Resumen de Mediterranean Cities, the Urban Dimension of the European Neighborhood Policy
Cities are home to the vast majority of people, energy consumption, and GDP production in the Mediterranean. They are crucial for the localization processes of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Cities play a growing role in international policy issues such as climate change mitigation, accommodation of migrants, and Track II diplomacy.
To intensify Euro-Mediterranean cooperation in a heterogeneous urban landscape across the Mediterranean divide, cities need to be brought on board.
Cities in the north of the Mediterranean have stronger traditions of municipal self-governance and autonomy. In some cities of the southern Mediterranean mayors are more akin to appointed civil servants with limited fiscal space and decision-making power.
The diversity and heterogeneity of international city networks has been recognized as a challenge and cities work to increase cooperation across institutional divides.
It is a matter of debate whether the current urbanization drive in developing countries and emerging markets can be interpreted as a positive developmental process or not.
If cities are exposed to negative side effects of economic globalization, they are also in a position to harvest some of its benefits
