstadt (Sieverts, 2003), megapolitan areas (Lang and Dhavale, 2005), megaregions (Regional Plan Association, 2006), and as in this special issue of Regional Studies, mega-city regions (Hall and Pain, 2006). (Hoyler et al., 2008a, p. 1055. All citations are presented in the Reference section)

Schafran (2015) suggests two reasons for this state of affairs: “For a concept which has grown significantly as an analytical tool over the past decade, there is little consensus as to the definition of megaregions. Part of this can be attributed to a mish-mash of related terms—megapolitan region, polycentric megacity region— and to the geographic and disciplinary diversity of megaregional scholarship” (2015, p. 77). Such a mish-mash, or versions thereof, is noticeable throughout the literature, and to me, encapsulates the state of the field. Some scholars have made a conscious choice to use or include terms for entities with distinctly divergent characteristics under one ‘generic’ terminology, explicitly so stating at the outset to set conceptual parameters for readers. Laquian (2005, p. 6), in his seminal tome on Asia, provides an excellent example of this. Laquian uses “the ‘megaurban region’ as a generic term to refer to these very large urban settlements” for what he described as (1) ‘megacitycentered extended metropolitan regions’, (2) ‘extended metropolitan regions’, (3) ‘polynucleated metropolitan regions’, and (4) ‘true megapolitan regions’. In contrast, examples of unexplained, yet interchangeable use of distinctly different terms or concepts by researchers abound in the literature. There is a second reason for the numerous terminologies and definitions for city-regional entities, that, in contrast to ‘mish-mash’, are more likely to be a product of the ‘geographic and disciplinary diversity of megaregional scholarship’ (Schafran 2015). The literature is replete with

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reviews and listings of such terminologies and definitions (e.g., Harrison and Hoyler 2015a; Rodriguez-Pose 2008, p. 1027). They reflect diverse disciplinary and subdisciplinary orientations (primarily economic and political) and divergent approaches (e.g., functional/morphological, structural/agency, etc.). Besides recognizing that our own perspectives are shaped by one, another, or a combination of these approaches and orientations, I find it also helpful to remember that most of the conceptual and definitional differences, and some of the so-called ambiguities and overlaps, can be attributed to these approach- and orientation-related differences. Disciplinary orientations are the distinct lenses through which economists and political scientists (as well as scholars from other related disciplines and sub-fields) view region and regionality. “The chapters in this book point to a divergence of opinion depending on whether you take geoeconomic or geopolitical arguments as your starting point” observed Harrison and Hoyler (2015c, p. 236) in the concluding comments on their edited volume on megaregions. And further, “When is a megaregion a megaregion? The interventions in this book provide further illustration that megaregions mean different things to different people, in different contexts. The politicized nature of megaregion formulation leads to the definition becoming blurred” (2015c, p. 237). Arguably, such interdisciplinary diversities lie at the very heart of the conceptual differences that are perhaps more readily observable than the more nuanced intradisciplinary discrepancies in approach (e.g., focus on form versus function). For example, Davoudi (2008), focusing on the city region as an ‘analytical construct’ that considered the ‘relational dynamics of the social networks and urban functions that often transcend the bounded perceptions of space’, said, Despite its long history, …the concept of the city-region does not enjoy a common definition, neither in its use as an analytical term nor in its upsurge as a political one. Analytically, it represents different spatial entities depending on how it has been arrived at methodologically. Politically, it means different things depending on the type of policy agenda it serves. In practice, the concept is frequently used simply to refer to the areal extent of a metropolitan area. (p. 51, emphasis added)

As his extensive review reveals, even within the same basic relational/functional (as well as ‘urban-centric and economic-driven’) approach, differences in methodologies and viewpoints in mapping functional urban regions (e.g., top-down/bottomup, nodal/non-nodal), including definitions of ‘core-city’ and tools for delineation of areal extent (e.g., actual flows/time-distance from core) have been debated, advocated, adapted, and/or adopted as city regions in various contexts. As with other topics (e.g., polycentricity, scale) that ultimately can be seen to be part of one geographic totality, a parallel set of form versus function al approaches has shaped the literature on city region since the inception of the concept. While it is probably too early to tell which path it will take in Asia and the rest of the developing world, scholars have noted that there are “…distinctive North American and European perspectives in research on large-scale urban-regional configurations” (Harrison and Hoyler 2015b, p. 10, emphasis added), and that these ‘perspectives’ change with time. To quote Harrison and Hoyler (2015b, p. 10) American perspectives are still rooted in a form-dominant spatial planning tradition. In contrast, European perspectives, once steeped in discussions about urban spatial form (Duhr,

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2007; Faludi, 2009; Kunzmann, 1996) are now more commonly associated with functionallydominant global-city inspired networked approaches. (Hall and Pain, 2006; Hoyler et al., 2008[…]; Pain and Van Hamme, 2014; Reades and Smith, 2014; Taylor et al., 2009) [Cited works are presented in the Reference section at end of chapter.]

It can be ventured that the process of shaping the ‘Asian megacity region’ concept may not be any less contested. It is interesting to note, as Davoudi (2008) reminds us, that it was in the United States that the ‘functional urban region’ (FUR) concept was first developed, later becoming established in Europe. At any rate, per Harrison and Hoyler (2015b, p. 10), distinctions between these two ‘traditions highlighted’ “how the type of megaregion that is constructed varies depending on whether you take rapid urbanization (form) or global economic integration (function) as your starting point…”. They further argue that “marking out the space [of a megaregion] is a deeply political act [that] begins when researchers choose to prioritize megaregional form or megaregional function as their entry point,” (2015b, p. 14) raising serious academic and practical issues for megaregional research around form/function complementarity in specific geographical contexts. In the context of this form-functional ‘duality’ in city-regional discourse, the relational approach advanced by Robert Dickinson merits mention. As Harrison noted on multiple occasions (Harrison 2015, 2007, pp. 21–22; Harrison and Hoyler 2015a), despite a general recognition of Robert Dickinson’s coinage of the term ‘city region’, his seminal works on the development of the city-region concept (e.g., Dickinson 1967, 1976 as cited in Harrison 2007) has been overlooked or neglected for decades. … [S]cholars writing about the new city-regionalism some forty years later have been guilty of overlooking Dickinson’s contribution, other than the usual perfunctory reference to acknowledge his minting of the term “city-region.” But in overlooking Dickinson, today’s researchers have neglected his contribution to what remains the cornerstone of our understanding of the concept—namely, that city-regions are socially and politically constructed. (Harrison 2015b, p. 26, emphasis added)

Harrison deserves our appreciation for his thoughtful appraisal of Dickinson’s contribution, not only to the concept of city region, but also to ‘region’. “Ironically, in the period of decline for the city region concept in the 1970’s, it was Dickinson himself who coined the phrase ‘the regional concept’ to promote the centrality of ‘the region’…” leading to “the new regional geography of the 1980s, and subsequently the new regionalism of the 1990s, …” (Harrison 2007, pp. 21–22). As Harrison ventures, this early neglect that Dickinson experienced could possibly have been because of his ‘bucking the popular trend of the time’ [the post-war emphasis on town and country planning] as he chose a “more constructivist approach: what today would amount to an incipient form of the “relational” approach to theorizing the city and the region” (2015, p. 26). Harrison (2007) considers the following to be the ‘essence of Dickinson’s conceptualization of city regions’, and notes that this was the sentiment that was famously echoed by others such as Allen et al. (1998) decades later. Dickinson’s original statement:

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3 From Megacity to Megacity Region: Is an Asian Paradigm … The concept of the city-region, like all concepts, is a mental construct. It is not, as some planners and scholars seem to think, an area that is presented on a platter to suit their general needs. The extent of the area they will need depends on the specific purpose for which it is required. The concept of the city-region can only be made specific and definable, as a geographic entity, by reference to the precise and areal extent of particular associations with the city. (Dickinson 1964, 227 as quoted in Harrison 2007, p. 322)

Considering that “an attempt to align the functional dominance of the geoeconomic global city (region) literature with the form dominance of traditional planning thought” is seen only over the ‘past two decades’ (Harrison and Hoyler 2015b, p. 7), Dickinson’s thoughts appear to be well ahead of his time. Thus, we come back to the topic of definitional issues, albeit through a somewhat circuitous path. It is heartening to note that the fog over conceptual and/or definitional parameters appears to be lifting. At the very least, there seems to be a serious effort afoot to establish some commonly accepted definitions of those various spatial configurations, or ‘spatial imaginaries’ (Glass 2015), that are fast becoming an integral part of urbanization, with especial relevance to Asian and other developing countries. Important components of megaregionality have been conceptualized by a number of scholars in recent years. While some of these, such as functional interconnectivity, intra and extra-regional networking, economic dominance, and global connectivity are among the commonly acknowledged defining characteristics of megaregions, others are more nuanced. Proximity, and/or spatial contiguity, is an example. Consider the following: “Megaregions consist of a number of metropolitan areas linked by proximity and some shared characteristics” noted Wheeler (2009, p. 864). “Our own respective research on global city-regions and mega-city regions has highlighted how, on a smaller scale, the evidence suggests that just because two urban systems are located proximate to each other does not mean they can be aggregated up to form a single, larger, more coherent and more competitive urbaneconomic unit …. What this alerts us to is a pressing need to assess the functional coherence of megaregional space,” observed Harrison and Hoyler (2015b, p. 18; emphasis added). In addition, new and innovative approaches to defining megaregions have come to be considered. For example, Florida et al (2008) attempted to ‘systematically, consistently, and objectively’ identify ‘megaregions in terms of contiguously (or very nearly contiguously) lighted areas as seen from space at night’ (p. 8 online; emphasis in original), using ‘light based regional product’ or LRP as proxy for economic development. Harrison and Hoyler’s (2015a) contribution on distinguishing between types of ‘urban regional spatial configurations’ is a welcome, and important, addition to this trend, which is equally applicable in divergent contexts regardless of a country’s developmental status. Their approach is especially meaningful to me because it aligns with my own understanding of the essential difference between megacity region and megaregion, two of the most indiscriminately and interchangeably used terms in the literature. Based on the premise that “[s]patial concepts are not interchangeable”, their statement zeroes in on what I consider to be the central differentiating factor: While global city-regions, mega-city regions, and metro(politan) regions relate to one urban system (comprising one or more cities), a megaregion comprises two or more interrelated

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urban systems, while planetary urbanization represents the reach of the global urban system across all geographic space …”. (2015b, pp. 7–8, emphasis added)

This characteristic of one, versus more than one, urban system(s), appears to me to be the essence of the difference between megacity region and megaregion. This distinction goes a long way in clarifying the concepts, although, as Hesse (2015, p. 32) notes, the ‘confusion remains’. “It [the terminological confusion] confirms that the question of how to label these large agglomerations is far from trivial, and the epistemology behind such concepts seems to be quite important when assigning a particular meaning to a certain matter” (2015, p. 32). The complex task of identifying and applying commonly agreed upon set(s) of parameters, for the definition of what should constitute an urban system, remains an enormously important issue to be resolved. Once this distinction is accepted and adhered to consistently in the academic and planning literature, the next hurdle will be the standardization of the definition of ‘megacity’.5 The megacity is both literally and figuratively the heart and the core of the ‘megacity region’, which, in turn, and in conjunction with other such spatial configurations, becomes a constituent part of the ‘megaregion’. I argue that the time has come for all concerned to be on the same page as to some of these conceptual and/or definitional parameters as related to the transformational forms and processes of urbanization of the city regions of Asia. Although we are not there yet, the journey has already begun, thanks to the works of a set of dedicated scholars whom I think of as early luminaries in the field of Asian urbanization.

3.2 Through the Lenses of Scholars: Asian Megacities and Their Regions Serious exploration of the conceptual parameters of the megacities, along with the various forms of their surrounding regions, has only begun in Asia over the past decades. This may be due primarily to two factors. First, even though aspects of the growth phenomena of the giant cities and their impact have been keenly observed in public media, and started appearing in professional discourse, relatively early in the post-WWII period, the impact of giant cities on surrounding city regions did not gain enough attention until the end of the twentieth or the beginning of the twentyfirst century, when a handful of pioneering researchers envisioned the transformative power of the emerging urban giants on their primarily rural, but inexorably urbanizing, hinterlands, especially in Southeast Asia. Secondly, even as conceptual horizons were expanding, detailed empirical studies on individual megacities have only begun to emerge in the past few decades; even fewer of these take into consideration the regions around the megacities. With the likely exception of Eastern Asia, the dearth of robust empirical studies addressing, and systematically analyzing, the dynamics

5 Some of the definitional and data-related issues of the megacities have been discussed in Chapter 2.

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of the spatial configurations of city regions, and the limited accessibility of data for such analyses, have been among key concerns in current urban studies. One striking trend in Asian urbanization studies in recent years has been a focus on the growth impact of the giant cities on their surrounding regions. However, this is a relatively new phenomenon in the urban literature on Asia. As discussed above, in the Western world, terminologies such as ‘megacity region’, ‘mega-urban region’, and ‘megaregion’ have generated much discourse and some confusion and have spawned the recent efforts to conceptually distinguish between them. Spatial, form-related factors such as areal extent and physical contiguity, as well as functional aspects involving the many facets of functionalities including functional coherence among contiguous city regions, networking, and national, international, and global linkages, have contributed to the shaping of our conception of these evolving regions around the megacities. Centricity (and nodality) issues, such as degrees of poly or monocentricity within the region from both morphological and functional perspectives, have been extensively discussed and debated in the literature (e.g., Burger and Meijers 2012; Meijers 2008; Green 2007; Davoudi 2002, 2003; Kloosterman and Musterd 2001). And, as noted above, one distinguishing factor—that of one urban system in the megacity region versus two or more systems within the megaregion—is appearing to emerge as an important defining criterion to conceptually separate these two urbanizing entities. However, this long conceptual discourse on city regions across decades has primarily taken place in the West, and more to the point—in the context of the West. As Asia started coming to the forefront of global attention because of the growth of its large cities, the attention of public media and professional literature fell primarily on these cities. Associated issues such as the economies and diseconomies of scale, drawbacks, and benefits associated with big city growth, and urban ‘maladies’ such as slums, overcrowding, and pollution took up much space in the post-WWII period urban literature on Asia. Two brief but insightful accounts (Ginsburg 1989, 1991) by Norton Ginsburg offered overviews of the city-centric research publications on urbanization in Asia. In the first, spanning about a thirty-year period from the mid or late 1950s, Ginsburg (1989) noted the names and contributions by scores of scholars from a number of Asian countries (including some of his own contributions), and commented on how much we had learned about Asian cities, such as settlement patterns, primacy, effects of ethnicity and migration, and dualism between formal and informal sectors about Asian cities from these publications. He specifically mentioned “Terry McGee and colleagues, who, in books, monographs, and articles in a variety of learned journals put the Asian city on the map, so to speak, and reinforced studies of it in the context of ongoing research on urbanization wherever it might take place”6 (1989, p. 21). In the second such account, in the preface of a seminal volume on the ‘Extended Metropolis’ generated and edited by Ginsburg et al. (1991), Ginsburg commented on the then prevailing views and counterviews on the positive

6 In this context, he also noted the “distinctive and seminal research of Paul Wheatley on the origins

of cities in China, Japan, and Southeast Asia….” (Ginsburg 1989, p. 21).

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and negative impacts of big cities. While much of the literature supported the “…negative notions of urban ‘dysfunctionality’, ‘overurbanization’, growth-pole strategies, and a general view of urban development as a constraint on national socioeconomic and political development,” a ‘substantial parallel history of variance with these views’ also existed. He illustrated this parallel trend by the outcome of a ‘vigorous debate’ about the role of cities in an international conference7 in 1967, where, as he describes (1991, p. xv), the “unambiguous conclusions…were that cities, and the larger ones in particular, act as engines for economic growth….”. As he indicated, years of ‘reflection, contemplation’, research and scholarly discourse, coupled with dissatisfaction with negative views of the large cities, along with prevailing mindsets that did not differentiate between the ‘Asian case and other developing countries’, ultimately led to the conceptual formulation of a new approach to the study of Asian urbanization. This approach, starting with recognizing the distinctive Asian-ness of Asian urbanization, would look beyond the city, and into its hinterlands as ‘dynamic systemic phenomena’ and explore the ‘high probability that the conventional division between ‘rural’ and ‘urban’ is outmoded’. Moreover, as he noted, the emphasis was on increasingly on the ‘process, not on morphology’ (1992, pp. xiv–xvii). Per Ginsburg, the first conceptual step, that of exploring whether there might be a distinctiveness in Asian urbanization, appeared to have been taken in an edited volume in the early 1970s (Dwyer 1972) to which he was one of the contributors. However, serious consideration of this distinctiveness, along with an underlying conceptual base of a uniqueness inherent to the hinterlands of large cities, did not come about until almost the ninth decade of the twentieth century, when Ginsburg and his colleagues directed the participants of a conference on—what they termed— the Extended Metropolis, to consider a hypothesis on ‘the existence and evolution of new and different kinds of settlement systems in Asia’. As Ginsburg put it—with his caveat ‘to the extent that this hypothesis might be true’—such a conceptualization cast doubt upon the “concept of a presumably uniform so-called ‘Third World’…”: The hypothesis under consideration suggests that this settlement transformation, which involves large and increasing percentages of the populations of many if not most Asian countries and the urbanization of the countryside without massive rural-urban migration, is distinctive to Asia, and is not, for the most part, characteristic of other developing countries. (1991, xiv)

At a subsequent conference on the mega-urban regions of Southeast Asia, McGee (1995, p. 10) described this process as a ‘region-based urbanization, as opposed to city-based urbanization’: Operating in Asia is the emergence of what can be described as region-based urbanization, as opposed to city-based urbanization. Rather than drawing a population from rural areas to a city, region-based urbanization utilizes an in situ population in the extended metropolitan region as well as drawing migrants from other rural areas. … This is spatially extended 7 Pacific

Conference on Urban Growth, theme: “A New Urban Debate”, under the auspices of the East-West Center, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and AID, Honolulu, Hawaii, 1967 (Ginsburg 1991, p. xv).

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3 From Megacity to Megacity Region: Is an Asian Paradigm … urbanization rather than just population concentration, and it raises a significant number of new research and policy issues that need to be explored. (1995, p. 10; emphasis added)

Considering the time period, and the prevailing city-centric research environment, this was a definitive, and consequential step that helped raise ‘significant numbers of new research and policy issues’ with monumental implications for sustainable urban developmental planning. Without a doubt, McGee, along with Ginsburg, and a number of their colleagues (such as Bruce Koppel, Ira Robinson, and others) helped shape the urbanization literature of Asia for decades to come. What a review of the literature attests to, but the discussion above merely hints at, is that the foundational arguments behind the new approach to Asian urbanization by McGee, Ginsburg, and their like-minded colleagues, as proposed in the 1988 conference, were laid out over many years, in numerous publications, as well as in papers presented, discussed, and debated in many national and international conferences on variations of the theme. In the Preface of the Extended Metropolis, Ginsburg (1991) noted this in his own inimitable style: “The idea of new zones of interaction, associated with what might also be termed the ‘dispersed metropolis,’ did not, of course, spring full-blown from the Jovian brows of the editors, authors, and other participants in the 1988 conference. On the contrary, it evolved from a long history of reflection, contemplation, dialogue, and systematic research…” (p. xiv). Years of scholarly discourse had taken place before the ‘extended metropolitan region’ of Ginsburg et al. (1991) or the ‘desakota’ made famous by McGee, became an intrinsic part of the Asian urbanization literature. But it was the articulation and refinement of the concept of desakota (representing a transitional settlement zone of a rural-urban mix of agricultural and nonagricultural activities and land use around large cities or along their connecting corridors), a conceptually insightful and potentially measurable morphological concept (with a functional component), that in my estimation, would define McGee’s legacy. McGee’s coinage of this term from two words, kota (town) and desa (village) in the Indonesian Bahasa language, was insightful as well as practical. As he noted (1991, pp. 23–24), the use of this term was adopted ‘after discussion with Indonesian social scientists’ because of his belief that “there was a need to look for terms and concepts in the languages of the developing countries that reflect the empirical reality of their societies.” As for practicality, consider Ginsburg’s (1991) rather droll comment: “Presumably, a descriptive English term for the phenomenon of a zone of intensive interaction within the hinterland of large cities would have been too clumsy. How, in short, does one name a new, and previously unrecognized, regional entity and the process by which it comes into being?” (p. xvii; emphasis added). The terms desakota or kotadesa (originally meant to name zones of settlement transition, but later also used to signify the process of such), and the relatively less used variations ‘desakotasi’ or ‘kotadesasi’ (si meaning process), would become a readily recognizable presence in the literature on Asian city regions over the next thirty years, continuing into the current era, maintaining its conceptual vitality and capacity to evolve with the times. With a somewhat tongue-in-cheek reference to ‘those who have vested interests in the persistence of the urban-rural paradigm’, McGee (1991), laid out definitions and

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parameters of the desakota concept in 1991 as he described ‘five main regions of the spatial economy’—the major cities, peri-urban regions, desakota regions, densely populated rural regions, and sparsely populated frontier regions—and noted the variables that would discourage imputing uniformity on their existence. Within specified niches (e.g., ‘high density’, ‘mostly rice-growing’), he also saw the desakota regions to be of three types: ‘Rural landscapes in which most of the economically active work is in nonagricultural activities’ (Type 1); ‘rapid economic growth compared to other regions of the country’ (Type 2); and ‘slow growth of income and involuntary economic activity’ (Type 3) (1991, pp. 8–9). His spatial juxtaposition of the three types of desakota zones with Vining’s (1986) concept of ‘core areas’ offers a valuable overview of the Asian situation in the early nineties.8 A second important volume (McGee and Robinson 1995) of scholarly contributions on Southeast Asian mega-urban regions, co-edited by McGee, continued the exploration of the desakota concept in examining the various spatial and/or functional components of Asian city regions. In his own magnum opus on Asian mega-urban regions, Laquian (2005) noted the McGee and Robinson volume (1995), along with the contributions of researchers such as Dharmapatni and Firman (1995), and Lin (1997), who “following McGee’s lead…[had]…described the process of desakota development in city regions like Bangkok, Jakarta, Seoul, Shanghai, and the Pearl River Delta region of China” (Laquian, 2005, p. 4. Cited references are noted in the References section). Since then, many other researchers have focused on the desakota principles to explore a wide range of socioeconomic, political, ecological, and other aspects of the evolving transition zone in wider spatial contexts in Asia than were originally intended (e.g., Moench and Gyawali 2008; Lin 2018; Zhang 2018). Equally significant, McGee, the originator of the term and a major proponent of the concept, has kept an ongoing research focus on it by examining its components from multiple spatial and conceptual perspectives (e.g., McGee 2008, 2009, 2017; McGee et al. 2007), thereby ensuring its continued relevance to the changing dynamics within Asian city-regional landscapes. “What was essentially a generic model designed to question Eurocentric assumptions concerning the urbanization process in Asia has been subject to critical regional deconstruction through empirical studies including the work of McGee’s students that has led to modifications and rethinking of the original idea of desakota” (McGee et al. 2007, p. 69), as exemplified by several works aiming to ‘carry this deconstruction process forward by a closer analysis of the process of Chinese urbanization’ (2007, p. 69). In perusing some of these works, including the original contributions in the McGee-Robinson volume that primarily focused on the mega-urban regions of Asia, I was once again reminded of my initial impression that in conceptualizing the original desakota concept, McGee and his colleagues had indeed captured the essence of the 8 Vining

defined the core areas as “…the regions containing and surrounding the country’s most important and dominant city (in a few cases, cities), which is generally but not always the capital city…” (Vining 1986, p. 4 as cited in McGee 1991). McGee noted that “these core areas were too narrowly defined spatially to fit neatly with zones of desakota, which may extend over large areas between urban centers. Still, the data presented in Vining’s analysis give an overall picture of the emergence of desakota zones in Asia” (McGee 1991, p. 9).

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evolving landscape of at least a part of the hinterlands around the large or megacities of Asia. Their concept of the desakota as regions (of varied types) with specific socioeconomic, land use, and other characteristics, and as processes involving complex, multidimensional forces, opened up the conceptual horizon for future researchers to approach different city-regional configurations and processes from their own vantage points. The following excerpt on Asian mega-urban regions by Michael Douglass (1995) from the McGee-Robinson volume serves as an example of the articulation of this essence: The second pattern of development [in the spatial restructuring] is the emergence of megaurban regions. More than simply the polarization of development in ‘mega-cities,’ the appearance of mega-urban regions is the outcome of complex economic and technological processes that have allowed for daily commuting and commercial interaction along corridors between core urban centres and into rural and urban hinterlands that extend far beyond the catchment areas of only a few decades ago. Called desakota regions by McGee (1991) and ‘extended metropolitan regions’ by Ginsburg, Koppel, and McGee (1991), they are complex fields of rural and urban interaction that reach 100 km or more from major urban nodes. As such they defy classification as either rural or urban; yet they are absorbing increasing shares of national populations. (Douglass 1995, pp. 50–51)

All components of the above description are consonant with my own understanding of the mega-urban region or megaregion (presupposing the existence of more than one spatially contiguous urban system with functional coherence). More to the point, they also align with my concept of a megacity region (one urban system, and at least one core city of a threshold population of 10 million). But whatever the parameters—megacity region, megaregion, or mega-urban region—they all have the same heart, the same essence: ‘complex fields of rural and urban interaction’. And herein lies the beauty, vitality, and viability of the desakota concept, which continues to generate new and innovative research approaches in keeping with changing times. From my own research perspective, the basic value of the concept of the ‘extended metropolitan region’ or the ‘desakota’ region lies in its foundational principles. I plan to revisit this topic in the following chapter, to briefly note areas where my own conceptualization of the ‘urban-rural interface’ in the ‘spread region’ of the megacity region meshes with or diverges from my interpretation of the desakota concept as it was originally presented. While Ginsburg, McGee, and their colleagues profoundly shaped the discourse on Asian urbanization by elevating the city regions and their rural-urban hybridity to our collective consciousness, Laquian’s contribution is found in his extensive analysis of Asia’s large cities and city regions, especially from the point of view of governance and sustainable planning. From this standpoint, I contend that their respective contributions will never be ‘dated’, but will be remembered as foundational to the field. In its in-depth analysis and unique insight, the publication of Beyond the Metropolis: The Planning and Governance of Asia’s Mega-Urban Regions in 2005 has been noted for its ‘in-depth research’ and recognized as an ‘important literature and ideal textbook to students in planning as well as in international studies’ (Zhang 2006). This contribution stands out in my mind as invaluable to our knowledge of Asian urbanization as it stood at the end of the twentieth century. As he himself

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noted more than once (e.g., 2005, 2011) Laquian incorporated John Friedmann’s concept of ‘urban field’ and McGee et al.’s idea of the desakota, into his own notion of the mega-urban region as the basis for his work. Looking back, this notion, that “in a number of Asian countries, mega-cities have greatly expanded to the extent that they now form ‘systems of cities’ linked together functionally in networks of settlements encompassing huge tracts of highly urbanized as well as rural areas” (Laquian 2005, p. 6; emphasis added to highlight the plural form), seems prescient, as it echoes the ‘multi-urban system’ distinction for megaregions as proposed by Harrison and Hoyler (2015) almost a decade later. Laquian did not strictly adhere to the ‘multi-system’ distinction in defining various city region configurations as under the ‘mega-urban region’ umbrella. Thus, the Delhi NCR, Kolkata, Dhaka, and Karachi regions were used as examples of “other urban areas that may be considered as mega-urban regions”, p. 8). Still, he demonstrated a keen awareness of the definitional ambiguities pertaining to the city regions in context of Asia. “Because definitions of what constitutes a mega-city, an extended metropolitan region, or a megalopolitan region tend to be fuzzy, it is important to clearly indicate the geographic area and the jurisdictional scope of such megaurban regions,” he stated, adding, that it “may be useful, therefore, to try to define the boundaries of these settlements” (2005, p. 7). Needless to say, boundary issues of city regions remain among the most critical topics for scholars and planners to resolve. Regarding these definitional issues, it bears reiterating that Laquian’s careful explanation of the definitional parameters at the very outset of his work was important and useful. As noted above, after explaining that he would ‘use mega-urban region as a generic term to refer to these very large urban settlements’, Laquian noted that ‘strictly speaking, mega-urban regions may refer to’ four broad groups and specified the criteria for each. Apart from this exemplary attention to parameter-setting, his 2005 typology—and a subsequent one in 2011—of the Asian ‘mega-urban regions’ offer us depictions of the emerging ‘mega-urban regions’ in Asia around two different periods of history set apart by more than a decade, as perceived by one of the most knowledgeable scholars studying this phenomenon. Laquian identified the following four groups in Beyond the Metropolis (2005, p. 6): 1. Megacity centered extended metropolitan regions, e.g., Bangkok Metropolis, Metro Manila, Jakarta Raya, and the Delhi and Dhaka national capital regions, ‘where development emanates from a dominant urban core and envelopes adjacent settlements’; 2. Extended metropolitan regions, e.g., the Shanghai-Nanjing-Hangzhou-Suzhou region and the Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan national capital region, ‘where a number of urban nodes form a regional network’; 3. Polynucleated metropolitan regions, e.g., Pearl River Delta region in southern China, ‘where no one city region dominates but a number of highly urbanized urban settlements form a system of cities’; and 4. True megalopolitan regions, e.g., the Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka bullet train corridor, ‘where several large megacities with their own extended metropolitan regions encompass a very large highly urbanized area’ (p. 6; emphasis in original).

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In keeping with the changing urban regional landscape, Laquian somewhat modified this classification of the Asian mega-urban regions in a subsequent UN publication (2011 reprint); and therein suggested three ‘distinct’ types ‘as based on their socioeconomic, demographic, and geographic characteristics’, as below: 1. Urban corridors, e.g., Tokyo-Yokohama-Nagoya-Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto ‘bullet train’ corridor (Japan), the Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan-Qinhuangdao transport corridor (China), and the Mumbai-Pune development corridor (India), ‘contiguous highly urbanized human settlements linked together by trunk urban infrastructure and services’; 2. Megacity dominated city regions, e.g., Metro Manila (Philippines), the JakartaBogor-Tangerang-Bekasi (JABOTABEK) region (Indonesia), the ‘Bangkokcentered region’ (Thailand), or the Dhaka metropolitan region (Bangladesh), ‘where urbanization is marked by primacy where the main city, usually the national capital, is many times larger than the next largest city’; and 3. Sub-national city clusters, e.g., the ‘Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong SAR of China-Macao SAR of China-Zhuhai region in the Pearl River Delta’ ‘creating the potential for a ‘southern China megalopolis’ (China); the Surabaya-SurakartaSemarang-Yogyakarta-Malang region (Indonesia); or the ‘Daegu-Ulsan-BusanGuangjiu region’ (Republic of Korea). ‘In countries with very large populations and wide national territories, a number of sub-national city clusters have evolved as mega-urban regions’. (2011, pp. 303–304). Laquian’s contribution to the field of Asian urbanization spanned many issues associated with megacity growth in developing countries. His deliberation on the utility of slums in the developing regions of Asia (e.g., Laquian 1971; Yeh and Laquian 1979), for instance, reflect his pragmatic and context-specific approach to urban issues, and should be seriously taken into consideration by future planners and policy makers. I find Laquian’s analytical deliberation and recommendations in terms of sustainable planning and governance of the different spatial and functional configurations of city regions, especially insightful. Following these seminal works in the 1990s, other scholars embarked on research on multiple forms of urbanization, especially focusing on various scalar variations of city regions. Research efforts on a variety of themes, e.g., demographic, socioeconomic, planning, and governance, have begun to emerge in the more recent literature, and have added to our understanding of city-regional concepts, forms, and structural configurations in Asia. While many of these contributions, predominantly in the form of research articles or monographs, have focused on or around individual urban centers or urban-related (primarily sectoral) problems, some have dealt with urban or regional issues as related to the evolving phenomenon of the ‘mega-urban’ region, attesting to its growing importance. Two extraordinary volumes, both titled Megaurban Region—one edited by Catherine Ross in 2009 and the other by John Harrison and Michael Hoyler in 2015, have significantly added to our knowledge and brought fresh insights by renowned scholars and researchers in many fields and related sub-fields. However, although both volumes are more inclusive than the

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Euro-US-centric literature of past years, and although both include conceptual contributions on, or applicable to, the Asian situation, their focus has not solely been on Asia. Mega-Urban Regions of Pacific Asia, edited by Gavin Jones and Mike Douglass (2008)—team leaders and major contributors with a long history of scholarship in this field—is an exception, and a substantial addition to the literature on mega-urban regions of Asia. I consider this contribution significant for many reasons. As noted in the Preface, the book was the result of close collaboration with researchers and their institutions in six countries…, who were brought together to study the dynamics of change in mega-urban regions focusing on six cities; Jakarta, Bangkok, Manila, Shanghai, Ho Chi Minh City and Taipei, based on analysis of 1990 and 2000 population census data. (2008, xvii, emphasis added)

The purpose of highlighting this statement is to mark the collaboration element, to underscore its immense implication, and the research potential it evokes for the rest of us. As the authors went on to explain, beside the crucial fact that the project enabled the team “to gain access to unpublished census data enabling it to study change in these MURs in ways that were never possible before”, it also “required colleagues in each country to collaborate in accessing the data, deciding on standardised approaches to enable comparative analysis, analyzing the data and writing the reports” (p. xvii; emphases added). In short, to me, this sounds almost like an ideal scenario for a solo researcher (or a like-minded team of researchers ‘sharing their enthusiasm for the project’, as the editors put it). A collaborative research environment such as this can be expected to optimally address most of the barriers, such as data accessibility, standardization, and comparability that constrain in-depth, analytical, and comparative research of the mega-urban-/megacity regions in most Asian countries. However, it is also important to note that the editors appeared doubtful about the prospects of replicating such a venture, one of the reasons being the “recent tendency for the data collected through the censuses to be less detailed, particularly in relation to the labour force” (p. xviii). This is a trend that I have also noticed with much consternation and disappointment in relation to at least one other country, specifically, India, as manifest in the 2011 Census of India, as well. Observations by Jones (2008, pp. 43–46, Chapter 3) on ‘Data and Definitional problems’ detailed a number of deficiencies: ‘Data quality and completeness’, including various degrees of undercounting of the city population within a given data period; ‘limited data on employment’ including definitional changes and a dearth of data in smaller geographical areas; and ‘difficulties on studying migration’ in Pacific Asia, as encountered by the research team. These observations reflect the frustration felt by many of us under similar circumstances. The adequacy and quality of data are serious matters that deserve serious and concerted attention from all national and international stakeholders, a topic that I will later address. In addition to the significance of the work for the above reasons, Mega-Urban Regions in Pacific Asia stands out as a major contribution to the field for its empirical findings, as well as its drawing from all the observed ‘commonalities and differences’ in mega-urban regions in order to discern ‘pathways to the future’. As the editors

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noted, despite enormous national and international economic and other impact, megaurban-regions (MURs) of Asia had not received the serious attention they deserved. The editors implied that contributions by McGee, Ginsburg, and other scholars on the ‘extended metropolitan regions’ or the desakota regions of Asia, primarily involved the ‘regions of dense agricultural population’, and trail-blazing as they were, left other needs unmet: What [were] lacking, however, [were] studies which systematically examine the structure and dynamics of change in MURs, recognizing the reality of different zones within the MUR which play different roles, and which disaggregate the overall pattern of change into the sharply differing patterns specific to each of these zones. (2008, p. 2)

It was this void, felt about a decade ago, that the Jones and Douglass contribution attempted to mitigate. A zonal approach was used to counteract, among other data issues, what the editors perceived to be inadequacies related to the delineation of administrative boundaries of cities that did not account for spillover into surrounding regions, as well as the variations in growth rates (and other characteristics) within and outside of these boundaries at different spatial distances from the core areas. Because “the basic contribution of the study is in analysing the dynamics of change in population, migration and employment between zones in the MUR, and relating these to the broader forces acting on MUR change,” it was imperative to delineate “zones according to criteria with some analytical meaning”, noted Jones (2008, p. 41). A rigorously applied measurement system based on density, agricultural employment, and spatial contiguity was used for the entire set of MURs; ‘the aim was to adhere as closely as possible’ to the established criteria and to maintain comparability among the MURs. However, Jones (2008, p. 42) joined in a refrain that resonates with many of us facing similar circumstances: “the practicalities of applying the delineation meant that the task required art as much as science” (p. 42). The criteria designated three zones: Core, of population density over 5000 population per square kilometer; Inner Zone, of population density exceeding 1000 population per square kilometer and agricultural employment of less than 10 percent; Outer Zone: the remainder of the administrative region around the core and the inner zone, with the aim to exclude areas with over 40 per cent employment in agriculture. However, many data limitations, such a lack of uniform availability of ‘useful data’ for all the MURs, necessitated manual adjustments and overriding of certain pre-established criterion. Despite ‘formidable data and definitional problems’, the venture was “well worthwhile, as it provided the first opportunity for such an intensive study of the dynamics of change of six major Asian mega-urban regions” (Jones 2008, p. 59), revealing distinct differences among the zones both in terms of urban (rural-urban migration) and demographic (fertility rates) transition. The authors’ observation a decade ago that the “layering of global dynamics over MUR economies and societies has had a transformative impact on the scale, pace of expansion, and form of each MUR”, appears just as valid today, even in the face of the astounding ascendance of the giant megaregions of Pacific Asia in the last few years. This enduring utility is also true for the perspectives they offered on four key modes of the MUR development. But for me, they also have a special

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importance because of their contextuality—the need to try to understand the myriad ‘local-global’ dimensions associated with the development of Asian MURs within the context of the Asian environment. As they explained, the zonal approach was chosen for better comparative assessment of the changing morphology of individual MURs, that indeed revealed much variation, but some commonalities as well. These variations and commonalities, within and between the MURs, as well as within and between the zones themselves, are revealed and discussed throughout the work. In conclusion, based on their interpretations of the observed trends, Jones and Douglass (2008, pp. 340–352) have also offered what they termed as “tendencies covering roughly five phases of the MUR formation”, that deserve careful attention. The authors’ concluding statements—distilled from this immense project—are notable primarily because of their expected relevance to a smaller variation of the mega-urban region, the megacity regions of Asia: “[With some exceptions as noted], the combination of demographic and urban transitions…exerts very powerful influences on the formation and expansion of MURs. …[A]t a macro-spatial scale, the outcome of these influences is a continued polarization of national development into the MURs”, and that, these are “intertwined with global economic forces that also have a profound impact on MUR formation and expansion”. (p. 344)

And, looking to the urban future, they added this cautionary note: While each MUR seems to be encountering similar forces shaping patterns of growth and change, none faces a pre-destined future. The major transitions of many types—demographic, economic, environmental, urban–…appear in sufficiently varied patterns and combinations to suggest that while a number of transformations are common to the MURs, they do not amount to a single development path for all…. …. even among MURs that are at a similar point in their economic and demographic pattern. (p. 347, emphasis added)

Five factors, according to Jones and Douglass (2008), ‘cut across these transitions in MUR dynamics’, namely, respective cultural, social and political histories; governance structures (over an authoritarian to democratic continuum); differential impacts of global economic events or upheavals, as well as other events such as epidemics and pandemics (e.g., SARS and Avian Flu) and natural disasters (e.g., tsunami, earthquakes, volcanoes); and finally, competition in the global economy (e.g., share of FDI). Viewed in this light, each of these factors, alone or in combination with the others, would have the potential to affect the ‘development path’ of the MURs. A quick comment: While in complete agreement with the need to be mindful of not imputing a single development path for the MURs, I do see some broad commonalities in terms of structural and functional changes in space, such as the progressive concentration of tertiary activities in the core,9 and of the residential population in the inner and outer zones. The exploration of such patterns of comparative dynamics of urban morphology, supported by data, can add new dimensions to MUR studies within the Asian context. 9 In

addition to the tertiary activities, other activities (e.g., related to research and technological innovation) can also be expected to start concentrating in the core.

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The work of Jones and Douglas (2008) clearly indicated a remodeling process at work in the Southeast Asian urban landscape. The appearance of a transitory overlay across the zones of the core, suburban, and peripheral MUR zones, depicting various intensities, types, and patterns of concentration of population and economic growth, also has been a source of a host of social and environmental issues. The MURs, an outcome of the urbanization process—in the face of continued growth and substantial economic progress—face threats in quality of life and environmental stress. For example, their study of the five components of environment (water, air, land, solid waste, and slums) of Southeast Asia, showed, despite improvement efforts, a state of environmental degradation within regions and amongst their delineated zones. The authors outline five phases of growth within the three zones (p. 340); the fifth phase highlighting a diminishing pattern of zonal differences. Does this fifth phase provide clues to the achievement of sustainability? If so, the creation of a city-regional framework within the continual urbanization process of urbanization becomes a crucial issue demanding urgent public policy attention, for the sake of sustainable development planning. As with the Ginsburg-McGee hypotheses and arguments related to the extended metropolitan region or the desakota zones, agreement or disagreement with JonesDouglas’s findings, or with their views on the five phases of the future ‘pathways’, is beside the point. What is more important is the fact that, by undertaking this painstaking and meticulous work on an important—but heretofore relatively under-researched—Asian urbanization phenomenon, and by forcefully voicing the constraints related to data deficiencies, undercounting, and the definitional issues affecting empirical research in Asia, they rendered invaluable service in advancing the frontiers of research in this field. This concludes my effort to sketch the seminal contributions of a few scholars and researchers whose thoughts and ideas on various aspects of the hinterlands, or the surrounding regions of the large cities of Asia, I have followed with interest over the past years, if not decades. Needless to say, I am acutely aware that this exercise has been inadequate as it leaves out significant early contributions by many. An article by Ginsburg (1989), as noted above, offers the names of some of these scholars; we owe a debt of gratitude to them all. The non-inclusion of names of others is a reflection of my inadequacy, and does not diminish the significance of their contributions. My decision to leave out many other scholars and researchers was borne out of the practicalities of time and resource constraints. Even though I have not called out their research on the Asian megacity region/mega-urban region phenomena, I know that we owe them a debt of gratitude for their contributions to the study of Asian urbanization. Distinguished scholars, such as Lawrence Ma, Dean Forbes, Yue-Man Yeung, Allen Noble, Frank Costa, Ashok Dutt, D.J. Dwyer, David Satterthwaite, Michael Cohen, and Yehua Dennis Wei, have left or are continuing to leave indelible imprints on the literature on the ever-evolving complex urbanization dynamics of Asia. Before concluding this section, however, I want to take a brief look at an innovative approach to identifying mega-urban regions through night-time light coverage by

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Richard Florida and colleagues (2008) that was mentioned above, but due to its somewhat different purpose and scope, not discussed in details.

3.2.1 Asian Mega-Urban Regions—A Novel Approach Florida et al.’s (2008) work did not focus exclusively on Asia. Rather, it was intentionally formulated as a global approach, partly as a refutation of ‘the world is flat’ argument advanced by Thomas Friedman (2005), and partly to support the authors’ assertion that megaregions around the world are gaining importance as economic units equal in stature to traditional nation-states. In their view, the fact that “[m]egaregions are integrated sets of cities and their surrounding suburban hinterlands across which labour and capital can be reallocated at very low cost” (2008, p. 459) supports their argument for a “strong set of counterforces that lead to geographic clustering [counter to the dispersal forces leading to the ‘global flattening’]”. “Megaregion,” the authors contended, “is a consequence and reflection of this clustering force,”10 as in a shift from the politically derived administrative units of the nation states era, megaregions were emerging as the area where the labor, economic impetus, foreign and domestic economic, political, and other resources converged or clustered. This view of the megaregions went against the ‘world is flat’ hypothesis, which postulated a ‘flattening’ of the world, primarily brought about by a convergence of technological innovations, political events, and the influence of multi-national companies. As they put it, “[t]he world remains extremely lumpy, spiky, hilly, etc., but the shapes of the lumps are changing,” and the megaregions “as a critical organizational level in this new global terrain” was emerging” (p. 360). However, the authors found no systematic definition of the megaregions that could be used for a comparative estimate of these variations as related to the clustering effects, enabling comparative analysis of the attributes of the megaregions on a systematic, consistent, and objective manner. Thus, to address this need, Richard Florida and colleagues came up with an innovative approach, whereby they used a global data set of night-time light to produce what they termed an ‘objectively consistent set of megaregions for the globe’, along with high resolution population data to estimate population. In order to examine the economic attributes of the megaregions, they processed the light data with published estimates of GDP. They used the number of patents granted to examine technological innovation clustered in individual megaregions (by combining city-specific data) and used the location of ‘highly cited scientific authors as a proxy for basic scientific innovation’. (For a detailed description of this interesting and novel approach to data constraints, see Florida et al. 2008, especially pp. 463–467).

10 As they noted, there were many reasons for this tendency to cluster, “…including local spillovers

and synergistic labour markets. The immense pools of productive labour and innovative industries that come together in modern mega-regions allow them to compete in the global market in a way that is very difficult for smaller places to match” (Florida et al. 2008, p. 460).

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The findings supported the authors’ contentions that globally the megaregions were a ‘considerable economic force’ and that contrary to the notion of the world being ‘flat’, a clustering tendency related to ‘geography and location’ was very much in evidence. Regarding the second, they had an interesting observation on what they considered to be the ‘great paradox of our time’: “at the same moment that technology [advancing transportation and communication] enables the geographic spread of economic activity, economic activity continues to cluster and concentrate around this mega-regional unit” (2008, 474).11 Forty of the largest megaregions (as determined by spatial contiguity of the nighttime light based methodology) produced over $100 billion in LRP, occupied only a fraction of the globe’s habitable land and yet housed close to 80% of the global population. These forty megaregions generated about 66% of total economic activity and about 85% of technological and scientific innovation. These were important findings, especially from the standpoint of global comparability—not only spatially, but also for the potential for future replications for temporal comparisons. This was the first ever effort, to my knowledge, to estimate the megaregions of Asia in specific, by rigorous application of a systematic and objective set of population, economic, and other criteria. Some minor questions or issues remained. For example, the statement, “India is home to one megaregion meeting our criteria for contiguity and economic output (Delhi-Lahore)” is a stretch; despite spatial contiguity as revealed in the satellite-based light imagery, location of this ‘megaregion’ housing two cities in two separate (and not too friendly) neighboring countries with limited economic and other interactions diminishes the probability of the synergistic interaction envisaged by the authors for mega-urban regions. Nonetheless, the impact of this study (including its methodological potential) to the Asian mega-urban region literature is significant, and its snapshot presentation of the comparative situation of the megaregions at the turn of the century, as juxtaposed with their continental neighbors, is highly informative. A wide range of disparities in population concentration and in the estimated resource-generating activities within and in between settlements and regions in the mega-urban regions of Asia were clearly apparent in the study. Japan, for example, housing four ‘significant’ megaregions in 2000—including Greater Tokyo (globally ranked #1) for LRP generation, followed by Osaka-Nagoya (globally ranked #5)— dominated the Asian scene in economic productivity. The ‘blurring of the boundaries’ among these megaregions as revealed in their light mapping (plus the impact of the existing and planned rapid-transit system through these megaregions) led the authors to muse that ‘much of Japan may be becoming a super-megaregion’ (evoking for a moment reflections on Doxiadis’s ecumenopolis). However, in terms of population concentration, the same megaregions dropped to 4th and 14th , respectively, whereas, Delhi-Lahore and Shanghai, with a global ranking of 1st and 2nd in population, 11 While not directly connected to my work, I find it important to make note of the authors’ view that the paradox was related to ‘human capital externalities’ that needed to be examined in future megaregional studies. “Developing deeper understanding of the role of these human capital externalities in the formation, growth and function of mega-regions is an important task of future research”, they concluded (Florida et al. 2008, p. 474).

