Moskva (Moscow), Russia (10.5)
Lahore, Pakistan (10.5)
Shenzhen, China (10.2)
Chennai, India (10.1)
Paris, France (10.0)
The century of megacities has already begun. From just two in 1950 and three in 1975, we grew to nineteen by 2007 and expect to have twenty-seven by 2025. Furthermore, in sheer size alone our global urban culture is shifting east. Of the eight new megacities anticipated over the next fifteen years, six are in Asia, two in Africa, and just one in Europe. Zero new megacities are anticipated for the Americas. Instead, this massive urbanization is happening in some of our most populous countries: Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Pakistan. New York City was the world’s second-largest metropolis in 1977, when Liza Minnelli first sang the hit song “New York, New York” (later popularized by Frank Sinatra) to Robert De Niro in a Martin Scorsese movie. By 2050, the “City That Never Sleeps” will be struggling just to stay in the top ten.
The story doesn’t end with megacities. People are flocking to towns of all sizes, large and small. Indeed, some of the fastest growth is happening in urban centers with less than five hundred thousand people. According to the United Nations model, the number of “large” cities—those with populations between five and ten million—will increase from thirty in 2007 to forty-eight by 2025. Three-quarters of these will be in developing countries. By 2050 Asia—the world’s most populous continent and still dominated by farmers today—will be nearly as urbanized as Europe.53
What does all this mean for life in the countryside? The world’s rural population is projected to peak somewhere around 3.5 billion in 2018 or 2019, then gradually fall to around 2.8 billion by 2050. Most of this rural depopulation will happen in the developing world, because OECD countries have now largely completed this shift. Take a drive through rural America. You’ll find it littered with ghostly relics of formerly bustling farm towns. The developing world is repeating now—on a much grander scale—the same emptying out of rural regions that began in developed countries in the 1920s.
If you’ve been adding and subtracting these various numbers, then you’ve already realized that the rural population declines are too small to offset the urban increases. The world’s total population of people will continue to grow substantially in the next half-century. We are now on a trajectory to add nearly 40% more population by the year 2050, raising our number to around 9.2 billion.54 Who will we be in 2050? In that year, for every one hundred of our future children and grandchildren born, fifty-seven will open their eyes in Asia and twenty-two in Africa, and mostly in cities.
What Kind of Cities Will They Be?
So the people of Earth are rushing into town. “The twenty-first century,” declared the United Nations, “is the Century of the City.”55 But what kind of cities will they be? Will they be prosperous or Dickensian? The best of times, or the worst?
There is certainly reason for optimism. The economic downturn of 2008-09 notwithstanding, the long-term trends all point to continued economic globalization, rising urban wealth, and a host of new technologies to help make cities cleaner, safer, and more efficient. It seems plausible to imagine the ascendance of shining, modern, prosperous cities all over the world. Take, for example, the success story of Singapore.
A port city situated on a large island at the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, Singapore began as a British trading colony in 1819 and remained under colonial rule for one hundred and forty-one years before gaining independence in 1960. Since then, despite its small size (less than 270 square miles), few natural resources, and no domestic fossil fuel supply, Singapore’s growth and economic success have been phenomenal.
Between 1960 and 2005 Singapore’s population grew rapidly, averaging 2.2% annually or doubling every thirty-six years. Once a calm British trading outpost, Singapore today has nearly five million people and has become a throbbing services, technology, and financial hub for Southeast Asia. It is a global supplier of electronic components and runs the busiest port in the world, with over six hundred shipping lines. Despite having no oil to speak of, it is a major oil refining and distribution center. Singapore is also attracting major foreign investments in pharmaceuticals, medicine, and biotechnology. With a 2008 gross domestic product (GDP) of USD $192 billion, Singapore’s economy is bigger than those of the far more populous Philippines, Pakistan, and Egypt.
Geopolitically, Singapore has become one of the most globalized, stable, and prosperous countries in the world. Per capita income is over USD $50,000, higher than in the United States. It has a democratically elected government and ranks second in the world’s Index of Economic Freedom. 56 It is a member of the IMF, WTO, UNESCO, Interpol, and many other global institutions. Since the 1970s the performance of its sovereign wealth funds has been legendary. Through heavy global investments they’ve returned 4%-10% annually, growing a few humble millions into over USD $200 billion today.57
Singapore has learned to manage long-standing tensions between its main ethnic groups (Chinese, Malay, and Indian) and religions. Mass transit is abundant, clean, and energy-efficient.58 There are wonderful parks, theaters, and museums. Singapore’s health care is excellent and its life expectancies are the fourth-longest in the world (seventy-nine years for men and eighty-five years for women). Aggressive law enforcement—while also leading to complaints of excessive strictness and a sort of police-state authoritarianism— has made corruption, violent crime, and the trafficking of sex and drugs virtually nonexistent.
Singapore is a good example of how rapid population and economic growth, when properly managed, can grow a city that not only has a large economy but is also technologically advanced, culturally vibrant, and an enjoyable place to live. To borrow a name coined by my UCLA colleague Allen Scott,59 it is a shining
Rapid growth was matched by enhanced well-being. The quality of life improved for large numbers of people. Singapore succeeded from the perspective of not only growth, but also social development. . . . China’s momentous decision in 1978 to reverse five centuries of economic isolation was influenced in part by Deng Xiaoping’s visit to Singapore that year. His dream to “plant a thousand Singapores in China” sparked numerous delegations on study tours to the island. South Korea was impressed with Singapore’s success in overcoming corruption. The city-state’s mastery in keeping urban traffic flowing has fascinated officials from many countries, and its housing program is studied by planners from around the world. Dubai eyes Singapore continually. . . .
Unfortunately, there is no rule saying a city must be a nice place to live in order to attract fast population and economic growth. Parks, good governance, and smoothly flowing traffic are optional, not required. Sometimes cities grow at an astonishing rate, despite being hell on Earth.
Take Lagos, Nigeria. Like Singapore, Lagos is a coastal port city, is built on an island, and was once a British colony. It guards the mouth of a huge swampy lagoon and for centuries has been one of the most important trading ports of West Africa. Over the years it has variously exported slaves, ivory, peppers, and, most recently, oil. Like Singapore, Lagos also won its independence from Great Britain in 1960. Both cities are located a few degrees north of the equator in moist, tropical climates. Both are governed by civilian democracies, although Nigeria’s is still young and shaky after years of military rule.
Since independence, Lagos’ population has grown even faster than Singapore’s—averaging about 5% annually since 1960. Between 2000 and 2010 its population grew almost 50%, from 7.2 to 10.6 million people. Nigerians are pouring in from the surrounding countryside and villages because there is money to be made in Lagos. The city has now run out of room, filling up its island and spilling across congested bridges to penetrate more than fifteen miles inland. By the year 2025, Lagos is projected to grow another 50% to sixteen million people, making it the twelfth-largest city in the world. With a 2007 gross domestic product of about USD $220 billion—bigger even than Singapore’s—Lagos is the economic epicenter of Nigeria and indeed of the entire western African continent.
Similarities between the two cities end there. Unlike Singapore, Lagos has not handled its growing pains well. It is an overcrowded dystopia of traffic jams, squalor, corruption, murder, and disease. Per capita income averages around USD $2,200 per year. Millions live in boats without electricity or sanitation. Four out of ten women cannot read. Police are outnumbered, ineffective, and unpredictably dangerous. The physical infrastructure is simply