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dropped to 35th and 31st , respectively, in LRP generation. This pattern of regional differences became even more pronounced when, based on compiled data (2008), the per capita generation of economic resources (LRP) was recalculated for Asia. Japan’s generation of an average of $40.00 per capita, far exceeded that of the most populated developing countries of China and India, who generated only $3.34 and $1.10, respectively, far below the average of $12.27 for the continent. Many have expounded on the interconnections between a host of endogenous factors such as historical and sociocultural conditions, contemporary regional development policies and a rising Asian regionalism, coupled with the impact of exogenous forces primarily related to globalization and precipitous technological advancements, to explain the mixed demographic and economic patterns of the megaregions of Asia, exploration of which is beyond my current focus. The point is that the broad regional economic activities accrued within and around the core megacities and the projected changes in future demographic patterns—likely to result in a shift to a higher level of production and consumption of resources—clearly signifies the Asian megacity regions’ growing importance and role in development. This in turn points to the imperative that future development and planning for the Asian megacity regions utilize a holistic, comparable, and data-derived approach. Discussions in this and the previous chapter highlight the shifting trends in Asian urbanization, namely the rise of megacities and the increase in their transformative influence on the very nature of their surrounding regions. This transformation is observable in many forms, including land-use patterns (e.g., agricultural land interspersed with sprawling urban and semi-urban settlements with mixed urbanrural work and living spaces), socioeconomic, cultural, ecological and environmental characteristics, transportation and communication infrastructure, and many other quality-of-life factors. Along with these trends, it appears that another significant paradigm shift is happening in the scholarly approach as related to the various scalar manifestations of the Asian city regions. Along with growing awareness that the large cities and their large-scale city regions of Asia—the megaregions—are on their way to becoming ‘economic powerhouses’ and ‘drivers of prosperity,’ we are beginning to pay attention to smaller scalar entities such as the megacity regions, a conceptual shift that has significant planning implications. Also, moving away from yesterday’s binary, urban versus rural, prism that viewed the city as the central focus, scholars have started to prompt us to view Asian city regions as unique and evolving mixed urban-rural entities with distinctive city-regional and sub-regional strengths and needs. However, these shifts are yet to be translated into cohesive research and planning agendas for the Asian megacity regions. As discussed in the introductory chapter, my focus for this volume rests on a three-pronged approach comprising three interconnected strands based on urbanrural dynamics, sustainability, and scale, all of which have been undergoing paradigmatic shifts in recent decades. This shift towards more integration, inclusivity, and flexibility bodes well for conceptualizing, adapting, and implementing an integrated approach to sustainable development for the Asian MCR. In the next four chapters, I discuss the three facets of my approach in terms of these conceptual shifts, and apply elements of my approach to an empirical exploration of the National Capital Region, Delhi, concluding with some thoughts and a vision for the future.

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Harding A (2007) Taking city regions seriously? response to debate on ‘city-regions: new geographies of governance, democracy and social reproduction’. Int J Urban Reg Res 31:443–458 Hardoy JE, Mitlin D, Satterthwaite D (2001) Environmental problems in an urbanizing world: finding solutions for cities in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Earthscan Publications Ltd, London Harrison J (2007) From competitive regions to competitive city-regions: a new orthodoxy, but some old mistakes. J Econ Geogr 7:311–333 Harrison J (2015) The city-region: in retrospect, in snapshot, in prospect. In: Jones KE, Lord A, Shields R (ed) City-regions in prospect? exploring points between place and practice. McGillQueen’s University Press, Montreal & Kingston, pp 20–52 Harrison J, Hoyler M (eds) (2015a) Megaregions: globalization’s new urban form? Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK Harrison J, Hoyler M (2015b) Megaregions: Foundations, Frailties, Futures. In: Harrison J, Hoyler M (eds) Megaregions: globalization’s new urban form? Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, pp 1–28 Harrison J, Hoyler M (2015c) Megaregions Reconsidered: Urban Futures and the Future of the Urban. In: Harrison J, Hoyler M (eds) Megaregions: globalization’s new urban form? Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, pp 230–255 Hesse M (2015) Megaurban regions: epistemology, discourse patterns, big urban business. In: Harrison J, Hoyler M (eds) Megaregions: globalization’s new urban form? Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, pp 29–50 Hoyler M, Kloosterman RC, Sokol M (2008a) Polycentric puzzles—emerging mega-city regions seen through the lens of advanced producer services. Reg Stud 42(8):1055–1064 Hoyler M, Kloosterman RC, Sokol M (2008b) ‘Special issue—globalization, city-regions and polycentricity in north-west Europe. Reg Stud 42:1055–1217 Jonas AEG, Ward K (2007) Introduction to a debate on city-regions: new geographies of governance, democracy and social reproduction. Int J Urban Reg Res 31:169–178 Jones G (2008) Comparative dynamics of the six mega-urban regions. In: Jones GW, Douglass M (eds) Mega-urban regions in Pacific Asia: urban dynamics in a global era. NUS Press, Singapore, pp 41–61 Jones GW, Douglass M (eds) (2008) Mega-urban regions in Pacific Asia: urban dynamics in a global era. NUS Press, Singapore Kloosterman RC, Musterd S (2001) The polycentric urban region: towards a research agenda. Urban Studies 38:623–633 Kunzmann K (1996) Euro-megalopolis or themepark Europe? scenarios for European spatial development. International Planning Studies 1(2):143–163 Lang R, Dhavale D (2005) America’s megapolitan areas. Land Lines, 17 (available at: http://www. lincolninst.edu/pubs/PubDetail.aspx?pubid = 1039) (accessed on 19 May 2008) Laquian AA (1971) Slums are for people: the Barrio Magsaysay pilot project in Philippine Urban community development. East-West Center Press, Honolulu Laquian AA (2005) Beyond metropolis: the planning and governance of asia’s mega-urban regions. Woodrow Wilson Center Press, Washington, DC Laquian AA (2011) The Planning and Governance of Asia’s Mega-Urban Regions. In: Distribution Population (ed) Urbanization, internal migration and development: an international perspective, UN department of economic and social affairs population division. United Nations, New York, pp 302–322 Lin G (1997) Red capitalism in South China. University of British Columbia Press, Vancouver Lin G (2018) Towards a Desakota Extended Metropolis? growth and spatiality of new (Peri)urbanism in Chinese Metropolitan Regions. In: Vigano P, Cavalieri C, Corte MB (eds) The horizontal metropolis between urbanism and urbanization. Springer, pp 111–130 Liu FK, Regnier P (eds) (2003) Regionalism in East Asia: paradigm shifting? Routledge, London McGee, TG (1991) The emergence of Desakota regions in Asia: expanding a hypothesis. In: Ginsburg, N, Koppel, B, McGee, TG (eds) The Extended Metropolis: settlement transition in Asia. University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, pp 3–25

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McGee TG (1995) Metrofitting the emerging mega-urban regions of ASEAN: an overview. In: McGee TG, Robinson IM (eds) The mega-urban regions of Southeast Asia. UBC Press, Vancouver, Canada, pp 3–26. McGee TG (2008) Managing the rural-urban transformation in East Asia in the 21st century. Sustain Sci 3:155–167 McGee, TG (2009) The spatiality of urbanization: the policy challenges of mega-urban and desakota regions of Southeast Asia. United Nations University Institute of Advanced Studies (UNU-IAS) Working Paper No. 161 McGee TG (2017) Desakota. In: Richardson D, Castree N, Goodchild MF, Kobayashi A, Liu W, Marston RA (eds) The international encyclopedia of geography. Wiley McGee TG, Robinson IM (1995) The mega-urban regions of Southeast Asia. UBC Press, Vancouver, Canada McGee TG, Lin GCS, Marton AM, Wang MYL, Wu J (2007) China’s urban space: development under market socialism. Routledge, London McKenzie RD (1935) The metropolitan community. McGraw Hill Book Co, New York Meijers E (2008) Measuring polycentricity and its promises. Eur Plan Stud 16:1313–1323 Moench M, Gywali D (2008) Desakota: reinterpreting the urban-rural continuum, Part II-A. Final report of the Desakota Research Group Mookherjee D, Geyer HS, Hoerauf E (2015) Dynamics of an evolving city-region in the developing world: the national capital region of Delhi revisited. International Planning Studies 20:146–160 Neuman M, Hull A (2011) Introduction: the futures of the city region. In: Neuman M, Hull A (eds) The futures of the city region. Routledge, London, pp xi–xxvii Pain K, van Hamme G (eds) (2014) Changing urban and regional relations in a globalizing world: Europe as a global macro-region. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK Parr JB (2005) Perspectives on the city-region. Reg Stud 39:555–566 Paasi A, Harrison J, Jones M (2018) New Consolidated Regional Geographies. In: Paasi A, Harrison J, Jones M (eds) Handbook on the regions and territories. Edward Elgar Publishing Limited, Cheltenham, UK, pp 1–20 Reades J, Smith DA (2014) Mapping the ‘space of flows’: the geography of global business telecommunications and employment specialization in the London mega-city-region. Reg Stud 48:108–126 Regional Plan Association (2006) America 2050: a prospectus. Regional Plan Association, New York, NY Rodriguez-Pose A (2008) The rise of the ‘city-regions’ concept and its development policy implications. Eur Plan Stud 16:1025–1046 Ross C (ed) (2009) Megaregions: planning for global competitiveness. Island Press, Washington, DC Sayre NF (2005) Ecological and geographical scale: parallels and potential for integration. Prog Hum Geogr 29:276–290 Schafran A (2014) Rethinking Mega-Regions: Sub-Regional Politics in a Fragmented Metropolis. Reg Stud 48(4):587–602. https://doi.org/10.1080/00343404.2013.834043 Schafran A (2015) Beyond globalization: A historical urban development approach to understanding megaregions. In: Harrison J, Hoyler M (eds) Megaregions: globalization’s new urban form? Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, pp 75–96 Sieverts T (2003) Cities without cities: an interpretation of the Zwischenstadt. E&FN Spon, London Scott A (2001) Global city-regions: trends, theory, policy. Oxford University Press, Oxford Simmonds R, Hack G (2000) Global city regions: their emerging forms. Spon Press, London Taylor PJ, Lang RE (2004) The shock of the new: 100 concepts describing recent urban change. Environment and Planning A 36:951–958 Taylor PJ, Evans DM, Hoyler M, Derudder B, Pain K (2009) The UK space economy as practiced by advanced producer service farms: identifying two distinctive polycentric city-regional processes in contemporary Britain. Int J Urban Reg Res 33:700–718

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Turok I, Bailey N (2004) The theory of polynuclear urban regions and its application to central Scotland. Eur Plan Stud 12:371–389 UN Habitat 2015 (2015) The case of the Asian and Pacific Cities. United Nations, New York UN-Habitat (2016) World Cities Report 2016: Urbanization and Development—Emerging Futures, UN, New York Vining DR (1986) Population redistribution towards core areas of less developed countries, 1950–80. International Regional Science Review 10:1–45 Wheeler S (2009) Regions, megaregions, and sustainability. Reg Stud 43:863–876 Xu J, Yeh AGO (eds) (2011) Governance and planning of mega-city regions: an international comparative perspective. Routledge, London Yeh, SHK, Laquian, AA (eds) (1979) Housing Asia’s millions: problems, policies, and prospects for low-cost housing in Southeast Asia. International Development Research Center Zhang T (2006) Review of beyond metropolis: the planning and governance of Asia’s mega-urban regions By A.A. Laquian. J Plan Educ Res 25:333–334 Zhang, Q (2018) Elements in Desakota. In: Vigano P, Cavalieri C, Corte MB (eds) The horizontal metropolis between urbanism and urbanization. Springer, pp 205–214

Chapter 4

Asian MCR: Urban-Rural Interface and Multidimensionality of the Spread Region

Abstract The profound socioeconomic and environmental repercussions of the growing Asian megacities on the rural, semi-urban, and urbanizing territories around them have stoked academic, political, planning, public, and other interests to pursue sustainable development strategies for the megacity regions of Asia. However, as yet, we do not know whether there are some principal characteristics unique to the Asian MCR, and strategy formulation is made difficult by non-standardized definitions of ‘urban’, a lingering city-centric outlook, and complex rural-urban dynamics involving flows, linkages, and interfaces in the hybrid, changing, and spatially uneven ‘spread region’ within the MCRs. Additionally, conceptual contrasts and differing approaches to sustainability, such as green and brown agendas, have also impeded the success of such pursuits. Here, I present the first two prongs of my tri-pronged approach to sustainable development issues in context of the Asian MCR: (1) the urban-rural interface (URI) as place, process, and concept manifests in the spread region, and (2) the multidimensional lens. I discuss some of the conceptual shifts evident in the literature, from the rural-urban divide to rural-urban and peri-urban interfaces (PUI), and from primarily economistic to multidimensional approaches to sustainable development. I offer a working definition of the ‘spread region’ of the MCR from the standpoint of the urban-rural interface that characterizes this space. And finally, I advocate the implementation of a coherent, ‘color-coordinated’ and multidimensional approach to examining the uneven spaces of the URI within the spread region at disaggregated scales for effective planning and research purposes. Keywords The Asian megacity region (MCR) · Megaregion · Urban-rural interface · Tri-pronged approach · Peri-urban interface · Spread region · Sustainability · Green and brown agendas

4.1 Introduction From its immense population load, to its diverse growth patterns and paces, the processes and patterns of Asian urbanization are gaining more attention than has been The original version of this chapter was revised: Typographical mistakes have been corrected. The erratum to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_4

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accorded in the past. Among all the other aspects of urbanization, in an environment fueled by uneven but advancing globalization and concurrent national and/or regional development on the economic, infrastructural, technological, and communication fronts, the rise of the urban giants—the so-called ‘megacities’—has been a significant phenomenon in Asia in the second half of the twentieth century. The profound socioeconomic and environmental repercussions of these growing megacities on their surrounding rural, semi-urban, and urbanizing regions have stoked academic, political, planning, public, and other interests in pursuing sustainable management strategies in order to meet growth-related challenges. From this standpoint, the emergence of the giant ‘megaregions’—the multi-system spatial entities out of a gradual coalescence of the individual ‘(mega)city regions—in certain parts of Asia, have garnered the lion’s share of attention in comparison to their smaller, single-system, megacity regional counterparts. City regions, reflecting functional and morphological interconnectivity and fragmented urban structures and forms over territorial areas adjacent to the giant cities, are increasingly being recognized as unique and important urbanizing spatial entities, gaining the reputation of being territorial economic powerhouses, especially at the megaregional scale(s). Many of the (real and/or perceived) positives (e.g., economic, infrastructural, quality of life enhancement, and sociopolitical development opportunities) and negatives (e.g., environmental degradation, sociocultural changes including break-down of traditional social mores, and dwindling resources in the face of the rising population load) have made the city regions of Asia increasingly consequential from the standpoint of developmental planning and sustainability. Florida et al. (2008) observed, … a mega-region is a polycentric agglomeration of cities and their lower density hinterland. It represents the new, natural economic unit that emerges as metropolitan regions not only grow up-ward and become denser but also grow outward and into one another. Just as a city is not simply a large neighborhood, a mega-region is not simply a large city—it is an ‘emergent’ entity with characteristics that are qualitatively different from those of its constituent cities. (2008, p. 461)

Divergent forces drive the form and functional constructs of settlement structures and spatial configuration of the extensive territories of megaregions. Such forces, operating in the national, international, and global arenas across the Asian countries, have shaped a range of urban systems in the territories around the growing megacities. The distinct identities and traits of these cities and regions are not summarily identifiable, as, in addition to the economic component, they reflect many diverse historical, cultural, and demographic backgrounds, although their geneses can generally be traced through the growth-induced thriving individual megacities spreading outward into the surrounding hinterlands and subsequently coalescing into a megaregional frame. Within such frames, the patterns of population concentration and economic generation are among the outcomes of growth that, while fostering prosperity and human well-being in certain terms, create challenges and planning dilemmas from the standpoint of others, sustainability being one of the primary concerns. To what extent the megacity region (MCR) is considered to be an outcome of ‘uniquely’ Asian urbanization process (Harrison and Hoyler 2015; Hall 1999), or part

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of a universal process, ‘in a transitory phase of the early decades of decolonization’, and merely mimicking a Western pattern (as famously observed by Dick and Rimmer 1998, for example) is open to debate. Jones and Douglass (2008) opined that all cities, regions, and countries are situated in their uniquely historical contexts and are linked in a variety of ways to national and global economies. Thus, the identity of the city-regional frame, based on a ‘local-global’ nexus, rather than on a broadly based geographic identity, as Asian, American, or African, would perhaps better reveal their distinctive identity. In view of the changing societies of Asian countries from rural to urban, the emerging city-regional characteristics—demographic, economic, infrastructural, political, sociological, and others—as historically evolving through periods of economic fluctuations, political upheavals, natural events, and the like, provide a good lens for understanding the growth dynamics of Asian cities and regions (e.g., Jones and Douglass 2008; Florida et al. 2008). Florida et al. (2008) contended that “it makes little sense to think of the growth of India and China as a national phenomenon but rather a mega-regional one” (p. 474)—a statement I see as illustrative of the emergent role of this phenomenon as an (spatial and temporal) entity that transcends national identities. In this context, it is important to re-emphasize a point noted in the introductory chapter. Throughout the volume, the term ‘megacity region’ (MCR) is used to denote a conceptual approach to this entity, as different from focusing on individual geographically distinctive megacity regions. Thus, beyond a basic background discussion comparing the diverse patterns of megacity growth among the Asian regions in Chap. 2, and the empirical study of one MCR in South Asia in Chap. 6, discussion in this volume does not pertain to individual megacity regions of Asia. Moreover, the spatial pattern of urban growth is observable vertically as well as horizontally. While it is the horizontal expansion of the metropolis into its hinterland that is our primary focus, vertical expansion as evidenced in the ongoing construction of high-rise built structures in many of these city regions—with a smaller physical footprint but many of the same issues associated with the horizontal encroachment such as ecological/environmental (e.g., water, sewerage, garbage generation and disposal, congestion, and pollution), sociocultural (e.g., social isolation, loss of traditional values, and anomie), and other impacts—is also of significant consequence from the standpoint of sustainable planning. As discussed in the previous chapter, the horizontal expansion of the Asian metropolises into surrounding territories has generated much scholarly discourse, revealing some distinctive city-regional characteristics over the past decades. Starting with the groundbreaking works of such luminaries as Norton Ginsburg, Terry McGee, Ted Koppel, and their colleagues, as well as contributions by other scholars such as Dean Forbes, Aprodicio Laquian, and, John Friedmann, research on these and related themes in context of the Asian city-regional environment gained momentum that has continued to this day. The impressive research contribution by Jones and Douglass (2008), an epitome of collaborative teamwork, is an example, but other forms of empirical research at various scales are also emerging (e.g., Murayama et al. 2017). These studies have explored various facets of the expanded patterns of the regional environment of the giant Asian cities, especially in terms of economic

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growth, land use, and land cover changes, as well as changes in a range of demographic and social elements. Because of their work, it is now commonly recognized that the unique landscapes of the megacity regions across Asia are being shaped by the expansion of the megacities and their satellites into the surrounding regions, whose physical, as well as socioeconomic, political, environmental, and administrative influence, is felt at various degrees and intensities across and within these regions. The former—the physical—primarily accrued from various means such as reclassification, boundary revision, and/or identification of random settlements or sprawls around the large cities, are readily observable. The latter—a more complex interplay of processes and products and their resultant outcomes,such as various forms of inter-migration between and within the so-called rural and urban sectors, and other interflows of goods, services, ideas, and the like—is more complex, nuanced, circular, multi-directional, and reciprocal (urban-rural and rural-urban, as well as urban-urban and rural-rural). The in situ population component in the region-based urbanization, as observed by McGee and Robinson (1995), can be said to be a product of both of these physical/morphological and relational/functional factors. Together, they are changing the traditional city-centric (and arguably, the city-regional) paradigm(s), especially in relation to the developing world. A more inclusive paradigm shift involving the recognition of the obsolescence of the rural-urban divide already appears to have taken place, and a recognition of the veracity of urban-rural linkages, interactions, and interfaces has entered into the discourses in the urbanization literature, especially in the developing countries of Asia. In this context, the Asian megacity region is gradually being recognized as an important planning arena and research laboratory. A collection of settlements of varying hierarchy and ‘urbanity’, with one or more major core cities, satellite cities, secondary cities, smaller centers, rural settlements, and a wide spread of mixed rural-urban landscape, the Asian city region is emerging as a hybrid region that is neither exclusively rural nor urban, nor a series of discrete rural–peri-urban–urban built land and/or socioeconomic spaces within the physical space of the city region. ‘City region’, ‘megacity region’, or ‘megaregion’ are some of the terms that are used to describe this entity, terms that are best differentiated per set of commonly established criteria, but in reality, are often used interchangeably. Always in a ‘state of flux’, this region demonstrates ever-changing intensities and types of urban-rural interaction at varying geographic1 distances from the core city/cities, displaying differing levels of urbanity and rurality throughout its expanse and over time. Traits that can be interpreted as markers of this so-called urbanity or rurality—sociocultural, economic, infrastructural, demographic, environmental, ecological, and others—differ across space, contributing to its hybridity, with significant planning and developmental implications.

1 Examples

of traversing nonphysical distance, one aspect of geographic distance, can be said to include activities related to networking, scale-jumping, scale-bending, and so on, as well as to the transportation and technology-related advances (communication, social media) that bridge, diminish, or transcend the effects of physical geographic distance.

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As the city region and/or megaregion with all its complexities, and its currently observable (and futuristically imaginable) positive and less-than-positive socioeconomic and environmental repercussions gains more prominence in the scholarly and popular literature, in the media, and in the daily life of the citizenry, the critical need for sustainability appears to have gained more urgency, spurring researchers and planners to delve into different facets of the sustainability issues. This heightened awareness is generating a sizable literature on the general theme of sustainability in the Asian context. However, despite this progress, the sustainability concept has remained rather elusive, and this elusiveness has contributed to the relative absence of a cohesive and holistic approach. Despite signs of a theoretically grounded multidimensional and holistic sustainability paradigm emerging in the current literature, divergent ideological viewpoints prevail and a rather fragmented, sectoral approach focusing on aspects of the so-called ‘brown’ versus ‘green’ agenda continues to dominate empirical research on urban sustainability-related issues. And, especially important to my focus of study, relative to the sizable literature emerging on some of the mega-urban regions or megaregions of Asia, research on this theme at the scalar level of the Asian megacity regions still appears to be in its infancy. In addition, for such a scale-based spatial entity (and temporal phenomenon) that is the Asian megacity/mega-urban region, the relative lack of a uniform/standardized scalar focus is troubling. As apparent in the Asian empirical research literature, it is difficult to compare the findings of many of the empirical research studies because, along with a dearth of a holistic consideration of sustainability as noted above, their scales of observation are often not comparable. Less than a uniform adaptation of the scale of an urban core of an MCR—the megacity—for example, affects comparability (thus reducing applicability) of the empirically derived findings. Also, consideration of the nonphysical components of scale—my interpretation of the variations of the discursive, inclusive, network-related elements of scales and subscales across space and time that will be discussed in the following chapter—appears to be a relatively neglected area of research on Asian megacity regions. Searching the literature for perspectives in context, I have come away with many implicitly raised, and unanswered, questions. However, I have not been able to locate studies that have explicitly articulated these questions or their answers, within the Asian context. For example: When the commonly accepted parameters of sustainability are taken into consideration, do the evolving transitory regions of megacities evince a concerted agenda of sustainability-based planning activities and policies for the current, as well as for future, generations? If so, how can they be brought into the planning discourse? What can we learn from their success? If not, why not? What are the issues that stand in the way of such a positive trajectory? How can a developmental framework be constructed for the megacity regions of Asia that would facilitate empirical research as building blocks for informed and holistic planning and policy decisions for the sustainability of the megacity regions of Asia? Two features that stand out rather prominently in my mind in context of this transitional landscape relate to the broad city-regional space, as well as to the degrees of the rural and urban interlinkages within and among the spaces within the spatial extent. How do we come up with an approach that acknowledges and incorporates

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both? How can we have some commonly agreed upon scalar parameters for at least one of the primary components of the megacity region (the core—the megacity)? As for the other component, the ‘region’ of the city region, how do we determine its extent? Are we prepared to consider a common set of markers for delineation or determination of boundaries? If so, how, and when? If not, how do we get there? And, perhaps more importantly, should we even consider standardized matrices for the delineation of such boundaries using specific measures (e.g., daily commuting distance, distance traversable in a certain length of time, functional and financial interactions etc.), or should there be more context-specific flexibility in determining the boundaries for individual megacity regions across the continent? Along with consideration of the spatial extent of change, how do we accord serious attention to the time-mediated changes happening within and among the spaces within the megacity region? How do we call for, create, and access the multidimensional, spatially and temporally comparable data sets at disaggregated scales, crucial for examining such intra-regional variations and changes, and how is effective sustainable planning possible without them? How do we tie jurisdictional and governance issues with the spatial extent and internal fragmentation of the megacity regions? Can we (or even ‘should we’)—working across academic, policy, planning, local stakeholder, and disciplinary boundaries—strive to conceptualize a framework for the Asian megacity region that would allow us to envision an Asian urbandevelopmental paradigm in light of its urban-rural interface, multidimensionality, and multi-scalar possibilities? Can we (or ‘should we’) come to a common set of strategies on operationalizing such a vision for a sustainable Asian megacity regional paradigm? Needless to say, I do not have the answers to these questions. While a sizable literature, both theoretical and empirical, relating to many of these questions is available in context of the developed, and some developing, parts of the world in general, and to a lesser extent on other city-regional scales (e.g., megaregions) in Asia in particular, in context of the Asian megacity regions, I have found it wanting. But questions and concerns such as these were at the root of my search for an approach to sustainable planning for the Asian megacity regions. I hope that the approach I offer may start a dialogue on this important but relatively under-researched theme. As noted in Chap. 1, three distinct facets or strands of ideas, contemplated in the context of the emerging Asian megacity regional phenomenon, form my approach. The first strand acknowledges the unique identity of the transitional rural-urban landscape in the territory of the Asian megacity region, a landscape that I see as an urban-rural interface (URI) of varied localized spatiotemporal shades of urbanity and rurality with diverse strengths and needs. Within this territory—that I call the spread region— complex interplays of sociocultural, political, economic, ecological/environmental, and other factors take place. The second involves the viewing of megacity regional sustainability issues from a holistic, multifaceted, and interdisciplinary2 perspective. 2 As

noted in Chap. 1, the terms interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary, cross-disciplinary, multidisciplinary, and such, each with their own individual and obvious connotations, are used interchangeably in this volume.

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The necessity to adopt a holistic approach has found overwhelming support in professional and popular literature; however, its adoption and execution is more often than not bogged down by data, logistical and planning issues, and ideological divides (e.g., between ‘green’ and ‘brown’ agendas), as well as by governance/jurisdictional and other challenges. The third strand relates to scale, and what I perceive as an emerging trend to reconcile the different meanings (e.g., size, level, and relation), ‘moments’ (ontological/epistemological), arguments (e.g., scale as pre-given/fixed, fluid/evolving, produced/constructed/reproduced), and other aspects of scale, viewing them from the perspective of sustainable planning for the Asian megacity region. Taken together, these three facets of my approach should offer a small step forward for research and data-based holistic planning for the Asian megacity regions. Research results, describing the changing multidimensional dynamics of the current (evolving, never stagnant) spaces within a given city-regional environment, should help formulate informed strategies for sustainable development for the unique urbanrural hybrid megacity regional spaces of Asia. My contemplations are presented in the following pages in the spirit of discussion. However, as the brief comments immediately below aim to show, a somewhat normative stance in the sense of ‘what should happen or what should be the case in an ideal world’ (Potter 2014, p. 83) cannot be completely avoided. Over the decades, diverse theories, strategies, and approaches to development have guided academic discourse and its practical application in planning policies. While I am not involved with theoretical specificities in this volume, generally speaking, one’s theoretical orientation, attitude to divergent viewpoints (and disciplinary background) tend to shape the approach taken. From this standpoint, a mention of Potter’s (2014) framework for ‘developmental thinking’ may be made that resonates with my approach. Potter emphasized that “development covers both theory and practice, that is, both ideas about how development should or might occur, and realworld efforts to put various aspects of development into practice”. In this context, he noted the differences between development theories and strategies as per their general definitions—theory as ‘a set of logical propositions about how the real world is structured’ and strategies as the ‘practical paths to development’. A third feature, development ideologies, which involve both theory and practice, are reflected in the different development agendas; for instance, an economic growth-oriented ideology with inherent income inequality may be contrasted with a multidimensional agenda that involves a ‘wider process of development’ and intentionally seeks to reduce inequalities. Potter (2014) saw Hettne’s (1995 as cited in Potter 2014) view of ‘development thinking’ as an ‘overarching concept’, using the term as a catchall phrase ‘indicating the sum total of ideas about development, that is, including pertinent aspects of development theory, strategy, and ideology’. As he noted, one way to ‘categorize development thinking through time’ was to recognize four major approaches based on theories, strategies, and ideologies on the holistic-economistic and normative-positive continuum that he superimposed on each other to create a two-dimensional matrix (Potter et al. 2008 as cited in Potter 2014). The dimensions portrayed a vertical axis polarizing the normative (what should be the case) from the

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Fig. 4.1 Theoretical ideas: an illustration (Source Adapted from Potter 2014)

positive (what has been the case), and a horizontal axis distinguishing the more holistic theories from the more economically oriented ‘partial’ theories of development. As I have tried to show in my adaptation of the matrix (Fig. 4.1), in context of this framework, the tri-pronged approach fits more in the ‘holistic-normative’ quadrant of ‘alternative approaches’, which to me does not necessarily relate to any one theory, but contains elements from different theoretical perspectives that appear contextually pertinent. For example, there are certain elements inherent in the ‘systems approach’ or ‘systems view’, as well as the ‘structuration theory’, that resonate with my thinking on the Asian megacity regions. In discussing the theoretical underpinnings of the peri-urban concept in the context of Africa, Mbiba and Huchzermeyer (2002) observed the implicit presence of ‘systems view’ that was dominated by ‘spatialgeographic considerations’, but also reflected ‘nonspatial economic, sociological and demographic conceptions as well”. The systems view recognizes that one aspect of this world is related to…any other and that the whole is more than just the sum of the parts. In spatial terms, the rural and urban are linked through flows of goods, people, services and information… (2002, p. 123)

Similarly, the authors considered structuration theory as bridging the divergent mindsets of the neoclassical economic and the neo-Marxist/dependency theories:

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[s]tructuration theory recognizes that both the processes of positive trickle-down and negative underdevelopment do take place but the magnitude and direction in any given context depends largely on the extent to which actors (both local and global) respond to the challenges. (2002, pp. 126–127)

This ‘duality’, and a more holistic (‘integrative?’) interpretation that takes into account the three elements of agency, space, and structure in city-regional contexts through time, albeit from different perspectives as to the relative emphasis of the ‘three modes of structurationist integration’ (Kellerman 1987), have also attracted me to some of the later interpretations of Giddens’ (1979, 1981, 1984 as cited in Kellerman 1987) initial conception of the structuration theory as well.3 These are some of the theoretical orientations and ‘development thinking’ that have had an influence on my own thinking. My contemplation of the urban-rural dynamics and scale-related issues is also informed by a necessarily selective perusal of some of the pertinent literature. But ultimately—given that they are based on my own interpretations, observations, and impressions, and shaped by my own biases— they should be regarded as subjective.

4.2 The Urban-Rural Dynamics—From Divide to Interface Theories of territorial development and their implications for planning policies have evolved over the past decades; “[d]ebates on the nature of rural-urban relations hold a prominent position in development theory and planning” observed Douglass two decades ago (1998).4 Our almost unquestioning acceptance of an urbanrural dichotomy, once ingrained in our collective mindset and embedded in the professional literature, has since been challenged, modified, and reformulated to include5 other, more nuanced concepts like ‘continuum’, ‘linkages’, and ‘interactions’ between rural and urban. Concepts and terms such as ‘urban fringe’, ‘rurban’, ‘peri-urban’, and ‘peri-urban interface’ (PUI) have become part of our lexicon in the English language (terms that notwithstanding their inherent differences and many nuances, often continue to be used interchangeably). Dualisms such as ‘top-down’ versus ‘bottom-up’, ‘urban bias’ versus ‘rural bias’, and role of cities as ‘generators of growth’ versus as ‘parasitic exploiters’ are also giving way to more nuanced approaches. The chronology of the evolution of development theories, and their respective planning implications, are not my focus for this volume. However, in view

3 For

an interesting discussion aimed to “highlight established and ongoing attempts to reach integrative perspectives in geography” (1987, p. 273) from the standpoint of structuration theory that offers an overview of many of the works that I refer to as ‘later interpretations’, see Kellerman (1987). 4 Reprinted in Tacoli (2006). 5 I purposefully use ‘include’ instead of ‘to be replaced by’ because evidence of an implicit assumption/belief in a rural-urban dichotomy is still discernible in the planning and policies of many lands, including in Asia.

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of the Asian megacity region al space that I see as a multifaceted urban-rural interface, a brief discussion of our changing perception over the years on the urban-rural relationship will not be out of place. To begin, are we even on the same page as to what is urban and what is rural? Much as I dislike sounding like a broken record, it needs to be said once again that as in case of some of the other terminologies discussed in the previous chapters, lack of a standard definition for rural and urban has also stood in the way of a collaborative discourse on urbanization and the rural-urban dynamics.

4.2.1 Conceptual Dilemmas: Urban? Rural? A two-fold irony seems to be embedded in all the debates and discussions on the complexities of the rural-urban divide, linkages, and interfaces. First, we still do not have a common definition of either ‘urban’ or ‘rural’. Comments on the extreme difficulty this deficiency has created for understanding and comparability are ubiquitous in the literature and can hardly be overemphasized. And second, even among the available definitions with some degree of acceptability, there are problems when it comes to specific details. As Cecilia Tacoli (1998a, 2006) has pointed out more than once, there are several issues related to these definitions that have stood in the way of our looking at ‘urban’ and ‘rural’ much beyond the ‘stereotypical images, preconceived notions, and outdated assumptions’ that had traditionally led to the conceptual rural-urban divide. Much has been written on these, so I will keep my own comments brief. As for the first, as numerous writers have lamented, definitions of ‘what is urban’ vary widely over space and time, although they may share common elements. “All societies have working spatial definitions of urban and rural areas with some common elements, such as size and political definition,” that “are highly variable from country to country and are often changed” noted McGee in 1991 (p. 20), who went on to propose an amelioration.6 Also, widely observable in the literature is the fact that almost two and a half decades later, things have not changed much in this regard. One or more combinations of criteria are commonly followed across the globe that include minimum population size threshold, density, employment share of supposedly ‘urban’ activities such as nonfarm/manufacturing/service and other sectoral work, urban infrastructural facilities and amenities, administrative/political status, as well as census designation and/or administrative reclassification of settlements. However, there are wide variations as to how many or which criteria are followed and how they are adapted to individual situations. The minimum population size criterion—a contested issue itself—for example, can vary technically between less 6 McGee

(1991) suggested that temporal data on (1) the ‘contribution of agricultural and nonagricultural activities to the GDP’ and (2) the proportion of the working labor force employed in agricultural and nonagricultural work’ in a given spatial unit would help develop ‘a more precise definition of urban and rural areas’ (p. 20).

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than 1,000 to over 50,000. Such extremes are admittedly uncommon, but a minimum threshold of 2,500 in many countries in Europe and South America, setting them apart from many Asian countries, is less so. While I cannot be sure of its accuracy, an item submitted in the World Bank Sustainable Cities Blog offers an interesting impression of the wide variations in minimum population size for cities prevalent across the globe.7 Ranging from 400 population for four countries at one extreme, to 50,000 for one country at the other, the graph presented in the blogpost depicts wide variations in the minimum population threshold for cities in between (e.g., 2,000 population size for 23 countries, 2,500 population for 13, 3,000 for three, 4,000 for one, peaking again at 5,000 population size for 21 countries). As the reader may recall, in Chap. 2, I cited examples of five Asian cities to show that indeed, even to this day, the definition of ‘urban’ (and/or ‘urban agglomeration’) for official census or other data sources varies among countries, and even between temporal points within the same country. As for the definition of ‘rural’, it is generally agreed that ‘rural’ has traditionally been treated as a ‘residual’ category; whatever remained after ‘urban’ was assigned would be ‘non-urban’, usually termed as ‘rural’. As for the second irony, as noted above, even within broad definitional parameters, there are several problems regarding specificities that affect our understanding of urban-rural dynamics (Tacoli 1998a, 2006). The confusion regarding the urban population threshold is only one of them. In addition, there are issues with urban boundaries. Urban population count can widely vary based on whether the count is based only on built-up areas, current or expected areas for future expansion around the built-up urban center, the urban agglomeration, or the extended metropolitan areas (Tacoli 2006, p. 5). But the boundary issue of the multi-functional, multisectoral emerging landscape of the extended metropolitan region (of various conceptual nature and scales) beyond the city itself is not always clear. In her insightful review of the literature on rural-urban interaction, Tacoli (1998b) importantly noted, “[e]specially in Southeast Asia, the growth of extended metropolitan regions where agricultural and non-agricultural activities are spatially integrated makes the distinction between rural and urban problematic” (p. 148). To continue with Tacoli’s analysis, connected to the boundary problem is that of a city’s ‘ecological footprint’ on the surrounding region and the ‘carrying capacity’ of the said region that makes any distinction between urban and rural, the city and its hinterland, somewhat meaningless. Finally, the reliance on traditional assumptions about a sectoral divide in occupation without consideration of sectoral interactions (e.g., agricultural activities in urban areas and nonagricultural in rural areas) and multi-spatiality of households ‘combining farm and nonfarm activities and rural and urban residence’ (p. 149) have added to the confounding equation of creating an ‘artificial rural-urban divide’ in terms of occupational criteria.

7 Submitted

by C. Deuskar on 6/2/2015 on the World Bank Sustainable Cities Blog. http://blogs. worldbank.org/sustainablecities/what-does-urban-mean.

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4.2.2 Urban-Rural Linkages: Some Considerations With the proliferation in number and population of the megacities, growth and/or development8 of the megacity regions has become a critical issue in search of strategies and policies for sustainable planning. Theories, notions, imperatives, and ideas pertaining to development have undergone significant changes over the past several decades, moving from ‘urban-oriented’ strategies to a variety of ‘rural-based bottom-up’ approaches in order to achieve the desired (albeit often contested) goals in a sustainable manner within the megacity/mega-urban regions and nations of Asia (Laquian 2005). In his introductory essay in an edited volume on Geography of Urban-Rural Interaction in Developing Countries (Potter and Unwin 1989)—one of the first such works of the time—Unwin (1989) observed that despite attention to rural-urban migration as a linked topic of research, traditionally rural and urban ‘development’ were usually treated as separate issues and literature on rural-urban linkages and interaction was relatively scarce until the early 1980s. This implicit conceptual dichotomy was reflected in the literature of the time, and almost without exception, dictated developmental planning policies throughout the globe. Unwin offered a few examples of published volumes on the rural (Harriss 1982; Chambers 1983) and urban (Roberts 1978; Gilbert and Gugler 1982; Potter 1985)9 spheres of the development literature of the time, but many other books, articles, and book chapters on urban (mostly cities) and rural themes can be readily located (thanks to the technological marvel of Internet search engines) that attest to the pervasiveness of this divided focus on what ought to have been an integrated theme. Even as consideration of the relative effect of the one on the other, for better or for worse, became an important topic of discourse with scholars taking sides on the ‘urban bias’ and ‘rural bias’ debates, such discussion did not appear to be grounded in urban-rural linkage or interaction. Rather, it was more of the nature of two separate entities having influence or power over or on the other, and the effect of this mindset was reflected in the ‘growth pole’, ‘top-down’, ‘bottom-up’ dualisms, and even in the arguably middle ground of the ‘urban function for rural development (UFRD)’ approaches. A number of works have analytically traced the complex patterns of change in theoretical concepts in the urban-rural academic and planning literature. A few of them stand out, and those I have greatly drawn on for this project. Rural-Urban Linkages edited and contributed by Tacoli (2006) brought together several of these works under one umbrella. The ‘draft for discussion’ version of a comprehensive literature review by the Peri-Urban Research Project Team (Development Planning Unit—DPU—of the University College of London), headed by German Adell (1999) is another invaluable contribution in offering an overview of the ‘changing conceptual landscape’ on rural-urban dynamics.10 8 Growth

and development, two non-synonymous concepts that have led to some spirited debates in the sustainability literature, are used interchangeably in this volume. 9 All examples here are as cited in Unwin (1989), and are presented in the Reference section. 10 This work is accessible online and is cited as such.

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Unwin (1989) discussed the theoretical underpinnings of some major ideas during a period in history that saw the beginning of a paradigmatic shift from rural-urban divide with urban dominance, to urban-rural linkage or interaction, as well as a progression from the concept of ‘peri-urban’ to ‘peri-urban interface’ and from there possibly toward a wider interpretation of an urban-rural interface which, to me, truly reflects the space(s) of the Asian megacity regions. Unwin (1989) concisely described the tenor of the time thus: “[t]hree basic and interrelated ideas have dominated much of the literature on urban-rural links in development planning since the late 1950s: the growth pole concept, the distinction between top-down and bottom-up development, and the conceptualisation of cities as being either parasitic or generative” (p. 13; emphasis in original). The ‘growth pole’ theory and its variants, also related to a ‘top-down territorial approach’ were widely utilized in the context of regional development planning of the ‘free market capitalist societies’11 ; “[n]umerous ‘growth pole’ policies all over the developing world followed the modernization paradigm in the 1950s and 1960s, focusing public investments …” (Allen 2010, p. 29). In its most basic form, it advocates an approach to induction of economic growth in rural territories with the assumption that with increased economic activities in the urban sphere, especially in the big cities, the rural territories will accrue benefits from the ‘trickle-down’ effects of growth from the urban-industrial concentrations. As many have noted, ‘growth pole’, ‘growth center’, and ‘urban diffusion’ strategies, utilized in a variety of contexts and in a variety of degrees and forms, have influenced urban-regional planning strategies in the developing world over the past decades. However, the success of these strategies has been considered to be rather limited, as reflected by a gap between desired and actual benefits accrued (Adell 1999, p. 9). Despite that, growth pole strategies occupied important agenda items as seen in the developmental studies of the 1980s and 1990s, and as Douglass noted in 1998 (2006, p. 125), “this remains the dominant spatial development strategy throughout the world, including Asia”. From the vantage point of their comprehensive review of the pertinent literature, Adell (1999) came to the conclusion that: Growth pole-oriented policies are still in use in LDCs, contributing to the maintenance of conceptual divisions between the city, seen as a pole of modernity and the countryside. (1999, p. 9)

Differing in focus from these top-down approaches to rural development, a variety of alternative strategies, fueled by Lipton’s (1977) arguments for ‘urban bias’, were generated over the years that illustratively, if not exclusively, may be considered variations of ‘bottom-up’ approaches, differing from the ‘top-down’ (growth pole) ideas. The spatial concept of ‘development’ in these approaches focused on the rural realm, involving its people, settlements, resources, and activities. An analytical discussion by Douglass in a seminal essay written in 1998 and reproduced in the abovementioned edited volume by Tacoli (2006) offers an insightful 11 Although, as Unwin observed, “…it is not only the so-called free-market capitalist societies that have embarked on such policies. Many centrally planned socialist states have also turned towards top-down, centralised planning strategies” (1989, p. 14).

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overview of the elements inherent in the various ‘top-down’, ‘bottom-up’, and other approaches that typified the urban-rural planning of the time. Douglass saw a ‘curious divide’ between the planning policies advocated by ‘urban planners’ on the one hand and ‘rural planners’ on the other that showed their implicit urban and rural bias, as well as their ignorance or disregard of one or the other sphere. From this perspective, he criticized the two prevailing efforts to bridge the urban-rural divide, the urban function in rural development (UFRD) as ‘thinly disguised urban bias’ and the integrated rural development (IRD) for erring ‘in the opposite manner by rarely including explicit urban components’ (Douglass 1998, reproduced in Tacoli 2006, pp. 126–12712 ). According to him, the ‘agropolitan’ approach, a decentralized, localized, participatory process put forth in the 1970s by a group of researchers (e.g., Friedmann and Douglass, 1978 as cited in Douglass 1998), was one of a few that ‘explicitly united rural with urban development’. While the agropolitan approach has, at best, been only partially applied in practice, its promotion of decentralization and democratization has emerged as the most vital issues in planning in Asia today. (2006, p. 127)

Despite Douglass’s attribution of urban bias to the UFRD (commonly associated with Rondinelli), I feel Rondinelli’s notion of a secondary city-system, based on ‘rural-urban’ linkages and expected to facilitate both agricultural and urban-industrial economy (Rondinelli 1983), has elements of the bottom-up outlook, and also actually answers some of Douglass’s concerns regarding the ‘curious divide’ in urban and rural planning. As a matter of fact, Adell (1999, p. 23) noted a parallel “between Rondinelli’s secondary cities paradigm and Douglass’ networked model”—and the irony here is that the latter is considered to be paradigmatically opposite to the epitome of the top-down planning philosophy, the growth pole model. As Adell put it, “Rondinelli considered fundamental the fact that the secondary cities, while having an adequate size to perform decentralized activities, had to be a part of a network of similar cities and of smaller ones, in order to produce the desired ‘diffusion’ to the rural areas (p. 23). As per Unwin (1989), both Rondinelli (1985) and Stohr and Taylor (1981 as cited in Unwin 1989) tied the growth pole theory to ‘top-down’, ‘trickle-down’, ‘ripple’ effects, as well as to free-market philosophy rooted in neoclassical economic thinking, but their responses were very different. In contrast to the ‘bottom-up’ approach of Stohr and Taylor (1981), Rondinelli’s approach focusing on the secondary cities and small centers and their relation to the ‘urban function in rural development’ (UFRD) program came to be broadly perceived to be a variant of the top-down outlook, based on the principles of central place theory and the manipulation of the urban settlement hierarchy (e.g., Unwin 1989; Adell 1999, p. 15). As noted above, in his analysis of the conceptual changes—starting with the traditional urban-rural divide—that affected planning policies from the 1950s to the late 1990s, Douglass 12 All

page references to this article by Douglass in this chapter are as reproduced in Tacoli (2006); not from the original (Douglass 1998) publication; the reproduced article is cited as Douglass (2006) in the Reference section.

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(1998) described urban functions in rural development as ‘thinly disguised forms of urban bias’ (Douglass 1998). Having noted this ‘perception’, however, I feel it is only fair to recognize that Rondinelli did not eschew the principles of the ‘bottom-up’ approach altogether but disagreed with its being the ‘sole source of developmental stimuli’. It has become more apparent in recent years that rural development goals, no matter how carefully conceived, cannot be achieved in isolation from the cities or entirely through ‘bottom-up’ stimuli. Economic growth with social equity requires both accelerated agricultural development and expansion of urban industry and commerce. Greater attention must be given to diversifying the economies of small towns and middle-sized cities in promoting a more balanced distribution of income. The ties between urban and rural economies… are likely to become more important as rapid urbanization continues in the developing world. (Rondinelli 1983, p. 10; emphases added)

Viewed in context of the early 1980s environment (‘before the emergence of a “New World Order” and the changes in the global economy’ as Adell 1999, p. 5 put it), Rondinelli’s acknowledgement that linkages between urban and rural are ‘crucial’ can indeed be interpreted as ‘very much a pragmatic stance’ as Unwin (1989, p. 18) saw it. My interest in Rondinelli’s position, viewed from the perspective of the 1990s as well from that of the current day megacity regional phenomenon of Asia, rests primarily on his faith in the generative quality of small and medium towns as related to their surrounding regions,13 his recognition of the urban-rural ‘linkage’ potential, and his attribution of importance to the ‘local’. “It is the concentration of Rondinelli’s approach on linkages, and in particular on linkages both between rural areas and small cities, and those between smaller and larger cities, that makes it of such interest in any consideration of urban-rural interaction,” remarked Unwin (1989, p. 18; emphasis in original). Rondinelli’s works (and their relationship to the UFRD program) have been subject to much discussion and criticism across the field (e.g., Douglass 1998; Bernard 1986; Fass 1985; El-Shakhs 1984). Without getting into the arguments, however, I feel that in the final analysis, Rondinelli deserves our appreciation. Megacity regions are a dynamic environment, affected by development emanating from the growing regional megacity core, as well as the growth of associated middle-sized cities, small towns, and rural settlements. The problems and prospects associated with such growth and development interact with existing rural, territorial, and sectoral forces, creating intricate patterns of linkages and flows in localized contexts. When viewed in context of the dual and divided stance (as noted by Douglass 1998) and the ‘big-city focus’ in urban and rural planning prevalent at the time, I feel that the three basic elements in Rondinelli’s approach, especially his emphasis on rural-urban linkages, ought to be recognized for their continued relevance to Asian megacity regions across decades to this day. An overview of the literature on the early days of the urban-rural interaction/linkage paradigm can be found in the edited volume by Potter and Unwin 13 As Tacoli (1998b) acknowledged, this approach was a ‘more recent and highly influential contribu-

tion’ to the positive view, prevalent in the 1950s and 1960s, of small towns ‘from which innovations and modernization would trickle-down to the rural populations’ (p. 152).

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(1989). As mentioned above, this was one of the first such collected works on the subject, although as Unwin (1989) noted, a ‘small but growing body of literature specifically concerned with rural-urban interaction’ had emerged by the end of the 1980s. Starting with Preston’s (1975) five-fold categories of such interaction, Unwin made note of the contributions by Gould in 1982 and 1985 under the auspices of the Human Geography Committee of the Social Science Research Council, and the Developing Areas Research Group of the Institute of British Geographers, respectively (Preston 1975; Gould 1982, 1985; all as cited in Unwin 1989, pp. 12– 13). Discussing Rondinelli’s (1985) classification of the urban-rural linkages in some detail, Unwin commented that it ‘conflate[d] different kinds of linkages and likewise different kinds of elements’ (Unwin 1989, p. 26; emphases in original). He went on to sketch his own views on ‘urban-rural relations in which linkages, flows, and interactions are seen as separate, but closely linked concepts’ (1989, p. 26). Somewhat predictably, this, in turn, has also been criticized for various reasons, including contradictions and its lack of testing ‘against reality’ (Adell 1999, p. 16). The literature on urban-rural linkages and flows has come a long way since these earlier conceptual explorations, but irrespective of their real or perceived limitations, these innovative approaches over three decades ago challenged the traditional ruralurban dichotomous mindset and brought about more nuanced conceptual perspectives on the urban-rural relationship. In place of the binary approach to urban-rural issues, the notion that we should “view rural/urban as a continuum—albeit not necessarily a smooth or unidimensional… [but] a discontinuous, ‘lumpy’ and multidimensional” one (Iaquinta and Drescher 1999, p. 4) gained ground. And simultaneously, with the emerging prominence of city regions, megacity regions, and/or megaregions around the rapidly proliferating megacities in the developing world—fueled by the transformational ‘space-jumping’ influences of a shrinking global village and of the national and regional planning policies of individual countries—the concepts of ‘peri-urban’ and ‘peri-urban interface’ (PUI) in the immediate hinterlands of the large cities started taking shape in the urban literature of the developing world. Recognized to be similar to, yet distinct from, the Western concepts of the ‘urban fringe’ and ‘suburbanization’, the ‘peri-urban’ (PUI) concept came to be associated primarily with Asian and African urbanization, while the concept of desakota imparted a distinctly Asian flavor.

4.2.3 Peri-urban and Peri-urban Interface: A Regional Focus To my mind, the terms ‘peri-urban’ (PU) and ‘peri-urban interface’ (PUI) have signified two slightly different meanings—primarily spatial/locational for the first, and both process and space-related for the second. However, they are often interchangeably used and defined in the literature. Both have the spatial connotation implied by the prefix ‘peri’ in relation to ‘urban’; but significantly, there is a growing recognition that they are not necessarily limited to locational criteria bounded by proximity to cities. As early as 1999—almost two decades ago—Adrianna Allen and colleagues

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noted that while PUI as the periphery of the city was the most common definition used in the literature, PUI as a ‘socioeconomic system’ and as the process of ‘interaction of rural-urban links and flows at the regional level’ were also among approaches used to conceptualize PUI. Their interpretation or ‘working definition’ of the PUI, as per their environmental focus, included characteristics of both an ecological, as well as a socioeconomic interface (Allen et al. 1999). Contextualization of tacit or explicit ‘working definitions’ in developing a concept is helpful because, conceptually, contextual specificity helps us to understand underlying assumptions/implications better, while in empirical studies such specificity helps ‘illuminate similarities and differences’ (Simon et al. 2006). Moreover, taken together, an array of multiple contextual interpretations offers a more gestalt overview than any single interpretation can. About a decade ago, an edited volume, The Peri-Urban Interface: Approaches to Sustainable Natural and Human Resource Use (2006), comprising a set of insightful contributions to the peri-urban literature in the context of the developing world, brought together, per the editors, ‘a range of conceptual and empirical studies representing the state of the art in contemporary analysis of peri-urban areas in several regions of the global south’ (Simon et al. 2006, p. 3; emphasis added). The underlying elements of some of the tacitly or explicitly used conceptual and/or empirical definitions of the PUI as offered in the contributions in this volume have relevance to the (mega)city regions of Asia. The examples offered in Table 4.1 share a flexible and holistic view of the PUI beyond rigid determinants of the exact spatial extent of the peri-urban zone(s), toward a more continuum or gradient-oriented view of urbanity/rurality as related to complex rural-urban dynamics of processes, linkages, and flows across space and time. In general, as will be briefly noted in the following, a basic agreement with two essential components appears to be emerging in the literature. While the first is clearly locational, the second can perhaps be termed a-locational. In terms of the locational aspect, it appears that even though location does not necessarily define peri-urban or PUI, location appears as an important zone of interaction that sets it apart from other areas, especially in context to physical distance from urban areas. However, the extent of the spatial distance from the core urban area into the hinterland, that would signify peri-urbanity, remains variable and contextual. Last, location, while not necessarily a defining criterion of peri-urbanity, does influence the peri-urban characteristics and processes. The many facets of the second (a-locational) component appear to converge on the idea that apart from (or in addition to) location, a multitude of urban-rural linkages, flows, and processes are at the heart of any comprehensive definition of peri-urban, and thereby, that of the peri-urban interface. Researchers have viewed the hinterlands around the large cities in the developing world through diverse lenses but have come to more or less the same realization—that the peri-urban areas where the rural-urban interface takes place are the ‘transitional zones around the cities’, the ‘zones of intense interactions’ where rural-urban linkages, flows, collaborations, and conflicts take place in contextually diverse ways, where urban and rural land uses and livelihoods coexist, where ‘dual urban-rural orientations in social and economic terms’ take place, and where ‘both

Definition/interpretation/recognition of elements in PUI “A distinct ecological and socioeconomic system under uncertain institutional arrangements…not based on physical features (distance to urban areas, density or infrastructural), but refers to a gradient…dynamics of rural-urban interaction affecting the PUI” ‘… [I]dentifying the physical location, of a PUI zone in terms of land-use type, density, [livelihood] or location of administrative boundaries, is problematic…’, ‘instead, it can be conceptually ‘interpreted as where rural and urban land uses coexist’, ‘in contiguous or fragmented units in any one area’ “Peri-urban areas are the transition zone, or the interaction zone, where urban and rural activities are juxtaposed, and landscape features are subject to rapid modifications, induced by human activities”

Source

Allen, Adrianna (2006, p. 32)

Bowyer-Bower, Tania (2006, pp. 153, 161)

Douglas, Ian (2006, p. 18)

Table 4.1 Contextualized definitions of peri-urban interface (PUI): some examples

(continued)

‘Developing areas perspective’ of ‘diverse peri-urban environments’, noting ‘key issues of peri-urban areas seen by scholars in Latin America, Africa and Asia’ reporting results by PU-ECHa

Empirical study of Harare, Zimbabwe, in the context of conflict between formal and informal governance of the coexisting land uses in the PUI from the standpoint of sustainability

Based on several international research projects, including three on Hubli-Dharwad, India, on the peri-urban poor in the context of challenges stemming from developmental and environmental concerns

Context

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PUI is more than a ‘transition zone between the city and the countryside’ and more than ‘an interface between two different types of landscape’. Physically, it is a ‘dynamic place’, ‘constantly moving outwards as the urban area expands’. It is also an ‘area of socioeconomic interactions’ and, per Douglass (1998) ‘centre for the flow of information’ ‘Strong urban influence’ and ‘production advantages’ were considered in determining the PUI (for survey locations), irrespective of rural location or distance from urban centers. ‘Although they may be geographically distant, they could arguably be defined as peri-urban to varying degrees because of the importance of the city to their society and economy’

Harris et al. (2006, pp. 59–60)

Lynch and Poole (2006, p. 82)

Several surveys, a case study, and in-depth interviews were used to seek horticultural and market information ‘in the PUI’ (five villages geographically close to cities) in two regions of Tanzania, sub-Saharan Africa

‘The Jos [Nigeria] PUI is…a large area dominated by the large urban settlements of Jos and Bukuru, but extending to other towns on the Jos Plateau and into rural areas where local economies are geared toward linking into the networks and markets’

Context

(Peri-Urban Environmental Change Project) of the Scientific Committee of the Problems of the Environment (SCOPE) of the International Council for Science (ICSU). Source Collated from McGregor et al. (2006b).

a PU-ECH

Definition/interpretation/recognition of elements in PUI

Source

Table 4.1 (continued)

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rural and urban features coexist, in physical, environmental, social, economic, and institutional terms’ (e.g., Allen et al. 1999; Allen 2003, 2010; Bowyer-Bower 2006; Shindhe 2006). Desakota, as conceptualized by McGee, Ginsburg, and colleagues in the context of the extended metropolitan regions (EMR) of Asia, exemplifies a variation of this unique ‘zone of interaction’ that lies close to large cities and transport corridors. Nevertheless, recognition of the ‘specialness’ of these proximate zones or areas around the cities notwithstanding, the actual spatial extent of what can be considered a ‘peri-urban’ zone, area, or territory, has been subject to different interpretations per individual academic or research purposes as reflected in conceptual discussions and empirical parameter settings. For example, the spatial extent of Friedmann’s concept of ‘urban field’ would “typically extend outward from the core to a distance of more than 100 kilometers” (Friedmann 1992, p. 4). Although not conceptualized in the Asian context, ‘urban field’ has been considered by Laquian, a renowned Asian scholar of urbanization, to be “an excellent way of understanding the emergence of mega-urban regions of Asia” (2005, p. 5). Specific to Asia, Webster and Muller (2009) contended that “[t]he peri-urban zone begins just beyond the contiguous built-up urban area and sometimes extends as far as 150 kilometer (km) from the core city, or as in the Chinese case, as far as 300 km”. “In some parts of Asia, these regions can stretch for up to thirty kilometers away from the city core,” observed McGee (1991, p. 7). In empirical studies, the definition of peri-urban is varied and mostly contextual. One of the earlier comparative research studies (Brook and Davila 2000 as cited in Simon et al. 2006) focusing on peri-urban areas in developing countries—Hubli-Dharwad in India and Kumasi in Ghana—is an excellent example of such contextual adaptation of the definition of ‘peri-urban’. The definition for Hubli-Dharwad included area covered by the ‘city bus service’, while for the Kumasi study no spatial limits were set “on account of their brief value in a situation of rapid growth and because various activities and processes would straddle any such arbitrary boundary” (Simon et al. 2006, p. 10). Viewed thus, the following observation made by Simon, McGregor, and Nsiah-Gyabaah in 2004 (pp. 238–239) and by Simon, McGregor, and Thompson in 2006 (p. 10) in context of the Kumasi and the Hubli-Dharwad peri-urban research, can be taken as an apt summary of the conceptual significance of these studies in recognizing the importance of contextuality over rigid uniformity: “Accordingly, it appears that no single definition will fit all circumstances and situations unless couched in broad and functional terms, rather than attempting to set discrete spatial limits.” Other examples of such contextual application of diverse scales of spatial proximity as a marker for ‘peri-urban’ are observable in the literature as well. Concurrent to the above, it is also being recognized that although location, especially in relation to proximity to or distance from the urban centers, is important in affecting the characteristics of the peri-urban landscape, it is not necessarily among the determining criteria for defining the peri-urban area or interface (PUI). In a work that included the identification of five peri-urban typologies related to sociodemographic processes, such as migration, at different proximities to cities, Iaquinta and Drescher (1999) eloquently described it thus:

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It is important that ‘proximity to the city’ seems not to be essential to the definition of periurban. The fact that many peri-urban areas are close to the city is substantively important and instrumental to a comprehensive understanding of peri-urban, but it is incidental to an elemental understanding of peri-urban.

They went on to add: ‘Proximity to city’ represents a further specification, which allows distinctions to be drawn among the types of peri-urban but does not define peri-urban per se. In addition, concentration of geographic location as a basis for defining peri-urban also undermines a clear understanding of the rural-urban spectrum as dynamic, interactive and transformative.

The authors’ analysis included peri-urban areas that were geographically nonproximate to cities but experienced ‘substantial urbanism’ (e.g., sociopsychological influences), yielding yet another form of peri-urban environment, which they termed “Village Periurban or Perirural (‘rural’ places with ‘urban’ consciousness)”, indicative more of rural-urban linkages than physical proximity.14 Simon et al. (2004) and McGregor et al.’s (2006a) concept of an uneven, nonlinear, and nonuniform gradient of ‘more urban and more rural segments within the peri-urban zone,’ sloping away from the city, also recognizes the influences of proximity to urban in shaping the character of the peri-urban. However, it goes beyond physical distance as its defining criterion and recognizes the futility of measuring the ‘precise width of the PUI’ in view of the rapid expansion of this region observed in some developing regions. In stating her working definition of the peri-urban interface (PUI), Allen (2006) included Simon et al.’s (2004) notion of gradient sans the ‘physical features’ in its definition: This definition is not based on physical features (distance to urban areas, density or infrastructure), but refers to a gradient between the urban and rural poles that can only be apprehended by examining the dynamics of rural-urban interaction affecting the PUI (Simon et al. 2004). (Allen 2006, p. 32; emphasis added)

This shift from urban proximity to ‘gradients across the rural-urban landscape’ (of ‘more urban’ and ‘more rural’ areas with pockets of urban-ness in rural areas and vice versa) resonates deeply with my concept of the urban-rural interface (URI), as I will discuss below. It leads us also to the second feature of the apparent consensus on the concept of peri-urban interface, involving extra-locational (or perhaps more aptly, a-locational) attributes and processes, which are increasingly recognized as essential to more fully capturing the complexities and the nuances of the concept. The following observation by Narain and Nischal in 2007, based on the prevailing literature and often quoted or referred to in subsequent discourse, summarizes this trend: The term peri-urban is used by researchers from many disciplines and paradigmatic perspectives to describe contradictory processes and environments. There is no single satisfactory definition of the peri-urban interface and different definitions are understood to apply in different circumstances. They may even change in the same location over time…. The word 14 The other four types of peri-urban areas, representing different migration dynamics, were referred

to as ‘proximate’ to cities, but I was not able to discern any mention of the exact distances involved.

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4 Asian MCR: Urban-Rural Interface and Multidimensionality … ‘peri-urban’ could be used to denote a place, concept, or process. As a place, it can refer to rural fringe areas surrounding cities. As a concept, peri-urban could be seen as an interface of rural and urban activities and institutions. As a process, it could be thought of as the two-way flow of goods and services and a transitional stage between rural and urban. (2007, p. 261; emphases added)

My conceptualization of the peri-urban and PUI, and thus of the urban-rural interface (URI), replaces the ‘or’ in ‘place, concept, or process’ with the inclusive ‘and’. This is important, as I believe that this view of PUI as place, concept, and process has important implications for our understanding of the city regions in the developing world. In my own journey, much of the evolving literature on the rural-urban relationship has resonated with my own thinking on the matter, as over the years, my views have also evolved. Starting with a primarily spatial perspective, I have come to see peri-urban, and more to the point, the peri-urban interface, as a more comprehensive, multidimensional and complex urban-rural interlinked space spanning many aspatial realms such as socioeconomic, governance, ecological., and other environmental aspects of urban-rural relationship as they pertain to the Asian megacity regions. This, and the belief that the PUI reflects spatially differential impact of the forces and processes that shape it, has helped consolidate my view of the rural-urban mixed landscape—the physical space spanning the entire city region that I call the ‘spread region’—as a spatial and temporal manifestation of, or playground for, the ‘urban-rural interface’.

4.2.4 Spread Region and Urban-Rural Interface The distinction between urban-rural interface’ (URI) and ‘peri-urban interface’ (PUI) goes somewhat beyond a semantic quibble, although I would not be averse to a synonymous use and interpretation of these terms in certain situations. There is an emerging realization in the literature that, irrespective of location, no area within a given megacity region is immune from some degree (or form) of the urbanrural interfacing, a realization that seems intrinsic to the interpretive definitions of both the PUI and the URI. Reimagining the peri-urban interface as a rural-urban or urban-rural interface (URI) would explicitly recognize this understanding by finally shedding the explicit or implicit spatial connotation of the prefix ‘peri’. I should note that replacing ‘peri’ does not, in my mind, refute the effect of urban proximity on the degree and nature of the urban-rural interfacing. In my estimation, both the ‘physical features’ (Simon et al. 2004; McGregor et al. 2006a, b) and the ‘dynamics of rural-urban interaction’ and linkages (Allen 2006; Douglass 1998) hold important places for a comprehensive understanding of the unevenness (e.g., pockets, patches, islands, and/or gradients) at micro-scale within the spatial extent of the megacity region, recognition of which is a crucial starting point for sustainable planning. Schafran’s (2014, 2015) conceptual distinction between the ‘megaregional space’ and the ‘spaces of the megaregion’ I consider to be highly relevant, and crucial from the standpoint of sustainable planning. More on this later.

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From my standpoint, spread region (SR), the spatial expanse within the megacity region, is where these variant spaces, the outcome of these forces or processes, are manifested in a variety of forms, features, and degrees of urbanity and rurality at diverse scales, which in turn affect the ongoing process. It is the stage where the urban-rural interfacing occurs. I see it as both a spatial as well as a temporal entity; process and product—one time-bound, the other space-bound— engaged in a perpetual cyclical dance that plays out across the spaces of the city-regions, keeping these spaces in a constant state of fluidity and flux. Observed throughout the developing world, these spatiotemporal dynamics—shaping and being shaped primarily by the doings of the human agencies—are at the heart of the Asian megacity regions as well. The spread regions of the megacity regions provide the stages where these interplays take place. As a spatial entity, the hybrid ‘spread region’, comprising ‘uneven, nonlinear and nonuniform’ spaces of urban and rural environments, spans the entire space of the megacity region beyond the megacity core; thus, the forms, features, and processes that relate to such a city region also pertain to the spread region. My concept of the URI as manifested in the spread region of the MCR (Fig. 4.2) is not limited to the influence commonly considered to be associated with the large cities; the smallest of the urban (and rural) centers, and all other settlements of in-between forms and sizes, depending on their location, growth, and socioeconomic attributes, may also shape the regional landscapes around them with varying traits and degrees of impact. The convergence of vectors—an outward movement of people from the existing central core city or cities, creating demand for settlement space, and inward and lateral migration from other areas outside and within the spread region—adds to the unique rural-urban dynamics of the spread region. As the physical stage for all the ruralurban flows of goods, services, people, and resources, as well as pollutants and waste products, the spread region is gaining increasing attention from urban and regional planners in the developing world. With a rapidly growing population, an expansion of physical infrastructure, industrial/commercial or mixed use of heretofore agricultural land, and a variety of other activities needed to satisfy the demands of a growing population, region, or nation, the spread region is increasingly vulnerable to ecological and other environmental degradation. Additionally, as widely noted in the urban literature, obvious resource needs and governance issues related to the management of population growth and conservation (and/or preservation, as appropriate) of rural land and natural resources are posing significant challenges for sustainable development for the spread region. Conversely, for the very same reasons, the spread region can offer enormous opportunities for innovative sustainable planning. Conceptualized as a precursor, concomitant entity, and outcome (past, present, and future) of an ongoing, and often intrusively urbanizing, process of increasing complexity, the spread region is also a temporal entity—a phenomenon—reflecting the interfacing of the rural and the urban over time. Based on contributions by a set of renowned scholars in a volume on the future of city regions15 (by the Regional 15 Initially published in a special issue on the “Futures of City Regions” by the Regional Studies Association in 2009.

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Fig. 4.2 The spread region of the MCR: a conceptual sketch (Source Author)

Studies Association), the editors (Neuman and Hull 2011) noted the inherent temporality of city regions: “…the mega-region is a new spatial and temporal entity, a polycentric multi-metropolis of shifting and dynamic multi-scalar and multi-speed architecture whose developmental logics respond to a new set of conditions” (2011, p. xiii; emphasis in original). As a temporal entity, the spread region (in the Asian MCR) is steadily breaking down our stereotypical views of urban and rural. In terms of livelihood, for example, they allow an extension of urban-oriented activities into the primarily non-urban landscape while rendering a rural slant to many urban area activities. Similarly, for many residents, place of residence (‘where is home?’) may no longer be clear-cut and simple because the concept of ‘home’ in many Asian cultures is rather complicated, informed by both the urban place of residence (or work) with the rural ancestral home.

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This intrinsic spatiotemporal duality of the spread region is of some significance in considering boundary issues for megacity regions. In the academic and planning lexicons the term ‘region’ does not always convey one universally accepted meaning. The addition of the prefix ‘spread’ in identifying a region adds further complexity to the understanding of a city’s regional pattern, as both the processes and patterning of regional traits relate largely to the growth of the city. Some five decades ago, while pointing out “persistence error” in the studies of the region in the discipline of geography, P.E. James (1967, p. 7) in his presidential address to the Association of American Geographers’ (AAG) annual meeting, considered a ‘region’ a “major, indefinite division of the inanimate world, or […] a large tract of land with some elements of homogeneity, or […] an administrative area.” Two fundamental regional issues that James’s address alluded, namely, ‘indefinite division’ and ‘elements of homogeneity’, appear today in many studies on the transitory regional environment of cities, both in terms of the spatial manifestation and the temporal component of the region-making process. The use of a criterion or a set of criteria in the determination of areal homogeneity/heterogeneity and spatial forms has varied widely in ascertaining the growth and spread effect of regional urbanization. Differing conceptual definitions of ‘urban’ and ‘rural’ among the countries of the world notwithstanding, it can be said that there are some spatially observable indicators that distinguish urban and rural, whereas ‘spread region’—the entire physical space within a (mega)city region—represents an evolving ‘mixed’ territory comprising spaces of varying degrees and shades of urbanity and rurality, parts of which are neither urban nor rural in the traditional sense. In light of the above discussion, then, my concept of the ‘spread region’ is based on the premises that • The entire spatial extent of the spread region represents an urban-rural interface (with the same features and processes inherent in the peri-urban interface, but with a nuanced interpretation of the spatial connotation of the prefix peri); • The supposed coherence of the megacity regional space at the macro-scale coexists with micro-level manifestations of the urban-rural continuum, gradients, variations, fragmentations, commonalities, and differences; • In conjunction with a-local factors, location—especially degree of spatial proximity to urban (and rural) settlements as relevant to the geographies of the local environment—affects the nature of the urban-rural interface; and that, • The spread region is a dynamic, fluid, and temporally alterable entity, always in a transitory state. In addition, there is a polycentric element to consider. Inherent to the character of the spread region, but not included in the foregoing discussion because of its lack of direct relevance to my proposed three-pronged approach, is the polycentric/polynodal aspect of the megacity region. Based on the voluminous literature on the morphological and functional components of polycentricity/polynodality in the context of city regions the world over (e.g., Burger and Meijers 2012; Meijers 2008; Green 2007; Davoudi 2002, 2003; Kloosterman and Musterd 2001) and the professed goal of encouraging polycentric development in some megacity regional planning (e.g., the National Capital Region, India) (NCRPB 2000), a conceptual construct

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of a spread region would be incomplete without at least a mention of this feature. Following the trend observed in city regions in both the developed and developing world, as observed in the literature, it can be said that the areal expanse within an evolving regional entity as the MCR, the spread region can be expected to exhibit an emergence and/or a gradual strengthening of a polycentric or polynodal character. Based on these premises, and in the context of the Asian megacity region, I offer a broadly formulated working definition of ‘spread region’: The entire spatial expanse within a polycentrically or polynodally inclined single-system city-regional territory around a megacity (a dominant city or urban agglomeration), housing other individual and/or coalescing groups of cities, as well as scattered settlements of varying sizes and forms, undergoing a process of transformation from predominantly non-urban to a mixed rural-urban or urban-oriented state, while remaining true to historical orientations, areal dimensions, structural features, forms, and functions, and serving as the spatiotemporal manifestation (as precursor, concomitant and outcome) of all aspects of urban-rural interface (URI) as place, process, and concept.

As noted in Chap. 3, my concept of the ‘spread region’ as an entity embodying the urban-rural interface shares the essence of the desakota concept by McGee and colleagues, but there are some differences,16 as briefly noted below.

4.2.5

Spread Region and desakota

In the absence of a broad consensus on the standard definition of what is perceived as ‘urban’, it is an arduous task to even identify a ‘transitory urban’ space for the processes that give rise to spatial configurations. As megacity growth continues to spread outside of the city boundary, there is no denying that even for a casual observer, the city’s adjacent space imposes urban footprints on what was once a non-urban/rural landscape. In this scenario, what is an appropriate metaphor for conceptualizing such an evolving spatial pattern around cities? Over the past decades, the urban literature has coined the terms urban fringe, urban transitional space, urban hinterland, extended metropolitan region, and a host of other terminologies to describe and analyze such patterns, facilitating (or confounding) our understanding of the Asian urbanization process. Following the traditional dichotomous concept of urban and rural (even in the absence of commonly accepted or standard definitions of such), this emerging urbanizing territory, observed around the Asian megacities is hard to classify. It is a non-urban, yet non-rural space of mixed forms and functions assumed to be an outcome of the symbiosis between urban influence and the transforming rural environment. Concepts such as ‘urban spread region’ (as discussed above) and ‘desakota’ (as conceptualized by McGee and his colleagues for the transformational process, and also specific to the transformed entity itself), relate to this symbiotic relationship between urban and rural. Both recognize the transformative process and 16 Same can also be said of the ‘urban field’ concept (Friedmann and Miller 1965; Friedmann 1992).

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its outcome (transient, temporally framed) in relation to urban growth in the complex spatial milieu of the Asian megacity regions.17 However, there are some basic differences between the desakota concept, as originally conceptualized, and that of the ‘urban spread region’ that, based on my subjective interpretation, pertains to both spatial attributes as well as process (Table 4.2).18 The table does not need elaboration, but I would like to make one additional comment. The Desakota region was one of ‘five main regions of the spatial economy’ as described by McGee (1991), the others being ‘the major cities, the peri-urban regions, the densely populated rural regions, and sparsely populated frontier regions.’ My concept of the spread region encompasses the desakota, as well as the peri-urban, the rural, and the frontier regions outside of the core megacity or urban agglomeration.19 Having noted my interpretation of the differences between desakota and spread region, it merits reiterating that my concept of the ‘spread region’, as the spatial (and temporal) manifestation of all aspects of the urban-rural interface (URI), shares the same heart with desakota, which centers on the recognition of the ‘complex fields of rural and urban interaction’ (Douglass 1995), and the unique hybridity’ of the space around or close to large, changing Asian cities. This essence is of paramount importance in studying the megacity regions of Asia. As Bruce Koppel (1991), in the concluding words of his essay on rural-urban dichotomy, noted, the form, function, and trajectory of this mixed emerging space “has been the pillar of development thinking” for its prospects and problems, and thus requires an “innovative, conceptual” and “empirical” approach to address the megacity’s region (pp. 66–67). From the vantage point of what we now recognize as the basic principles of the PUI/RUI and/or the URI concept, it can be said that these principles are at the heart of both desakota and spread region. While for the desakota region (McGee 1991) the context of this space might be the extended metropolitan region (EMR) (Ginsburg et al. 1991) and for the spread region the span of the entire megacity region (MCR) beyond the core, the understanding of both rests on the recognition of this ‘mixed emerging (and evolving) space’ around the large centers of Asia which are undergoing a complex 17 It is important to point out that in conceptualizing and analyzing desakota, McGee and colleagues focused on both process and outcome. While I also see the spread region both as a process and an outcome (as well as a precursor), in this volume I am focusing only on its spatial aspect as the current outcome of a process, not on the process itself. Moreover, it is equally important to remember that the ‘currency’ of the outcome—the ‘current’ state of the spatial entity at micro-levels across space at any given time—is always transitory, evolving, in a state of flux. (Needless to say, this is another vital reason for ensuring that data sets for research and planning purposes are available and utilized contemporaneously). 18 In keeping with the evolving nature of the urbanizing landscape against which the concept of desakota was first formulated, it has been subject to both theoretical and empirical explorations over the years that followed, not least of which by McGee himself. As a result, the original concept has undergone subtle conceptual modifications with more nuanced interpretations and wider applications. My comments in this section pertain only to my interpretation of the concept as it was originally formulated. 19 In the absence of definitional parameter(s) of what would constitute ‘major’, the conceptual status of the ‘major cities’ (other than the core city) vis-à-vis the makeup of the spread region, is somewhat tenuous in my mind at this point.

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Table 4.2 Desakota and spread region: a subjective interpretation Geographical context The extended metropolitan region (EMR)/The extended metropolis—Desakota

Megacity region—The spread region (Manifesting the urban-rural interface)

Physical features Construed to be a ‘zone’ within the extended metropolitan region, rather than as a ‘region’. May appear in a linear or patchy shape, bounded by ‘peri-urban’ area of large city core and densely populated rural area. May also occur as an ‘enclave’ within high-density rural farmlands Thus, the occurrence of desakota, usually depicted in small size in a contiguous fashion along the cities’ transportation routes, or in small-scale patchy forms within the rural areas, as shown in the regional spatial system. (Source: McGee 1991: Spatial Configuration of a Hypothetical Asian Country, p. 6)

Conceived as ‘spread region’ outside the corporate boundary of a megacity/UA of over 10 million population. Means of demarcation of its areal extent/boundary remain unclear; may coincide with where the urbanizing influence of the megacity tends to cease. Encompasses all urban and rural areas, including all the urban-prefixed entities (e.g., urban-fringe, urban sprawl, urban-transitional area, urban-agglomerated region), as well as peri-urban areas proximate to urban centers. Thus, spread region includes a larger area with varied configurations of spatial traits, sizes, and shapes (Fig. 4.3) than the desakota

Traits/Attributes/Characteristics Depicts zones of intensely mixed agriculture and nonagricultural activities that previously were characterized by high-density population engaged in agricultural activities (primarily wet paddy) interspersed by smaller cities and towns

Appears as an extensive, multi-functional region around the core megacities amid varied urban and rural settlement systems, land-use types, economic activities, and governing systems. This is a hybrid region comprising mixed urban and rural elements in ‘varying intensities of urbanity and rurality’ across the region

Process Initially, the “growth of the metropolitan core” city is regarded to be the major force that, in combination with availability of relatively cheap land, labor, and indigenous [but relatively modernized, e.g., moped] transport facilities, social capital, and social networks, led to the formation of the desakota. Research on the outcome of the process, especially for the identity of ‘change’ in ‘spatial economy’ is not considered universal, as the patterns are dependent on a range of prerequisites (e.g., ‘high population density’, ‘rice-growing economic niches’, and ‘variability in rural growth rate’)

Given the complex settings of the megacity’s growth and their varied impact on the region, it is envisaged that the process originates primarily from the core megacity’s growth, subsequently in concert with developmental activities in both urban and rural contexts (and possibly from local, regional, and state policies) permeating throughout the region as an intrusive (and/or in situ) process of varied intensities producing a host of spatial forms and functions. Thus, spread region is considered to be both the outcome and the possible precursor of a process

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array of changes in many frontiers. And finally, sustainability is the overarching goal for this evolving space, no matter how we view its many nuances.

4.2.6 How Unique Is the Asian Megacity Region? An important and logical question that arises at this point in our conversation on urban-rural dynamics in the context of the Asian megacity region relates to whether a certain amount of distinctiveness can be ascribed to the Asian MCR. Are there some principal characteristics of the Asian MCR that make it uniquely Asian? Or are many of these attributes potentially generalizable to other continents or countries in the developing world? Although the Asian megacity region is the focus of this volume, it is apparent that with the exception of the original concept of desakota, which was formulated exclusively in the context of certain regions of Asia, other related theoretical and empirical insights on urban-rural dynamics within city-regional landscapes, as discussed in this and the previous chapter(s), were not based entirely on the Asian experience. Rather, a number of observed commonalities that emerged can arguably be applicable to the developing world in general, beyond specific continents or countries. Conversely, evidence of attributes distinctive to a specific continent, country, or region is growing. The literature on the urban-rural dynamics in diverse African and Asian milieu appears to span a generalizability–uniqueness (G–U) spectrum at multiple scalar layers. While some point to the potential generalizability of certain broad characteristics of the MCR that transcend geographical or political boundaries (e.g., properties of urban-rural interface, peri-urban interface), others note variations within these broad characteristics that are specific to certain geographical scales or locales (the original concept of desakota being a prime example), which render them unique. Discourses on the exact spatial extent and implication of ‘peri’ in PU or PUI, the intensity and nature of rural-urban interactions, linkages and flows that represent the URI, and the differential impacts of external and internal forces, attest to this fluidity on the G–U spectrum across space and time. Viewed from this perspective, my response to the question “Are Asian megacity regions uniquely Asian?” will have to be a ‘qualified yes’, with a strong and fervent ‘but we need to know more’. As for the ‘qualified yes’, at a basic level, there are certain indications that Asian urbanization is following its own unique trajectory with characteristics that set it apart from other spaces on the globe. Rapid urban growth is one; it has been noted that “…almost 60% of all global urban growth occurring between 2010 and 2050 [will take place] in Asia, much of it located in the extended urban space of large mega-urban regions” (McGee 2017). The rapid rise in the number and growth of the megacities, as discussed in Chap. 2, have further distinguished the urbanization profile and trajectory of Asia. These are established, and verifiable facts that can be used to support Asia’s somewhat unique position on the G–U spectrum with some degree of confidence. These, along with a few other such indicators on the Asian urbanization scene can be used

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to ascribe a certain uniqueness to Asian urbanization in general. However, when it comes to the megacity region, discovering principal (and distinctive) characteristics of the Asian MCR as a conceptual entity becomes more a matter of inference, conjecture, or theorization without sufficient supporting evidence, primarily based on the prevailing literature within and beyond Asia, as well as bits and pieces of empirical research, usually geared to scales other than that of the MCR. This, of course, is because of the glaring lack of theoretical and empirical attention paid to the Asian MCR per se, an issue that this volume hopes to draw attention to. As discussed in this and the previous chapter, definitional ambiguities, lack of standardized definitions of either the ‘megacity’ or the ‘city region’ and lack of a clear conceptual demarcation among different city-regional entities have further clouded the situation. Terms such as ‘Extended Metropolitan Region’, ‘megaregion’/‘mega-urban region’, and megacity region, are frequently used interchangeably. As noted in Chap. 3, the interchangeable use of the terms is sometimes carefully noted by the authors at the outset (e.g., McGee 2009; Laquian 2005), but often there are no specifications offered. And even with such notice, the interchangeable or generic use of terms such as ‘megaurban region’ for ‘Extended Metropolitan Region’ as by McGee (2009) or to other terms (‘megacity-centered extended metropolitan regions’, ‘extended metropolitan regions’, ‘polynucleated metropolitan regions’, and ‘true megapolitan regions’) as by Laquian (2005) muddies the definitional boundaries, leaving the reader to rely on inference and conjecture for specific city-regional scalar entities. These are among the reasons behind the caveat inherent in the ‘qualified yes’ offered above. However, despite the caveat, the ‘yes’ underscores my view that when finally given the long overdue research attention, the Asian MCR will indeed prove to be a relatively unique urban-regional entity (as well as a phenomenon) with its own array of traits and trends. It bears reiterating that, at this time, we are primarily left to speculate about the uniqueness of Asian megacity regions from conceptual discourse and empirical findings in context of other spatiotemporal entities or phenomena at various other scales than that of the MCR (e.g., country, region, megaregion/mega-urban region, Extended Metropolitan Region, and desakota). In this vein, the rapid rise of the Asian megacities can be inferred to have implications for the characterization of the Asian MCR, as its spread region is exposed to the many ramifications of such rapid rise of the core cities. As discussed, the mixed land-use patterns of agricultural and nonagricultural pursuits, the hybridity and fluidity of the landscape, the urban-rural interactions, flows, and linkages of varied intensities and kinds, and the differential impact of the internal and external forces on the above have been generally recognized to characterize the ‘transactional’ spaces of the various city-regional configurations (e.g., mega-urban regions, EMRs, and desakota zones) of Asia. By inference, then, it can be argued that these processes and features should be recognized as among the hallmarks of the Asian MCR as well. The basic premises of my working definition of the spread region of the Asian MCR as distilled from the literature are based on such inferences as well, which may prove to be characteristics that render uniqueness to the Asian MCR.

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Most of these and other inferable urban-rural transformational dynamics have already been discussed. An important idea that has not been discussed, and which might potentially be recognized as among the principal characteristics of the Asian MCR, relates to differences in the relative pace of rural-urban transition or transformation in the Asian regions in current times compared to what has been experienced historically in Asia as well as in other regions of the developing and developed world. ‘Space-time telescoping’ or ‘space-time collapsing’ (Marcotullio 2003; Marcotullio and Lee 2003) describes a speeded-up process of transformation taking place in the Asian urban scene that, as McGee (2008) observed, defies the expectation of linear development borne out of the traditional transition theory based on the idea of a rural-urban dichotomy. As Marcotullio (2003) noted, “‘[t]ime space compression’ can be seen at work with environmental transitions”, thus replacing the ‘sequential’ with ‘simultaneous’ in environmental agenda setting, and introducing an element of scalar expansion (from the city to the city region) into the need for simultaneity in addressing environmental issues (such as ‘brown’ versus ‘green’, as will be discussed in the next chapter). Although developed and discussed in global, Asian, and city scales, the notion of time-space telescoping can be inferred to be equally applicable to the Asian MCR as individual Asian megacity regions experience all the associated dynamics of a speeded-up rural-urban and developmental transformation process within their respective previously primarily agrarian spaces. The primary reason for the second part of my response to the question (‘but we need to know more’) rests on the diversity among and within the individual megacity regions in Asia. The inter-MCR diversity itself is formidable. Although Asian urbanization in the last decades is marked by the rapid rise of megacities, it is worth remembering that out of a total of almost 50 countries in Asia, only eight have these urban giants in their urban hierarchy, and their emergence and growth trajectories have sharply varied over the years (Fig. 2.3). Shaped by their diverse historical, socioeconomic, geographic, and political backgrounds, past and contemporary development strategies and levels, relative advances in communication and transportation technologies, and the global standings of their respective host countries, the megacities exhibit their own distinctive arrays of traits, driving forces, and future growth potentials, thus having distinct influence on their respective city regions. It is logical to expect, therefore, that their respective MCRs, by extension, will display their own distinctive arrays of traits, driving forces, and growth potentials as well. The interregional diversities do not negate the importance of the argument for a concerted conceptual focus on the Asian MCR; on the contrary, they provide strong support for the argument for a paradigm shift in the direction of the MCR from the standpoint of strategic planning for sustainable development of the diverse and fast-transforming megacity regions of Asia. Apart from the inter-regional variations, the intra-regional (more specifically, the intra-MCR) diversities—reflecting their respective internal urban-rural dynamics and differential impacts of a multitude of internal and external forces—bolster the argument for why ‘we need to know more’ about the individual MCRs of Asia, as posited above. This theme will be revisited in the next chapter.

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My conceptualization of the URI as place, process, and concept, as manifested in the spread region of the Asian MCR, constitutes the first prong of the tripronged approach. In the following pages, I explore the second prong: adopting a multidimensional lens to sustainable planning of the Asian MCR.

4.3 Sustainable Development Through a Multidimensional, Interdisciplinary, and Color-Coordinated Lens Multifaceted changes (from socioeconomic, demographic, infrastructural, and cultural, to environmental, ecological, and others), as observed in the spread regions of the Asian megacity regions, have created unique sustainability issues, leaving scholars and practitioners searching for solutions. However, the overwhelming complexities of managing the myriad aspects of urban-regional sustainability, coupled with the diverse backgrounds, interests, and jurisdictions of participating institutions and actors, have contributed to the much-lamented ineffectiveness of often uncoordinated, and fragmented approaches and sectoral outlooks. The second prong or facet of my tri-pronged approach rests on this aspect of the sustainability discourse, connecting it to the first (the dynamics of the URI in the spread region of the MCR) and the third (scalar perspectives) that will be discussed in the next chapter. As the foundational idea, this is at the crux of my approach. As a metaphorical trope, I see it as the hyphen that conceptually and pragmatically connects the other two. The basic premise of this prong rests on two simple and interconnected ideas. First, sustainable development considerations for the megacity regions of Asia must go beyond sectoral, unidimensional, or even the economically driven tri-dimensional (e.g., the triple bottom line or TBL) approaches, and actively embrace a multidimensional, multidisciplinary outlook and expertise to integrate environmental/ecological components of development with their socioeconomic and other counterparts, thereby translating concepts into practice. The second is a corollary of the first, emphasizing a purposefully implemented, coordinated approach in combating many of the perceived and/or ‘false’ dichotomies between the so-called ‘green’ and ‘brown’ agendas, instead focusing on how to holistically address the ‘two groups of environmental challenges’ underlying both agendas (Allen 2006, p. 30; McGranahan and Satterthwaite 2000) that affect the URI in the spread region of the MCR. Paradoxically however, despite, or perhaps because of, such simplicity, discussing this prong is difficult for two—somewhat contradictory—reasons. The first challenge stems not from the paucity of material, but in fact because the literature is replete with voices that support the basic premise. That we need a multidimensional focus, is too obvious and too basic to be questioned. So many scholars over the years have argued so convincingly for going beyond a unidimensional approach to sustainability in general, and urban sustainability in the context of cities (and certain urban settlements) in particular, that the assertion hardly needs further restating. Similarly, although not as widely observable as the above, the need to adopt an interdisciplinary

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approach for operationalizing the multidimensionality and for bringing together the different environmental/ecological agendas has also been widely acknowledged and advocated in the literature. This is one side of the coin. Lamentably, however, there is another side. The overwhelming majority of the literature (with certain exceptions) is focused on cities. Notwithstanding the welcome effort in the more recent years to bring the city regions and the PUI into the sustainability discourse, there is a glaring dearth of literature in this area when it comes to the study of megacity regions of Asia. The following section reflects the dilemma created by these two opposing situations. Despite the primacy of the multidimensionality lens in the three-pronged approach, this section of the chapter will necessarily be brief, acknowledging the support in the literature for such an approach, underscoring the scarcity of practical application to the PUI, and reiterating the importance of an intentional and integrated approach to sustainable development in the Asian MCR. The literature on sustainability is vast, multifaceted, and at times fraught with divergent notions, interpretations, and nuances. A host of excellent reference books, offering contributions by renowned scholars, have come out in the last decades that offer fairly comprehensive overviews of the evolutionary path of the sustainability concept, organizational and institutional efforts (e.g., under the auspices of the United Nations) that have historically advanced the cause, as well as the ramifications of such efforts (e.g., Pugh 2000; Wheeler and Beatley 2004; Vojnovic 2013; Mazmanian and Blanco 2014). Numerous other works in the fields of urbanization and urban (and/or rural) development, although not focused on sustainability per se, have contributed valuable perspectives and insights on the subject, and a smaller number of collected works on related themes, such as the peri-urban interface and megaregions (e.g., McGregor et al. 2006b; Ross 2009; Harrison and Hoyler 2015), have included sustainability considerations in their deliberations. In general, the overall trend points to a gradual movement of sustainability-associated concepts toward more inclusive, multidimensional, and ecologically sensitive approaches that force us to rethink the traditional predominance of economic imperatives. From the standpoint of the Asian megacity regions, this is encouraging, but there are at least three concerns. First, as ongoing discourse regarding conceptual dichotomies (such as conservationist/preservationist; growth/development/‘steady state’/‘minus growth’; green/brown/gray agendas; and weak/strong sustainability) suggests, we are still short of reaching common conceptual ground. Second, those conceptual commonalities that have been reached, or are close to being reached, as reflected in the literature, do not yet seem to have been translated into practice; at best, the sporadic efforts to adapt them can be described more as the exception than the rule. And finally, most of the literature on urban sustainability continues to be city-centric, as well as based on the Western experience, with scant attention to city regions, to say nothing of the megacity regions of Asia in particular. In perusing the urban sustainability literature, I had to constantly shift mental gears to draw parallels, or to evaluate the applicability or adaptability of a conceptual theme or suggestion (e.g., in support of a holistic approach) or a refutation (e.g., of prioritizing economic considerations over others) made in terms of the city (frequently in the Western context) to the locale and scale of my focus—the Asian megacity region.

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Keeping the importance of factors such as contextuality and scalar differences firmly in mind, it is heartening to find that much of the time the sentiments expressed specific to cities seem to have parallel validity, adaptability, or applicability in terms of the Asian MCR. However, it is important to add a few words here to justify the two qualifiers above, which are embedded throughout the sustainability literature. Contextuality, for example, matters in all socioeconomic, cultural, historical, political, environmental, and other aspects of human existence across varied geographies even at a comparable scale. By the same token, sustainability issues have different scalar manifestations from neighborhood to city to regional to national, international, and global scales. It is even more important to recognize that along with inter-regional variations in related ideas such as sustainability markers and/or other quality of life indicators (and expectations), we should expect intra-regional variations in such. The relevance of this brief detour in finding parallels between issues explored in context of the city, primarily the Western city, and the Asian MCR, and the need to qualify such topics in terms of context and scale, will be apparent in the following discussion, which, with some exceptions, is primarily based on the literature that has traditionally had its major focus on the city. It is useful to establish conceptual definitions preliminary to any such discussion. However, as definitions reflect individual conceptualizations and perspectives, and these in turn reflect the ideological and disciplinary orientations of the actors, definition of a concept as complex as sustainability is of necessity fraught with complexity. Given all the discourse and debate, and the voluminous literature on sustainability in the scholarly and public realms, one may be justified to consider this as an essential, but exasperating, subject. A statement in the Economist (2014) aptly sums up the frustration felt by the public: Sustainability can refer to anything from building wind farms to combating social inequality. The idea crops up everywhere from Starbucks to the deliberations of the United Nations whose governments are in the middle of working out a set of so-called Sustainable Development Goals for 2015-30. An ill-defined, controversial notion is no basis for coherent policy. (The Economist, August 30, 2014, Business, p. 61)

The situation is no less confusing in the professional literature, where there are ‘likely hundreds of published definitions’ (Hempel 2009 as cited in Mazmanian and Blanco 2014). The definitions, as mentioned above, reflect the respective assumptions and interpretations of individual stakeholders and organizations. For instance, in the ‘hands-on exercises’ section for ‘students or interested readers’ in the concluding chapter of one of the seminal volumes of collected classic works on urban sustainability, the editors (Wheeler and Beatley 2004) gave no less than nine examples of definitions of sustainability from various international sources, which focused on a wide range of themes and definitions of the concept as extracted (abridged) below: 1) meeting the needs of the present generation without compromising that of the future generations; 2) carrying capacity of ecosystems; 3) maintaining natural capital; 4) maintenance and improvement of systems; 5) positive change without eroding ecological, social or political systems; 6) sustaining human livelihood; 7) protecting and restoring the environment; 8) opposing exponential material growth; and 9) a composite approach comprising five elements of conservation and development, namely, basic human needs equity and social

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justice, social self-determination and cultural diversity, and ecological integrity. (Wheeler and Beatley 2004, pp. 321–322)

Notably, the first example was from the now ubiquitous definition coined by the Brundtland Commission Report of 1987 that brought the temporal importance of sustainability (intergenerational as well as intragenerational) to a clearer focus, and is considered by some as one of the two major definitions of sustainability (Blanco and Mazmanian 2014): First, “[s]ustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (UN WCED 1987). As is the case with many definitions in the social sciences, the implied meanings of this definition were also subject to differing interpretations. For example, noting the report’s recognition of intra- and intergenerational equity issues, Pieterse (2011, p. 310) commented that “[t]his framing implied that we require a development model that does not see the irrevocable erosion of nonrenewable resources that effectively limits the options and choices of future generations” and went on to connect it to the triple bottom line (TBL) idea of economy as the prerequisite for the other domains in perpetuating the status quo of an ‘extractive capitalism’. On the contrary, Blanco and Mazmanian (2014, pp. 3–6) surmised an implicit ecological element, as well as a recognition of the finite carrying capacity of the ‘earth systems’ in the same definition: “It […] refers to the more recent ecological meaning of sustainability, the natural environment’s ability to meet human needs and functions. This idea implies that earth systems have a carrying capacity, a finite ability to sustain or carry life, and that at this point human activity is unsustainable” (Blanco and Mazmanian 2014, p. 4). The second important definition of sustainability, as per Blanco and Mazmanian (2014), was based on the three E’s (environment, equity, and economy) as referred to above, which led to the triple bottom line (economic, social, and environmental), or the three pillars (people, planet, and profit) schema for the business sector, reflecting the interplay among social, economic, and environmental dimensions. While acknowledging its importance, the authors did not, however, agree with the purportedly ‘co-equal’ or balanced status of the three elements as assumed in this definition; instead, they posited a relationship of ‘nested dependency’ with the economy dependent on the social organizations, which in turn was dependent on the natural environment. In this view, the natural environment is ‘the primary system on which all human societies depend’. “…[S]ocieties must strive to conserve natural resources and reduce resource degradation; and economies within these societies will require changes to facilitate the conservation and quality of natural goods and services” (2014, pp. 5–6). The principles of both the Brundtland Report and that of the triple-bottom-line approaches have been widely discussed, praised, criticized, and debated in the literature. My interest lies in what I see as the temporal and ecological implications of the former, and as a step beyond the traditional unidimensional approach to sustainability of the latter, both of which have profound implications for the megacity regions of Asia. Considered together, these two definitions exemplify the kinds of theoretical and ideological underpinnings of the sustainability concept that have influenced our

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thinking and shaped planning and policy decisions over the years. They are also important because they paved the way for a gradual shift toward consideration of dimensions beyond the three of the TBL models, to strong sustainability.20 Strong sustainability refers to a shift from the conceptual dominance of economic capital in relation to all other social, environmental, and ecological capitals. The study of five dimensions of social, physical, economic, ecological, and political sustainability, as conceptualized and discussed by Adrianna Allen in 2001, was a forerunner in this regard. Allen (2001, p. 154; Allen and You 2002, p. 16) saw the three-ring model21 as a ‘great advance on previous perspectives’, acknowledging that ‘[q]uite rightly, the environmental, economic, and social goals still apply’, but that (‘perhaps’22 ) it did not ‘go far enough’ for several reasons: Apart from being ‘too abstract’, it fell short of showing its understanding of or explaining several important issues, namely, the ‘inherent trade-offs found in the simultaneous pursuit of these goals’, the political underpinnings influencing these goals, and the (contradictory) relationship between the ‘macroeconomic strategies’ and the urban socioenvironmental goals. Allen’s model was conceptualized in the context of the fishing industry in a city in Argentina. Although first used in a city context, the city-regional implication was already implicit in her discussion (2001), which was brought more clearly to the forefront in a subsequent publication (Allen and You 2002). This publication, a collaborative effort by the Development Planning Unit (DPU), University College of London and the United Nations Human Settlement Programme (UN-Habitat), connected the individual dimensions to the city regions, stressed the significance and practicality of concepts such as the rural-urban continuum and rural-urban interface for developing countries, and asserted that “…integrated urban-rural approaches to development can contribute significantly to more sustainable forms of urbanisation” (Allen and You 2002, p. 11). In it, the authors reasserted that although ‘the environmental, economic and social goals still apply’, in order ‘to assess whether any given practice, policy or trend is moving toward or against urban sustainability’ it would be necessary to consider five dimensions of urban sustainability, namely, economic, social, ecological [pertaining to urban production and consumption on the integrity and health of the city region and global carrying capacity], physical [built environment], and political. Support for simultaneous consideration of all five dimensions appears implicit in the model, which resonates with my view of the need for simultaneous application of the three prongs in my approach. Figure 4.3 shows the interrelationship among these dimensions relative to the carrying capacity of the 20 Debates on the opposing paradigms of strong and weak sustainability, based primarily as to whether natural capital is substitutable for man-made and other capitals, continue to permeate the literature on sustainability. In his seminal volume on the intricacies, nuances, and implications of the two, Neumayer (2013) referred to the former as the ‘non-substitutability paradigm’ and the latter the ‘substitutability paradigm’. Together, the opposing viewpoints, each deemed justifiable by their respective supporters, epitomize the contradictions embedded in the entire sustainable development field. 21 The ‘three-ring-circus’ model is how she referred to it (Allen 2001). 22 This qualifier seems unnecessary, and at odds, with the rightful assertions and arguments for multidimensionality convincingly made by Allen in this and subsequent publications.

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Fig. 4.3 Conceptual dimensions of sustainability (Source Reproduced from Allen and You 2002)

urban region (Allen and You 2002, pp. 16–17) and the role of the political dimension in ‘guiding’ or ‘regulating’ the other four as in the original formulation (Allen 2001). However, there is one interesting change in the adapted schema that, in my view, more realistically reflects the reciprocal nature of influence exerted by the respective conceptual domains in the model. In place of the unidirectional arrows emanating from the dynamics of the dimensions to urban sustainability in the original sketch (Allen 2001), the adapted model (Allen and You 2002, p. 16) shows a bi-directionality that is more representative of the real world. The many case studies showcased in the volume highlighted different aspects of the multidimensional and interconnected aspects of sustainable development being explored and/or implemented in individual situations around the world. Taken together, they make a compelling case for adopting a holistic vision , as well as for finding contextually applicable practical approaches to urban-regional development. In recognition of the indisputable multidimensionality inherent in all sustainability-related issues, outlooks on the subject have taken a decidedly more holistic and integrative turn in the last decades. Besides the Agenda 21 Earth Summit in 1992 and the Habitat Agenda (Rio) in 1996 that attempted to combine the concepts of the multi-focal nature of sustainability with a local and participatory approach, while also lifting up the urban perspective, this trend is also evidenced in a number of recent contributions that discussed, extended, or operationalized parallel or similar

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views on aspects of the three-dimensional or multidimensional approaches. Darshini Mahadevia (2002), for example, asserted that the “move towards a ‘sustainable city’ in the South has to be an ‘inclusive approach’ based on the four pillars of environmental sustainability, social equity, economic growth with redistribution, and political empowerment of the disempowered” (p. 140; emphasis in original). She considered this a ‘holistic’ approach as it incorporated ‘all dimensions of development’, and made a point of noting the importance of simultaneity in addressing sustainability issues: “These four dimensions have to be approached simultaneously in the process of development and not, as at present, with one dimension taking precedence over the others within a fragmented and sectoral approach to sustainable development” (p. 140; emphasis added).23 Considering occasions when well-intentioned action in the realm of one dimension has had a negative impact on the other(s) in the absence of simultaneous enactment of measures to counteract the negatives (e.g., measures to offset the loss of social equity/employment as a result of the closing down of a polluting industry or getting polluting vehicles off the road), Mahadevia came to the conclusion that ‘developmental processes, programmes, and projects need to be multidimensional and multi-sectoral’ (2002, p. 154). The importance of heeding this interconnectivity among the dimensions, as to considering ‘how individual issues fit together,’ was also emphasized by Wheeler and Beatley (2004) in the edited volume of classic contributions on sustainable urban development. According to the editors, this was the first of three important themes in ‘exploring the various dimensions of sustainable urban development’; the other two concerns involved ‘how actions at different scales relate, and who does what at each level’ (Wheeler and Beatley 2004, pp. 69–70). The following from the editors eloquently argues against compartmentalization in sustainable developmental considerations: First, even while exploring particular dimensions of urban planning, it is important to keep in mind an overall sense of how these planning topics fit together. How do transportation systems link to land use, housing, or environmental planning? How can particular economic development strategies reinforce local land-use planning visions or community livability? […] Indeed, a leading reason for unsustainable urban development in the past is that planners, elected leaders, and citizens often have not made such linkages. Engineers have planned freeway systems, yet have paid little attention to the ways they promote sprawling suburban land use. Land-use planners and developers have often mapped out new subdivisions without considering whether they have promoted an equitable distribution of affordable housing in the region. […] As Jacobs, McHarg, and Mumford have suggested, such compartmentalized thinking has helped create current urban problems. (2004, p. 69)

Even in its abridged form as quoted, these words paint a vivid picture as to the importance of going beyond compartmentalization, and for recognizing the multidimensional linkages requiring interdisciplinary collaboration for sustainable development of the cities and their hinterlands.

23 Incidentally, although viewed from a different perspective—i.e., urban-regional ecological carry-

ing capacity—Allen and You’s adaptation (2002) of the Allen (2001) schema, as shown in Fig. 4.3, also incorporated into it a conceptual guard against evidence of such imbalance that would imply unsustainability.

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The call for an integrative and interdisciplinary approach to sustainability has been echoed by many scholars over the years, and some have noticed a positive trend in this direction. Brugmann (2013), for example, spoke of interdisciplinarity as one of three ‘consolidations in thinking and practice’ taking place in the context of cities since the turn of the century.24 He saw this as a ‘broadening of interdisciplinary collaboration regarding the city as a phenomenon” in which ‘geographers, sociologists, engineers, planners, political economists, and ecologists’ collaborated, received funding, and made a ‘principled effort’ to ‘focus on points of convergence…” (p. xxii). However, not everyone appeared to share Brugmann’s optimistic view of the advance of the consolidated approach. In their edited volume (Mazmanian and Blanco 2014) on sustainable cities, with contributions by a distinguished slate of scholars from myriad fields, Blanco and Mazmanian (2014, pp. 6–8) noted that while the environmental, social [equity], and economic dimensions of sustainability are widely recognized, two other aspects, an ‘interdisciplinary or integrative’ and a ‘systems-oriented’ approach to sustainability remained relatively neglected. They saw sustainability as an ‘integrative concept’, and interdisciplinarity (or as they put it, ‘the intent to integrate various dimensions in a situation’), as the ‘hallmark of a sustainability approach’, implicit in the ‘balancing of the three E’s’. They called for a ‘substantive interdisciplinarity’ that integrated the various urban systems such as transportation, housing, public health, land use, density, and economic activities. Their conception of the ‘systems-oriented approach’ involving ‘complex interplay among urban systems of infrastructures, built environment, nature’s services, organization, and information systems that combine to facilitate urban life’ was also a call for interdisciplinarity. Collectively, the contributions in the volume call for, and attest to the importance of, a multidimensional, integrative, and interdisciplinary approach to sustainability—that parallels and supports my proposed second prong. Intrinsically connected to the integrative focus, as discussed above, is a shift in approach to the so-called ‘brown’ and ‘green’ agendas that for decades pitted urbanists and environmentalists against each other. Specific areas targeted by the two agendas may vary or overlap. Marcotullio (2003, p. 242), for example, divided environmental challenges into three agendas: ‘brown’ (water supply, sanitation, and infectious diseases), ‘gray’ (air and water pollution and other negative aspects of industrial processes), and ‘green’ (that included consumption-related problems, ecosystem health, ozone depletion, and greenhouse gas emission issues). Notably, the ‘gray’ agenda items overlap both the ‘green’ and the ‘brown’ categories, depending on their spatial and temporal influence affecting intragenerational and intergenerational equity. In general, it is commonly understood that the differences between the two agendas boil down to the ‘brown’ camp’s focus on ‘environmental health’ with emphasis 24 The

other two areas of consolidation involved the approach to the so-called ‘green’ and ‘brown’ agendas, and recognizing the city ‘as a biotic and political-economic geography in its own right, not as a subsidiary jurisdiction to be managed by municipalities, reformed by social movement projects, and shaped by national and international programs or corporate interests’ (Brugmann 2013, p. xxii).

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on intragenerational equity versus the ‘green’s’ ‘ecological sustainability’ and intergenerational equity concerns. Brugmann described it thus: “The green camp arose from the Western environmental movement and problematized the chronic challenge of the city as an un- or even anti-ecological resource processing, consumption, and waste production system that threatened planetary ecology”. […] The brown camp arose from the social movements of the slum dwellers and urban poor, and it problematized the acute challenges of urban land tenure, legal exclusion, and other injustices reproducing housing, public health, and economic crisis for growing urban majorities” (2013, p. xxi). Many works detailing the respective philosophy, arguments, and positions of each ‘camp’ are available in the literature, making it unnecessary to repeat them here. Suffice it to note that as McGranahan and Satterthwaite (2000) pointed out, we need to be aware of some of the stereotypical and extreme perspectives of the two agendas in order to guard against the creation of ‘false dichotomies’. This observation is especially meaningful when we consider the futility of creating a divide within what is essentially one aspiration, a shared human yearning for equity, quality of life, and survival. As the authors observed, recognition of the ‘five interconnected equity principles’ identified by Haughton (1999 as cited in McGranahan and Satterthwaite 2000) ‘provides a common language for addressing both sets of concerns and potentially a common goal (reducing inequity)’ (2000, p. 76). The principles are briefly noted below to highlight some of their relevance in the sustainability discourse for the MCR. Per Haughton (1999), equity priorities for the ‘brown’ agenda involved intragenerational and procedural equity (ensuring legal and other rights for all), and those for the ‘green’ agenda centered around intergenerational, transfrontier (preventing transferring environmental costs to other regions or people), and interspecies (recognizing the rights of other species) equities. Even though the first in each agenda group, the notions of intra- and intergenerational equity, have received the most prominence and recognition in the urban sustainability literature; the others have special significance for specific groups of people, organizations, or institutions in specific fields or with specific interests or goals. Concern for ensuring transfrontier equity, for example, has special connotation for the MCR in the developing world.25 Many of the concerns around shifting or displacing so-called ‘environmental burdens’ (Marcotullio and McGranahan 2007; also see Kundu 2007) away from affluent neighborhoods in cities to peripheral areas containing slums or squatter settlements, or away from the city to surrounding regions (in terms of location of polluting factories, disposal of waste products and such), directly pertain to transfrontier inequity. This, in turn, has both intra- and intergenerational implications, thus falling within the purview of either (or both) of the two agendas. The point is that ultimately, the salient arguments behind each of the ‘brown’ and the ‘green’ agendas—especially the arguments involving intra- and intergenerational equity and transfrontier equity— converge. Thus, questions as to how the real or perceived contradictions between the

25 For

an insightful discussion of issues related to ‘spatial displacement of environmental burdens’ from the perspective of transfrontier’ inequity, see, McGranahan (2007).

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two agendas are resolved or reconciled, and how they are coordinated and implemented in a unified, multidimensional and interdisciplinary agenda approach, have enormous significance for sustainable development of the Asian MCR. In his overview of the aforementioned edited volume (Vojnovic 2013) of contributions on urban sustainability made by over 40 eminent scholars with diverse perspectives, Brugmann (2013) said, “This book manifests a more colorblind conceptualization of urban sustainability that has been emerging in the twenty-first century” (p. xxii, emphasis added). Important and welcome as this observation is, I have two comments. First, Brugmann’s observation pertained to cities (not city regions): “It presents a more holistic view of the city as a socioeconomic and ecological phenomena to be developed in an integrated fashion within a local context…” (p. xxii). Despite the obvious parallels between the city and its region, comparable literature specific to city regions, and especially the MCRs of Asia, is still lacking. Brugmann’s (2013) description above is another example of the inter-scalar applicability of some of the ideas one comes across in the urbanization literature, which, although expressed in context of one scale (e.g., city), is also appropriate (and/or adaptable) at another (e.g., city region), thus highlighting their integrative potential. Second, my approach does not necessarily call for color-blindness as much as color-coordination. It does not advocate ignoring the differences between the two colors but rather on recognizing them and deliberately focusing on the similarities, differences, and overlaps between them in terms of their underlying issues, causes, concerns, and contexts in order to come up with tangible solutions. Semantic quibble aside, the shift (albeit mostly implicit) to a colorblind or color-coordinated view of the green and brown agendas in recent years, as observed by Brugmann (2013), is deeply heartening. In addition to the implicit shift to a coordinated approach, explicit attempts to bridge these gaps are also emerging in the literature. Two such contributions, focusing on ‘drawing together the green and the brown agenda’, as McGranahan and Satterthwaite (2000) put it, and on ‘bringing together the green and brown planning perspectives’ as described by Allen and You (2002), both published around two decades ago, exemplify a pragmatic and collaborative stance taken by individual or groups of researchers under the auspices of organizations/institutions with similar integrative foci. In their analyses, both teams (McGranahan and Satterthwaite26 2000; Allen and You27 2002) emphasized that despite their relative emphasis on different kinds of equity (e.g., intragenerational for brown and intergenerational for green), ‘a concern for greater equity’ in general, was at the core of both agendas. McGranahan and Satterthwaite (2000) offered a number of examples of commonalities between the two, some of which ultimately connect to the equity issues. Although formulated in the context of the city, it can be contended that the commonalities, as well as the 26 “Gordon McGranahan and David Satterthwaite are with the Human Settlement Programme at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)” (McGranahan and Satterthwaite 2000, Endnote, p. 87). 27 The volume ‘directed and written’ by Adrianna Allen and Nicholas You (2002) was ‘jointly produced by the Development Planning Unit (DPU) University College London and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) for the special session of the United Nations General Assembly, Istanbul+5, in 2001’ (Wakely 2002, p. xiii).

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strategies built on these common values, have potential for parallel application (or adaptation) to the MCR. One of these, pertaining to the opposition of both agendas to “‘environmental racism’ (the location of the more dangerous or unsightly factories and waste management facilities in low income areas)”, can be indicative of a convergence of the ‘transfrontier’ equity concern for the green group (Haughton 1999 as cited in McGranahan and Satterthwaite 2000) with the ‘intragenerational’ equity of the brown. The point is that this convergence, focused on city-specific income disparity issues, is clearly comparable to similar concerns for the city region. By pointing out the inherent contrasts in their respective approaches to concrete issues such as water, sanitation, solid waste disposal, air pollution, and land-use management, McGranahan and Satterthwaite’s contribution (2000) also offers valuable insights into the ‘complementarities’ between the two agendas, offering concrete suggestions for reconciling these differences. Such insights have important implications for a coordinated approach to sustainable development for the MCR, provided the willingness to pursue such an approach exists. In addition, several ‘broader institutional processes’ to reconcile the two agendas, as suggested by the authors, have special resonance for the Asian MCR. I note them primarily as indicative of a positive direction in integrative thinking, with explicit recognition that in order to be meaningful, they will need to be adapted, reformulated, and contextualized for the Asian MCR • “[…] open and participatory processes within each city that allow environmental problems to be discussed and agreements reached over priorities for action and investment”; • “[…] national policies that encourage and support urban development that takes account of ecological sustainability but within an understanding of potential conflicts with brown agenda priorities and other social and economic priorities”; and • “[…] a stronger basis for mutual understanding between the brown and green agenda proponents and this depends on a good knowledge of the environmental issues within and around each urban centre” (2000, pp. 85–87). Important as it was to a conceptual shift in the sustainability discourse, the citycentric focus of these and other scholars kept much of the urban sustainability literature in a relatively narrow, non-holistic frame, contributing to the lag in comparative work for city regions. However, as discussed earlier in the chapter, a paradigmatic shift was already beginning in the emerging literature on urbanization (e.g., see Tacoli 1998a, b, 2003) that recognized rural-urban linkages and continua instead of divides, and focused on the need to understand and integrate many aspects of the peri-urban and/or rural-urban interfaces (PUI/RUI) in the hinterlands of major cities in the developing world. Contributions by Adrianna Allen, one of the more ardent advocates for such an approach, along with those of her colleagues and other scholars in the recent years (e.g., Allen 2003; Allen and You 2002; Allen et al. 1999, 2004; Brook and Davila 2000; Brook et al. 2001 all cited in Allen 2006) also exemplify such a shift. In a chapter on environmental sustainability, building on several past research projects by herself and colleagues, Allen (2006) discussed the two sets of environmental challenges as reflected in the ‘green’ and ‘brown’ agendas in context

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of the PUI and made this important assertion: “The central argument of this chapter is that in order to understand the specific environmental challenges arising from ruralurban interactions and particularly manifested in the PUI, it is necessary to overcome the rural-urban and green-brown dichotomies and to recognize the specificity of the PUI” (p. 31; emphases added). It is perhaps important to reiterate here that, as discussed earlier in the chapter (and akin to my own thinking), despite the connotation of spatial proximity to urban centers as evoked by the prefix ‘peri’ in peri-urban interface, Allen’s conception of the PUI (e.g., 2006, p. 32) went beyond proximity by imbuing the PUI concept with a broader meaning of urban-rural interface (URI), irrespective of distance. Allen and You’s work (2002) on reconciling green and brown perspectives was similar to that of McGranahan and Satterthwaite (2000) in intent, but with a wider focus on the urban-rural continuum in the surrounding region, including the PUI beyond the city limit. It has been asserted (Allen 2006) that Agenda 21, formulated at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in 1992, first stressed the ‘need to consider these two sets of [environmental] challenges [as pertaining to the brown and green agendas] in an interconnected way’. Mahadevia (2002, p. 136) opined that Agenda 21 ‘went beyond ecological sustainability to include other dimensions of sustainable development such as equity, economic growth, and popular participation’ and that ‘sustainable development and Agenda 21 are converging’. Agenda 21 was followed 4 years later by the Habitat Agenda. Allen (2006) echoed Wakely’s (2002, p. xii) statement in claiming that together, “[…] these two agendas set the stage to bridge the so-called ‘green’ and ‘brown’ perspectives on urbanization: environment and development” but notably added the qualifier ‘implicitly’ to Wakely’s statement. The title of the volume by Allen and You (2002)—Sustainable Urbanisation: Bridging the Green and Brown Agendas— clearly announces the authors’ intent. Like McGranahan and Satterthwaite (2000), the authors argued for going beyond the stereotypes in recognizing, and building on, the commonalities between the two agendas. From this standpoint, they selected ‘solid waste management’, one of the major areas of contention (and discussed at length in many city-oriented urban sustainability literature), as an example, in order to present a matrix of ideas with the potential to reconcile the two perspectives into a coordinated and pragmatic approach. The matrix (Fig. 4.4) presented the respective concerns, and the related actions addressing them, in relation to two ‘planning perspectives’ at local, subnational, national, and global levels. As the authors had expected (2002, p. 35), the matrix showed that the stereotypes did not hold up on closer inspection: “Whilst the platforms from which they were launched may have had their origins in either the green or brown perspective, their strength lies in tackling issues of urban sustainability together”. My belief in the validity of the second prong of my three-pronged approach lies in recognizing the strength inherent in ‘tackling issues of urban sustainability together’; the second prong champions the interweaving of multidimensionality, interdisciplinarity, and color-coordination, in a holistic approach to sustainability. However, in concluding this chapter, a point needs to be made. Although the urbanrural dynamics as reflected in the concepts of urban-rural continuum and interface(s)

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Fig. 4.4 The green and brown planning perspectives: an illustration (Source Reproduced from Allen and You 2002)

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can be inferred to have been implicitly recognized in the word ‘urban’ in the statement quoted above, for me they need to be more explicitly recognized as central to my approach. Thus, in concert with the first prong as discussed above, the pursuit of a sustainable future for the Asian MCR must involve ‘tackling … together’ not only ‘urban’ or ‘rural’ sustainability issues, but all the uneven, localized, and multifaceted urban-rural interfaces for the entire spread region of the MCR from a holistic, multidimensional, interdisciplinary, and ‘color-coordinated’ perspective. This brings us to consideration of the scalar concepts and paradigmatic shifts relevant to both prongs discussed so far, which will be taken up in the next chapter.

References Adell G (1999) Theories and models of the peri-urban interface: a changing conceptual landscape. Draft for discussion. Peri-urban Research Project Team, Development Planning Unit, University College of London, London Allen A (2001) Urban sustainability under threat: the restructuring of the fishing industry in Mar del Plata, Argentina, Development in Practice, 11(2–3):152–173 Allen A (2003) Environmental planning and management of the peri-urban interface (PUI): perspectives on an emerging field. Environ Urban 15:135–147 Allen A (2006) Understanding environmental change in the context of rural-urban interactions. In: McGregor D, Simon D, Thompson D (eds) The peri-urban interface: approaches to sustainable natural and human resource use. Earthscan, London, pp 30–43 Allen, A (2010) Neither rural nor urban: service delivery options that work for the peri-urban poor. In: Khurian M, McCarney P (eds) Peri-urban water and sanitation services: policy, planning and method. Springer Science+Business Media B.V, pp 27–62. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-4819425-4_2 Allen A, da Silva NLA, Corubolo E (1999) Environmental problems and opportunities of the periurban interface and their impact upon the poor. Draft for Discussion. Development Planning Unit, UCL, London, UK Allen A, Davila J, Hofmann P (2004) Governance and access to water and sanitation in the metropolitan fringe: an overview of five case studies. Paper presented at N-Aerus Annual Conference on Urban Governance, Diversity and Social Action in Cities of the South. Barcelona, Spain, 15–16 September Allen A, You N (2002) Sustainable urbanisation: bridging the green and brown agendas. Development Planning Unit (dpu), University College, London Bernard FE (1986) Review: applied methods of regional analysis: the spatial dimensions of development policy by Dennis A. Rondinelli. Geogr Rev 76:101–104 Blanco H, Mazmanian DA (2014) The sustainable city: introduction and overview. In: Mazmanian DA, Blanco H (eds) Elgar companion to sustainable cities: strategies, methods and outlook. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK, pp 1–11 Bowyer-Bower TAS (2006) The inevitable illusiveness of ‘sustainability’ in the peri-urban interface: the case of Harare. In: McGregor D, Simon D, Thompson D (eds) The peri-urban interface: approaches to sustainable natural and human resource use. Earthscan, London, pp 151–164

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Mbiba B, Huchzermeyer M (2002) Contentious development: peri-urban studies in sub-Saharan Africa. Prog Dev Stud 2:113–131 McGee TG (1991) Emergence of desakota regions in Asia: expanding a hypothesis. In: Ginsburg N, Koppel B, McGee TG (eds) The extended metropolis: settlement transition in Asia. University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, pp 3–25 McGee TG (2008) Managing the rural-urban transformation in East Asia in the 21st century. Sustain Sci 3:155–167 McGee, TG (2009) The spatiality of urbanization: the policy challenges of mega-urban and desakota regions of Southeast Asia. United Nations University Institute of Advanced Studies (UNU-IAS) Working Paper No. 161 McGee TG (2017) Desakota. In: Richardson D, Castree N, Goodchild MF, Kobayashi A, Liu W, Marston RA (eds) The international encyclopedia of geography, Wiley McGee TG, Robinson IM (eds) (1995) The mega-urban regions of Southeast Asia. UBC Press, Vancouver, Canada McGranahan G (2007) Urban transitions and the spatial displacement of environmental burdens. In: Marcotullio PJ, McGranahan G (eds) Scaling urban environmental challenges: from local to global and back. Earthscan, London, pp 18–44 McGranahan G, Satterthwaite D (2000) Environmental health or ecological sustainability? Reconciling the brown and green agendas in urban development. In: Pugh C (ed) Sustainable cities in developing countries: theory and practice at millennium. Earthscan, London, pp 73–90 McGregor D, Simon D, Thompson D (2006a) The peri-urban interface in developing areas: the research agenda. In: McGregor D, Simon D, Thompson D (eds) The peri-urban interface: approaches to sustainable natural and human resource use. Earthscan, London, pp 313–325 McGregor D, Simon D, Thompson D (eds) (2006b) The peri-urban interface: approaches to sustainable natural and human resource use. Earthscan, London Meijers E (2008) Measuring polycentricity and its promises. Eur Plan Stud 16:1313–1323 Murayama Y, Kamusoko C, Yamashita A, Estoque RC (eds) (2017) Urban development in Asia and Africa: geospatial analysis of metropolises. Springer Nature, Singapore Narain V, Nischal S (2007) The peri-urban interface in Shahpur Khurd and Karnera, India. Environ Urban 19:261–273 NCRPB (National Capital Region Planning Board) (2000) National Capital Region. NCRPB, Government of India, New Delhi Neuman M, Hull A (2011) Introduction: the futures of the city region. In: Neuman M, Hull A (eds) The futures of the city region. Routledge, London Neumayer E (2013) Weak versus strong sustainability: exploring the limits of two opposing paradigms. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK Pieterse E (2011) Recasting urban sustainability in the South. Development 54:309–316 Potter RB (1985) Urbanisation and planning in the third world: spatial perceptions and public participation. Croom Helm, London Potter RB (2014) Theories, strategies and ideologies of development: an overview. In: Desai V, Potter RB (eds) The companion to development studies. Routledge, London, pp 83–87 Potter RB, Binns T, Elliott J, Smith D (2008) Geographies of development: an introduction to development studies. Pearson-Prentice Hall, New York Potter RB, Unwin T (eds) (1989) The geography of urban-rural interaction in developing countries: essays for Allen B. Mountjoy, Routledge, London Preston D (1975) Rural-urban and inter-settlement interaction: theory and analytical structure. Area 7:171–174 Pugh C (ed) (2000) Sustainable cities in developing countries: theory and practice at millennium. Earthscan, London Roberts BR (1978) Cities of peasants: the political economy of urbanization in the Third World. Edward Arnold, London Rondinelli D (1983) Secondary cities in developing countries: policies for diffusing urbanization. Sage, Beverly Hills

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Chapter 5

Scale and Where the Three Prongs Can Meet

Abstract The importance of scale in research and planning for the MCR in the developing world is no longer debatable. This is especially true in the current era of globalization and technological advances transforming traditional scalar hierarchies and creating multiple spatialities. The aspatial, network-based, representational, and discursive roles of scale are also becoming increasingly more consequential. I see scale as the third prong in a coherent tri-pronged approach to sustainable development in the Asian MCR that should be used in conjunction with the other two prongs, as discussed in the previous chapter. I recognize that scale remains a confounding concept, although a paradigmatic shift toward conceptual inclusivity by reconciling its many facets, seems to be taking place in the literature. In this chapter I offer an overview of this shift, followed by a brief look at the framework of the MCR from a bi-scalar perspective, and, given the need to recognize the diversities among (and within) the spaces in the MCR, conclude with one example of how elements of the three prongs can converge into a coherent approach for sustainable planning. Keywords Scale concepts · Observational scale · Tri-pronged approach · MCR · Sustainability

5.1 The Concept of Scale in Geography: Foundational yet Confounding Scale is at the heart of all matters of analysis within and beyond the physical, biological, and social sciences, but is especially relevant to geography. Howitt (1998) considered it ‘one of geography’s foundational concepts’ and also noted that both Peter Taylor and Neil Smith (“[t]wo figures [who] dominated the discussion of scale in the 1980’s”) had also argued for scale as a “fundamental concept in political geography” (Howitt 2003, p. 139). “Clearly, scale is central to the research agenda of the entire discipline of geography, though the approaches that are being taken are quite varied,” noted Marston (2000, p. 220). Per McMaster and Sheppard (2004), The original version of this chapter was revised: Typographical mistakes have been corrected. The erratum to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_5

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scale, ‘intrinsic to nearly all geographical inquiry’, is a complex concept that has been conceptualized, debated, contested, and used in multiple ways. “The concept of geographic scale has intrigued scholars from many disciplines for centuries. From science to fiction,1 authors have struggled with the many meanings and problems in understanding geographic scale,” write McMaster and Sheppard (2004, p. 1). This faith in the essentiality of scale in geographic analysis has been shared by countless scholars within and beyond the fields and subfields of human and physical geography. At the same time, it has also been recognized that it is a complex, and rather confounding, concept of multidisciplinary orientation, usage, and terminologies that continue to pose challenges to the achievement of a common understanding among (and even within) the related disciplines and sub-disciplines that invoke it. In an insightful section entitled, ‘What sort of a thing is a scale?’, Howitt (2002, p. 304) commented, “Despite the heat and light created in these debates [on the relationships between space and place, time and space, and place and identity], there has been relatively little clarification of the nature and role of geographical scale”. In the concluding chapter of their edited volume, editors Sheppard and McMaster (2004a) observed: “As chapters of this book demonstrate, conceptions of geographic scale range across a spectrum of almost intimidating diversity” (p. 256), and “… a major difficulty in discussing scale is the disparate language used by geographers and others” (2004a, p. 262). Moore (2008) noted the ‘growing concern that scale has become an unwieldy concept, laden with multiple, contradictory and problematic meanings’ (p. 203). Jonas (1994, p. 258) observed the conflation of ‘scale as abstraction’ with ‘scale as metaphor’ by geographers to have caused confusion, and (2006) commented, “…Marston et al. have concerns about the growing amount of confusion, frustration and ambivalence surrounding the deployment of scale in human geographical knowledge and practice. Therefore, they propose that we abandon notions of scale altogether” (p. 399). It is this seeming dialectic, this recognition of the indispensability of scale on the one hand, coupled with that of its conceptual ambiguity with the other, that have added to the challenge. Sayre (2009) noted this duality thus: For many people, scale is the fundamental conceptual challenge in the human and natural sciences, critical to progress in understanding and ameliorating human–environment interactions. It remains remarkably unclear exactly what scale means and how to use it, however, and within geography the confusion is particularly acute. (2009, p. 95)

Despite, or should we say ‘because of’, such complexities and challenges, scale studies, spanning several fields and subfields related, but not confined, to physical and human geography, as well as the relatively new ‘disciplinary middle ground’ of environmental geography (Castree et al. 2009, p. 2), have proved to be a vibrant, evolving, multifaceted, and at times contentious, discourse. For those of us who have not been actively immersed in this discourse over the past decades, several studies offer extensive and analytical overviews from multiple perspectives, providing valuable insights into the complexities inherent in this concept as well as its evolution 1 Interestingly,

in context of the comment that ‘scale is intrinsic to nearly all geographical inquiry’, McMaster and Sheppard (2004) offer what they call a ‘lay example of the importance of scale’ in the realm of fiction, from a novel Lewis Carroll penned in 1893.

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over time (e.g., Sheppard and McMaster 2004a, b; Marston 2000; Smith 2000; Howitt 2003; Brenner 2001; Jones et al. 2017; Moore 2008; Paasi 2004; Sayre 2009). As the overviews have shown, scalar concepts have followed a complex, spirited, and sometimes contentious path marked by different disciplinary, sub-disciplinary, and/or ideological orientations. Some seeming contradictions and confusions in approach are also attributable to factors such as the conflated use of different aspects of scale such as size, level, and relation (Howitt 1993). As Paasi (2004) noted, Howitt (1998) saw scale both as an ‘areal concept (scale as size) and a hierarchical one (scale as level)’. A third concept, ‘scale as relation’, referred to ‘scale boundaries as interfaces, and the concomitant interaction of scale entities with other entities’ (2004, p. 538). Conflation of the first two concepts—scale as size and level—added to the confusion in separating the ‘ontological moment’ from the ‘epistemological moment’ of scale (Sayre 2005, 2009) and continued to maintain the isolated ‘islands of practice’ where ‘scholars have difficulty seeing past their particular focus’ (Purcell 2003). Attempts to bring some kind of ‘structure’ and ‘meaning’ to the scale concept across various fields within and beyond geography have become increasingly apparent since the early 1900s. Lam and Quattrochi (1992) and Cao and Lam (1997), for example, brought together what they termed the aspects (spatial, spatiotemporal, and temporal) and the meanings (geographic/observational, operational, and cartographic) of scale in a cohesive structure. In a later contribution on the diverse interpretations and uses of scale in the aforementioned volume edited by Sheppard and McMaster (2004b), Lam (2004) referred to those works in identifying four ‘common uses’ of scale: The cartographic or map scale [referring] to the ratio between the measurements on a map and the actual measurements on the ground. … The observational or geographic scale [referring] to the spatial extent of the study or the area of coverage. … The measurement scale, or commonly called resolution, [referring] to the smallest distinguishable parts of an object (Tobler, 1988) such as pixels in a remote sensing image or sampling intervals in an ecological study. … The operational scale [referring] to the spatial extent at which certain processes operate in the environment2 … This concept [operational scale] can be easily extended to both natural and social-political processes. (2004, 25–26; emphasis in original; cited study details provided in Reference section)

Although contextually somewhat different, two points made by Lam (2004) are worth noting because of their parallels to the prevailing thinking of other scholars, as well as their relevance to city-regional planning. First, though spatially conceptualized, these definitions could be ‘easily extended to the temporal domain’ (p. 25). Second, that although devised from the standpoint of GIS applications and remote sensing, “extensions or modifications of the above definitions to physical geography and human geography applications are possible and strongly encouraged” (p. 26). This conceptual flexibility in linking aspects of scale across different fields was also becoming evident elsewhere. Marston (2000, p. 220), for example, remarked that the 2 Note

that Marston (2000, p. 220) in discussing this classification, describes operational scale as corresponding to ‘the level at which relevant processes operate’, suggestive of a separation of level from spatial extent as described by Lam (2004).

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Fig. 5.1 The ‘meanings’ of scale (Source Reproduced with permission from Sheppard and McMaster 2004a, b)

conceptualization by social theorists “in their attempts to address scale [focusing] on understanding the processes that shape and constitute social practices at different levels of analysis,” was closest to the ‘operational connotation of the physical geographers’. And, in recognition of the constructionist approach to scale in human geography, Sheppard and McMaster (2004a, p. 262) added a fifth ‘meaning’—the construction of scale—to Lam and Quattrochi’s (1992) cartographic, geographic, operational, and measurement (resolution) definitions3 (Fig. 5.1). These, and other works striving to understand and reconcile disparities across and within disciplines, are parts of a welcome shift toward a more inclusive and dialectical mindset in geography. They have made a particular impact on my own thinking on the megacity regions that I will try to articulate in the next section following a brief look below at the shifting thoughts and integrative focus on scale within and beyond human geography.

5.1.1 Shifting Thoughts and Integrative Focus Within human geography, the literature on scale has evolved in many different ways over the last decades (e.g., Jones et al. 2017; Moore 2008; Paasi 2004; Howitt 2003). 3 Considering

the wish to find a ‘joint language’ for geographic concepts (such as scale, in the current context), it was interesting to find the content of the Lam and Quattrochi framework (1992) variously described as ‘definitions’, ‘meanings’, ‘uses’ (Lam 2004), ‘connotations’ (Marston 2000, p. 220), and ‘types’ (Sheppard and McMaster 2004a, b).

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A basic paradigmatic shift—from scale as a bounded, fixed, and inert container for societal processes, to scale as a relational, multidimensional, and temporally fluid entity—seems to have taken place. A ‘particularly fundamental shift’ on ‘thinking on the role and nature of geographical scale’ is said to have occurred since the mid-1980s (McMaster and Sheppard 2004, p. 13; emphasis added), although as Moore (2008, p. 204) noted, Marxist influence on political-economic theories of space economy started to raise theoretical questions about the production of scale as early as the 1970s, drawing geographers out of what Marston (2000, p. 220) describes as the ‘spatial science preoccupations of the 1960s and 1970s’. Moore (2008), referring to McMaster and Sheppard (2004), describes it thus: “[p]rior to this point scale was primarily treated as inert, abstract space and the central scale questions for human geographers were operational and methodological—that is, identifying the spatial levels at which specified processes operated; and determining the optimal levels of research” (Moore 2008, p. 204; emphasis added by Moore). As scale literature started to move away from the ‘a priori’, ‘fixed’, and ‘ontologically given’ (Marston 2000, p. 220) concepts of scale, a diverse array of conceptualizations of causalities, forces, or processes and their relative importance— social, political, economic, technological, discursive, and others—were advanced and debated (McMaster and Sheppard 2004, p. 16; Marston 2000, p. 220; Moore 2008). Marston (2000, p. 221) credited Henri Lefebvre’s (1991) ‘simple but powerful observation that space is a social product’ as the ‘touchstone’ for social constructionist theorizations on scale, which spawned a vast amount of literature within a relatively short period of time. Several in-depth analytical reviews (e.g., Moore 2008; Howitt 2003; Brenner 2000; Marston 2000; Marston et al. 2005) portrayed the inherent complexities, nuances, and divergent theoretical standpoints in the ‘what’, ‘why’, and ‘how’ (McMaster and Sheppard 2004) of scale from divergent perspectives that included, but went beyond political-economic constructs. Along with Marston et al.’s (2005) advocacy for a ‘flat ontology’, an intense analytical discourse (e.g., Brenner 2001; Leitner and Miller 2007; Purcell 2003; Jonas 2006) focusing on differences in viewpoints on the relative roles of political/economic production/social reproduction and consumption, global/local (neighborhood, household, and body), agency/structure, etc., dominated the scale literature of this period. Scholars such as Sally Marston, Neil Smith, Eric Swyngedouw, among many others, conceptualized a broader view of scale that went beyond the prevailing, more restrictive, constructs. Marston and colleagues (Marston 2000; Marston et al. 2005) added social reproduction and consumption from the perspective of neighborhood and household to the capitalistic view of economic production at global, regional, and urban scales (2000). Howitt (1993, 2002, 2003) included the crucial concept of ‘relation’ to the ‘size’ and ‘level’ dimensions of scale, as well as recognition of the time element. “It is also, perhaps, better to …conceptualise geographical scale as an event, a process, a relationship of movement and interaction rather than a discrete ‘thing’,” observed Howitt (2002, p. 304). His vision was of “time, space, place and scale as co-equal conceptual and/or analytical elements of cultural landscapes, and indeed, of complex geographical totality” (2002, p. 299). The broadening and increasingly inclusionary stances led Brenner (2001) to voice concern for an “analytical blunting of the concept

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of geographical scale as it is applied, often rather indeterminately, to an expanding range of sociospatial phenomena, relations and processes” (Brenner 2001, p. 592), but his concept of scalar structuration involved the process-oriented and relational aspects of scale as well.4 The ‘progression’ of ideas in scale studies over the years has been far from a smooth or linear process, and with the transformative power of technological and economic changes on the physical, relational, processual, discursive, and other interpretations of scale, it is likely that this evolution will continue far into the future. In the coming together of two schools of thought on scale in a poignant tribute to the late Neil Smith’s contribution to the scale concept, Jones et al. (2017) appeared to have hinted as such as they talked about their diverse paths (of a ‘flat ontology’, and ‘scale’s intersections with other, also non-territorial, spatialities’) in the ‘postSmithian’ era (p. 149). However, at least for the time being, a consensus seems to have been reached with implication for city-regional research. It involves the concept of geographical scales, not as an ontologically pre-given, fixed entity, but as relational and socially constructed (see, Howitt 2003, pp. 144–151; Delaney and Leitner 1997), “historically contingent and presumptively malleable, subject to contestation and transformation (or rescaling)” (Sayre 2005, p. 284). As McMaster and Sheppard (2004, pp. 18–19) observed, debates over the relative merits and interrelation among the different constructionist perspectives notwithstanding, a consensus challenging ‘at least four aspects of more conventional thinking about scale’ had been reached. Scale was no longer considered fixed or predetermined, hierarchical, nested, and ‘subdivided into spatially contiguous units of a certain size’. Further, as Delaney and Leitner (1997, pp. 93–97) noted, another ‘common ground’ reached among some scholars was that thus constructed, geographic scales ‘are themselves implicated in the constitution of social, economic, and political processes’. Recognition of these attributes, along with the relational, transitory, discursive, network and other extraspatial elements of scale, has greatly aided our evolving conceptualization of scale. McKinnon (2010), for example, considered recognition of the ‘coexistence of multiple spatialities’ [e.g., scale, place, networks, positionality, and mobility], and a shift toward, what is perceived to be a more relational, and discursive post-structuralist approach to scale as the two strands of [the prevailing] research in human geography.5 4 As

McKinnon (2010, p. 26) observed, the “sense of the transformation of scalar relations over time is central to the scalar structuration approach…”. 5 In this context it may be interesting to note the following observation by Adam Moore (2008, p. 204): Possibly the only point about which geographers are in agreement is that scale is not a fixed or given category, rather it is socially constructed, fluid and contingent (Marston 2000). However, …this now near ritual nod toward social constructivism tends to obscure rather than illuminate, different theoretical approaches to scale. Moore (2008) identified ‘two diffuse but discernible trains of thought’ on the definition and attributes of scale, ‘that roughly align[ed] along materialist-idealist lines’ (p. 204). The former viewed scale as ‘material socio-spatial entities,’ that Neil Smith described as ‘platforms for specific kinds of social activity…platforms of absolute space in a wider sea of relational space’ (2000, p. 725 as cited in Moore 2008, p. 204). The idealist line of thinking, on the other hand, is said to

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Through it all, a shift toward more inclusive and integrative approaches to the ‘scalar question’, along with a call for common ground, has become evident in human geography. The ‘agency/structure’ debate, deemed “one of the most significant and influential debates in human geography” (Leitner and Miller 2007) is an example. As Leitner and Miller observed, although the debate itself “fizzled out rather than being definitively resolved, … a loose consensus coalesced around…” several ideas, including ‘the acknowledgement of structure and agency as mutually constitutive…’. “Emphasis was placed on overcoming binaries and dualisms, and seeking instead relationships and ‘dualities’” (2007, p. 118).6 Howitt (1993, 2003) argued for an empirically grounded dialectical approach to scale. Acknowledging prevailing criticisms against ‘tired dualities [did he mean dualism?] and rigidities of conventional thinking’ along with concurrent ‘canvassing’ for a “new synthesis which unites into dialectical totalities things which have been conventionally conceptualized as distinct, separate entities…”, Howitt argued for a ‘new way of thinking’. For him such a synthesis entailed a relational, dialectical approach to the relationships among various geographic scales (e.g., local/regional/global) as well as the need to recognize the broader contexts relevant to the focus of study at a given spatial scale. This call for an integrative approach was picked up by others as well. Noting that “[g]eographers are inherently focused on the integrated processes and systems that comprise the physical and social environment,” Ruddell and Wentz (2009) called for ‘greater theoretical and methodological integration’: A ‘mixing and matching [of] various theoretical/ methodological approaches to help advance research on scale’ (p. 692). McKinnon (2010) focused on the ‘conceptual overlaps’ between the political-economic and post-structuralist views on scale, clarifying and reconciling some of the prevailing notions that separated them. Analyzing the prevailing tendency to attribute ‘fixity’ to the political-economic and ‘fluidity’ to the post-structural approach, for example, McKinnon suggested that each attribute in fact highlighted a ‘different dimension in the construction of scale, emphasizing material and discursive processes, respectively’ (pp. 26–27). Further, in bringing together key concepts and overlaps between the two approaches, he pointed out the underlying view of scale as non-fixed and relational in both, and argued that ‘it is only as a result of past processes of social construction that scales can be said to precede emergent forms of social practice’ (pp. 27–28). My interpretation of this bridges the ‘scale as given’ versus ‘scale as process’ dualism by seeing scale as an outcome of past process (and/or agency), have represented a ‘post-structuralist’ perspective, as it introduced the representational (scale as a ‘representational trope’) and discursive elements in the construction and identification of scale that did not necessarily correspond to the material conditions but had the potential to affect the material world (Jones et al. 2017; McKinnon 2010; Moore 2008; Kurtz 2003; Howitt 2003; Jones 1998; Kelly 1999). For an insightful discussion that explains, and seeks to reconcile, much of the apparent materialist-idealist/post-structuralist conflict, see McKinnon (2010). 6 For a discussion on the distinction between ‘duality’ and ‘dualism’ as pertains to human geography, see Kellerman (1987), who referring to Gregson (1986), viewed “…duality as a structure” to be “sharply distinct from… dualism, which puts side by side or makes antagonists of individuals, society, agency and structure, subject and object” (1987, p. 269). Kellerman saw ‘duality’ as a process, ‘dualism’ as a dichotomy.

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with potential for future change. “Rather than advocating full theoretical integration” of the two, McKinnon sought to promote “increased cross-fertilization by bringing together elements of each approaches’ treatment of scale through the concept of scalar politics” that would be ‘sensitive to’ both the materialist element of the former and the discursive element of the latter (2010, p. 28). And last but definitely not the least, Neil Smith’s contribution to this breaking down of the dualisms in scale literature has been memorialized in ‘Neil Smith’s Scale’ (Jones et al. 2017). Noting, that for Smith, scale was both the ‘driving dynamic and outcome’, Jones and his coauthors observed: Neil’s conceptualization of scale was determinately Marxist in origin, and consistent with this was his lifelong adherence to dialectical thinking. Throughout his evolving theorization of scale, one can witness a long list of [process-related] dialectics at work… . Other, more meta level and specifically spatial outcomes, such as developed/underdeveloped, core/periphery, and global/local, follow in the wake of these interconnected processes—it was never one or the other, but always both/and. (p. 149; emphasis added)

It is this search for ‘both/and’ that has pushed researchers to look for common ground on scale across diverse ‘geographic inquiries’. Concurrent to the call for an integrative and/or dialectical approach to scale within human geography, there has been an effort afoot to go beyond disciplinary/sub-disciplinary boundaries. This movement has encouraged efforts to align different interpretations, terminologies, and methodologies in various fields toward a more synthetic, integrative, and/or dialectical approach to scale, and has tried to reconcile what Sayre (2005, 2009) called ‘ontological’ and ‘epistemological moments’, as will be discussed below. The birth of ‘environmental geography’ , occupying “the fertile ‘borderlands’ where geography’s various traditions of scholarship—not only human and physical, but also regional and GIS—come together and connect with each other and with cognate traditions of environmental work outside geography” (Castree et al. 2009, p. 2), is an important example of this outlook, with significant implication for scale in empirical research. The edited volume (2004b) by Sheppard and McMaster, which offered an overview of scale across the various sub-disciplines of geography, in an attempt to integrate them, as discussed above, is another groundbreaking example. Neumann (2009) discussed interventions by Sayre (2005, 2009) and Manson (2008), who had made “explicit efforts to advance the scale debate by drawing from the analytics and concepts of ecology and identifying a conceptualization of scale that is interdisciplinary and comprehensible across fields” (Neumann 2009, p. 400). As Neumann (2009) pointed out, although Sayre and Manson approached the subject from different perspectives—disciplinary differences for Sayre and ‘a realism versus constructivism’7 continuum within ecology for Manson—both addressed prevailing confusion and conflation around resolution (grain), extent (size, scope, duration), and 7A

minor observation: although Neumann (2009) uses the term ‘constructivism’ to discuss Manson’s conceptualization of the scale continuum, Manson (2008, p. 777) himself labeled it as ‘constructionism’.

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relation regarding scale. Both stressed ‘the production of scale through interacting processes’, and also noted a ‘potential for shared conceptualization of scale in ecology and human geography, specifically for research on human–environment interactions’ (Neumann 2009, p. 401). Purcell (2003) saw intellectual limitation standing in the way of looking beyond one’s own research focus, as well as political divisions among the various subthemes (e.g., capitalism/patriarchy, racism; global/local; political economy/ecology; global north/ south as per Purcell) of isolated scholars in their respective ‘islands of practice’. Taking the Marston-Brenner debate as an example of what he considered avoidable differences of viewpoint, Purcell noted: “What is required is a more synthetic critical human geography. This synthesis will require a sustained and self-conscious effort to transcend the pervasive limits imposed by islands of practice” (p. 328). Acknowledging the academic specialization and expertise that underlie these islands, he concluded that a ‘cross-island [theoretical and methodological] collaboration’ would probably be more ‘practical and productive’, and for scholars ‘who do not disagree theoretically [but] are being held apart by methodological tradition’ such collaboration would dissolve the distance between some islands. Sayre (2005) also believed that an integration or a ‘shared conceptualization of scale’ was possible, ‘provided that the unique attributes of each discipline’s subject matter are recognized and respected’ (p. 283). As he explained, Sayre (2005, 2009) drew from both ecology and human geography to explain the ‘epistemological’ and the ‘ontological’ perspectives (or ‘moments’, as mentioned above), of observational and operational scales in scale research. As commonly understood and utilized in physical geography and ecology, ‘grain/ resolution’ and ‘extent’ are the two components of scale; ‘observational scale thus relates to the grain and the extent of what is observed’ (Sayre 2005). “Grain refers to the finest level of spatial or temporal resolution available within a given data set. Extent refers to the size of the study area or the duration of the study” (Turner et al. 1989 as cited in Sayre 2005, p. 281). The choosing of the grain and the extent is the epistemological moment for the researcher. The operational scale, on the other hand, ‘refers to the idea that phenomena occur at determinate spatial (and temporal) scales in the real world: that scale is an actual material property of processes, not simply a matter of how they are observed” (Sayre 2009, p. 98). McMaster and Sheppard described the operational scale as ‘the logical scale at which a geographical process takes place’ (2004, p. 5). Noting that there is a general agreement among the disciplines on the non-fixed, relational nature of scale, Sayre (2005) explains: “If the epistemological moment involves choosing a grain and extent that capture the processes through which these relations are revealed over time, the ontological moment considers these relations as objective realities” (p. 281). According to Sayre, the two are dialectically related and ‘their dialectical relation is of the utmost importance’, but ‘confounding [them] collapses the dialectic’, thus creating much preventable controversy (2005; 2009, pp. 104–105). This, along with the conflation of scale with size, level, and relation, has contributed to some of the seemingly discordant discourse. Much of the disagreement in the Marston-Brenner-Smith debate, according to Sayre (2005, 2009), could have been resolved had these distinctions

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been observed. Acknowledging Marston’s selection of household as a ‘grain’, (coupled with selecting an appropriate ‘extent’ such as community) as observational scale (epistemological moment), in order to observe the associated process(es) and relationships between them and other levels, rather than thinking of it as the operational scale (ontological moment), might have prevented or alleviated much of the disagreements. It is important to recognize that it is the relationship between levels that connotes scale, but levels are not scales; levels are determined by diverse processes, and ‘many processes span multiple levels’ (Sayre 2005). Purcell (2003) and Sayre (2005) saw an implicit recognition of this notion in Brenner’s (2001) distinction between the singular and plural in ‘politics of scale’, whereby ‘singular’ denotes level and ‘plural’ (with the implication of relationship between levels) the scale. This, according to the authors, was another example of the interchangeable use of ‘level’ and ‘scale’ that clouded the scale concept. In an extensive analysis of the literature Sayre (2009) used the perspectives of ecology and human geography to differentiate between the ‘many meanings of scale’, as size, level, and relation. Reiterating the significance of distinguishing between and identifying operational and observational scales, he observed that in view of the basic agreement among the disciplines that ‘different processes operate at different scales’ and that there was no one single correct scale, ‘identifying the operational scales of processes and reconciling them with observational scales are therefore central challenges of research” (p. 98). In conclusion of his valuable clarifying essay on scale, Sayre (2009) remarked that a “remarkable and apparently unwitting convergence has occurred in ecological and geographical conceptions of scale in the past two or three decades. From very different starting points, drawing on ideas and insights from across the social and natural sciences, scholars in both fields have moved from scale as size and level to scale as relation” (p. 105). In view of integrating the geographical and ecological scale, Sayre listed several foundational ‘principles’ between them: both recognized scale as relational, that it is through the spatiotemporal processes ‘that relations among phenomena are manifest’; that there is no single ‘correct’ scale, ‘any given process may, however, have an appropriate or best scale for research’; that scales are produced through many diverse processes and have ontological and epistemological moments; and that the two moments are dialectically related but confounding the two collapses the dialectic. The last principle he notes involves ‘thresholds of nonlinear or qualitative change across scales (for any given process) and between processes of different scales’. “It is at these points that scaling effects, mismatches of scale or rescaling are manifest, and where critical issues of social-ecological change and sustainability may be engaged most fruitfully” (2009, p. 105). Scale is a complex geographic subject; the discussion above offers a thumbnail sketch of a vast literature as based on my subjective interpretation, and is not a robust or thorough theoretical discussion. However, theorization has been far from my focus. My purpose for this exercise was to get a feel for the evolving trend and the emerging consensus, if any, on such a contentious issue as scale from the perspective of empirical research and developmental planning in the Asian megacity regions. In

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this context, perspectives on scale from the ecological and physical geographic literature, with their overlapping and complementary elements to the human geographic approach, have been a refreshing and welcome contribution. I have especially gained from the discussion of the different ‘moments’, ‘scales’, ‘levels’, and ‘meanings’ related to the overall ‘scale question’ by scholars from fields beyond human geography, which complemented the emerging consensus in the latter. Together, they introduced a theoretical coherence and practical clarity to my understanding of the diverse aspects of scale in formulating my approach to scale from the perspective of empirical research and planning in context of the Asian megacity region. However, translating the conceptual discussion of scale in the literature to the work of empirical research on Asian megacity regions has been a difficult task. One of the main reasons for this difficulty has been that this has been a relatively uncharted territory. With some exceptions, it has been hard to locate pertinent and concrete examples of research connecting the theoretically derived ideas to empirical application in the context of megacity regional development/planning in Asia, or for that matter, elsewhere in the developing world. An excellent article focusing on a sectoral issue (Xu 2016) entitled “Contentious space and scale politics: Planning for intercity railway in China’s mega-city regions” is an exception, one which aimed to ‘challenge the onesidedness of both the political economy tradition and the post-structuralist approach in reading scale’ and concluded that more than a material existence, scale was also a ‘representational trope’. Although my approach is inherently different from that of Xu, his argument, that “[s]cale is thus both material and discursive. Understanding the two moments of scale enables a fuller dissection of political transformation” (p. 57), has a special resonance for my scalar vision for the Asian megacity region. In the following sections, I will try to articulate this vision as to how the many meanings of scale, as the third prong, fit into my conceptualization of the ‘tri-pronged’ approach to sustainable planning in the Asian megacity regions.

5.2 Where the Three Prongs Meet In collecting my thoughts for this section, a sentiment attributed to the late scholar and educator Alan B. Mountjoy came to mind: “…activities in the human sphere cannot be divorced from the physical stage upon which they are enacted. …[A] main role of the geographer is to ensure that those in other disciplines connected with development keep their feet firmly on the ground” (Hilling 1989, p. 2). That I share this spirit of connecting human and physical elements, the aspiration of discourse and insight beyond one’s own discipline, and, last but not the least, the prudence of a pragmatic approach—keeping the ‘feet firmly on the ground’—can, perhaps, be felt in this section as well as in the rest of this volume. The importance of scale in research on the rapidly urbanizing landscape of the megacity regions of Asia is no longer a debatable issue, especially in the current era of globalization and technological innovation that is transforming traditional scalar hierarchies, increasing the importance of supra-national as well as sub-national scalar

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entities, and creating multiple spatialities, and thus generating aspatial, networkbased, representational and discursive roles for scale. Megacities, and by extension, megaregions, are fast becoming economic powerhouses and political hotbeds on one hand, and subjects of concern from the standpoint of sustainable planning on the other, thus garnering much attention from researchers and planners. My focus for this volume is on the Asian ‘megacity region’, a ‘single-system’ regional entity around the megacity (Harrison and Hoyler 2015a) that is smaller in scale than its expansive megaregional counterpart, but larger than the city regions that form around urban centers of all sizes below ‘megacity’ status. This entity, the MCR, in my estimation, raises serious questions about issues of optimality of scalar focus for sustainable regional planning and empirical research. Needless to say, both planning and research will need to be grounded in a holistic, multidimensional, and interdisciplinary approach to truly be valuable to planning and policy decision-making. In addition, in order to realistically examine sustainable and unsustainable elements, trends, and patterns of development, the byproducts of urbanization of the spread region, the hybridity, uneven development profile, and temporality of the urbanrural interface will merit careful consideration. And finally, in conjunction with the above, the many roles or meanings of scale will need to be recognized and incorporated in all city-regional discourses as appropriate. Integrating these three elements into a coherent approach is what I envision for a sustainable planning environment for the megacity region. The scalar focus is a vital part of this vision. An inclusive approach to scale, incorporating pertinent elements in scale’s physical, as well as its evolving/constructionist/representational/discursive, and other aspects, will need to be explored and utilized in any pursuit of regional sustainability. However, a clear designation of the regional frame of the MCR, based on a set of standardized criteria but tailored to individual countries, is likely a prerequisite to all other pursuits. The megacity region comprises two distinct components, a megacity core and the ‘spread region’ outside of the core, spanning the entire extent of the city region. As previously discussed at length, neither the core city, nor the city region, has clear determining criteria across a defined space, nor is there conceptual agreement on approaches to defining the city region, viewing its rural and urban elements, and determining boundaries for purposes of planning and governance. Although my focus here is neither on core nor on boundary issues, but rather on the diverse internal spaces within the spread region of the MCR, it stands to reason that the spread region, the hybrid urban-rural interface within the megacity region, can only have meaning in context of the megacity regional frame. This, in turn, is subject to various subjective interpretations; the section below offers a brief discussion of how I view the evolving regional frame of the MCR in terms of these two components, the core and the extent of the spread region (Fig. 5.2).

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Fig. 5.2 The MCR: a bi-scalar conceptual sketch (Source Author)

5.2.1 Core and Extent: Two Components of the Megacity Regional Frame Despite the notion that city, including its built-up area, is becoming an ‘outmoded’ and ‘inappropriate’ entity (Parr 2005), it is generally recognized that the growing city continues to be a major urbanizing force in the territorial dispersion of its population and activities, economic, social, cultural, political, and infrastructural alike. Other urbanizing factors such as urban reclassification schemes for transferring space from rural to urban, annexation of land that in turn extends the urban footprint into the countryside, and changes in the criteria for determining urban identity (e.g., density and occupation) have also contributed to an ongoing process in which a host of interactions begins to take place between the urban and the rural entities, forming an inbred city-regional landscape. However, the fact that there is no one standard definition of ‘urban’—let alone what constitutes an ‘urbanized’ area or zone, makes formulation of a clear definition of city region more difficult. Parr’s (2005) zonal model exemplifies this challenge. Parr considered the interactions between two unlike spatial structures forming a city region: the ‘C zone’, comprising the city and its surrounding continuous built-up areas with a specified population threshold limit, and the ‘S zone’, linked with the ‘C zone’, containing rural, as well as urban population (p. 557). As Parr himself acknowledged, “Obviously, the extent of a CR

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[City Region] will be sensitive to the criteria employed in its definition, so that an element of subjectivity is inevitably present” (2005, p. 564). In the absence of clearly articulated common definitional criteria in the complex geographies of countries and regions around the globe, it would not be easy to determine either the C or the S zones. There are many reasons for making this a daunting task. For example, there is the consideration of contextuality, which calls into question the prudence of any universally applied definition for either the core or the extent of the MCR. And second, even in contextualized instances, there are contested issues with the associated theoretical as well as practical underpinnings. A brief discussion follows. First, the core. The most commonly accepted and utilized definition of the megacity/urban agglomeration (UA) core is derived from the UN definition of a ten-million population threshold. Some issues pertaining to the imprecise nature of this definition have been discussed in Chap. 2. Suffice to note that first, the United Nation’s practice of accepting diverse definitions/determination of population and areal size of the megacities or urban agglomerations, as offered by individual countries, coupled with the many spatial and temporal inconsistencies (e.g., in the enumeration of data and delineation of agglomeration boundaries among and within these countries) has stood in the way of a uniform and accurate understanding of what constitutes a ‘megacity’. Second, the 10-million population threshold itself—in fact the notion of any population-based measurement—is contested, and there are valid grounds for those objections. Moreover, beyond these and other concerns is the often sloppy or indiscriminate use of the term ‘megacity’, as, upon closer inspection, many of the cities or urban agglomerations labeled ‘megacities’ in both the professional literature (usually empirical studies) and in the media reveal a wide range of disparate population sizes, often far less than the UN-defined threshold. While fully aware of, and agreeing with, most of the counter-arguments against the ten-million threshold or other population-only criterion, I am inclined to accept it for the time being as the threshold population of an urban agglomeration for designation of megacity status.8 But there is an important caveat. Acceptance of the identity of a megacity by its minimum population size can only be recognized as an initial step in pursuing a collaborative approach to regional sustainability so that all actors can be on the same page in order to engage in the necessary work. The minimum population threshold, in that capacity, should be considered merely a placeholder, to be modified as warranted with changing demographics. Similarly, the upper limit of population (and the areal extent of the core city/urban agglomeration) can remain unspecified or flexible for the time being until such time when a consensus as to the minimum threshold and/or areal specifications has been reached and a standardized methodology to evaluate the growth trends of the cities in the varied geographies of Asia over time is in place. Next the extent. A population-based definition of megacity—debatable and simplistic as it is—can at least be considered an initial and pragmatic approach toward 8 It

is debatable whether it is appropriate for this 10-million threshold to be universally applicable, which may be a better fit at this time for the more populous continents of Asia and Africa than of Europe and Australia. In the latter cases, cities and urban agglomerations demonstrating all or many of the characteristics related to finance, influence, networking, and other matters commonly attributed to megacities, may carry much smaller population loads.

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a working definition of the core. Determining the extent of the megacity region, the boundary issue, on the other hand, is a much more complex task, with the idiosyncratic conceptual approaches of individual stakeholders and their attitudes, toward the influence of the core on the urban-rural dynamics of the city region, adding to the complexity. Harrison (2015) brought some coherence to the seeming confusion among the approaches by identifying three prevalent analytical conceptions of the city region: the agglomeration model, the scale model, and a functionally and ‘relationally networked hub and spokes model’, that have influenced city-regional thinking on planning and boundary issues. The first model, agglomeration-oriented, city-centric, and ‘spatially-selective’, evoked a call to recognize the ‘urgent need to place the rural in city region development’ (Harrison and Heley 2015, p. 1128). The adoption of a rural-urban integrative stance to city-regional planning is largely attributable to elements of the second and third models, the ‘spatially inclusive’ ‘regions first’ approach to determining city region ‘boundaries for governance’ (Coombes 2014), and the relationally networked approach. Harrison and Heley (2015) proposed a ‘functionally dominant city region’ typology, connecting the main elements of the latter two approaches, which, they contended, viewed the region in a spatially inclusive way without breaking up space along ‘explicitly territorial lines’ (as in the ‘region first’ approach). Moreover, they reasoned that such a typology would recognize the functional importance of smaller (‘non-city’) urban settlements, and bring ‘hitherto neglected temporal aspects into sharper focus’ by considering the various developmental stages of the ‘hubs’ within the region. Although conceived, analyzed, and advocated in the context of the Western world (primarily Europe), the elements of these approaches have obvious and direct relevance to a conceptual formulation of the Asian megacity regional framework, and thereby to an approach to the determination of the city-regional extent. The megacity regions of Asia represent diverse geographic, socioeconomic and historical-political contexts, and exhibit distinct regional identities that defy the adoption of standardized or universal criteria for determination of their boundaries. In the Western world, the issues of city-regional identity and determination of boundaries have been extensively discussed both from theoretical and practical governance and jurisdictional considerations, but no consensus has been reached. “Where and how does one draw the boundaries or cast the scale of analysis of city-regions that are also tied to global trade? Where does the city-region end, and on what basis should it be defined? There is no universal definition” (Shields 2015, p. 56). The approaches discussed above spawned diverse operational strategies even within similar conceptual frames. Davoudi (2008), for example, noted that over the past five decades, different methodologies, primarily from urban-centric and economic perspectives (e.g., statistical analysis of flows of people/commuter, and commuting time between the core and the surrounding territory), have been employed to determine the extent of functional urban regions. However, with more awareness of the relational and multidimensional nature of the city regions, it has been recognized that identifying city-regional boundaries must include considerations that go beyond functional and economic determinants. As such Jonas’ (2006) description of the ‘region’ can be applied to our current concept of the megacity region: “The ‘region’ is less a material

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object, a static geographic category or a taken-for-granted scale, and much more a subject with identity, a strategic domain, an object of struggle and/or a site-and-scalein-the-process-of-becoming” (2006, p. 402; emphasis added), and also ‘a relational and political construct’ (Jones and MacLeod 2004 as cited in Jonas 2006). Dickinson’s (1964) evocative statement that the city region is not an ‘area…presented on a platter’ also comes to mind. In contemplating the region (with or without the ‘mega’ prefix), Hesse (2015) commented on the unbound, relational aspect of the region as viewed by other contemporary scholars; this characterization is also applicable to the megacity region. No longer taken as a ‘given, fixed’ entity, it is considered to be relational; ‘a wide network of socioeconomic and ecological interrelations’ (Gregory 1993 as cited in Hesse 2015, p. 41). Referring to Amin (2004), Hesse noted, “in this context there are no clear endings and beginnings, in both temporal and territorial regards. The contemporary region is unbound, discontinuous and increasingly difficult to demarcate, delineate and thus to determine based on spatial terminology’ (2015, p. 41; emphasis added). In line with this thinking, which resonates with my own, it thus follows that in view of the unique identity and multiple interrelated sociopolitical, environmental, and other relational aspects of city regions, determination of their boundaries will, at the very least, need to be contextual. They can be expected to evolve as they are shaped (produced/reproduced/constructed), by a diverse set of past and contemporaneous interlinked processes ranging from global to local, even as they, in turn, influence future processes. Megacity regions, thus conceived, are fluid and unique entities, the extent of which can be denoted in different ways depending on their individual identity and context, as well as the purpose and focus of stakeholders (e.g., research, planning, governance, and resource allocation). For example, determining the spatial extent of measurable influence of the megacity as reflected in functional, economic, and noneconomic interactions (e.g., commuting, shopping, educational, sight-seeing, pleasure trips and other travel distance to and from the core and vicinity, financial transactions, and other interactions and exchanges of people, goods and services) can be one way to determine the boundaries of individual city regions. Boundaries can be also delineated9 for planning purposes or jurisdictional issues (e.g., NCR of India) by national or regional actors, based, ideally, on shared considerations. Realistically, however, it can perhaps be ventured that, at least on occasion, they may instead be based on political and/or economic expediency, collaboration, or competition among political and financial stakeholders, and that the determining criteria for delineating the boundary of the MCR may be explicitly stated or implied, or absent altogether. At any rate, the following statement by Coombes (2014, p. 2426) is well worth noting, and to my mind, connects the two segments of the preceding discussion, by applying to both the processually constructed and denoted, and the administratively delineated, city region: “Defining city-region boundaries for governance or policy requires robust data analysis reflecting a conceptualisation of city-regions”. All roads in my conceptual journey seem to come back to data. 9 Obviously, here I am making a subjective distinction between ‘denoting’ and ‘delineating’, giving

the former a process-based, and the latter an administrative/ jurisdiction-based, connotation.

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In concluding this discussion on the bi-scalar regional framework, I draw attention to the granular level that lies below the extent, as sketched in Fig. 5.2. As noted in the discussion on scale, extent and grain are the two components of any observational scale. “In nearly all geographic inquiry, one must not only select the geographical area—the scale—but also the resolution of the data to be analyzed,” observed McMaster and Sheppard (2004, p. 5). No matter how the question of megacityregional extent is resolved, determination of the appropriate granular level of the spread region for the purpose of observation will remain an important consideration. This component of scale will be discussed in the context of Fig. 5.3 in the following section.

5.2.2 In Recognition of the Diverse Spaces of the Megacity Region From this perspective, a few words to highlight the support for micro-scale investigation in city-regional context in the prevailing literature may be appropriate.10 As noted in Sect. 4.2.4, in my view, it is in the context of the spread region that Schafran’s (2014, 2015) conceptual distinction between the ‘megaregional space’ and the ‘spaces of the megaregion’ assumes a crucial relevance from the standpoint of sustainable planning. Viewing the megaregion as a ‘large and unwieldy envelop’, Schafran (2014) attempted to provide a ‘practical means of grappling with this new scale’ from the standpoint of strategic intervention by introducing the more manageable ‘spaces of the megaregion’—‘specific spaces [within that envelop] impacted by the process’. He also identified these as “the interstitial spaces where the process of megaregionality is being experienced most intensely” (2015, p. 90).11 Harrison and Hoyler (2015a) considered Schafran’s process-oriented conceptualization timely, because of its emphasis on the ‘need to rethink the region’. As they put it, Schafran’s distinction between the two “enables us to consider two distinct, yet interrelated, forces which are always present in, and in conflict across, megaregions”. While the ‘integrative forces’ ‘seek to reassert the coherence, legitimacy, and validity of the megaregional space…’, ‘differential forces […] ensure [that] the exposure to megaregionality is geographically uneven across the megaregional space’ (Harrison

10 The question is, even if appropriate, are these words necessary or are they redundant? Is it realistic,

or is it naïve, to expect that in light of the recent shifts in thinking on the nature (and unevenness) of the rural-urban interfaces/ linkages across the city-regional landscapes, the need for microlevel examination is already established in the planning and academic community that requires no convincing? 11 This description gives it a somewhat different connotation than my conceptualization of the spread region and its spaces but does not affect the underlying argument.

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Fig. 5.3 Where the three prongs meet: a conceptual schema (Source Author)

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and Hoyler 2015a, p. 239).12 It is this geographic unevenness as produced by the forces, not the forces per se, that is my focus here. Admittedly, Schafran’s concept of this distinction between the two spaces was formulated and discussed in a particular locational and scalar context—‘megaregions’ of the West rather than the megacity regions’ in Asia which are my focus. Further, the impact and nature of the forces at the ‘megaregional’ and ‘megacity regional’ levels are not necessarily the same. However, it can be argued that irrespective of such differences in scales, locales, and nature of impact, the basic spatiotemporal dynamics of the dual forces (of integration/differentiation, convergence/divergence) would remain similar, thus suggesting the validity of this distinction for the megacity regions of Asia as well. Not only is it valid, but I contend that this distinction, presupposing differential impacts of diverse exogenous and endogenous forces and processes on the internal space of the MCR, is also crucial to our recognition of the unevenness of the urban-rural interface. The acknowledgement of the unevenness among the megaregional spaces has led researchers to call for micro-level analyses to examine the differential impact of these forces on megaregionality, as well as to determine the nature of the ‘processes of megaregionality’ in localized context (e.g., Harrison and Hoyler 2015a, p. 18; 2015b, p. 245). Again, the same logic can be argued to be applicable for the megacity regions, which, in turn, has vital implications for planning. Schafran (2014, pp. 599– 600) referred to this as the identification of key spaces. Recognition of the envelop, as well as the key spaces for intervention within that envelop would, in his view, separate the former as the ‘place of analysis’ from the latter as the ‘space of engagement’ (the ‘scale of political intervention’). The key spaces ‘can then be sites of potential tactical and historically rooted sub-regional interventions.’ The discussion above is critical to the importance of recognizing the importance of the ‘local’ in managing urban-rural interfaces of the city regions in the developing world for planning purposes, as recognized decades ago by some scholars. The importance of localized knowledge, for example, was an integral element of the ‘agropolitan approach’ developed by Friedmann and Douglass (1975), who advocated that this knowledge be ‘incorporated in the planning process’. More recently, in discussing his ‘regional network (cluster) concept’ as an alternative to the growth pole paradigm, Douglass (1998) highlighted ‘local-level research on rural-urban linkages’ as a starting point. His approach is based on the premise that urban-rural linkages reflect ‘flows of people, production, commodities, capital/income, and information’,13 and constitute ‘localized networks’ among urban settlements as well as 12 Simon

et al. (2006) considered the ‘notion of progressive, unidirectional convergence [as] too simplistic’, instead they opined that ‘significant forces of divergence’ were contributing to ‘new forms of diversity at different levels’ (2006, p. 7; emphasis in original). 13 Referring to a previous work (Allen et al. 1999 as cited in Allen 2003) in which they had added two other important flows—natural resources, and waste and pollution—to Douglass’ framework, Allen (2003, p. 143) observed that local policies and strategies, regional and national policies, and international processes might drive the dynamics of these flows.

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among centers and their hinterlands. Although not analogous to mine, I see some conceptual affinity in his emphasis on the importance of ‘localized knowledge’ of spatial variability in rural-urban linkages, his idea of the ‘diversity and complimentarities’ of ‘clustering villages and towns’, and his suggestion of a ‘more diversified multistranded approach to regional development which rests on integrating rural with urban development at the local scale’ (1998, p. 13). In the context of the importance of ‘localized knowledge’ and ‘local-level research on rural-urban linkages’, Douglass speaks to potential variability even within relatively small spatial scales, thus sustaining my notion of the importance of micro-level analysis. Recognizing that proximity to urban settlements would influence the nature and types of urban-rural linkages in the hinterlands, Douglass observed that “ […] variations in rural-urban linkages are great even among the hinterland of the same principal town” (Douglass 1998, p. 13). Douglass’ approach advocated ‘a disaggregated and finely-tuned set of policy interventions that allow for variations in regional resource endowments, existing divisions of labor in urban and rural sectors, and local development needs and potentials” (1998, p. 13; emphasis added to highlight commonalities). As the current literature on the urban-rural relationships shows, Douglass’ approach, formulated two decades ago, continues to influence our interpretation and understanding of the dynamics of rural-urban linkages and supports our call for micro-level studies, but as to what extent the underlying principles are followed in the planning arenas is uncertain. Other researchers, engaged in analyzing the many nuances of the urban-rural relationships of peri-urban / rural-urban interfaces, have also acknowledged this variability in linkages and called for more ‘disaggregated’, ‘space-specific’, or ‘micro-level’ analyses of the landscape for effective planning (e.g., Allen 2006). In the introductory article to a special issue of Environment and Urbanization, ‘developed in partnership with the Development Planning Unit (DPU) of the University College, London’, Cecilia Tacoli (2003) observed: A common thread linking the papers in this issue is the tremendous variety of the linkages and interactions between rural areas and urban centers. This makes generalizations difficult and, to a large extent, unhelpful. Indeed, one of the main reasons for the failure of many policies that, since the 1960s, have attempted to draw on rural-urban linkages to promote regional development, is that they were based mainly on assumptions which did not necessarily reflect the real circumstances of specific locations and the people living and working there. (Tacoli 2003, p. 11; emphasis added)

She went on to note that, by contrast, papers by some of the contributors in this issue “show[ed] the importance of tailoring interventions to the specific environmental, social, economic and institutional context of each urban center and its surrounds” (2003, p. 11). To sum up, then, it is this variability in the ‘multistranded linkages’ among and within the spaces of the megacity region that leads to the importance of contextuality, as well as multidimensional localized knowledge of the spread region over time and space. For sustainable planning to occur, we need data-based micro-scale analyses

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involving contextually appropriate observational scales at the granular level, determination of which, as discussed in the following section, is a vital component of my overall conceptual vision.

5.2.3 Observational Scale: An Example of Where the Three Prongs Can Meet Aspects of the foregoing discussion in this and in the previous chapter are consolidated in an illustration in Fig. 5.3. It brings into play some of the critical elements from each of the three prongs of the trident, converging on the analysis of urbanrural attributes, linkages, and flows at an appropriate observational scale at a disaggregated level.14 But before proceeding, it is important to emphasize its illustrative nature. That the three prongs be taken simultaneously into consideration for research and planning as related to sustainable development of the MCR, is central to my approach; but there is no single way to achieve this. Consolidation of the elements of the three prongs into cohesive approaches can have numerous pathways, depending on multiple factors such as context, purpose, tools, data, and expertise. My focus on the observational scale as the point where the three prongs meet, as presented in Fig. 5.3, reflects my views as to one of the ways such consolidation can take place. The salient aspects of the three prongs have been discussed at length earlier; therefore, they do not require elaboration. The importance of a contextually constructed, multifaceted, interdisciplinary and ‘color-coordinated’ approach (coordinating and integrating the ‘brown’, ‘gray’, and ‘green’ agendas) to sustainable planning for the city region is presented under the rubric of ‘multidimensional focus’ in the diagram. This has been noted in Chap. 4 to be at the core of my overall conceptual approach, metaphorically described as the center prong of the trident, and also as the hyphen that connects the other two. Scalar consideration, contextually framed within the positivistic-relational continuum and embracing the more inclusionary paradigmatic shifts within and beyond human geography, as discussed in this chapter, constitutes the third spear, and for want of a better descriptor, is titled ‘physical and conceptual’. Some of the physical aspects of scale, with their accompanying conceptual and practical implications, have been discussed above. My expectation for the identification of new subscales, with strategic and fine-tuned planning/policy implications, are borne out of the relational, process-based, discursive, and other roles of scale. This is integral to my vision for the future, as will be briefly noted in the concluding chapter. That leaves the first prong as shown in the diagram—the URI of the spread region. As should be apparent by now, my conceptualization of the urban-rural interface (URI) in the spread region of the MCR, as shaped by my interpretation of

14 This

is the granular component of the observational scale (McMaster and Sheppard 2004, p. 5) as in Fig. 5.2.

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the literature as discussed above15 is at the heart of my approach for sustainable planning and research in the context of the Asian megacity region. Multifaceted, uneven, dynamic, and transitional, reflecting varied degrees and kinds of rural-urban interactions, linkages, and flows, and displaying diverse mixes, levels, and changes in urban-developmental attributes, the URI is simultaneously a place, concept, and process. And, as discussed earlier in the chapter, I see the spread region, spatially and temporally fluid and malleable, spanning the inner expanse of the territory within the delineated or denoted extent of the MCR but outside of the megacity/agglomeration core, as the entity where the process(es) and patterns of the urban-rural interfacing play out across time and space. Put another way, it is in context of the spread region that the three facets or prongs converge and connect, in what I hope to be a coherent and pragmatic whole. I consider this connectivity among the prongs and the need for simultaneity in their application to be vital for my approach as a whole to be meaningful. Although each has an important and distinct role in sustainable planning considerations for megacity regions, it is when they are conceptualized and applied together in a comprehensive approach that their synergistic potential is realized. One way to do this, in my view, is to acknowledge the epistemological significance of the selection of appropriate observational scale(s) (Sayre 2005, 2009), in this case for micro-level analysis of the spread region, a prerequisite for sustainable planning. This would ensure that, as a starting point, selection of the observational scale(s) be contextually guided by purposeful inclusion of appropriate elements from each of the three facets, as illustratively included in Fig. 5.3. Given the multifaceted unevenness of the URI across the spread region, selection of observational units at the smallest appropriate aggregation representing both urban and rural features, forms, functions, and linkages—regardless of existing jurisdictional boundaries—is, in my estimation, an essentiality. A holistically formulated outlook, taking into account all the contextually relevant interrelated strands of socioeconomic, ecological/ environmental, and physical sustainability with their associated ‘political underpinnings’ (e.g., Allen and You 2002; Allen 2001), is another essential ingredient.16 From this perspective, Douglass’ (1998) multistranded linkages reflecting ‘flows of people, production, commodities, capital/income, and information’, and Allen et al.’s (1999) subsequent additions to these flows (i.e., natural resources, and waste and pollution), are of special significance in city-regional context in maintaining the multidimensional focus at the micro-scale (subject, of course, to data availability). Along with the flows, 15 In addition to the literature, my thinking has also been shaped by my observation of one of the Asian MCRs, NCR, Delhi in India. 16 In this context, elements of a conceptual framework by Pieterse (2011) comprising ‘three critical meta-domains of sustainable infrastructure, inclusive economy, and efficient spatial form (with land-use implication)’—come to mind. Although conceived in the context of cities, the underlying elements can also be argued to be applicable to sustainable planning for the city regions. For example, Pieterse divided the infrastructural into two parts: social (e.g., health, education, and housing) and bio-physical (e.g., roads, transportation, information-communication technology, energy, water, and sanitation). Both should be among the foci for a multidimensional analysis of the city region at a micro-scale, thus rendering importance to the selection of the granular level of observation.

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the levels and rates of growth of socioeconomic, urban-developmental, land use, and other attributes will need to be examined in localized contexts across space and time, requiring selection of observational units as well as data sets allowing for this spatiotemporal comparability. I would like to conclude this chapter with two thoughts. The first is to reiterate that my focus here has not been on a specific methodology but to illustrate an interconnected approach based on these three prongs that can potentially lead to a cohesive and practical application of the theoretical imperatives prevalent in the literature, and importantly, start a conversation. The hope is that the integrated application of the prongs and the ensuing conversations would have the potential to positively influence future course(s) of action in terms of issues such as planning, policy-making, research, and data. The second is to add a cautionary note. The potentiality, as noted above, is eminently achievable under the right circumstances, but at the very least will depend on follow-up steps taken by all pertinent players and stakeholders, so that research results or serious proposals based on informed deliberations, following the premises of the tri-pronged approach, do not find their final resting place on the desks of bureaucrats, gathering dust. The bottom section of Fig. 5.3 offers what I consider some of the ‘logical next steps’ necessary for the viability of the approach. First of all, there will need to be a strong foundation of shared conviction and determination by all concerned (the powerful and the powerless, and all the actors and agencies in different places on the power-interest spectrum) to climb these steps together.17 I know that in envisioning this scenario, I am counting on this collective conviction, and thereby making an implicit assumption of an ongoing follow-up that would include, at a minimum: following up on the leads, questions, issues, and problems raised in the initial studies; taking study-findings into serious planning and policy considerations in many arenas (e.g., planning, policy-making, governance, sectoral and spatial jurisdictions, and resource allocation); being open to the idea of engaging in, and encouraging, a communicative environment18 across disciplinary, jurisdictional and other socioeconomic and political boundaries; and finally, being willing to challenge and evaluate preconceived notions and the status quo.

17 At a meta level, it is interesting that every item on the list invariably leads to the question of data availability. It is important to recognize that the essentiality of such data will need to be clear in the minds of all the governmental and nongovernmental actors in order to start and facilitate a process that would address the data issues. In other words, to translate concepts into practice we need data support, but a clear idea as to the ‘why’ and the ‘what’ of this support is essential for its fruition. 18 I am aware of the fraught nature of terms/concepts such as communication, consensus, discourse, and dialogue in the planning literature. I have always been drawn to some of the basic elements in Communication/Collaboration or Critical Planning Theory (CPT); however, my intention is not to advocate any particular planning approach.

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My thoughts on an approach to sustainable planning and research in the Asian MCR thus concludes on this note of guarded optimism. The following chapter represents my venture to incorporate aspects of the foregoing approach into an empirical study of an MCR, National Capital Region of Delhi, India.

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Chapter 6

The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical Exploration

Abstract The National Capital Region, (NCR, Delhi) in India is one of the first and foremost examples of extensive regional planning efforts in South Asia, created with the goal of containing the growth of the core, while controlling and regulating the development of the surrounding region for sustainability. A hybrid and evolving urban-rural region, the NCR, can thus be considered a laboratory for both theoretical and empirical exploration. The uneven urban-rural linkages, flows and traits, produced by exogenous and endogenous forces, that characterize the urban-rural interface of the city region are widely acknowledged; calls for holistically examining these, at localized or micro-scales for targeted planning purposes, are rising. In this chapter, I incorporate aspects of my tri-pronged approach—the concurrent consideration of multidimensionality, urban-rural interface (URI), and scalar variations—in an exploratory study at a disaggregated observational scale representing both urban and rural elements. I observe intra-regional variations and changes in urban-developmental patterns within the NCR vis-à-vis the NCR planning objectives. Principal Component and Cluster analyses are used to observe static structural patterns in 2001 and 2011, as well as changes that took place between the two periods. In each model, results reveal distinct clusters, with intra-group similarities and intergroup differences in traits indicating mixed success of the NCR plan. The results also underscore the potential applications of my approach for sustainable developmental planning for the Asian MCR. Keywords Megacity region · Urban-Rural interface · NCR, Delhi · Principal Component Analysis · Cluster analysis · Sustainability

6.1 Introduction Growth of the megacities and the rapid rise in the level of urbanization continue to remain significant indicators of national economic development and prosperity. However, organically, as the growth-absorptive capacity of cities diminishes, or by design—through national, regional, or metropolitan level of policy and planning The original version of this chapter was revised: Typographical mistakes have been corrected. The erratum to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_6

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strategies—the population and activities begin to gravitate towards the territories adjoining the cities, resulting in the emergence of ‘mega-urban’ regions of massive proportions that have drawn global attention, especially for their economic impact. Although at much smaller scales, ‘megacity regions’, comprising “networks between megacities and regions” rather than the ‘cities’ per se, are also gaining focus as the economic engines of growth and development, reservoirs of natural resources, and seats of political power, and are being considered to be among avenues for prosperity. Yet, such emerging regions are also becoming focal points for many concerns, some of which are focused on spatial features and forms epitomized by the ubiquitous rise of sprawls manifested in the megacity regions, while others span a wide range of environmental degradations and imbalanced development in morphological, socioeconomic, and political structures of various sorts. Over the past three decades, following the seminal works of Ginsburg et al. (1991), others (e.g., Jones and Douglass 2008; Sorensen and Okata 2011; Harrison and Hoyler 2015) have made substantial research contributions informing us of distinctive traits of some of the extended metropolitan regions or city regions in the developing world, underscoring the need to understand these traits for individualized approaches to sustainable planning. Unmanaged urban growth sets up a natural tendency towards a spread process between the two unlike spatial units, from the ‘urban core’ to the ‘adjacent periphery’ that, despite an overall gain in a variety of socioeconomic and cultural domains, also manifests many negative effects of growth. A thorough understanding of the dynamics of the individual megacity regions is thus, without a doubt, imperative for sustainable planning. However, despite our growing knowledge of the growth patterns of Asian megacities, our understanding of the evolving needs of the respective megacity regions remains inadequate, clouded by many factors that include confusing definitions and concepts, a paucity of micro-level data, and a less than optimal attention to a holistic outlook for long-term, multidimensional, regional planning. This then should be high in our collective research agenda. Although the term ‘region’ is considered to be ‘generic’ in the disciplinary jargons as the ‘giant’, ‘mega’, or ‘meta’ regions frequently appearing in the urban discourses on relatively large cities, Pacione’s (2011) depiction of a set of four ‘mega-urban’ regions around a group of megacities of Asia is useful in forming a clearer understanding of the topology of Asian city regions, especially in detecting the ‘urban form’ of the regional landscape: i.

megacity centered extended metropolitan regions, such as Bangkok, Metro Manilla, and Jakarta, where development emanates from a dominant urban core to envelop adjacent settlements; ii. extended metropolitan regions, such as the Shanghai-Nanjing-HangzhouSuzhou region and the Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan national capital region, where a number of urban nodes form a regional network; iii. polynucleated metropolitan regions where no one city dominates but a number of highly urbanized settlements form a system of cities, such as in the Pearl River Delta region made up of Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Macao, and Zhuhai;

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iv. true metropolitan regions such as the Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka bullet train corridor where several large megacities with their own extended metropolitan regions encompass an extensive highly urbanized area (Pacione 2011, p. 30). Overall, the influence of two primary urban systems in the identity of the megaregions is clearly evident in the above classification. One is largely centered around a single core city (and their satellites), while the others are characterized by multiple city-systems in the amalgamated regions. Other researchers (e.g., Harrison and Hoyler 2015) have used this uni-core or uni-system versus multi-system configurations to conceptualize the difference between the megacity region and the mega-urban region. This has been discussed in Chapter 2; my purpose of bringing it up here is only to reiterate my focus on the uni-core city-regional system—the megacity region. However, what I consider fundamental to sustainability studies for city regions, namely, discovering the differential patterns of attributes varying over space and time within such regions—would be relevant in all of the other multi-system/scalar configurations as well. The distinctive characteristics of a city (large, giant, mega or meta) or a group of cities, irrespective of their defining criteria, are reflected in the making of their regional patterns. Beyond the corporate boundaries of cities, the exhibited commonalities of the cityscapes tend to fade in the surrounding hybrid landscapes portraying complex interplay of the rural-urban environments, educing an image of an ‘interface’ of spatially sub-scaler heterogenous patterns. Obviously, considering the varied geographies of Asian countries, the extent of city regions and their traits would not be expected to be uniform, although some of the countries have shared common experiences in their history and culture, as well as in the rapid rise in the number and growth of megacities. Internal variations in these patterns in the megacity regions are (or ought to be) of immense significance from the standpoint of sustainable planning. Thus, arises the need for concerted empirical research to explore the regional frameworks of the emerging regions within which to conceptualize the regional growth parameters and analyze the spatial traits to assess and further pursue sustainable policies and strategies. The rise of megacity regions in South and Southeast Asia is one of the most fascinating urbanization phenomena of the current era that has generated writings from many fields. My endeavor in the previous chapters to contemplate on aspects of it has but scratched the surface of this vast and complex field. However, as noted in the introduction to this volume, my purpose has been to serve as a springboard for thoughts and discussions on this emerging phenomenon from the standpoint of its sustainability implications. The following are the primary reasons that prevailed in my motivation to select the National Capital Region (NCR) of India as the focus of my empirical exploration. To start with, the NCR, Delhi epitomizes the emerging megacity regions of Asia. As a capital, the seat of federal power of the most populous democratic nation of the world, Delhi megacity has recorded phenomenal economic and demographic growth. However, in line with historical precedents in many other similar situations in the developing world, as well as observations made specifically in context of the NCR, it can be expected that the peripheral territory around the core

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city—comprising a hybrid growth-induced ‘spread region’ of urban-rural interface (URI)1 —is likely to be far from uniform in spatial development. Thus, as one of the first comprehensive planning undertakings for a megacity region in Asia, the evolving growth and developmental pattern of the spread region of the NCR is of both theoretical and practical interest. For example, a continuation of the unbalanced developmental trend scenario, as expected from the contemporary empirical research results in the developing world in general (e.g., Mbiba and Huchzermeyer 2002; Jones and Douglass 2008), and in the NCR in particular (e.g., Jain 2013, 2018a), would make it an antithesis to the vision of ‘balanced development’—a long-standing planning objective—for India, as well as for the National Capital Region. Indication of a more balanced developmental scenario, on the other hand, would herald a more successful and sustainable regional planning trajectory. Irrespective of the research outcome, I felt that an exploration of the developmental patterns and paces, reflecting localized strengths and needs within the spread region of the NCR, would be of interest from both academic, planning, and policy perspectives. Hence, NCR was selected as a laboratory to explore and operationalize the three-pronged interlinked approach, facets of which have been discussed in the preceding chapters. It rests on my belief on the fluidity of the sub-scalar structures as they evolve within the territory of a given megacity region, as well as on my conviction that it is within the broad scale of the areal spread of a megacity region spanning its entire urban-rural interface (URI), that the emergence of sub-scalar patterns—portraying growth effects at local and regional levels—play out over time and space. And finally, it supports my contention that the dynamics of these ‘spaces of the city region’ within a ‘cityregional space’ need careful examination in a holistic, multidimensional context, by planners and policy makers for sustainable planning to work. Needless to say, the availability of a carefully constructed series of micro-level data is of paramount importance for this. This introductory note is followed by a discussion of the geographies of the NCR including its planning goals and a brief perspective on two research approaches on the NCR. Next, our empirical research objectives and methodology are presented. The key findings are then discussed in the final sections, along with some concluding thoughts.

1 My

conceptualization of the ‘spread region’ (SR) and the URI has been discussed in Chapter 4.

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6.2 The Geographies of the NCR2 6.2.1 A Brief Background According to the 2011 Census report, India housed nearly 32% of its 1.2 billion people in urban areas. Even though at around one-third of the total population, India’s urban level is considered to be low, the country has experienced a steady rise in the degree of urbanization from the merely 10% urban level at the turn of the century, along with a historical bias for disproportionate concentration in the larger cities. Among twenty megacities of over 20 million population in the world, Kolkata (Calcutta), Mumbai (Bombay), and Delhi are examples of India’s iconic representation of city development in the developing world. Over time, largely because of a steady rise in population and diverse administrative and economic functions, such cities assumed a high degree of monocentricity. Even though during the early phase of the post-colonial era, India’s national planning focused on a balanced rural-urban development, the continued growth and dominance of the large cities remained unabated due to their initial locational and embedded sociopolitical advantages. The economic benefits derived from such concentration phase of urbanization, primarily in terms of the economies of scale and its ‘trickle down’ process—once a dominant theme in the literature on development and popular in many parts of the world—had also received much recognition in the early days of national planning in India. However, a corollary of this phenomenon started gaining the attention of the policy makers soon thereafter as it became obvious that after a certain level of urban concentration is reached, the diseconomies of scale that set in start to outweigh the initial advantages presented by the core cities, resulting in the deconcentration of businesses and population to locations along the fringes of the cities or locations nearby the core city (Richardson 1977, 1980; Geyer et al. 2012). One effect of the planning policies and the urban growth patterns in India in the early years following independence can, arguably, be detected in the uneven hierarchical structure of its urban settlements, as well as in the urban-developmental differences among the states and the regions (Census of India 2001; Sivaramakrishnan et al. 2005), leading to a complex state of ‘urban-regional dualism’ that are to characterize the urban-developmental profile of India for years to come (Mookherjee and White 2011). As the national capital with many of the associated locational, financial, and political advantages, Delhi experienced a dramatic growth over the past five decades, with an average decadal growth rate that was substantially higher than those of most of other megacities of India, including three of the largest cities, namely, Mumbai, Chennai, and Kolkata, and the negative aspects of such growth became apparent as early as the early 1960s. Efforts to address the uncontrolled growth and the associated 2 Sects.

6.2.1 and 6.2.2 contain extended excerpts, reproduced with permission, from “Dynamics of an Evolving City-Region in the Developing World: The National Capital Region of Delhi Revisited” by Mookherjee et al. (2015).

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issues started with the first Master Plan of Delhi in 1962 that proposed the creation of a few ‘ring towns’ “to deflect some of its population” into them, followed by draft regional plans in the 1970s that first explored the involvement of the neighboring states in the planning effort. However, limited resources, no governmental/federal assistance, lax enforcement of planned guidelines, and lack of financial backup and coordination were among the reasons that made such efforts rather inconsequential (NCRPB Directory 2000, pp. 1–2). It took the NCR Planning Board Act 1985, and the appointment of a National Commission on Urbanization (NCOU) by the government in 1988, for the urbanization and related problems to start receiving more systematic or coordinated attention. In retrospect, it can be said that strategic spatial planning to offset the urban ills arising out of uncontrolled urban concentration—by promoting sustainable urban development and addressing the complex issues of control and management of growth in a timely and collaborative fashion—is a more recent phenomenon in the Indian planning scene, and the 1985 act was but a harbinger of the trend that was to emerge about two decades later. However, in context of that time, the planning process that led to the creation of the National Capital Region (NCR) has been the first, and to date the foremost, example of such an effort for a comprehensive and collaborative planning in India in achieving sustainable urban development (Fig. 6.1). Before moving on to NCR’s regional profile and broad objectives, a few words on India’s planning philosophy as per the 12th Five-Year Plan in context of sustainable development may be of interest. In face of continued population growth and urban-industrial expansion that threatens the environment, fosters and perpetuates imbalances, and creates a multitude of unsustainable socioeconomic challenges, India’s national concerns and commitment to various facets of sustainable development are well laid out in the Twelfth Planning Commission Report (Planning Commission 2013). The report mentions that India’s ‘policy goal’ in context of participation in the global arena is marked by an ‘aspirational’ rather than a ‘mandatory or prescriptive’ approach toward sustainability, that—without agreeing to a ‘binding mitigation commitment’—follows the principle of a ‘common but differentiated responsibility’ (CBDR) as adopted in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). In the national context, among a wide ranging agenda items, some specifically geared to ‘industrial development and urbanization’ such as ‘diffusion and transfer of environmentally sound technologies and management techniques’, reduction of ‘high levels of water pollution due to poor waste disposal practices’ and ‘inadequate sewerage and drainage’, could serve as good examples for megacity regions in their effort to manage urban growth and resources while mitigating environmental degradation. Their recommendation for setting up of more community and collaboration-oriented and holistically planned ‘eco-industrial parks (EIP) or estates’ is noteworthy; but from the standpoint of the NCR, their suggestion of converting the more restrictive ‘Special Economic Zones (SEZs) and townships’ ‘along the Mumbai-Delhi Industrial Corridor’ into such EIPs, especially deserves notice. The report acknowledges that effective participation of people and involvement of institutions enhance democratic values while strengthening policy making tools and their applicability at the

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Fig. 6.1 The National Capital Region (NCR) of India: Location (Source NCRPB 2005; Census of India 2011)

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local and regional levels. Recognition of much needed coordination of activities among the institutional agencies3 and an integrated approach to governance at the national, state, and local levels and among the ‘urban local bodies’ (ULB), along with emphasis on participation of the stakeholders—important prerequisites for effective planning—characterize the Planning Commission’s vision for sustainability that are also of especial relevance for the megacity regions of India.

6.2.2 Regional Profile and Planning Objectives The NCR is a vast region, an amalgam of diverse physical, economic, urban-rural, and sociocultural environments. At inception, the National Capital Region comprised an area of 30,242 km2 . covering the Delhi National Capital Territory (NCTD, 1483 km2 ) and parts of three adjacent states, Haryana (13,413 km2 , comprising 5 districts), Uttar Pradesh (10,853 km2 , comprising 3 districts), and Rajasthan (4493 km2 , comprising 1 district). Delhi (NCT) constituted the regional urban core for its political and economic status consisting of 3 municipal bodies and 29 census towns. The three sub-regions of the NCR—comprising parts of three states—significantly differed in their ‘developmental characteristics’. Two of the states, namely Uttar Pradesh (UP). and Rajasthan, were often referred to as “Bimaru” states (denoting ‘sickly’ in the Hindi language), thus characterized to be low performers on urban and developmental indicators as compared to the state of Haryana at a higher developmental status (Mookherjee and White 2011). The urban settlement system within the NCR also showed (and continues to show) a widely diverse pattern, dotting the region with a variety of urban settlements differing in functional, morphological, and civic status.4 In addition to urban settlements of over 20,000 population in the NCR (outside of the NCT) from a size of 20,407 population with the civic status of Nagar-Panchayat at the lowest end to the highest size of over one million population holding the status of a Municipal Corporation, smaller urban centers below the 20,000 population size, including ‘villages’ and ‘census towns’—many with the requisite urban criteria but without municipality status—also contributed to the makeup of the urban-rural landscape of the NCR. Thus, the National Capital Region Planning Board (NCRPB) 3 For

example, see “the measures to policy instruments”, NGO’s role in development; multistakeholder’s platforms; green rating for integrated Habitat assessment (GRIHA); Joint forest management (JFM); Women’s empowerment under Integrated Infrastructural Development (IFD); National Knowledge Network (NKN); and Waste Minimization Circles (WMC). 4 There are two types of administrative units characterizing urban settlements in India: statutory towns (defined by a statute, e.g., municipal corporation, municipal council, etc.) and ‘census towns’ (defined by a set of population and workforce criteria), and six classes of urban centers marked by population size. Class I: 100,000 and more; Class II: 50,000–99,999; Class III: 20,000–49,999; Class IV: 10,000–19,999; Class V: 5000–9999; and Class VI: less than 5000 population (Census of India 2001). In line with the recommendation of the National Commission on Urbanization (1988), we excluded the three smallest classes below 20,000 population from our study. For a view that many urban centers (‘quasi-urban’) below 20,000 population did not meet the basic ‘functional and other’ urban characteristics, see Bose (1994, p. 7).

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envisaged that with the diversities in the regional makeup and in the characteristics and functions of the urban settlements at various levels of the hierarchy, the composition of the NCR would offer unique opportunities and challenges for spatial planning and development (NCRPB 2000). The areal pattern and the administrative boundaries within the NCR have changed since its earlier planning era5 (National Capital Region Directory 2000). As noted in the Regional Plan 2021 (NCRPB 2005, 2013), the region included (Fig. 6.2) the NCT-Delhi (1483 km2 ), and sub-regions from Haryana, comprising nine districts (13,428 km2 ), Uttar Pradesh, containing six districts (10,853 km2 ), and Rajasthan comprising the sole district of Alwar (8380 km2 ). The creation of the NCR represented a need “to plan Delhi in the regional context under a suitable legislation which would control and regulate development in the region” (NCRPB Regional Plan 2021 2005, p. 3). There were also many basic but compelling reasons for conceptualizing a planning region beyond the traditional state or administrative boundaries. For example, the Planning Board took note of the fact that, “migrants do not feel bounded by physical boundaries of states while… administrative, development planning and resource allocation systems operate within the limits of territorial boundaries” (NCRPB, Regional Plan 2001 1988, p. vii), thus underscoring the logic and the wisdom for setting up the NCR in the context of the adjacent regions in different administrative units (states). This logic made it possible for the planners to contemplate a more comprehensive regional framework than the prevalent urban planning practices in India at that time. The NCR act of 1985 has been lauded as ‘exemplary’ and ‘unique,’ “… the only one of its kind till date, wherein three states voluntarily agreed to surrender their constitutional rights in favor of the Board for planning and development of the NCR, including Delhi” (NCRPB Directory 2000, p. xix). In addition to introducing a more comprehensive problem-solving element in urban planning, it also rendered opportunities for collaborative planning work for various government and non-governmental organizations, agencies, and investors. A set of hierarchical plans—sub-regional and local projects—were collaboratively formed and implemented by the states within the broad framework of the NCR Plan in concert with the National Five-Year Plan programs to ensure “a balanced and harmonious development” within the region (NCRPB Regional Plan 2001 1988, p. x).

5 The difference between the total areal size as noted in the Regional Plan 2021, and the information

presented here is due to reorganization, e.g., Panipat district in Haryana, Palwal in U.P., and as per reporting of the Government of Rajasthan, for the Rajasthan sub-region of the NCR (see, Regional Plan 2021, NCRPB 2013).

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Fig. 6.2 Administrative boundaries within the NCR (Source NCRPB 2005; Census of India 2011)

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The prime objective of the Regional Plan of 2001 (1988, p. 10) was to “contain Delhi’s population size within manageable limits, at least by the turn of the century.” The following statements excerpted from the Plan clearly articulate the prevailing reasoning behind the strategies adopted by the NCR planners: As a strategy…it has been realized and recognized that in order to save Delhi from population explosion, it is necessary to moderate the growth in the areas around it. …[I]t is also recognized that any additional population in the DMA [Delhi Metropolitan Area] towns, excluding Delhi, will not to any extent moderate or reduce the problems of Delhi as their inter-dependence is intensive and necessarily mutual. … [E]conomic activities with potential for large scale employment should necessarily be located outside the DMA, preferably at a distance which discourages daily interaction with Delhi. (NCRPB Regional Plan 2001 1988, p. 10; emphasis added)

Towards this end, it was acknowledged that “a pragmatic approach and strategy” would involve the formulation of a “conscious policy of” 1) decelerated and restricted growth of Delhi Union Territory; 2) controlled moderated growth of the [six] DMA towns [Ghaziabad, NOIDA, Faridabad, Gurgaon, Bahadurgarh, and Kundli (the last only with an assigned or projected population for 2001)] excluding Delhi so that the volume and directions of growth are well coordinated, and 3) giving impetus to the regional centers through provisions of adequate infrastructure and services…to dissuade the potential out-migrating population… [and] to attract and absorb the Delhi-bound migrants…. (NCRPB Regional Plan 2001, 1988, p. 18)

As the NCRPB Directory (2000, p. 7) noted, the policy also specified Priority Towns in the area beyond the Delhi Metropolitan Area (DMA) inside the NCR, as well as the development of five counter-magnet areas outside of the NCR. Thus, the overall planning focus of the NCR appeared to be two-fold: (1) to contain the growth of Delhi and (2) to re-distribute population within its peripheral region. The plan signified a de-polarization approach (halting polarization by restricting growth) in favor of a planned ‘poly-nodal’ or ‘polycentric’ pattern from the existing ‘mononodal’/monocentric one (NCRPB 1988, p. ix). The 2001 Regional Plan (notified in 1989) had proposed three zones for the NCR—the National Capital Territory (NCT-Delhi) containing the core city of Delhi, the Delhi Metropolitan Area (DMA), and the Rest of the NCR, and articulated goals for each zone. Based on the 1999– 2001 population growth trend, Regional Plan 2021 (NCRPB 2005) concluded that “the policy to contain the population of Delhi and deflecting 20 lakhs [2 million] population of outside to NCR has met with very little success. Also, the induced growth envisaged for the Priority Towns in the Rest of NCR has not taken place” (p. 18). Consequently, with the aim ‘to promote growth and balanced development of the National Capital Region’, Regional Plan 2021 (2005) proposed “to harness the spread of the developmental impulse and agglomeration economies generated by Delhi for harmonized, balanced and environmentally sustainable spatio-economic development of the NCR with effective cooperation of the participating states” (2005, p. 18; emphasis in original). A set of policy initiatives was outlined for achieving the stated aim, and in addition to the three zones—NCTD, DMA, and Rest of the NCR—a fourth, a Highway Corridor Zone, was put in place. The DMA zone was renamed as the Central National Capital Region (CNCR); as the 2005 report noted,

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the “controlled/development/regulated areas [of contiguous towns of GhaziabadLoni, NOIDA, Gurgaon, Faridabad-Ballabgarh, Bahadurgarh and Sonepat-Kundli and the extension of the Ridge in Haryana], measuring 1,696 sq kms, have undergone changes. In many cases, new areas have been added,” increasing the total area of the CNCR to around 2000 km2 (2005, p. 20). The total area for the Rest of NCR zone was specified at around 29,795 km2 .6 In contrast to the earlier conclusion on the limited success of the plan, the NCRPB considered the policy goals in the previous decade to be ‘substantially successful’ as determined by the 2001–11 population data. NCT-Delhi and the Rest of the NCR zones, respectively, attained 93% and 91% of the projected population growth, while the CNCR exceeded the proposed growth. The policies were retained and reproduced almost verbatim in the 2013 version of the Regional Plan 2021. However, a few snippets of added or changed words, apparent only upon close inspection, point to policy shifts that I consider consequential. For examples, notice the italicized words below that were added or changed from the 2005 version: For the CNCR zone: “The opportunities presented by CNCR need to be maximized to enable it to effectively reinforce/support [in place of ‘compete effectively’ as in the 2005 version] by offering jobs, economic activities, comprehensive transport system, housing, social infrastructure and quality of environment….”; and, “Major economic and non-polluting activities intended to be located in NCT-Delhi should be located in the urbanisable areas planned in this zone and, where appropriate and necessary, in the rest of NCR”. (2013, p. 18) [The italicized phrase was added in 2013] For the Rest of NCR zone: “Infrastructure has to be substantially upgraded at local and regional level (both by State and Central Governments) in order to induce the growth in these areas, specifically in the settlements i.e., Metro Centres, Regional Centres, Sub Regional Centers, etc.”. (2013, p. 18) [Italicized words were absent in the 2005 version]

Taken together, they point to a vision of (1) a supportive rather than competitive relationship with the core; (2) a more spatially expansive decision making process for locating ‘major economic and non-polluting activities’ beyond the CNCR into the rest of the NCR; and (3) an active focus on the lower order settlements for infrastructural development in order to induce growth. Before concluding this section, I wish to make a small comment that pertains to the following statement made by the NCRPB (2013) in context of the success of the Plan: The analysis of the proposed population vis-à-vis actual population [in the three policy zones] indicate that with effective cooperation of the participating States, the policy to contain the population of Delhi, and to harness the spread of the developmental impulse and agglomeration economies generated by Delhi for harmonized, balanced and environmentally sustainable spatio-economic development of the NCR has been substantially successful. (2013, 17; emphasis added)

Whether or not degree of success for meeting a comprehensive goal of such magnitude, as noted in the italicized part of the statement above, can be determined 6 Interestingly,

no mention of areal sizes for the respective zones can be found in the corresponding sections in the 2013 update of the Regional Plan 2021.

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by population growth alone is debatable. In support of the above conclusion, it can perhaps be said that the quoted data do indicate that the urban growth trajectory for each policy zone appears to be in the right direction and that the policies appear to be working. However, as to the level of success for the other important aspects of the goal (e.g., ‘harmonized, balanced, environmentally sustainable spatio-economic development’) for an urban-rural city region of as diverse traits, needs, and strengths as the NCR, it can be argued that broad-scale population data, while important, are not enough; multiple indicators across time and space, starting at grassroots levels, will need to be examined before level of success can be determined. The voluminous reports produced by the NCRPB and other organizations and agencies, as well as the growing research literature generated in the academia, attest to a recognition of this need. Many approaches, techniques, and focuses mark this growing field; below is a brief perspective on one such approach in examining the intricacies of the NCR in the recent years that complements my own.

6.2.3 Some Research Perspectives The National Capital Region of India has captured global attention in the more recent years, but ever since its inception, NCR had generated a wide range of media, popular, and research interest,7 especially within the country. While traditionally, most of the research interest centered on sectoral issues, a growing volume of studies has started to focus on the urban-developmental dynamics of the region from various theoretical and empirical perspectives, including a core-peripheral distance-based approach that has been adopted in a number of NCR studies in the recent years. The gradient/transect model, my term for this approach, uses distance gradient curves, rings, or zones around the megacity core at specified distances to look for inter-zone differentials in targeted urban-developmental indicators (Fig. 6.3a). A few research studies on the NCR using aspects of the gradient model are noted below, followed by a brief discussion of an alternative space-based approach that is at the core of my current work. The underlying elements of my idea of a spatially pervasive urbanrural interface spanning the entire spread region of the megacity region—containing spatial sub-scales of nodes or clusters of urban-rural entities, based on similarities or differences in designated attributes—have already been discussed in Chapter 3. Therefore, only a brief note on this model (Fig. 6.3b) is offered. A study (Taubenbock et al. 2008) on a selected set of distance-based concentric zones around the three megacities of Delhi, Mumbai (Bombay), and Kolkata (Calcutta) showing comparative areal features of elements, such as growth and density variations, is one of the earlier examples of the gradient model that included the NCR. More recently, several works by Manisha Jain and colleagues have used this approach to examine a wide range of urban and developmental scenarios in the 7 Even

a cursory search with keywords related to the NCR would reveal an impressive range and size of literature on the geographic area in and around Delhi.

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Fig. 6.3 Urban-rural interface: conceptual models (Source Author)

NCR. In order to identify the ‘urban development stage’ of the NCR, Jain et al. (2013) divided the region into several segments, designating a ‘core’, and a set of four concentric ‘rings’ within and around the NCTD. They found evidence of spatial variations in density, employment, and population among the designated rings, noting that the density gradient indicated a ‘compact core and sprawling outer periphery’, and that “Delhi region was in the stage of absolute decentralization since 1981 with the Core losing on both population and employment whereas the agglomeration was gaining” (2013, 253). More recently, in an effort to examine settlement and infrastructural development in the NCR, Jain and Korzhenevych (2017) compared population, employment, and infrastructural characteristics in five zones or rings around Delhi, indicating that the zones were constructed “in an intuitive way, defining the rings with the simple criteria of proximity and common borders” (2017). Their findings

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revealed variations in population growth, employment opportunities, and infrastructural provisions among the zones with implications for the decentralization policy for the region. In another multiple-ring model using 50-km ‘buffer rings’ around Delhi, Jain (2018a) examined the role of distance on ‘urban transformation’ per settlement size and million-plus city dominance, as well as employment opportunities and quality of life. Higher order settlements close to the ‘Delhi State’ were found to derive the benefits of employment opportunities and urban amenities, casting a ‘shadow effect’ for the lower order settlement at a distance, hindering their growth potentials. Our own studies (Mookherjee et al. 2014, 2015) on growth patterns of urban centers relative to distance from Delhi over the 1991–2001 and 2001–11 decades, used 20 km concentric contour lines around the NCTD that, with some variations, revealed distance-related growth differentials with cities closer to the core (within 20 km) growing at higher rates than those further away (beyond 40 km), across both decades. While not ignoring the role of distance, the space-based scaler model (Fig. 6.3b) can be viewed as more of an integrative or holistic approach in observing the spatiotemporal dynamics of the megacity region. Viewing the entire spread region around the core as a rural-urban interface, it presupposes the importance of discovering spatially localized attributes over time for targeted policy decisions across rural and urban realms. As discussed in Chapters 4 and 5, in the recent decades, I have been captivated by a trend in the literature towards inclusivity and holistic thinking relating (among others) to the concept of sustainability as it pertains to rural-urban dynamics and scale. It has bolstered my belief that the process of integration of rural and urban elements over time, as well as the spatial outcome of it, is a complex interplay of divergent forces from within and outside of the megacity region, evolving to distinct scalar and/or sub-scalar traits of varying intensity in the city-regional space, and that it is important to capture these dynamics over time, and finally, that from this perspective, a space-based scalar model deserves serious consideration. While such models have limited utility in discerning causal factors related to growth-related issues (the ‘why’), they are useful in observing sub-scalar intricacies in the urban-developmental structures of the transient landscapes over time (the ‘what’ and ‘when’). What are the current urbanizing traits of the region? Do they differ from those of the past? What are the trends in the population growth and developmental activities across the spaces of the region? Do the patterns conform to the NCR planning objectives? Are the evolving spatial patterns depict the desired outcomes of the current urbanization process? And, especially relevant to our work, are there localized clusters, nodes, or concentrations of areas of distinct urban-developmental attributes, needs, or strengths requiring individualized planning decisions that transcend or overlap common jurisdictional boundaries? These are some of the questions into which this model could potentially offer some insights. However, there is an enormous caveat to this expectation. Want of data often impedes or precludes the construction of such models, making it especially problematic to draw causal inferences for the evolved patterns from the observed patterns. A lack of consensus on concepts, criteria, and definitions related to city regions, as discussed in Chapter 3, also gets in the way of theory building for an environment as diverse as the Asian megacity regions. Despite

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such limitations, data-supported execution of space-based models can reveal variations in strengths and weaknesses, needs and bounties, growth spurts or lags at locally disaggregated levels across and overlapping administrative jurisdictions or boundaries, which can be invaluable in growth planning, development of policies, and/or in the modification of current planning strategies. Studies using elements of the gradient/transect model, as noted above, have added much to our knowledge and understanding of the urban-developmental dynamics of the NCR in relation to proximity to the urban core. Some of the gradient or distancebased studies have also incorporated elements of the space-based approach (see, for example, Jain and Korzhenevych 2017; Jain and Pallagst 2015 for their inclusion of the entire set of tehsils across distances in their investigations). In other works, researchers have used yet other approaches to offer various in-depth perspectives of the NCR that are of immense value to us. Together, they have contributed synergistically to our understanding of the NCR. In the same vein, it can be expected that the gradient and the space-based models, applied across the same city-regional space, would complement each other. And finally, from this perspective, it can be ventured that the Scalar model, carefully constructed, and operationalized by availability of necessary data, will have a special utility from the standpoint of sustainable planning. My hope is to start a conversation.

6.3 Dynamics of the URI in the Spread Region of the NCR, Delhi: An Empirical Exploration 6.3.1 Research Design, Purpose, and Methodology Purpose: As noted earlier, there are considerable differences of opinion as to the relevance and applicability of First World derived theories of urbanization on the Third World. The following statement, made in the generalized context of social sciences, appears to aptly sum up the obstacles faced by many a researcher attempting to undertake theoretically relevant empirical analyses in the relatively under-explored territory of urban-regional geographic issues in the megacity regions in context of the developing countries: “(T)heory building and theory testing are particularly difficult in social sciences, given the imprecise nature of the theoretical concepts, inadequate tools to measure them, and the presence of many unaccounted factors that can also influence the phenomenon of interest” (Bhattacherjee 2012, p. 4) In line with my idea of a tri-pronged approach to studying the Asian megacity regions as discussed in the previous chapters, I attempted to operationalize it by designing an empirical study with the purpose of integrating elements from the trans-urban/urban-rural, scalar, and multidimensional facets of my approach in an empirical approach to an Asian megacity region. Thus, I approached this explorative study with a three-fold purpose. First, I aimed to incorporate my perspectives on some of the elements of urban-rural interface, as discussed in Chapters 4 and 5,

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by selecting both the areal extent (the intrinsically urban-rural spread region within the delimited boundary of the NCR) and the resolution/grain at a disaggregated level (tehsils) housing both urban and rural population, that was deemed the most appropriate. Multidimensionality, the second prong, central to tri-pronged approach, as discussed in Chapter 4, was perhaps the most difficult to operationalize because of data constraints. As stated in the introductory chapter, my aim to focus at the smallest meaningful level of observational units in mixed urban-rural settings added to the challenge and required much consideration of the trade-offs between gaining higher resolution versus sacrificing data/variables, both predicaments commonly faced by researchers in similar contexts in many regions of Asia. Selection of units at a higher level of administrative hierarchy (e.g., districts as units of observation), for example, would have yielded far more variables while sacrificing resolution. Within these confines, I attempted to instill a multidimensional element by selecting a limited set of demographic, socioeconomic, infrastructural, and land-use variables that, with minor adjustments, accorded the needed temporal and spatial comparability. Table 6.1 offers a brief overview of my rationale for selecting the research parameters. Finally, mindful of the emergent integrative focus in the scale literature, as discussed in Chapter 5, my scalar approach may have had their fair share of both the ‘ontological’ and the ‘epistemological’ moments (Sayre 2005, 2009). I was often reminded of these two ‘moments’ in formulating this part of my work as I struggled to incorporate my conceptual approach into my empirical research. The significance of the more inclusive and integrative stance in the evolving scalar conceptualizations in the recent years was brought home at every step of setting up my research design from my decision to accept certain ‘givens’ (e.g., megacity size, areal extent of the delimited megacity region of the NCR) to my expectation that—consequent to the urbanizing process at work influencing the URI in the spread region of the NCR during the decade under study—a new set of emergent sub-scales would be observable in the delimited megacity region. Data and variables: Efforts to implement theoretically framed multidimensional approaches in understanding of the urban regional dynamics, a process relatively painless in the data-rich First World scenario, are inevitably tempered by practicality when it comes to similar research ventures in the Third World urbanization context. Data constraints often dictate the scope, design, objectivity, and comparability—and thereby the efficacy and applicability of empirical research—in many of the Third World countries. This reality was brought home again in course of the current work, when my attempts to broadly operationalize the basic constructs of urban-regional sustainability (e.g., social, economic, political, demographic, land use) as commonly conceptualized in the academic literature, into meaningful variables (or proxies thereof), were significantly restricted by available data, especially at the observational scale of tehsils within the Delhi National Capital Region for 2001 and 2011. Several months of failed efforts to gain access to more theoretically relevant data at the tehsil level (such as migration, employment, levels of education and income, urban amenities and house ownerships, as well as variables relating to the inter-tehsil or inter-urban functional interactions such as commuting, communication, and financial transactions data) resulted in our reliance on basic data

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Table 6.1 Research parameters and rationale Areal focus and methodology

Rationale

Selection of the study area: NCR

• The unique position of the NCR as one of the first and foremost examples of integrated regional planning efforts involving voluntary cooperation by several states, situated in the most dominant democratic nation in South Asia, and in the second most populous country in the world • Appropriate for the use of a commonly accepted megacity definition of a minimum population threshold of 10 million; and of the areal extent of a delineated planning region that reflects the URI at various intensities across the entire spread region as the MCR • An appropriate arena for utilizing elements of the shifting trends in scale literature as discussed in Chapter 5, e.g., in the selection of areal extent and observational scale, and in exploring changes in sub-scalar developmental patterns in localized contexts across the MCR

Selection of the resolution/grain: Tehsils

Smallest administrative units at a sub-district level with • both urban and rural elements within its boundary-intrinsic to our purpose • availability of comparable data across the decade; and • temporal and spatiala comparability for research purposes

Selection of variables: Demographic, land use, infrastructural, socioeconomic

• Attempt to reconcile the element of multidimensionality essential for sustainable planning with data constraint from secondary sources • Use of surrogate or proxy variables to represent some of the dimensions

Selection of research tools

• Utility of these methods (PCA, Ward’s Clustering) as attested in related literature

a With

minor variations, tehsils as sub-district administrative units, housing both urban and rural settlements are used in all/most South Asian countries, including India

sets from secondary sources (such as the Primary Census, Agricultural Census, and the Existing Transport Networks). Following initial data preparation on scaling (e.g., normalization, conversion to ratios, and examination of correlation matrices), a small set of 17 variables was selected for analysis (Table 6.2). Decidedly not optimal, this set was deemed acceptable in capturing some of the basic elements of the regional

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Table 6.2 Selected variables, definitions, and data sources Selected variables

Definitions per tehsils

Urbanization

Urban Population/Total Population

Density

Total Population/Total Area

Literacy

Literates/Total Population

Workforce Participation

Ratio of Main: Marginal Workers ((Main_xx/Total Pop)/(Marginal_xx)/Total Pop))

Agricultural Workers

((Total cultivators + Total Agricultural Workers)/Total Pop)*100

Nonagricultural Workers

Total Other Workers/Total Population

Household Workers

Total Household Workers/Total Population

Agricultural Land Use

Total Agricultural Land/Total Area in km2

Crop Intensity

Gross Cropped Area_xx/Net Sown Area_xx

Road Network

Km of Road_xx/Total Area of Each Tehsil_xx

Road Accessibility

Km of Road_xx/1000 Population_xx

Rails Network

Km of Rail_xx/Total Area of Each Tehsil_xx

Rail Accessibility

Km of Rail_xx/1000 Population_xx

Housing Accessibility

Housing Units_xx/1000 Population_xx

Housing Density

Housing Units__xx/Total Area of Tehsil_xx

Household Density

Households_xx/Total Area of Tehsil_xx

Distance

Distance between centroid of Tehsil and centroid of Delhi NCT

Data sources Primary Census Abstract, Census of India, 2001 Primary Census Abstract, Census of India, 2011 Agricultural Census of India, 2000–01 (Table 1; Table 3; Table 6A; Table 6B) Agricultural Census of India, 2010–11 (Table 1; Table 3; Table 6A; Table 6B) Existing Transport Network (Roads), 2002 Existing Transport Network (Rail), 2002 Existing Road Network, 2007 Existing Rail Network, 2007

traits (e.g., demographic, socioeconomic, infrastructure, and land-use dimensions) at the smallest meaningful unit of analyses. A few of the variables are briefly discussed below: In consideration of the yearly use of the same farmland for more than one crop cycle, a cropping intensity measure as per the FAO8 (gross cropped area/net sown area) was utilized. While cropping intensity is generally taken as a measure of efficient utilization of agricultural land, the long-term impact of increased cropping intensity on the soil appears to be uncertain and debatable (e.g., Verma et al. 2017); but no matter the verdict, it is considered to have sustainability implications for the future of agricultural land in the megacity regions.

8 FAO

= Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

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Absence of distinct sectoral or occupational data in the Indian Census reports of the more recent times has made it exceedingly difficult to analyze the structure of the work force. For example, distinct categories as in the prior censuses (e.g., manufacturing, trade and commerce, transportation, etc.), or at the very least, differentiation by clearly defined secondary and tertiary sectors, instead of lumping all nonagricultural activities together under a broad and diffused ‘Other Worker’ category as in the current Census, would have been much more meaningful. For this study, the Other Worker category is considered to represent the nonagricultural workers; Agricultural Laborer and Cultivators, two groups of workers in the agricultural sector, classified according to ownership of land, were combined to represent the portion of the total labor force employed in the agricultural sector. A ratio of Main Workers (who worked for over 180 days ‘in the reference period’) and Marginal Workers (working for less than 6 months during the same period) was calculated as an indicator of workforce participation rate. Considering the influence of relative proximity (to core) on the surrounding region, a measure of distance, from the center of the National Capital Territory (Delhi) to the midpoint of each tehsil, was calculated to construct the distance variable. In view of the continuing population load in the 2001–11 decade on a finite amount of land within the fixed NCR boundary, density and/or crowding was deemed to be an important feature of the urbanizing landscape. Therefore, besides the basic population/area measure, density was viewed from two other perspectives, namely household density, and density of housing units per area. However, vertical spread of housing units in urban or newly urbanizing areas (e.g., high rises and multifloor apartment houses) can have smaller spatial footprints9 than horizontal spreads containing the same number of units, potentially distorting the housing units/area ratio. Therefore, a housing unit/population ratio for housing was included as an additional infrastructural variable along with those of rails and roads. Decision as to whether to include some of the apparently redundant or highly correlated variables (e.g., calculating the transportation network of railroad and road per sq. km as well as per 1000 population for each tehsil) presented a dilemma; however, it was deemed that they represented distinct and complementary components rather than duplications (for this line of reasoning, see Hahs and McDonnell 2006, 439), and thus well within the scope of the Principal Component Analysis (PCA).10 Observational Units (Tehsils): As jurisdictional or administrative units at the sub-district level, the tehsils in India are at the fourth place from the top in a five-step hierarchical administrative structure (nation-state-district-tehsil-village panchayat), and, with a few exceptions, house both urban and rural population. They are also referred to by other names (such as Circle, Mandal, Taluka, Sub-Division, Police Station) in different states of India and in some other countries in South Asia (e.g., 9 Obviously,

the smaller spatial footprint of a high-rise apartment building does not compensate for the immense environmental and infrastructural footprints (in the form of water, sewage, garbage disposal, etc.) it adds to the equation. 10 Statistically, the PCA model’s ability to handle collinearity helped the decision to include some variables with high inter-collinearity.

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Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka). With minor variations in their jurisdictional frameworks, tehsils share some common characteristics that make them suitable as observational units, such as their position in the administrative hierarchy at the subdistrict level (between the districts and the village panchayats), and their distinction of being the smallest administrative units containing a variety of urban and nonurban population mix and activities, for which comparable census data at a given time frame are readily available. “Tehsil/taluk is the major revenue, administrative and planning unit after the district, and most of the development programms are routed and implemented at this level. The tehsils/taluks comprise both rural and urban areas” (Sekhar and Hatti 2005, p. 3, emphasis added). Fifty-nine tehsils, as they existed in 2001, comprised the study units for which data were available for both 2001 and 2011. Data for a few of the 59 tehsils that were divided by 2011 into smaller tehsils were aggregated to the 2001 status for comparability. All analyses for the project followed the NCR boundary as it existed in 2001. Three tehsils—Weir, Mahwah, and Baswa—were newly created by 2011, and thus, having no comparable data for 2001, were excluded from the study. Method (PCA and Clustering): The statistical analyses were conducted for two periods of time: 2001, 2011, and the changes that transpired over the 2001–11 period. The techniques employed for the analyses were guided by the objectives for each phase of the study. Principal Component Analysis, using orthogonal Varimax rotation with Kaiser normalization, was selected for the first part of the data analysis in reducing the variables into a few relatively independent sets of ecological dimensions of the study region. A set of commonly adopted criteria was utilized for retaining the components for the orthogonal rotation: in addition to selecting those with eigenvalues over 1, and an explanatory power of at least 5% of total variance, the inclusion of a random variable to detect the beginning of ‘noise’, and a scree plot to visually support the decision were also utilized. Standardized scores (component scores) based on the rotated component solution for each tehsil were computed and plotted for visual inspection of the spatial distribution of regional characteristics as revealed through the extracted components. Finally, component scores on the selected dimensions for each tehsil in the three models (2001, 2011, and 2001–11) were used for cluster analyses to identify groups of tehsils with marked intra-group similarities and inter-group differences in characteristics. A hierarchical clustering technique, using Ward’s algorithm (Griffith and Amrhein 1997; Delamater et al. 2013), was selected for this purpose. One of the ‘appeals’ of a hierarchical clustering algorithm is that “…the number of clusters in the solution need not be specified in advance. It is possible to analyze and learn from the results at each level of the hierarchy” (Mikelbank 2004, p. 946). Admittedly, there is an element of subjectivity inherent in this method. However, as Mikelbank (2004) observed, “[t]he question of cluster selection is not entirely sidestepped by the hierarchical method…. Which level of the hierarchy yields the best representation of the data? Which provides the most information? Every step of the procedure is a candidate” (p. 946). In response to these questions, he followed the procedure employed by Hill et al. (1998) for their analysis challenging the prevailing notion

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of homogeneity of central cities in the United States. Hill et al. (1998), referred to fellow researchers, as they stated the following: There is no purely objective method to determine the optimal or ‘correct’ cluster solution. The critical question is when to stop clustering (Aldenderfer and Blashfield 1984; Everitt 1993). Everitt (1993, p. 44) indicates that analysis of the agglomeration schedule, specifically the change in the agglomeration coefficient [‘sum of the within-group variance of the two clusters combined at each successive stage’] is the most commonly employed guide to halting the clustering. (1998, p. 1942) (Cited references are included in the Reference section.)

The agglomeration schedule (and coefficient values) were used to determine the selection of the clusters. Transition from a previous stage producing ‘marked’ increases in the value of the coefficients, signaled that “heterogeneous clusters [were] being combined” at these stages (Hill et al. 1998, pp. 1942–1943) and the stages previous to these, just before the move towards more heterogeneity, were therefore deemed the most appropriate ‘candidate cluster solutions’. The coefficient values and the first and second percent changes, representing the “growth in the combined variation of the clusters” at each step, and the “growth (or sometimes decline) in the first percent change from one step to the next” (Mikelbank 2004, p. 948) were also observed. Viewed this way, peaks in the second percent change values at cluster solutions indicating ‘relatively large increases in the within-group variance at that stage’ (Mikelbank 2004, p. 948; Hill et al. 1998) supported selection of the cluster solutions at the preceding stage. ‘To distinguish among these solutions and to recognize their hierarchical nature’ (Hill et al. 1998, p. 1944), I followed the authors’ example to refer to them as ‘groups’ and ‘clusters’. Needless to say, that while the ‘groups’—representing later stages in the clustering process combining more heterogenous clusters’—paint a relatively broad-brush picture of the attributes, the ‘clusters’ (representing solutions selected at preceding stages on the agglomeration schedule) are more sensitive to the inter- and intra-group similarities and differences. Results of the agglomeration coefficients, reporting the last 15 stages of the cluster solution were utilized for each model. The selected cluster solutions for 2001, 2011, and for the 2001–11 change were mapped, and the defining characteristics or attributes of each cluster were examined through their respective component scores in terms of the average values of the individual variables in the defining components.11 Cluster solutions for 2001 and 2011 are expected to provide interesting snapshots of what I view as the sub-scalar profiles of the NCR, pointing to commonalities and differences among groups of tehsils within the megacity region as per their component structures at two different time periods, a decade apart. The cluster nesting maps for 2001 and 2011, as well as diagrams summarizing salient characteristics of the clusters for each period, are presented, following their respective component structures. Because of my primary interest on the emerging sub-scalar structures, 11 A

Discriminant Analysis was used to calculate the hit ratios as another indicator of the ‘validity of the cluster solutions’ (Hill et al. 1998, pp. 1944–1946) that are included at the bottom of the respective diagrams presenting the salient traits of the nested hierarchical clusters, as in 2001, 2011, and 2001–11 changes.

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based on changes between the two periods, only the cluster solutions for the 2001– 11 change are discussed in some details. The names and locations of the selected tehsils, along with those of their respective districts and states in the administrative hierarchy (Fig. 6.2) have been presented in Sect. 6.2.2. Finally, two important clarifications are in order. First, that to better understand the characteristics of the clusters, and keeping in line with the proportion-based nature of PCA analyses, the averages for the proportion of each variable across all clusters at each time point: 2001, 2011, and change between 2001 and 2011 were calculated. Average values of the variables for each cluster were obtained by adding together each corresponding tehsil’s value on a particular variable and dividing by the number of tehsils in that cluster. Unless specifically noted to have been based on raw data in course of discussion, the regional averages for the NCR in each time period and for the 2001–11 changes (as in the ‘cluster-attribute diagrams’ in the following sections) were based on the proportions of each variable summed across all tehsils in the region and divided by the total number of tehsils. I felt that instead of considering the average values derived from summing the raw data for all tehsils in each cluster, this procedure better captured the relative patterns of the variables within and between the clusters while broadly highlighting the change(s) occurring across the region. Second, for the dynamic model (2001–11), changes in all attributes (variables) pertained to their respective changes between two static levels (not growth rates) in 2001 and 2011, and that the tehsils that were picked up in the individual cluster solutions in the ‘dynamic’ model (2001–11 Change) were the ones whose developmental levels for 2001 and 2011 were traced and observed in relation to the respective averages for the NCR.

6.3.2 Results and Discussion As noted above, Principal Component Analysis to view the component structures of the region, followed by a hierarchical clustering technique using Ward’s algorithm to observe the intra-group similarities and inter-group differences of the tehsils, were utilized for the two static (2001, 2011) and one dynamic model (2001–11 change). Maps showing the spatial distribution of factor scores for each component and those of the nested clusters, along with a diagram summarizing the salient characteristics of the clusters, as revealed in the cluster solutions, are presented for each model. Observations on the two static periods are briefly noted; findings from the ‘dynamic’ model are discussed in more detail.

6.3.2.1

Component Structures and Cluster Solutions, 2001, 2011

Component Structure, 2001: Analyzing 17 variables, representing aspects of the demographic, socioeconomic, infrastructural, and land-use dimensions on 59 tehsils, yielded 6 components with eigenvalues over 1. Application of the other criteria as

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specified above, resulted in the final extraction of four components for the rotated solution for 2001, explaining 72% of the total variance. Communalities, measuring the proportion of variance explained by the four-component solution for each variable were at, or higher than 0.70 for 13 of the 17 variables in the PCA. Together, they may be indicative of the robustness of the model (Wyly 1999, p. 325). Variables with the highest loadings, generally considered to be the ones defining the component, are presented in Table 6.3. Mapping of the component scores for each of the tehsils, as computed from the variable loadings in the individual components, shows the spatial patterns of the component structures as they existed in 2001 (Figs. 6.4a–d). Component 1, explaining 37% of the total variation, polarized the densely populated urban tehsils located closer to Delhi with a higher fulltime versus part-time employment ratio and nonagricultural workers, from those on the other end of the spectrum, with a higher proportion of the labor force in agriculture, further away from the core city, a pattern broadly reflected in Fig. 6.4a. Components 2 and 3, accounting for about a quarter of the total variance, portray the road and rail infrastructure of the region. Whereas roads (Fig. 6.4b) show a rather pronounced east west variation, Table 6.3 Component structure, 2001

Component 72.15%

Variables

Loadings

Communalities

1 37.26%

Housing Density

0.923

0.873

Household Density

0.922

0.873

Urbanization

0.921

0.883

Density

0.919

0.881

Workforce Participation

0.871

0.764

Nonagricultural Workers

0.737

0.647

Distance

−0.574

0.705

Agricultural Workers

−0.839

0.719

Road Accessibility

0.809

0.855

2 13.91%

3 12.66%

4 8.32%

Road Network

0.804

0.682

Housing Density

0.595

0.454

Rail Accessibility

0.914

0.879

Rail Network

0.875

0.888

Literacy

0.518

0.680

Crop Intensity

0.810

0.680

Agricultural Land

0.562

0.425

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Fig. 6.4 a–d Component score maps, 2001 (Source Author)

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the pattern for the railroads appears more diffused (Fig. 6.4c). The last component (8% variation) differentiates the tehsils on the crop intensity measure, pointing to an arguably more efficient utilization of the available agricultural land in parts of the region12 (Fig. 6.4d). Cluster Solutions, 2001: Cluster solutions depicting the nested clusters (Fig. 6.5), along with a diagram portraying some of the cluster attributes (Fig. 6.6), are presented in this section. The diagram reflects the hierarchical mean component scores per cluster with the defining variables for each component, the mean values for each variable across clusters, and the corresponding average values for the National Capital Region (referred as the ‘regional average’) The diagram on cluster attributes (Fig. 6.6) is self-explanatory; viewed together with the cluster nesting map, it offers a broad picture of the commonalities and differences among the tehsils as they existed in 2001. Clearly, these depictions of the cluster solutions serve only to offer a snapshot of the sub-scalar variations within a city region at a fixed point in time. More importantly, to me, is the potential it hints at—that, with appropriate multidimensional and micro-level data, technique, and standardizations in place, discovering the changes in city-regional sub-scalar structures can be of immense value for developing sustainable planning strategies. Component Structure, 2011: All parameters for the 2001 analysis, such as units of study, variables, and selection criteria for extraction of the final components, were maintained for the 2011 PCA of the component structure of the NCR. While I am mindful of the edict of not taking the two static sets of principal component analyses as comparable, I was curious to see whether all the planning and policy related changes would be reflected in a component structure of the region that would be discernably different from the same as revealed in 2001. The result was illuminating. While the spatial configuration of the patterns shifted somewhat, the basic structure did not appear to change significantly between the two periods. The first four components accounting for 73% of the total variance revealed a structural pattern in 2011 that closely resembled the component structure of the region as observed in 2001, as defined by urban-rural traits, transportation, distance from Delhi, and agricultural/intensity of cropland use. As in the 2001 PCA study, communalities (with 11 of 17 variables at or over 0.70, and 14 at or over 0.60) in the 2011 analysis appeared to support the relevance of the model in explaining the variables. Those with the highest loadings in each component are presented in Table 6.4, and their spatial patterns representing the factor scores as computed on each tehsil, are offered in Figs. 6.7a–d. Component 1 (38.4%) differentiated the more urban tehsils with higher levels of (population, housing, and household) density, nonagricultural workers, and workforce participation ratio (full vs. part-time workers) from those with more agricultural workers, more road accessibility, at a relatively longer distance from Delhi. The north-south variation, 12 To

repeat a comment made in Sect. 6.3.1, although cropping intensity is generally considered to be a measure of efficient utilization of agricultural land, the long-term impact of increased cropping intensity on the soil appears to be uncertain and debatable (e.g., Verma et al. 2017). However, irrespective of the positions taken, sustainability implications of this practice on the agricultural future of megacity regions remain an important issue.

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Fig. 6.5 Cluster nesting map, 2001 (Source Author)

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Fig. 6.6 Salient attributes of nested clusters, 2001 (Source Author)

6.3 Dynamics of the URI in the Spread Region of the NCR, Delhi: … Table 6.4 Component structure, 2011

177

Component 73%

Variables

Loadings

Communalities

1 38.4%

Urbanization

0.937

0.907

Housing Density

0.892

0.817

Household Density

0.886

0.805

Density

0.877

0.797

Nonagricultural Workers

0.849

0.868

Workforce Participation

0.771

0.669

Household Workers

0.546

0.487

Distance

−0.529

0.771

Road Accessibility

−0.716

0.819

Agricultural Worker

−0.781

0.857

Rail Accessibility

0.871

0.831

Rail Network

0.801

0.787

Literacy

0.689

0.581

Housing Accessibility

0.569

0.590

Road Network

0.664

0.618

Road Accessibility

0.507

0.819

Agricultural Land Use

−0.726

0.575

Crop Intensity

−0.796

0.701

2 14.5%

3 11.6%

4 8.9%

as observed in 2001, is also observable in 2011 (Fig. 6.7a). The spatial pattern of the second largest component (14.5%), loading more heavily on railroads, literacy, and housing accessibility, is presented in Fig. 6.7b. The north-south trail of tehsils at the western part of the NCR appears to point to those areas with higher levels of transportation and housing infrastructure and literacy. Component 3 (11.6%) picks up the agricultural land-use pattern in the region. As observed in 2001, the measure for crop intensity, arguably reflecting a more efficient management of agricultural land, loaded on the fourth component (8.9%), differentiating the tehsils closer to Delhi with higher ratio of sown land to cropped land from those farther away (Fig. 6.7d). Cluster solutions, 2011: A cluster nesting map (Fig. 6.8) and a diagram of cluster attributes (Fig. 6.9) are presented below. Together, they show the spatial spread and

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Fig. 6.7 a–d Component score maps, 2011 (Source Author)

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Fig. 6.8 Cluster nesting map, 2011 (Source Author)

179

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Fig. 6.9 Salient attributes of nested clusters, 2011 (Source Author)

salient characteristics of the clusters. My comments above, made in context of the 2001 static analysis, pertaining to the supporting tables and data, as well as to the primary purpose that these depictions are meant to serve, apply to this time period as well, and need not be repeated.

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6.3.2.2

181

The Dynamics of Change: Principal Component Structure and Clustering, 2001–11

Component Structure, 2001–2011: This part of the analyses focused on the changes in each of the variables in 2011 from their respective situation in 2001. In other words, changes, if any, in the socioeconomic, demographic, infrastructural, and land-use variables, were analyzed to reveal the structural patterns of change in the NCR. Five components, explaining 70% of the total variance, were extracted in the rotated solution. Communalities were calculated to be at or above 80% for 8, and 60% for 11, of the 17 variables. Variables with the highest loadings in the respective components, along with their communalities, are presented in Table 6.5. Maps of the component scores depicting the component characteristics of change for each tehsil are presented in Figs. 6.10a–e. All three of the density indicators (housing, household, and total), with communalities over 90%, emerged as negatively correlated to distance in Component 1 (20%). This pattern is reflected in Fig. 6.10a. As expected, density in all three forms was generally higher for tehsils at closer proximity to the core city. Again, a north-south variation is clearly observable (Fig. 6.10a). Component 2 (16%) separated tehsils with the Table 6.5 Component structure, 2001–11 change

Component 70.44%

Variables

Loadings

Communalities

1 20.16%

Household Density

0.919

0.925

Density

0.911

0.923

Housing Density

0.906

0.907

Distance

−0.596

0.610

Nonagricultural Workers

0.708

0.530

Household Workers

0.614

0.507

Urbanization

0.597

0.713

Crop Intensity

−0.651

0.659

Literacy

−0.706

0.561

3 12.07%

Road Network

0.909

0.849

Road Accessibility

0.829

0.834

4 11.64%

Rail Network

0.928

0.869

Rail Accessibility

0.909

0.877

5 10.89%

Agricultural Workers

0.621

0.449

Workforce Participation

−0.710

0.802

2 15.68%

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6 The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical …

Fig. 6.10 a–e Component score maps, 2001–11 changes (Source Author)

6.3 Dynamics of the URI in the Spread Region of the NCR, Delhi: …

183

Fig. 6.10 (continued)

highest changes in proportion of urban to total population, as well as in workers in two nonagricultural sectors from the more agriculturally oriented tehsils with the highest changes in crop intensity, although their spatial distribution was more diffused (Fig. 6.10b). Components 3 and 4 picked up changes in the transportation infrastructure in the forms of roads and rails. Although examination of raw data revealed relatively small changes in these sectors, the component structure maps (Figs. 6.10c, d) point to a relatively improved transportation picture throughout the region, which is especially noticeable for roads (Fig. 6.10c). The fifth and final extracted component, accounting for 11% of the variance, appears to pick out the time element (full vs. part-time employment) polarizing the tehsils into those with higher changes in the main-marginal worker ratio—signifying an increase in the fulltime employment— from those with most changes in the agricultural workforce, perhaps suggestive of more seasonal, part-time work in the agricultural sector (Fig. 6.10e). Altogether, the five-component solution and their respective scores, as computed on each tehsil, offer a broad picture of the structural pattern of the spread region of the NCR when the changes between the two periods (2001 and 2011) were compared in terms of the selected variables. A subsequent step—clustering the tehsils on the basis of these changes as depicted in the component structure—was initiated with the expectation that it would reveal a spatial pattern or the topology of cluster-groupings of tehsils with observable intra-group similarities and inter-group differences in the patterns of changes that took place during the 2001–11 decade.

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Table 6.6 Agglomeration schedule 2001–11 change Stage

Clusters

Coefficient

First derivative

Second derivative

44

15

42.844

9.68

−7.10

45

14

46.645

8.87

−8.33

46

13

51.326

10.04

13.11

47

12

56.529

10.14

1.01

48

11

61.812

9.35

−7.81

49

10

67.668

9.47

1.38

50

9

76.201

12.61

33.10

51

8

86.715

13.80

9.41

52

7

99.132

14.32

3.78

53

6

111.998

12.98

−9.36

54

5

134.929

20.47

57.76

55

4

166.994

23.76

16.07

56

3

199.741

19.61

−17.48

57

2

244.596

22.46

14.52

58

1

290.000

18.56

−17.34

Cluster Analysis: 2001–2011 Change: As above, following the Principal Component Analysis, based on 59 tehsils within the spread region of the NCR, a hierarchical clustering technique, using Ward’s algorithm, was utilized for this phase of the analysis, which revealed 10 clusters (consolidated into six groups). Results of the agglomeration coefficients reporting the last 15 stages of the cluster solution, along with the coefficient values, as presented in Table 6.6, supports selection of the six- and the ten-cluster solution. An overview of the mean values of the component scores for each of the six and ten-cluster sets, along with the defining variables that had the highest loadings in each component, is presented in Table 6.7. As noted in Sect. 6.3.1, all attributes (variables) referred to in the tables pertain to their respective changes between two static levels (not rates) in 2001 and 2011, and the tehsils picked up in the individual cluster solutions in this model (2001–11 Change) were the ones whose developmental levels for 2001 and 2011 were traced and observed in relation to the respective averages for the NCR. In context of the NCR Planning Board’s vision (2005) for a ‘harmonized, balanced and environmentally sustainable spatio-economic development of the NCR’ and its self-appraisal of ‘substantial success’ of the vision (2013), as discussed in Sect. 6.2.2, there was an interest on my part to look for some indication of the envisioned trend for sustainable development for the clusters of tehsils housing the DMA and Priority centers. The discussion below reflects this interest in observing the respective trends of urbanization and urban growth vis-à-vis the clusters (Table 6.8). In the absence of other, more appropriate, and sophisticated multidimensional data support, a population-based finding, such as the degree and pace of urbanization apropos urban growth rate in the individual clusters, was deemed, albeit arguably,

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185

Table 6.7 Mean values of component scores, 2001–11 change Component 1 20.16%

Component 2 15.68%

Component 3 12.07%

Component 4 11.64%

Component 5 10.89%

Distance − Density + Household Density + Housing Density +

Urbanization + Literacy − Household Wrkrs + Non-Ag Wrkrs + Crop Intensity − Housing Density +

Road Network + Road Accessibility +

Rail Network + Rail Accessibility +

Workforce Participation − Agricultural Workers +

1

−0.721

−0.157

−0.745

0.031

1.058

2

0.254

−0.964

0.974

−0.315

−0.703

3

−0.208

−0.539

−0.937

−0.399

0.032

4

−0.244

0.558

0.478

−0.296

0.697

5

−0.381

0.434

0.280

−0.263

−0.847

6

−0.043

−0.206

1.230

3.570

0.610

7

0.756

3.711

0.193

−0.264

−0.423

8

4.115

−0.041

0.189

0.031

1.717

9

1.909

1.009

−1.633

−0.693

−3.096

10

−0.274

0.340

−1.025

2.311

−1.213

1

−0.409

−0.376

−0.822

−0.217

0.446

2

0.254

−0.964

0.974

−0.315

−0.703

3

−0.298

0.509

0.401

−0.283

0.096

4

−0.182

0.122

−0.123

2.814

−0.484

5

1.140

2.810

−0.416

−0.407

−1.314

6

4.115

−0.041

0.189

0.031

1.717

Cluster (Group)

Cluster

Group

to be indicative of a positive step in the direction of ‘sustainable spatio-economic development’. It is important to note here that in contrast to the proportion-based cluster and regional averages for the rest of the variables in considering the cluster attributes as explained in Sect. 6.3.1, the urbanization profiles in Table 6.8 are based on raw data. In keeping with the initial focus on the urban centers of over 20,000 population in 2011, as noted in Sect. 6.2.2, the smaller Census Towns, being recognized as one of the rising phenomena of Indian urbanization in recent years (e.g., Guin 2018; Jain 2018b; Mitra and Kumar 2015), were not included in this work. The ‘cluster nesting map’ (Fig. 6.11) depicts spatial distribution of the tehsils as per their inclusion in both the six and the ten-cluster solutions. Salient attributes of change of the nested clusters are presented in Fig. 6.12. As noted in Sect. 6.3.1, the example set by Hill et al. (1998) of referring to the clusters at successive stages by

95.2

61.1

Cluster 6 (2)

Cluster 10 (3)

66.2

Cluster 5 (7)

Group 4

69.1

Cluster 4 (11)

Group 3

81.33

Cluster 3 (12)

61.85

127.29

Cluster 1 (8)

Group 1

Cluster 2 (11)

–

Spread Region

NCR

Group 2

Average distance from NCTD

Urban data are based on raw data; not on PCA Proportion

28.16

6.96

14.86

38.35

18.58

25.27

20.35

34.51

2001

35.90

6.18

23.08

41.67

20.45

27.98

24.89

42.57

2011

Degree of urbanization

27.49

−11.16

−0.78 7.74

54.91

8.66

10.06

10.72

22.31

23.36

Rate of change

8.16

3.32

1.87

2.71

4.54

8.06

Change

Urbanization by NCR spread region and clusters, 2001–2011

43.76

4.70

69.59

24.94

34.84

40.53

29.12

55.41

Urban growth rate, 2001–11

100,000–999,999

50,000–99,999

20,000–49,999

0

1 (PT) (22.1%)

0

0

0

2 (PT) (36.3%)

0

2 (PT) (120%)

4 (1 PT) (22.4%)

1 (DMA) (42.5%)

3 (PT) (17.1%)

1 (PT) (21%)

0

0

0

4 (20.4%) [27.0%]

2 (16.2%)

3 (50.1%)

1 (18%)

3 (1 PT) (41.1%)

0

4 (24.5%)

3 (25.5%)

3 (25.9%)

9 (26.4%)

5 (19.6%)

Number and average growth rates of Priority Towns and DMA Centers

1 million and over

Table 6.8 Urbanization patterns and trend, NCR, 2001, 2011, and 2001–11 change

7

0?

3

(continued)

17 (13 in UP. Modinagar 25%)

5

5

7

Census Towns (Jain and Knieling 2018)

186 6 The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical …

82.08

89.43

77.06c

39.55c

2011

64.16

41.26

2001

Degree of urbanization

7.35

37.51

22.90

Change

8.95

94.84

55.50a

Rate of change

Urbanization by NCR spread region and clusters, 2001–2011

66.91

280

133.15b

Urban growth rate, 2001–11

100,000–999,999

50,000–99,999

20,000–49,999

2 (DMA) (52.1%)

0

0

1 (326.7%)

1 (DMA) (407.1%)

1 (108.9%)

1 (28.4%)

0

1 (58.8%)

2 (132.5%)

0

0

Number and average growth rates of Priority Towns and DMA Centers

1 million and over

of Change in Urbanization: GBN: 457%; Dadri: 30.85%. b Urban Growth: GBN: 580%; Dadri: 110%. c Gurgaon includes Farruknagar and Manesar Source Census of India (2001, 2011)

a Rate

30.19

32.8

Cluster 9 (1)

Cluster 8 (2)

45.5

Cluster 7 (2)

Group 5

Group 6

Average distance from NCTD

Urban data are based on raw data; not on PCA Proportion

Table 6.8 (continued)

5

2

7

Census Towns (Jain and Knieling 2018)

6.3 Dynamics of the URI in the Spread Region of the NCR, Delhi: … 187

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6 The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical …

Fig. 6.11 Cluster nesting map, 2001–11 changes (Source Author)

6.3 Dynamics of the URI in the Spread Region of the NCR, Delhi: …

Fig. 6.12 Salient attributes of nested clusters, 2001–11 changes (Source Author)

189

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6 The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical …

different names to distinguish between them, as well as to recognize their hierarchical nature, was followed for all three models. Thus, the clusters in the 6-cluster solution are called ‘Groups’, while those in the 10-cluster solution are referred to as ‘Clusters’. As discussed below, while the ‘groups’ offer a broader view of the tehsils with similar patterns of changes, the ‘clusters’, at a preceding step in the clustering process, are more sensitive to intra-group variations. Group 1, comprising 20 tehsils in two clusters (1 and 3), portrays a general pattern of spatial contiguity and location relative to the geography of the NCR. In general, except for a couple of small tehsils, the remaining tehsils in this group are located around the outer edges of the NCR and at a relatively greater distance from the core city of Delhi, although some locational differences between the two are noticeable. In general, with a couple of exceptions, tehsils in Cluster 1 are primarily located in the southern part of the NCR at a greater distance from Delhi than those in the other cluster in this group. I also found it interesting that no tehsil from Rajasthan was in Cluster 3, while none from Haryana was picked up in Cluster 1. Despite differences in the locational and developmental characteristics between the two clusters, Group 1, a primarily agricultural group, is broadly characterized by relatively less progress in roads, less decline in the proportion of agricultural workers, and less increase in the three measures of density. Urbanization does not appear to have been a major characteristic or catalytic agent for development in this group. Given that during the 2001–11 decade, the proportion of agricultural workers declined in all but one of the clusters, Cluster 1 is primarily defined by its second smallest decline in both developmental status (−1.55%) and in the rate of change (−5.37%) in agricultural workforce, much lower than corresponding regional averages (Fig. 6.13). While somewhat higher than Cluster 3 in status and rate of progress in transportation infrastructure (roads), Cluster 1 demonstrated below-average performance in both measures (Fig. 6.14). A relatively smaller increase in the three forms of density emerged as another defining characteristic of this cluster. One of the least urbanized clusters, this cluster of 8 tehsils—spread over the second highest

Fig. 6.13 Agricultural workers, 2001, 2011 (Source GoI)

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191

Fig. 6.14 a Road accessibility, 2001, 2011, b Road networks, 2001, 2011 (Source GoI)

areal expanse (6038 km2 ) in the spread region of the NCR—housed only one Priority Town, fewer than ten smaller urban centers ranging in population from twenty to forty thousand, and only one city of around 80,000 population. Although its rate of urbanization was almost double that in Cluster 3, viewed in terms of change in urban population alone, urban growth of this cluster was more lethargic (29% as compared to 41% urban growth rate for cluster 3) (Table 6.8). Growth rate for the sole Priority Town of Alwar in this cluster declined over the 2001–11 decade as compared to that of the previous (1991–2001) decade (21.0% versus 27.1 in 1991–2001), a trend also observed in most of the Priority Towns. Incidentally, the relative insignificance of literacy among the variables defining this cluster notwithstanding, it bears noting that from the lowest position among the ten clusters in 2001, tehsils in this cluster made the highest gain in literacy over the decade, surpassing the regional averages of changes in both status and rate. Can this impressive gain in literacy, in context of a low urbanization background as observed in this cluster, be indicative of rural development and/or development of the small urban settlements and census towns (‘subaltern’ urbanization) unrelated to big city growth? Similarly, can it be taken as

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a measure of success for the balanced urban-rural developmental vision of the NCR planners? Cluster 3 seems to be primarily defined by its lack of progress in transportation infrastructure, especially in terms of road network and road accessibility measures, progress in both of which (per changes in developmental status and rate of progress), have been below the respective averages for the NCR (Figs. 6.14a, b). Except for the three Priority towns with populations ranging from around 100,000 to close to 300,000, the rest of the urban centers in this cluster ranged from around 20,000 to 67,000 population in 2011; most of their growth rates ranged from approximately 13 to 38%. More significantly, contrary to the planning goals, growth rates for all three Priority Towns in this cluster—Bulandshahr and Khurja in the east, and Panipat in the northern part of the NCR—demonstrated the same trend, as observed in Cluster 1, of losing momentum in the 2001–11 decade (Table 6.9). And, in glaring contrast to the expectation of the NCRPB for these towns, growth rates for two of the three even fell below that of the NCTD, the only ones among all counterparts in the region to experience such ‘lower than that of the core’ growth rates during 2001–11. Interestingly, however, the three smaller urban settlements— referred to in the Census Table 6.9 Growth rates of DMA Centers and Priority Towns, 1991–01 and 2001–11

Towns

1991–2001 (NCTD growth rate 47%)

2001–2011 (NCTD growth rate 21%)

Bahadurgarh

109.4

24.5

Faridabad

70.9

33.9

Ghaziabad

113.2

70.3

Gurgaon

42.0

407.0

Kundli

–

–

Noida

108.2

108.9

Alwar

27.1

21

Palwal

70.2

31

Khurja

22.8

12.6

Bulandshr

38.8

26.1

DMA Centers

Priority Towns

Rewari

33.6

42.1

Dharuhera

74.2

60.6

Bhiwadi

121.6

209.8

Hapur

44.9

24.1

Meerut

41.8

22.1

Panipat

36.9

12.4

Rohtak

32.7

30.6

Source Census of India (2001, 2011)

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193

as Panipat TA—ranging in population from 29 to 68 thousand and located adjacent to the relatively slow-growing (12.44%) Priority Town of Panipat demonstrated the highest growth rates (of 37, 53, and 93%, respectively) of all urban centers in this cluster. Group 2 comprises the same 11 tehsils as in Cluster 2. Eight of the 11 tehsils in this group/cluster are located closer to the NCTD, within or proximate to the CNCR/DMA and to some of the satellite cities coalescing with others (e.g., Faridabad-Ballabgarh Complex). It is also home to one of the DMA Towns, Bahadurgarh (Fig. 6.1). In contrast to Group 1, this group stands out for its improvement in roads, crop intensity, and literacy. Already relatively advanced in road infrastructure in 2001, this cluster demonstrated the second highest growth in both road network and accessibility among all clusters during the 2001–11 decade, surpassing the regional averages in both status and rates of improvement. It also made strides in measures for crop intensity and literacy; progress in crop intensity (in both status and rate) far exceeded the corresponding regional averages, while the same measures for literacy also showed above average performance. Concurrently, this group shows the steepest decline in the proportion of nonagricultural workers, as well as second steepest decline in the proportion of workers in the household and agricultural sectors. Without more information, one can only speculate as to whether workers in these sectors, gravitating to the perceived (and possibly real) opportunities offered by the big cities nearby, could explain these declines. Bahadurgarh (with a population below 200,000 in 2011), as the sole DMA town in this cluster, experienced around 42.5% growth during the 2001–11 decade. While that is by far higher than that of the other smaller urban centers in this cluster whose rates of growth ranged from about 16 to 22%, we should note that contrary to the expectation of the NCRPB, this rate represented a decline from a much higher growth rate (109%) during 1991–2001 (Table 6.9). Sohna (MC), the only other town in this cluster that I could track for the previous decade, also revealed a decline, from around 69% in 1991–2000 to 33% in the 2001–11 decade. It can perhaps be surmised that urbanization within the cluster did not propel development in this cluster; however, it appears that proximity to the CNCR, in the form of gravitational pull for workers, coupled with infrastructural improvements (due to economic necessities and/or administrative policies), may have had an influence in determining the makeup of this cluster. Group 3 combines two clusters comprising 18 tehsils, housing four Priority Towns. Seven of the 11 tehsils in Cluster 4 are spatially contiguous units located at the northern part of the NCR, spanning the states of U.P. and Haryana, while the seven tehsils in Cluster 5 are more spatially diffused. This group appears to pick up on the element of change, primarily in workforce makeup, degree of urbanization and infrastructural areas of roads and housing, but the level and direction of change tend to differ between the clusters, suggesting that the differences as revealed in the clustering stage of the 10-cluster solution were somewhat blurred at the later stage in the clustering process. Basically, both clusters 4 and 5 reveal an increase in the proportion of nonagricultural and household workers as well as in road and housing infrastructure, surpassing their respective regional averages in all areas, changes more pronounced

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6 The National Capital Region, Delhi, India: An Empirical …

in Cluster 4. From the perspective of the decadal decline in the proportion of agricultural workers in all but one cluster as mentioned above, it is interesting to note that while Cluster 4 experienced the smallest decline (−1.06%), it was the steepest (−10.95%) for Cluster 5, twice as much as the regional average. Along with variations in the level of changes, variations in the direction of the changes is also observed between the clusters. Whereas Cluster 4, as one of four clusters, shows a declining ratio in workforce-participation ratio (fulltime/part-time workers, Cluster 5 enjoyed an increase in this measure, more than double the regional average, pointing to more fulltime employment. This trend of a steep decline in agricultural workforce and simultaneous increases in its nonagricultural counterpart as well as in fulltime workforce participation, when viewed with its lackadaisical urbanization trend and low level of increase in density,13 is hard to reconcile, and it may be too simplistic to trace it to proximity to the CNCR/DMA urban settlements. In contrast to the above scenario as observed in Cluster 5, the smallest decline in agricultural workers, coupled with a decline in workforce participation ratio (indicating an increase in the proportion of part-time workers in the workforce) in Cluster 4 may simply point to the seasonal nature of work in the agricultural sector, especially in view of the penultimate position of this cluster in the crop intensity measure, one of two clusters in the 10-cluster solution that declined in crop intensity. My reasoning for this speculation is that if a given amount of agricultural land is multi-cropped year-round, it could have conceivably increased the time of engagement for agricultural workers, raising the workforce participation ratio (full versus part-time), a prospect that seems unlikely given the decline in the crop intensity measure in this cluster. This set-up, along with part-time job opportunities for road construction and in the household work sector, can also help explain the changes in the employment characteristics for this cluster. Despite some commonalities, including location of Priority Towns, certain distinctive characteristics are observable in the urbanization profiles of Clusters 4 and 5. For example, Cluster 4 surpasses the other clusters in the sheer number of urban centers, including the million-plus city of Meerut at one end (one of its two Priority Towns, the only such towns in the U.P. sub-section of the NCR), and the highest number of Census Towns among the clusters on the other, punctuated by a small number of urban settlements at different hierarchical levels. Seventeen Census Towns can be traced to this cluster, 13 of which are in Uttar Pradesh (Jain and Knieling 2018). Already at a relatively more urbanized stage in 2001, Cluster 4 maintained similar status in 2011, but the rate of change in its level of urbanization (degree urban) was almost at the bottom of all clusters and far below its urban growth rate (Table 6.8). It is worth noting that both of the Priority Towns in this cluster (Meerut and Hapur) experienced substantial decline in growth rates in 2001–11 as compared to those of the previous decade. This, of course, should be viewed in context of the fact that except for two CTs, all 11 of the Priority Towns experienced a decline in the growth 13 Given that the three measures of density (population, household, and housing units per sq. km) increased in all the clusters over the decade, Cluster 5 experienced the smallest increase in all three measures.

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195

rate in the 2001–11 decade compared to the 1991–2001 decade (Table 6.9). In this respect, the two Priority Towns in Cluster 5, with growth rates diametrically in the opposite direction, merit notice. While Palwal, a city of over 100,000 population by 2011, experienced the sharpest drop in growth rate (from 70 to 31%) during 2001– 11 over the previous decade, Bhiwadi, a Census Town crossing the 100,000 mark by 2011, grew by around 210% (accelerating the 122% growth momentum of the previous decade).14 Both clusters 6 and 10, the two small clusters in Group 4, stand out with both measures for railroad growth as the strongest defining variables, with Cluster 6, comprising two non-contiguous small tehsils at the western and southern edges of the NCR as the clear winner. From a below-regional average status in transportation infrastructure (except for the road accessibility measure barely bettering the regional average), it made the most improvement among all 10 clusters in terms of both network (as per km2 ) and accessibility (per thousand population) measures in both train and rail transportation. Considering the lack of progress in the development of railroads in the NCR spread region during the 2001–11 decade, the improvement in rails as reflected in the two tehsils of Beri and Lachhmangarh is noteworthy; both of these tehsils saw addition of new railroads, a relatively rare situation during 2001– 11. From the standpoint of urbanization, Beri with 10% and Lachhmangarh with a mere 4% of urbanization stood at the bottom of all the clusters in 2011. Although Lachhmangarh, with one Census Town accounting for 100% of its urban population (Jain and Knieling 2018) showed a modest 14.5% growth in urban population during 2001–11, both lost ground in urbanization (urban to total ratio). Does the decision to add the railroads to two of the least urbanized tehsils in the NCR attest to the balanced planning vision of the NCR planners? Was it a coordinated planning decision by the different divisions of the transportation authority? Although both clusters in Group 4 are primarily defined by changes in the transportation infrastructure, it is more nuanced for Cluster 10, the second cluster comprising three larger tehsils in this group, located close to each other and to the CNCR. Tehsils in this cluster were already relatively more developed in rails and roads in 2001—at or near the top of all clusters—in all measures. A decade later, while the railroads showed the second highest increase in both accessibility and network measures, roads did not improve, thus registering below-average performance. Two other noticeable characteristics of this cluster lie in the increase in its workforce participation ratio as reflected in a change in status around three times the regional average and in a rate of change (of over 50%, the third highest among the clusters), as well as in its steep decline in the proportion of agricultural workers (second steepest). In this context, the improvement in transportation infrastructure (especially railroads), their proximity to Delhi and to the DMA towns of Bahadurgarh and Gurgaon, as well as location of three Priority Towns in two of the three tehsils in this cluster, have significance. At the same time, it should be remembered that although all three of the Priority Towns had relatively healthy growth rates ranging from around 30 to 14 In

this sense, the 120% average growth rate as shown in Table 6.8 masks the distinct growth dynamics of the two sole Priority Towns in this cluster.

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60% during 2001–2011, except for one (Rewari), the growth rates represent a decline from the same in the previous decade. The next two groups in the cluster solution are composed of the more urbanized and densely populated tehsils with several distinct inter and intra-group characteristics. Group 5 combines two very small clusters of tehsils straddling the NCT. Cluster 7, comprising two tehsils (Dadri and Gautam Buddha Nagar), is primarily defined by increases in nonagricultural workforce, urbanization, and density, juxtaposed to a decline in literacy rate—a scenario to be expected due largely to its strategic location adjacent to the NCT and between the DMA towns of Ghaziabad and Faridabad. However, despite such similarities, the urban dynamics of the two tehsils are distinctly different. Dadri, a relatively more urbanized tehsil (53.91%) in 2001, as compared to the 7.51% urbanization of GBN at that time, housed the DMA Town of Noida, a Census Town that in contrast to most other CTs (whose growth rates declined over the previous decade) held on to a growth rate of around 108% in two successive Census periods, contributing 81% of the tehsil’s urban population in 2011. In addition to four other Census Towns of much smaller sizes (Jain and Knieling 2018), Dadri, the only other city with a sizable population of around 91 thousand, also made close to 60% gain in urban population over the decade. In stark contrast, GBN— although sporting a 457% rate of growth in urbanization fueled by its two Census Towns that accounted for 83% of the tehsil’s total urban population (Jain and Knieling 2018)— was home to a much smaller urban population load (at around 17% of Dadri’s population of 783,094). Concurrently, it displayed a curious anomaly, namely, lower levels of increases in proportion of population, housing, and household density in 2011, comparable to the same in more agricultural clusters at much longer distances from Delhi, but much lower than the corresponding measures for the two other tehsils (Dadri and Gurgaon) in this group. However, it can probably be argued that the slow growth may be in consonance to the planning objective for balanced growth for areas closer to the core, while similar pattern of slow or declining growth of distant tehsils may be indicative of unmet planning goals of urban and developmental diffusion across the spread region. Cluster 9, comprising the single tehsil of Gurgaon and housing the DMA Town of the same name, stands out for its substantial proportional increases in workforceparticipation ratio, the three measures of density, degree of urbanization, and share of nonagricultural workers, coupled with relatively lower performance in transportation infrastructure. Described as ‘one of the world’s largest urbanized hubs’ (TCPO 2007), the city of Gurgaon, at the epicenter of much media, planning, and academic attention as a rising technological hub with immense infrastructural issues, and fast approaching the million-size threshold, marked a spectacular 407% growth of urban population over the 2001–11 decade. While nearly not as spectacular, Gurgaon as a tehsil also underwent impressive urbanization. When combined with Manesar and Farruknagar15 —two small contiguous tehsils (that were non-urban in the previous decade)—the extended tehsil of Gurgaon showed over 77% growth in urbanization, 15 Manesar and Farruknagar were combined with Gurgaon for this study, hence they are not shown in Fig. 6.2.

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whereas rate of urbanization for Gurgaon tehsil alone exceeded 90% (93.11). Both as a tehsil, as well as a city, Gurgaon emerges as a unique example of a rapidly urbanizing entity close to the core city, with worrisome quality-of-life issues from the standpoint of sustainability and balanced urban development as widely reported in media and in a variety of publications. In terms of the NCRPB’s vision for balanced dispersal of economic and urban development in the NCR away from the core, the selection of Gurgaon in such short distance to Delhi as a site for no less than 38 Special Economic Zones or SEZs (as compared to 44 such zones for the rest of the NCR) is questionable (e.g., Jain and Korzhenevych 2017). Finally, Group 6/Cluster 8 picks up two other tehsils within the CNCR—Ghaziabad and Faridabad—each home to one of the DMA Towns. Somewhat predictably, this cluster is primarily defined by relative increases in density, coupled with decline in workforce-participation (fulltime to part-time). At this point, it may be worthwhile to note a couple of interesting trends for both the DMA and Priority centers over the 2001–11 decade (Table 6.9). First, with a couple of exceptions, growth rates of both of these settlement types slowed down over the 2001–11 decade compared to the previous decade. And second, even with the slower growth rates, most settlement types still grew at a faster rate than the NCTD (which itself had undergone a significant slowing down over the decade). Together, these trends send a mixed signal that should be of immense interest to developmental planners and policy makers. The development scenario of the clusters of tehsils in which the DMA centers are located reveals that despite structural changes (2001–11), the urban growth of these clusters far exceeded their corresponding rates of urbanization (Table 6.8). The four giant cities, Noida, Gurgaon, Ghaziabad, and Faridabad, are located in three clusters (7, 9, 8) occupying less than 10% of the total area of the NCR spread region, while Bahadurgarh and Kundli, the remaining two DMA Towns belonging to the tehsils of Bahadurgarh and Sonipat, are part of the scattered, non-contiguous clusters (2 and 4). By virtue of their proximity to the urban core, the effects of agglomeration are clearly evident in these urban centers as reflected on the clusters. The availability of skilled manpower, preponderance of institutes of various kinds, transport facilities and good connectivity with Delhi, and the availability of land are the primary attributes of these DMA centers (Town and Country Planning Study Report 2007). The Report notes some of the distinctive attractiveness of these cities, such as Bahadurgarh for its abundance of unskilled labor force and cheap land, Gurgaon and NOIDA for their active participation in the development of the SEZ, and Ghaziabad and Faridabad— the two millionaire urban centers—for diversity of labor force and land resources conducive to launching a wide range of activities of national and global significance. However, as they noted, the current growth patterns and future development of the DMA urban centers in the regional clusters should be carefully assessed as they are embroiled in a variety of commonly observed ‘growth’-induced environmental concerns. In a SWOT (Strength, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis, the TCPO report (2007) noted issues such as lag in standard urban amenities and infrastructural facilities, an explosive real estate market, erratic power supply, and a poor state of law and order as among the negatives associated with these DMA

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centers, which, unsurprisingly, would have far-reaching (literally, in terms of both space and time) implications for their surrounding hinterlands as represented by the clusters. As noted earlier in the chapter, the NCRPB’s decision to designate the Priority Towns, mostly located along the outer edges of the NCR beyond the DMA zone and at a relative distance from the NCTD, was guided by an intention of promoting a more balanced development and population distribution throughout the NCR, in addition to dissuading some of the Delhi-bound migrants. Of the 11 Priority Towns, four were located in Clusters 1 and 3 of Group 1; another 4 in Clusters 4 and 5 in Group 3, and the remaining three in the lone Cluster 10 of Group 4 (Fig. 6.2). Thus, five clusters, spanning 77% of the spread region, included all the planned Priority Towns—the potential development inducers for the bulk of the megacity region. As noted above, in view of the goal and the strategic distribution of the PTs, I expected to see some indication of a distinctive urbanizing trend for the clusters housing them (as compared to those hosting the DMA centers). This expectation was not met. Instead, just as in the case of the clusters housing the DMA centers, the growth rates of each of the five clusters housing the Priority Towns also outpaced corresponding rates of urbanization (Table 6.8). With an underlying connotation of ‘development’ in the demographic concept of ‘urbanization’ as used here, this apparent mismatch between growth of urban population and rate of urbanization is problematic, to say the least, and even at a basic level, the reasons are obvious. An analysis of this mismatch, as well as of the degree of success or failure of the planned vision for the NCR, is beyond my scope; however, certain concerns, such as whether this trajectory of development can be sustainable for the region, are bound to rise. Such concerns add to the calls for systematic analyses of the impediments and/or prospects of urban impetus-oriented developmental planning for an urban-rural hybrid environment such as that of the NCR, bringing to mind arguments set forth by scholars (e.g., Friedmann and Douglass 1978; Douglass 1998) in favor of a rural-urban integrated approach, utilization of localized knowledge, and research on localized rural-urban linkages and flows, as discussed earlier (Chapters 4 and 5). A supportive and participatory political environment with adequate provisions for necessary resources would, of course, be the yeast that will be required to bind and synergize all other elements. The observed urban growth and urbanizing features of the clusters, as discussed above, have only indicated the ‘what’ and ‘when’ aspects of the spatial traits; they are not indicative of the influence of the multitude of local or endogenous forces contributing to the changes in growth-related features and forms, nor do they help explain any functional interlinkages amongst these elements. The formation of sub-scalar spaces (clusters) can be interpreted to provide insight into the ‘internal spatialities’ of the region as they evolve under the impact of growth. There are a variety of ways to form such sub-scalar spaces of different properties, in planned or unplanned setups. Thus, the issues that arise are not just related to location and hybridity per se, but rather to the process and pattern of change as evidenced in spatial cluster formations, and what such change implies for present and future sustainability. Overall, it appears

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that, at least in context of the NCR, the formation of the urban growth-oriented clusters/spaces still favors location at close proximity to the urban core, while the rest of the clusters portraying diverse, and admittedly arguable, signs of urban-rural hybrid and mixed developmental dynamics (e.g., literacy, transportation, workforce participation, etc.) are scattered across the urbanizing spaces in the periphery. Can the overall developmental patterns of the clusters (including the above ‘mismatches’)— some showing a ‘sluggish RU [rural-urban] transformation’—be considered from the perspective of an ‘exclusionary urbanization’ trend, as observed by Kundu (e.g., Kundu 2009; Kundu and Saraswati 2012)? Again, this is an interesting thought to be pursued. I conclude by reiterating a simple but vital adage: Beyond a thorough understanding of all the external and internal forces that continue to influence the city region in the transformational process, achieving regional sustainability requires micro-level spatial analyses for optimum locational knowledge for all activities in space. Further, these micro-level/locational analyses will need to be integrated into an overall regional and extra-regional information system, based on multidimensional analyses and research. These are crucial steps that will need to be considered in addressing the current and future strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) for the individual city regions. Such an approach has the potential to lead to comprehensive and strategically designed plans for the individual MCRs that generate and/or harness appropriate local and extra-local resources, including political commitment and localized knowledge and perspectives of stakeholders, in context of the distinct sub-scalar spaces within the Asian MCRs.

6.4 A Closing Comment In a departure from the conceptual reflections on aspects of the Asian MCR that characterize the rest of this volume, this chapter has been a quantitatively formulated, empirical exploration of one of the predominant megacity regions of Asia. A hybrid and evolving urban-rural region, the National Capital Region of India, has been one of the first and foremost examples of extensive regional planning efforts in South Asia, whereby a planning region around a massively growing core city was created by carving out territories from voluntarily cooperating neighboring states. The focus of the NCR Planning Board (NCRPB) centered on containing the growth of the core city, while controlling and regulating the development of the surrounding region onto a sustainable development path. The intent was a ‘restricted growth’ plan for Delhi, and concurrent ‘controlled or moderated’ growth of the DMA towns closer to the core city, as well as ‘impetus-oriented’ provisions for growth of the Priority Towns strategically identified in the rest of the NCR. Against this backdrop, I found my idea of a ‘spread region’ of the Asian MCR, as discussed in Chapter 4, to be conceptually compatible to the city-regional profile of the National Capital Region of India. As discussed in Sect. 4.2.4, I believe the defining characteristics of the spread region of Asian MCR include the uneven and

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evolving urban-rural interfaces, spanning the entire spread region, of varied intensities of urbanity, rurality, urban-rural linkages and flows, related to the differential impacts of diverse exogenous and endogenous forces. My perception of this conceptual compatibility offered the perfect opportunity to treat the NCR, Delhi as a laboratory in which to undertake a micro-level analysis of the spread region in line with my three-pronged approach, incorporating elements from the three aspects of this approach—the concurrent consideration of urban-rural relationship, multidimensionality, and scalar nuances—at a disaggregated observational scale. Despite serious data constraints, the study yielded a three-fold result. First, it illustrated one of the numerous ways that the three prongs can be integrated into micro-scale investigation of the urban-rural nexus in the Asian MCR. Second, the findings offered glimpses into the uneven developmental dynamics of the NCR, Delhi across localized spaces over the decade, thereby further bolstering the argument(s) for micro-level analysis inherent in the tri-pronged approach. And third, it brought data issues to the fore once again, a theme of utmost concern to all researchers. At this point, I leave consideration of the potential conceptual implications of the first two outcomes, vis-à-vis the tri-pronged approach, for future researchers to support, refute, or carry forward. The third issue, that of data issues, I will briefly address in the next concluding chapter. I believe, that within the field as a whole, empirical research on individual Asian MCRs, based on common definitional parameters and grounded on the three prongs, will be a logical next step. However, at this point in time, this step is not for me to take, as I happily pass my metaphorical baton to the future researchers.

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Chapter 7

Concluding Thoughts

Abstract The rise of megacities and the rural-urban hybridity of their evolving city regions, within spaces of fragmented and overlapping governing and administrative systems, have been hallmarks of Asian urbanization. The primary focus of this volume has been to draw attention to this scalar entity and urbanizing phenomenon—the Asian MCR—while stressing the need for an interconnected approach to its urban-rural domain for sustainable research and planning. It has been my contention that the three facets of my approach, simultaneously applied, and contextually adapted, will have the potential to forge a viable path toward sustainable development of the Asian MCR. In this concluding chapter, I revisit this position, and note elements of my empirical study of NCR, Delhi that support the call for sub-scalar examination of city-regional spreads for localized strengths and needs, representing varied urban-rural attributes, linkages, flows, functions, and processes for informed developmental planning. I make brief comments on governance and data issues, two of the themes that arose in the course of this work. And finally, I share my vision for a synergy between research, planning (including governance and jurisdiction), and discursive realms: a perpetual cyclical relationship of process and outcome, shaping and being shaped by elements inherent to each realm as well as to the central concept of sustainable development of the MCR through time and space. Keywords Asian megacity region · Urban-rural interface · Sub-scalar spaces · Governance · Data issues · Future vision

7.1 Introduction Over the last few decades, the rise of the Asian megacity has emerged as an important agenda item in the study of urbanization phenomenon. The growth impact of the megacity on the evolving urban-rural landscapes of the expanding peripheral regions has drawn significant research attention. Intense discourses in both public media, and professional and academic circles, continue to portray different images of the human habitat and of the environmental and ecological implications of this emerging The original version of this chapter was revised: Typographical mistakes have been corrected. The erratum to this chapter is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_7

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phenomenon. Such responses span an optimism-pessimism continuum: While some see this emerging landscape as instrumental in generating human prosperity, by following the traditional link between urbanization and economic growth and development, others argue the undesirability of this growth pattern for its negative effects on the denudation of natural resources and a variety of other adverse social consequences. Despite the abundance of divergent views of, and concerns about, city regions in the literature, it is worth noting that there has been relatively less effort in developing a holistic approach to understanding the urban-rural relationship critical to both urbanism and the urbanization process in the city-regional frame, a crucial prerequisite to gauge sustainability of the urban-regional environment. It is also somewhat paradoxical that despite the growing literature on megacities and megaregions, confusion on the conceptual definitions of both the megacity and of the different scalar forms of the city regions such as the ‘megaregions,’ ‘mega-urban regions,’ and ‘megacity regions’ continue to prevail. As I have taken pains to stress at the outset, my focus in this volume has centered on the ‘Asian megacity region’ as a conceptual entity as well as a distinctive phenomenon, not on individual MCRs. Also, in concurrence with Harrison and Hoyler (2015), I have viewed the MCR as a ‘single system city region’ around a megacity core, rather than as an ever-expanding multi-system coalescence of multiple city regions and/or megacity regions into the enormous urbanized landscape. Nor have I viewed the MCR as an ‘Extended Metropolitan Region’, interchangeable with ‘mega-urban region’, as used by McGee (2009). Is there such a thing as the Asian megacity region? Are there some principal characteristics of the Asian MCR that make it uniquely Asian? Or are many of these supposed individualities potentially generalizable at this scale in other continents or countries in the developing world? As discussed earlier (Chap. 4), questions such as these have intrigued me throughout my research and reflections in course of this project, but I have yet to find, or to come up with, a concrete answer. The literature certainly points to the potential uniqueness on the part of the Asian MCR. However, the veracity of this can be established or refuted only through empirical analyses of the socio-politically (and culturally) diverse MCRs within and outside of Asia. And to be meaningful, such analyses will need to be built around a standardized set of definitional and other parameters. The rise of the megacities and the consequent (and consequential) formation of the hybrid landscapes of the megacity regions in recent decades have been hallmarks of Asian urbanization. My purpose for this volume has been to draw attention to this phenomenon of the megacity-oriented-regional spread taking place across Asia from the standpoint of the many complex elements of its urban-rural interface. I have looked for and shared what I believe to be signs of the uniqueness of the Asian MCR, not only from my own perspective but also from that of the trailblazing scholars of Asian urbanization. This particular conceptual journey for me stops at this point. I will leave it to future researchers to explore and examine those signs, refute or support their significance, or hypothesize regarding other observed and expected characteristics, testing those through rigorous empirical research.

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As the previous chapters have indicated, despite all the conceptual and definitional murkiness and divergent viewpoints, there appears to be a broad consensus on the need for sustainable city-regional development that is responsive to intra- and intergenerational equity concerns for the people who inhabit these evolving urbanizing territories. The current volume, stressing the need for an interconnected (tri-pronged) approach to sustainable research and planning in the Asian megacity region, was borne out of these concerns. It has been my contention that the three facets of my approach, holistically and contextually formulated and simultaneously applied, can forge a viable path toward sustainable development of the Asian MCR. Namely, we must recognize (1) the unique, contextualized, uneven, interactive, hybrid and transitional urban-rural interfaces in localized spread region of the MCR, (2) the physical/observational (extent, grain) and the operational and/or nonphysical (relational, discursive, networked) elements of scale in examining the sub-scalar urban-rural dynamics within the MCR, and (3) the importance of adopting a multidimensional, interdisciplinary,1 and ‘color-coordinated’ approach to sustainability. As noted in Chap. 1, the conceptual foundation of the approach lies in my belief in the interconnectedness of the three, and my conviction that in order to be effective, they will need to be pursued in tandem. However, despite the voluminous literature on shifting paradigms, and the growing scholarly support for more inclusive and holistic interpretations of each of these individual facets in general, there is a significant dearth in the same for the Asian MCR. This void is even more pronounced when it comes to an explicit recognition of these prongs, and an emphasis on the need for simultaneity in their consideration and application—two steps I consider essential for informed developmental planning and policy-making decisions for the Asian MCR. Per the discussion of the bi-scalar nature of the megacity region as discussed in Chap. 5, the megacity (MC) is literally and figuratively central to the concept of the MCR. As a backdrop to the consideration of the Asian MCR from the perspective of the tri-pronged approach, a basic discussion of the shifting urbanization dynamics in a global context, as well as the disparities among the various Asian regions, primarily in terms of megacity growth, was offered in Chap. 2.2 Some conceptual complexities involving city regions as commonly encountered in the urban literature in general, and within the pioneering contributions specific to Asian city regions in particular, were discussed in Chap. 3. Following the discussion of the three facets of my proposed approach in Chaps. 4 and 5, Chap. 5 concluded with a brief note illustrating one of the many ways that the three can converge for practical application. An empirical exploration of the National Capital Region of India, attempting to apply elements of this convergence in the face of rather severe data constraints, was presented in Chap. 6. It is not my intent to discuss or summarize the preceding chapter contents

1 As

noted in Chap. 1, the terms interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary, cross-disciplinary, and such, each with their own individual and obvious connotations, are used interchangeably in this volume. 2 That the information was based on the same UN data sets that were criticized earlier in the chapter for their diverse criteria and inaccuracy affecting comparability, underscores our dependence on these global organizations for reliable data despite all the skepticism.

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in this concluding chapter. Rather, I would like to briefly comment on some themes that emerged in the course of my work. One of my goals, as noted multiple times in the preceding pages, has been to start a conversation. Governance (including jurisdictional boundaries and overlaps, policy coordination and implementation, resource allocation and such) is another subject of monumental importance for discourse on the sustainable development of the diverse megacity regions of Asia. Moreover, the issue of generation and accessibility of appropriate data sets at disaggregated scales, unquestionable prerequisites for empirical studies and by extension for sustainable planning, also has been underscored as a vital topic indeed for future conversation. Last, a critical topic for future inquiry is the comprehensive examination of the attributes, urban-rural linkages, and flows in the diverse ‘spaces of engagement’ (Schafran 2014, 2015). I believe such a conversation is key to informed sustainable developmental planning, as discussed in Chap. 5, and this conviction is further supported by the findings of the empirical study on NCR, Delhi (Chap. 6). A few thoughts on these issues are offered below.

7.2 Governance and the Asian MCR My concept of governance, as different from government, is analogous to Laquian’s description, in that it includes both the relationship among ‘the government and the governed’3 and the process ‘by which legitimate authority and power are exercised within a political unit’ (2005, pp. 108–111). Governance (and planning approaches4 ) are beyond the focus of this volume, beyond underscoring a few notes of concern raised by other scholars in the field. Although a sizable literature on governance has emerged in recent years, somewhat unsurprisingly, the city-centric approach as noted elsewhere also appears to prevail here as well; moreover, contributions made in the context of the MCRs fell short of a well-rounded approach. “It could be expected that 25 years after the revival of the region as a unit of study and the emergence of the idea of governance, governance in MCRs would have been thoroughly understood and become embedded in practice” commented Evers and De Vries (2013, p. 537). However, as they noted, that has not happened. Referring to a number of works, the authors went on to observe that ‘most studies at this level’ were ‘predominantly theoretical in nature’ or ‘based on single case studies’, and that there was ‘a lack of international comparative research on governance [and planning] in MCRs’ (p. 537). It is doubtful 3 Laquian

noted that ‘the governance of Asian mega-urban regions goes beyond mere management of urban services,’ offering the following: “Urban governance is the relationship between civil society and the state, between rulers and the ruled, the government and the governed” (McCarney et al. 1995 as cited in Laquian 2011). 4 Planning, another subject integrally related to governance, and of critical importance to sustainable development of the MCR, is also beyond my focus for this volume. Therefore, beyond the passing reference to the potential for change in the planning paradigm, planning approaches and planninggovernance dynamics are not discussed.

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whether this situation, described in the context of the West, is much different in the Asian MCRs. The diversities within and among the Asian megacity regions, as they evolved out of individual socioeconomic, political, and historical paths, coupled with the commonalities borne out of the modernizing effects of globalization and technological sea changes—products of the forces of differentiation and integration (Harrison and Hoyler 2015)—have added to the challenges. Editors Xu and Yeh (2011) in a pioneering contribution on governance and planning of the megacity regions, albeit not specifically in the context of Asia per se, reflect this sentiment: They [the chapters in the edited volume] suggest that the governance and planning of megacity regions have been uneven, taking different forms, in different places, and impelled by different context-specific forces and historical contingencies. They also indicate a common trend leading to the rise of mega-city regions as key sites, functions, and orchestrators of globalization […]. It is this distinctive combination of path dependencies and new regional initiatives that demand further research and more theorization. (Xu and Yeh 2011, p. 21; emphasis added)

This ‘demand’ for ‘further research and more theorization’ also poses challenges for the Asian MCR. Can we consider adopting the currently available general (and Western-derived) theoretical approaches to governance-related concepts, such as elements of ‘good governance’ and ‘inclusive development’, into practice in the Asian context? Do we need more theorization? In arguing for viewing governance as ‘both an analytical and normative tool’, Gupta et al. (2015b, p. 119) explained it thus: “In its analytical incarnation, governance helps us understand how society manages itself, who acts, how, why and for what purposes. From a normative perspective, the shift from government to governance was justified by the way in which it would democratize society and make it less top down”. I believe in the importance of theorization—based on empirically supported and spatiotemporally comparable evidence—for optimal understanding of governance as both an analytic and normative tool. If governance can be viewed as an often interconnected set of analytical and normative tools (Gupta et al. 2015a, b), does it not make sense that for theorization in the Asian context to occur, empirical research, based on standardized data and common parameters, on the diverse MCRs of Asia will need to take place across the various spatial, scalar, and temporal contexts, spanning the entire extents of the URI and the PUI environments of the spread regions? Undoubtedly, the blurring of the urban and the rural adds to the challenges of governance for these territories, as discussed by Bowyer-Bower (2006, p. 154) in context of the PUI in Harare, Zimbabwe. These challenges include the following issues: Mixed urban-rural land uses that fall outside the governmental jurisdiction, a lack of clarity as to rural and urban land demarcation, ‘weak, ineffective or corrupt governance’, and, in the absence of a ‘clear and/or effective formal governance’, development of an ‘informal governance in the form of community negotiated and administered rules of management and control.’ Ros-Tonen et al. (2015, p. 85) identified the ‘three governance problems that hinder a more integrated approach toward the urban-rural interface’ as ‘fragmentation, institutional inertia, and the inability to realize inclusive development’.

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To my knowledge the most detailed understanding of governance in the context of the Asian mega-urban/megacity regions5 has come from the works of Laquian (1995, 2005, 2011). As early as 1995, Laquian raised concerns about prevailing governance models in the ‘mega-urban regions’ in the developing world, including Asia. These concerns were explored in-depth in his 2005 tome, Beyond Metropolis: The Planning and Governance of Asia’s Mega-Urban Regions. In a later UN publication (2011), he summarized four major areas of concerns as related to governance for the Asian mega-urban regions: (1) ‘fragmentation and jurisdictional conflicts’, (2) ‘lack of financial capacity’ and weak local revenue base, (3) barriers in the intended path of public participation (e.g., large size of regions or jurisdictional units, bureaucracy, inaccessibility to elected representatives, and ‘political partisanship at the local level’), and (4) [problems related to] ‘transparency and accountability’ in the form of ‘graft and corruption’ with roots to ‘complex cultural factors’ (e.g., kinship ties, tradition of gift-giving making it difficult to separate gifts from bribes, and the importance of saving face). Specific to India, and of particular interest to me, is Jain and Pallagst’s (2015) empirical work that considered the role of the prevailing governance and planning structures and their repercussions on the National Capital Region of India (NCR, Delhi). The detailed discussion offered by the authors is worth perusing for insightful examples of governance concerns in NCR. As the authors summarized it, “[t]he findings suggest a weak empowerment of governing bodies, which consequently directs the growth into transition zones, and fragmented governance as the reasons for the failure to achieve the integrated growth of land use and transport, thus creating a sprawling land-use pattern” (2015, p. 29). The findings of my study, as discussed in Chap. 6, indicating the emergence of sub-scalar spaces (‘clusters’) of diversities and commonalities in urban-developmental strengths and needs6 examined at micro-level across the spread region of NCR, make the concerns as raised by Jain and Pallagst the more relevant from the perspective of governance. If our findings (e.g., Chap. 6; Mookherjee et al. 2014, 2015), along with those by Jain and colleagues (e.g., Jain and Pallagst 2015; Jain and Siedentop 2014), in the specific context of NCR can be taken as even remotely indicative of the general trend across other MCRs of Asia, governance and sustainable developmental planning for these regions will need major rethinking in order to meet the challenges of addressing diverse intra-MCR dynamics in a regionally coherent and spatially responsive manner.

5 As

noted in Chap. 3, Laquian’s conception of the mega-urban region also included or overlapped other scalar versions of city regions, such as megacity regions. 6 The results are suggestive of the workings of the differential and integrating forces and processes as can be expected in the city-regional environments; however, as emphasized at the outset, the individual forces per se were beyond my scope for this volume.

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7.3 Data Issues and the Asian MCR One of the few incontrovertible issues in a sea of controversies and cross-arguments is that in view of the emergence of Asian megacities and consequent Asian megacity regions and mega-urban regions, the working base for studies of growth and sustainable development must be founded on pertinent, factual analysis of data and information on micro-level spatial entities. The data need for these distinct peripheral regions is particularly crucial to understanding the transitory nature of the landscape in a timely manner, as has been emphasized innumerable times in the literature in various contexts and across diverse disciplinary or thematic issues. In naming the emergence of desakota regions in Asia, close to three decades ago, McGee voiced the need for small-scale and temporal data, but noted that “unfortunately few developing societies possess data that can be analyzed in this way, relying instead on macrodata that conceal these significant differences between urban and non-urban areas”. Importantly, he then raised the question that has special bearing for my conceptualization of the URI embedded in the spread region of the Asian MCR. “But what happens if the rural-urban dichotomy ceases to exist, as in the case of the desakota zones?” (McGee 1991, p. 20). Soon thereafter, Brennan (1995) made a forceful argument for ‘coding or tabulating urban and rural data in small spatial or statistical units’ (p. 245; emphasis added), as a means to facilitate international comparison, and to ‘allow development for analytical purposes of larger statistical areas, including mega-urban regions, which are not limited to political boundaries’. As she noted, ‘sub-metropolitan geographical data’ would be of importance even for individual megacities with stable boundaries, because, as she put it, “Such cities do not remain stable internally”. In context of ‘sub-areas of megacities and mega-urban regions’, Brennan advocated “a comprehensive set of indicators on population characteristics, infrastructure, environmental and economic conditions and other relevant variables for as many points in time as possible” (p. 245). In the absence of a specific definition, it seems unclear as to whether Brennan’s concept of the mega-urban region included the megacity region, but definitional ambiguity notwithstanding, her conclusion echoes my sentiments regarding the Asian MCR: Spatially disaggregated data are needed to enable policy makers and planners to begin to understand the complex processes taking place in mega-cities and mega-urban regions throughout the developing world. (1995, p. 264)

Reiteration of the above sentiment (albeit only at the city scale) can be found in the report by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) in 2011: Effective governance and planning, including the capacity to properly monitor the urbanization process and the growth patterns of individual cities requires more systematic and detailed data. […] Spatially disaggregated data, in particular, are indispensable to understand local realities and thus inform policy and planning, especially in light of the new challenges brought about by climate change and global interconnectedness. (UN-DESA 2011, p. 5; emphasis added)

Again, this is an extremely important point, made by an international body immensely consequential in the data field; unfortunately, however, this statement indicates that

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even as late as at the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century, the scalar focus for ‘spatially disaggregated data’ did not seem to include the city region, or more significantly, the ‘megacity region’ of the developing world. Other important collaborative contributions in recent years have spoken about data shortcomings, emphasizing that ‘investment in data for South Asian countries is urgently required’ (Ellis and Roberts 2016), and recommending ‘concrete’, ‘solid’, and ‘comparable pools of data’ and ‘data infrastructures’ to facilitate the creation of ‘indicators’ ‘both in temporal longitudinal section and in thematic cross-section’ (WBGU—German Advisory Council on Global Change 2016, pp. 434, 451), especially for developing countries. However, both the preceding examples had a city-centric focus. The following examples focused on the city regions of Asia, albeit in different scalar contexts. As mentioned in Chap. 3, Jones and Douglass (2008) discussed data issues, specifically from the standpoint of the mega-urban regions of Pacific Asia, their research venue. They noted the benefits derived from collaboration by their team of researchers from different countries in the region, which facilitated accessibility to data (including ‘access to unpublished census data’), and enabled them to come to a standardized and comparable approach to analyzing the data. Observations made by Jones (2008, pp. 43–46) in the same volume, on data and definitional problems as encountered by the team, focused on concerns including ‘data quality and completeness’, ‘limited data on employment’, ‘definitional changes and limited data on smaller geographical areas’, and ‘difficulties on studying migration’. The authors/editors also made note of a “recent tendency for the data collected through the censuses to be less detailed, particularly in relation to the labour force” (2008, p. xviii), a concern that I share in regard to Census of India workforce data. Another voice raised specifically in context of the city-region of Asia (in this case the megacity region of the NCR, Delhi) has been that of Manisha Jain (2013), who highlighted many data-related concerns, ranging from ‘availability’ and ‘acquisition,’ to bureaucratic hurdles, boundary and classification changes in the Census affecting comparability, and an absence of data on important workforce and developmental indicators. “Since the dataset collected and managed by the government are not public resources, it required more time and energy to deal with the bureaucracy to get the data. It was a difficult task because those having resources were not willing to share them, and those who controlled the data resisted sharing data…”, wrote Jain (2013, p. 212), echoing the frustration felt by many of us. In a more recent research contribution on the same MCR, Jain and Pallagst (2015) reiterated the earlier concern: “The lack of data poses a serious challenge to conducting spatial analyses of Indian urban regions because the quantity of data that is required and the associated costs to cover and analyze such large landscapes are high. An urban dynamic is a complex process because urban growth contains both temporal and spatial patterns, which require different high-quality time series data for analysis” (2015, p. 34). They also noted some of the limitations they faced with digitized data. Although most sources of the database, for example, demographic and socioeconomic characteristics are available from the National Census of Population within the political and administrative divisions of individual countries, details are rarely available on individual traits (e.g., job status, employment types, wage rates, and

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household income) and the diverse activities of people, agencies, and organizations (e.g., industrial and workforce categories, production, consumption, and trading patterns), especially on an ongoing basis. Furthermore, for data sets that might eventually be available, timeliness can be a major issue. Many Asian countries, for example, have decennial censuses that capture data in discreet points in time, but the data are not always available to researchers on a timely basis. In particular, ‘flow’ data, frequently utilized in the appraisal of growth and development relations to ascertain changes in urban and rural spheres, are often nonexistent or unavailable in many less developed countries. The movement of goods and services, or of people, or, for example, data on time and cost for commute time to work between settlements, and/or between core and peripheral areas are essential ingredients in the analyses of regional systems in identifying growth and sustainability concerns. Even as these data needs are especially urgent, they are going unmet. It is difficult, if not impossible, to envision effective sustainable city-regional planning without creative intervention in the compilation and management of currently unavailable data and the exploration of additional sources in securing information to prepare adequate data sets for spatial analysis of the spread regions. Needless to say, it is neither practical, nor perhaps feasible, for individuals to take on such responsibility for data generation on the complex landscape of the vast evolving city regions. It is thus incumbent upon private and public agencies, academic institutions, and research organizations to carry out this work in a systematic manner, ideally maintaining transparency for public use. In line with my overall intention, I would like to briefly sketch four of my ideas as distilled from the literature, for mitigating some of the data constraints with the hope of starting a conversation that may have the potential to help translate oft-voiced concerns into a concrete agenda. Mining of data from existing sources: Many economic and social organizations, irrespective of their identities, activities, and goals, tend to produce scores of information and data in course of their own undertakings that could be of immense value for developmental planning, but are not systematically recorded and/or routinely available for public use. Consider, for example, the potential for the data produced by the real estate industry in the course of business. The information documented by such transactions could lead to a variety of data on land values/land use/land cover, etc., which could be useful for the analysis of growth and development. Implications of such data are of enormous relevance to the socioeconomic identity of a given population (e.g., income level and occupation) that can go beyond mere ownership and values of the transacted properties. Exploration of New Data Sources: New sources will need to be explored to further improve analytical robustness. For instance, the existence of varied rules and regulations within various political and administrative divisions can influence the socioeconomic behavior of residents, including the mobility of people, goods, and services. This influence, can in turn, impact the shaping of socioeconomic attributes across divisional boundaries within the city region. Data related to the nonuniform

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tax structure (sales, property, excise, and stamp duty) among those administrative divisions in some countries is an example of this subset of data (e.g., TCPO Study Report 2007). Despite their potential role in shaping spatial patterns in the long run, often such data (located in various administrative and regulatory bodies of city, state, or federal organizations) find limited use in research and planning, rather than being available and incorporated in the analysis. Data such as that within individual divisions should be actively harnessed and recorded at the appropriate observational levels in planning context for regional sustainability studies. Establishment of Data Bank(s): Besides the collection and generation of data in the appropriate format(s) of usability (e.g., micro-scale), there is a great need for preservation of data sets, ensuring their availability for public use. Integration and coordination of public and private organizations in the development of a ‘culture’ of sharing existing data, as well as the exploration of new data sources for the common causes of sustainability, and the improvement of quality of life in the megacity regional environment, can greatly expand the analytical scope of research and planning. Within individual countries, the creation of a ‘National Data Bank’ for megacity regions for collecting, ordering, and preserving data from public and private agencies of regional constituencies would be highly desirable. Such data banks should also include various ‘sample survey’ or ‘special survey’ databases, including ‘oral historical’ records. The task of generating relevant information and transforming it into appropriate data sets would require careful deliberations among all relevant constituencies in consultation with all stakeholders (e.g., researchers, planners, and political leaders) before data are banked. Administrative personnel in each sector of the city-region should, in collaboration with community leaders, take the initiative in scheduling regular inter- and intra-sectoral/departmental convenings, focus groups, workshops and meetings to explore the ways and means of cultivating a collaborative culture in developing collective databases. Variations of this idea have been advocated in many studies in a variety of contexts. Focus on Special Topics: National and International Conferences: Exchange of professional expertise in research and planning plays a vital role in the vetting and shaping of new ideas on developmental planning. For example, it is apparent that understanding of the Asian megacity regional phenomena, and related growth and sustainability issues, requires a standardized approach to the analysis of comparable data sets, requiring collaborative effort across disciplines, political institutions, and individual countries.7 One way of accomplishing this objective is to schedule agenda items on such topics as data collection, processing, standardization, accessibility, etc., as related to megacity regional sustainable planning, in national and international meetings and conferences of various organizations and institutions to explore

7 As

noted above, the example of this collaborative venture among the scholars and researchers of six countries resulted in a model study of the ‘mega-urban regions (MURs) of Asia’ (see Jones and Douglass 2008).

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opportunities for the standardization of data, accessibility issues, and methodological parameters in the megacity regions of Asia.8 These imperatives, related to issues ranging from data types and disaggregation, data mining, exploration of new data sources, and creating data bank, might appear a tall order. However, the alternative—inadequate empirical research and ineffective planning toward the mitigation of unsustainable or unmanaged negative impacts of urban growth on people, society and environment—is dire indeed. The imagined horror of an unplanned future may generate the motivation we need to pursue such strategic endeavors.

7.4 Urban-Rural Interfaces, Sub-scalar Spaces and a Vision for Future Discourse on Sustainability It is well-acknowledged that the proliferation of megacities and their growth impact in the expanded territories of their distinctive city-regional frames is indicative of a ‘scalar shift’ in the urban development arena, from the traditional concentration of people and activities in growth-prone ‘monocentric’ prime cities (e.g., megacity, capital city, and giant city) to expanded ‘polycentric’ city regions (e.g., metropolitan region, extended MR, greater city, city suburban) of macro- or micro-scalar areal entities (Rodriguez-Pose 2008, p. 1026). However, nowhere are the growth effects in the complex sociopolitical and economic realm of geographic territory more visible than in this emerging amorphous city-regional landscape—the hybrid urban-rural interface—outside the megacity core, that have given rise to a wide range of discourse on ‘rescaling and governance’ (e.g., Evers and De Vries 2013). Our empirical exploration depicted the effects of growth (local, regional, and extra-regional) on the transitional interlinked urban-rural landscape, that led to the emergence of the spatial ‘clusters’ of diverse attributes across the spread region of NCR, Delhi in two different periods of time as well as in terms of their changes across a decade. One of the major limitations of the empirical exploration was that, despite the essential premise of multidimensionality and rural-urban linkages, interflows, and functions, it was not possible to incorporate them in the study because of data constraints, or more bluntly, the absolute nonavailability of data. Nonavailability of data also necessitated leaving out another vital component of multidimensional investigation, chiefly, the rates, levels, and flows of migration across the National Capital Region. Thus, only variables representing certain demographic and developmental 8A

variety of geographic organizations and societies hold regular annual and/or bi-annual conferences, e.g., Association of American Geographers (AAG); Asian Urbanization Conference (AUC); International Geographical Union (IGU) on a wide range of themes including those related to urbanization, planning, and sustainable developmental issues. In addition, national or international conferences focused on a particular theme and/or geographical region has been convened from time to time. The 1992 ASEAN international conference on ‘Managing the Mega-Urban Regions of ASEAN Countries: Policy Challenges and Responses’ is an early example of the latter.

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attributes were used in the statistical analyses in order to explore the incorporation of some of the salient aspects of my approach. Needless to say, the selection of attributes was also severely restricted by data availability at the disaggregated level of observation deemed appropriate for the study, thus curtailing many of the ‘dimensions’ inherent in multidimensionality. Despite these limitations, however, the study results point to distinct patterns of similarities and differences of rural-urban and developmental traits at levels below (and/or transcending) the prevalent jurisdictional/administrative scale(s) (e.g., districts) across space and time. These results have both conceptual and practical significance. Conceptually, the results support the process-based interpretation of the fluidity and temporality of scale. So-called ‘differential forces’ (Harrison and Hoyler 2015) leading to uneven exposure to city-regionality, or the ‘forces of divergence’ (Simon et al. 2006) causing diversities at varied levels, appear to be at work in NCR within the study period creating uneven spaces across the urbanity–rurality spectrum. From this standpoint, it can also perhaps be argued that the study results point to new sub-scalar spaces in the making, with future planning and policy implications (as potential operational scales for jurisdictional, resource allocation, and/or other purposes). The utility of the study from a more practical perspective overlaps the above, depending on the focus of the principal actors, agencies, or organizations, and their respective scale(s) of operation. The study findings certainly support the argument for subscale or micro-scale examination of city-regional spreads for localized strengths and needs representing varied urban-rural attributes, linkages, flows, functions, and processes for sustainable developmental planning. In view of the need for a critical assessment of the hybrid elements of rapidly expanding transitional spaces, the approach undertaken shows high potential for further empirical studies in creating the foundation for informed decision-making for sustainable development of the Asian megacity regions. From the standpoint of NCR in particular, this study adds to the emerging set of literature on various aspects of its urban-developmental status in general, as well as on specific locations proximal or distal to the urban core. In the national context, it offers a contextual platform for comparative studies of the other Indian MCRs. By the same token, and important from the perspective of theory-building, I see the potential for the tri-pronged approach, and its practical exploratory application, to set an agenda for collaboration over sustainability research and planning across the diverse MCRs of Asia. Despite the diverse histories, geographies, economies, and sociopolitical setups and the global, national, regional, and local influences and power plays involved, the basic elements of the three facets, based on the premise of concurrence in the application, should prevail across different environments. However, the same diversities would mandate an individualized application of the approach, in context and purpose, thus dictating the selection of appropriate variables and observational scales. Although the above is mentioned in the context of empirical studies, given the role of such studies for informed planning and policy-making, it stands to reason that the tri-pronged approach, contextually adapted, would have the potential to become a useful lens for sustainable development planning and discourse. In this vein, Fig. 7.1 shares some aspects of my vision for a synergistic and cycli-

7.4 Urban-Rural Interfaces, Sub-scalar Spaces and a Vision …

Fig. 7.1 A vision for the future

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cal relationship among research, planning (including governance and jurisdiction), and discursive realms. In this model, the three realms are in a perpetual cyclical relationship of process and outcome, shaping and being shaped by elements inherent to each realm, as well as to the central concept of sustainable development of the MCR, through time and space. Before engaging in a brief discussion, two important points need to be noted. First, that although not portrayed in the diagram, the significance of the political underpinnings of the entire frame, akin to Allen’s (2001; Allen and You 2002) and Pieterse’s (2011) thoughts on the political element, holds tremendous potential to affect the relative success or failure of the envisioned relationship. And second, the scenario presented in the diagram presupposes a concurrent adaptation of the three prongs of my approach. Based on the findings of my empirical study on NCR, which was conducted with a skeleton data set, it can be expected that with a more comprehensive set of relevant data, emergence of localized pockets, patches or gradients of similarities, differences, or complementarities in static patterns or dynamic trends will be more acute and thus more revealing. The enormous utility of such findings for targeted and comprehensive planning purposes is self-evident. However, to be effective, the intricacies and nuances of such findings will need to be closely examined (preferably from a multidisciplinary perspective) as they are likely to raise issues beyond the initial scope of the studies. For example, if (or more likely, when) such clusters transcend or overlap the existing jurisdictional boundaries, as indicated in the NCR study, the findings would have especial bearing on jurisdiction and governance, requiring multi-level cooperation and coordination at both vertical and horizontal scales. The initial empirical studies are also likely to accentuate existing data issues, underscoring the need for multidimensional data at disaggregated scales (both the nature of data and the level of disaggregation to be contextually determined across the varied Asian MCRs). If these emerging clusters can be conceptualized as shaped by the interplay of diverse exogenous, endogenous, integrative, and/or differentiating forces as discussed in earlier chapters, it may not be too far from the truth to think that they represent the possible emergence of new operational scales that will have both conceptual and pragmatic significance for targeted strategic planning or policy purposes. Further, attention to the local, combined with a conducive political climate and thoughtful planning approach, would have the potential to encourage, facilitate, and utilize local stakeholder participation and input, while simultaneously guarding against locally dictated fragmented policy decisions/recommendations that may fall short of, contradict, or ignore the gestalt consideration of the megacity region. This, in a nutshell, is the relationship between the research and planning realms as envisioned in Fig. 7.1. Intrinsically, and bidirectionally, connected to both research and planning is the discursive aspect, the third component of the diagram. As mentioned in the introductory chapter, and repeated many times in the preceding pages, discourse, as conversation, dialogue or communication (not as theoretically loaded interpretations related to discourse theory or analysis) is critically important to my vision. The important role of discourse in raising awareness and shaping and/or shifting outlooks is recognized in both the academic and nonacademic literature. For example, fictional works, such as Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1852, and the

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Citadel by the Scottish physician-writer A.J. Cronin in 1937, started societal conversations that helped change the collective mindsets of their times, thus affecting historical outcomes in related areas. In talking about the ‘discursive construction of scale’, Kelly (1999) noted how a conversation on globalization helped embed this scale in our consciousness. In the richly diverse field of planning literature, concepts like Manuel Castells’ ‘communication power’ and Jurgen Habermas’ ‘communicative action’ have been used by supporters of Communicative, Collaborative, or Critical Planning Theory (CPT), leading to extensive discourse on ‘communicative planning’ (Sager 2018). Although consideration of planning or discourse theory is beyond my expertise and thus my focus, I have been drawn to some of the basic elements of CPT ever since its inception in the 1980s. In a recent contribution, Innes and Booher (2015) offered a valuable overview of its flexibility and inclusivity, starting with an acknowledgement of some of the points of criticism aimed at this approach as valid (itself an effective way to engage in a conversation). Concerns raised about any so-called ‘collaborative’ approach, as discussed by the authors, include the potential for peer pressure and of marginalizing or ‘co-opting’ of the less powerful, of the requirement for ‘altruism on the part of participants’, that such processes could ‘paper over conflict rather than acknowledge and confront it,’ and of the risk of rendering legitimacy to inequitable or suboptimal outcome.9 However, in envisioning an environment of collaboration and communication in the planning arena (without allegiance to any specific planning doctrine), I take heart in the authors’ attempt to overcome ‘the dividing discourses’ through ‘communication power,’ as they explain some of the apparently dichotomous ideas inherent in the criticisms. Their treatment of four such dichotomies, namely, community knowledge versus science, communication power versus state power, collaboration versus conflict, and process versus outcome, actually takes the ‘versus’ out of these perceived dichotomies, adopting instead an inclusive stance (that is reminiscent of Neil Smith’s ‘both/and’ as noted in Chap. 5). Without getting into theoretical complexities, I offer below a few ideas from their writing (Innes and Booher 2015, pp. 200–207), which, subjectively plucked from an in-depth discussion, may appear simplistic. Nonetheless, they resonate with my rather dialectical bent of mind as I have tried to express in this volume, and support my vision: Re. community knowledge versus science: With communicative action among scientists, planners, and laymen, all can learn and take advantage of what the other does best, and the resulting knowledge can be both more accurate and more meaningful. […] The most powerful knowledge makes use of both local knowledge and science, but it requires mutual education and cooperation. (Emphasis added)

Re. communication power versus state power:

9 In discussing the role of discourse planning practice, Richardson (2002) noted some of the ‘exclu-

sionary mechanisms’ as identified by Michael Foucault that are used by institutions to control discourse. These include creating ‘taboos’ on topics that can or cannot be discussed and ascribing more importance to the views of some and not others (e.g., the so-called ‘experts’ and ‘lay people’). These mechanisms, in my view, add to or overlap the concerns about a planning environment of communication and collaboration as acknowledged by Innes and Booher (2015).

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Communication mediates the way these power relationships are constructed and challenged. Thus the power of the state and communication power are inextricably entangled, shaping and influencing one another. […] While communication by itself does not change public actions or institutions, [multi-way communication] plays an integral part in such change by shaping the understanding of key actors and the public.

Re. collaboration versus conflict: Critics often assume that collaboration is the opposite of conflict, but nothing could be further from the truth. Collaboration is about conflict. If players did not have differences, they would not need to collaborate…. […] [C]onflict is the central dynamic that drives the process [of collaboration and consensus building]. Solutions are never permanent, however […]. Problem solving, like making plans, needs to be regarded as work in progress.

And finally, Re. process versus outcome: We see process and outcome as integral to each other. […] [Some] outcomes can shift throughout a process and because of the process. […] Process versus outcome is thus a false dichotomy. Stakeholders engage in a process because they care about the outcome. Aspects of process are part of the outcome through communication power. […] Giddens (1984) offers a path to placing this contradiction into a common frame in his argument that structure constrains agency and agency alters structure over time. (Emphasis in original)

The examples offered within the Discursive Realm in Fig. 7.1 have been supported and shaped by these perspectives. For example, it is commonly acknowledged that for communication to be meaningful, it has to be grounded in knowledge or information. “If discourse has to appear rational, it also has a hunger for truth and knowledge, which is why the production of knowledge is a fundamental activity in discourse production. In planning, knowledge is constructed through, for example, the use of analytical tools,” noted Richardson (2002, p. 355). “Surely good planning today requires not only talk, but also on drawing on the best information…” commented Goodspeed (2016), on the apparent waning and waxing of different versions of the collaborative or communicative planning theories, as he argued for more use of technology such as ‘computer databases and models’. In this context, while supporting the argument for integrating the ‘local’ with the ‘scientific’ knowledge as discussed above, I see appropriately formulated micro-level empirical studies as an important means to acquire that authentic ‘knowledge’ or information essential for a meaningful discourse to take place. The three realms, in my vision, are thus interconnected in one perpetual, bidirectional, cyclic loop—empirical research findings shaping planning/governance/jurisdictional issues, shaping discourse, shaping data issues, shaping empirical research findings. While each has the potential to individually influence, and be influenced by, the others, the anticipated synergy takes place when the process-outcome-process dynamics among the three realms get to work in tandem toward the common vision of sustainability for the MCR. Needless to say, adequate data support is an essential prerequisite for the envisioned scenario to transition from a utopian ‘pipe dream’ to what I consider to be an achievable reality.

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On this note I conclude my journey. My observation over the last decades of the unfolding of the Asian urbanization phenomenon in context of the rise of the megacities, and my perusal of the related literature, has gradually shaped, and later bolstered, my belief that Asian countries need to articulate their own uniquely Asian path to urban regional sustainability, and that a cohesive approach, such as the tri-pronged one, can be one way to address this. Thus, following retirement, after over five decades of research and teaching, I decided to embark on this exploratory journey, culminating in this meta-study. This has been an interesting undertaking, alternately absorbing, challenging, illuminating, and at times frustrating and even onerous. I have tried to distill and preserve the lessons left us by the luminaries in the field, to look for inclusivity and common ground in the areas of contemporary and historic academic discourse, and to put forward an evidence-based and practical threepronged approach to this complex topic, and to demonstrate the application of such an approach in an empirical exploration of an Asian megacity region. As apparent in the preceding pages, in course of this journey, I have noticed signs of a new awakening—a recognition of the need for more integrative and inclusive approaches to rural-urban dynamics, scale, and sustainability issues beyond single disciplinary and sub-disciplinary orientations. This has been evident in the overall discourse, as well as within the individual realms of each of the three facets. As I incorporated this trend toward inclusivity and holistic thinking in my own approach, a fresh crop of compelling questions arose: What can we do, on our part, to nurture this trend? What conditions must prevail so that an interconnected cohesive approach such as this (or others) may take shape in sustainable development planning and research for Asian megacity regions? What sort of planning and governing approach, or combination of approaches, can acknowledge and accommodate this inclusivity, and at what scale(s) and what cost? How do we reconcile inter- and intra-regional diversities with the trans-Asian commonalities from the standpoints of theory and practice? How can Asian scholars and planners and citizenry do without theories specific to Asia, and how can such theories be built without spatially and temporally comparable empirical studies? Is there such a thing as an Asian roadmap for the MCR? Given the diverse systems of governance in Asia, ranging between various shades of democracy and autocracy, with all their associated socioeconomic nuances and historical trajectories, is such a roadmap even contemplatable? And finally, as we study the evolving urban-rural dynamics of the Asian MCR, how well can we balance the contextual specificity of individual megacity regions with the three C’s, comparability, collaboration, and comprehensive focus of the tri-pronged approach? These are the questions that fascinate me today. I cannot wait to dive deep into the responses that will emerge over the coming years. May the conversation continue, it is my honor to be part of it.

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Erratum

Correction to: D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1 An error in the production process unfortunately led to publication of the original version prematurely without the incorporation of the final corrections, which have now been incorporated. The version supplied here has been corrected and approved by the author.

The updated version of the book can be found at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020, corrected publication 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1_8

E1

Index

Footnotes are in italics. A Agenda 21, 109, 115 Asian MCR, The. See Asian megacity region, The Asian megacity region, The, ix, 7–11, 40, 43, 44, 47, 64, 67, 77–79, 81, 84, 87, 94, 95, 97, 98–104, 105–106, 112–118, 123, 132–133, 137, 143, 145, 149, 163, 164, 213, 203, 209, 211, 213, 216

B Bimaru, 156 Brown and green agendas.See Green and brown agendas Brundtland Commission Report, 106, 107

C City region, 44 Cluster analysis, 169–171 Collaborative approach, 5, 6, 8, 8, 61, 75, 81, 108, 113, 136, 153, 154, 157, 210, 212, 217

D Data issues, 5, 6, 59, 137–138, 165, 209, 213 accessibility, 5, 6, 8, 54, 61, 206 comparability, spatiotemporal, 78 disaggregated scale, at, 78, 142 standardization, 24, 61, 174, 207 Demographic divide, 15–16

Demographic dividend, 40, 40 Desakota, 3, 4, 22, 56–58, 98–104, 209 Development thinking, 79–81 Dialectical approach, 126, 129, 130, 218 Differential urbanization, 19, 38 Dispersed metropolis, 56 Dualism, 54, 129, 153, 201 Duality, 51, 80, 96, 124, 129

E Environmental geography, 124, 130 Epistemological moment, 79, 125, 131–132, 144, 165 Extended Metropolis, The, 55–56 Extended metropolitan region, 3, 49, 55–56, 57–58, 59, 83, 89, 99, 102, 150

F Form and function, 50–51 Functional approach, 50–52, 137 Functional aspect, 49, 54, 56, 57, 74 polycentricity, 97 Functional urban region, 49–51, 137

G Globalization, 7, 10, 22, 41, 67, 123, 133, 207, 218 Green and brown agendas, 9, 73, 77, 78, 104, 105, 110, 117, 143, 146, 221 Growth Pole paradigm, 85–87, 141

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 D. Mookherjee, The Asian Megacity Region, The Urban Book Series, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42649-1

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224 H Hierarchical clustering. See Cluster analysis Holistic-economistic continuum, 79 Holistic-normative approach, 79 Hybridity, 4, 5, 9, 10, 44, 58, 76, 79, 95, 99, 134, 149, 151, 199, 205, 214 Hybrid region. See Hybridity I Images, mental, 47 Inclusive approach scale, 129–131 sustainability, 105, 109, 129–131 Inclusivity, 126 M MCR.See Megacity region Megacities, Asian definition, 23–28 developmental trend, 37–40 population trend, 28–31 Megacity region, 53 areal extent, 77, 135–136 conceptual complexities, 46–47, 49–51 core, 17, 20, 21, 49, 53, 57, 58, 59, 76, 77, 134, 136, 151, 156, 159 distinction from megarurban region, 52– 53 governance issues, 136–138, 156, 206, 206, 207, 209, 215, 218 single-system, 4, 52, 54, 151 spread region, 9–10, 58, 73, 78, 94, 94–98, 98, 98–104, 104, 117, 133– 134, 139, 139, 142, 143–145, 151–152, 163–165, 183, 205, 207, 208, 211, 213 Mega[city]-regional spaces, 45, 52. See also Megaregional spaces spaces within, 9, 44, 45, 73 Megaregion, 7, 45, 49, 52–53, 54, 59, 62, 67, 73–74, 105, 134, 139, 141, 204 distinction from megacity region, 52–53 multi-system, 48, 54, 151 Megaregionality, 52, 139, 141 Megaregional spaces, 94, 139 place of analysis, 141 space of engagemensub-scalar spacest, 141, 206 spaces within, 76, 94–97, 134, 139–143, 139, 152, 163, 206, 208, 214 sub-scalar spaces, 208 Mega-urban region, 208, 208. See also Megaregion

Index Metaphor, 2, 47, 104, 143 Mish-mash, terms, 49–50 Monocentric, 2, 17, 20, 159, 213. See also Monocentricity Monocentricity, 54, 153 Morphological aspect, 54, 74 polycentricity, 97 Multidimensionality, 10, 78, 104, 108, 109– 110, 143, 144, 149, 165, 200, 213. See also Sustainability

N National Capital Region-Delhi, The, 8, 10, 59, 149 areal size, discrepancy, 157 background, 153–156 counter-magnet areas, 159 DMA towns, 159 laboratory, 151–152 planning objectives, 157–161 Priority towns, 159, 191–195 regional profile, 156–157 research perspectives gradient-based approach, 161–163 space-based approach, 163–164 NCR. See National Capital Region-Delhi, The Networked approaches, 45, 51, 86, 137, 205 Normative-positive continuum, 79

O Ontological moment, 79, 125, 130, 131–132, 165 Optimists, urban, 14

P Peri-urban, 20, 47, 81, 84, 88–94, 142. See also Peri-urban interface Peri-urban interface, 73, 81, 84, 88–94, 94, 97, 114 Peri-Urban Research Project Team, 84 Pessimists, urban, 14 Polycentric city region, 2, 17, 20, 46, 48, 74, 96, 159, 213. See also Polycentricity Polycentricity, 49, 50, 54, 97–98 Polycentricity/polynodality, 19 Polynodal, 17, 48, 159. See also Polynodality Polynodality, 97 Polynucleated metropolitan region, 49, 102, 150

Index Principal Component Analysis, 168, 169, 171 R Rural-urban.See Urban-rural Rural-urban interface. See Urban-rural interface S Scalar structuration, 128, 128 Scale, 10. See also Ontological moment; Epistemological moment cartographic, 125 meanings, 125 observational, 10, 125, 131–132, 139, 143–145, 143, 165, 168, 200, 205, 212, 214 operational, 125, 125, 131–132, 164, 205, 214, 217 structure, 125 Secondary cities, 2, 18, 20, 31, 38, 76, 86 Structural change, urban, 17–18, 19–20 Structuration theory, 80, 81 Sustainability, 3–7, 77. See also Sustainable development environmental, 14, 109, 114 interdisciplinary, 5, 5, 78, 104, 110–111, 112, 117, 134, 143, 205 multidimensional, 9, 73, 104–111 simultaneity, 108–110 strong, weak, 105, 107–108, 107 Sustainable development, ix, 6–9, 43, 64, 67, 73, 79, 96, 123, 143, 149, 154, 209, 214, 219

225 equity, 21, 109, 111–114, 205 three-ring model, 108 triple bottom-line approach, 104, 106– 108 Sustainable planning.See Sustainable development Systems approach, 80

T Tehsil, as observational unit, 165, 168–169 Trickle-down process, The, 80, 85, 86, 153 Triple bottom line approach, 106–108 Tri-pronged approach, 4–6, 9–10, 44, 73, 79, 103, 104, 115, 123, 133, 145, 149, 164, 165, 200, 214 interconnectedness, 5–6, 205 simultaneity, 10, 143–145, 205

U Urban development, sustainable, 15, 20, 56, 110, 154 Urban field, 3, 4, 28, 59, 92 Urbanity-rurality, 76, 78, 89, 94, 97, 214 Urban-rural dichotomy, 2, 16, 81, 81, 84, 99, 209 dynamics, 16, 67, 81, 83, 115, 137, 220 interface, xiv, 1, 5, 10, 73, 78, 84, 89, 94– 98, 97–104, 108, 114, 115, 117, 133– 134, 141, 143, 149, 151–152, 160, 161, 163, 164, 205, 207, 213 linkages, 10, 76, 84, 87, 89, 93, 114, 141, 141–142, 142, 146, 213