Editorial 5..8

As this issue goes to print, our Journal of Town & City Management celebrates its first birthday. Since June 2010, not much has changed in the world . . . or has it? In our special editorial with views from JTCM’s Editorial Board on international trends in city management, few could have predicted quite what a test the European Union would face in terms of the credibility of its currency with the rescue of the Greek, Irish and then Portuguese economies — and the saga of rescue packages may not be over yet. Neither would they have forecast the key strategic energy supply dilemmas raised worldwide by the major incident occurring at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant as a result of the devastating 9.0 magnitude Japanese earthquake and tsunami, which almost coincided rather morbidly with the date of the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. We can also mention the new ceilings broken by the price of a barrel of Brent crude as a result of rising demand from China and popular uprisings in much of north Africa and parts of the Middle East, or the yet-to-beestablished global security fallout of the recent capture and death of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan. Given the pace of changes experienced by the world in the last twelve months but, more crucially, their magnitude, it may be tempting for some thinkers to air rather apocalyptic views of the future for major North American cities, including San Francisco, Phoenix, Memphis, New Orleans and Cincinnati. Laurence Smith, for instance, reminds us in his book ‘The New North’ that, given current trends, the expected demand for oil in 2030 will require the discovery of the equivalent of nine Saudi Arabias; China will have become the world’s largest economy by 2050 (followed by the USA and India); Japan will have 13 people of working age for every 10 retired people; and global warming will lead to a complete thaw of the permafrost in the Arctic circle to free the Arctic of sea ice and open up major sea trading routes across the north of the United States, Canada, Russia, Iceland, Greenland, Norway, Sweden and Finland, with the stage set for a dramatic growth in population and local economies in these regions. It is in times of flux like these that it is often wise to reflect on the past and carry out a certain level of soul searching with regards to strategic priorities for the future. Behind the apocalyptic rhetoric of some thinkers, there is an easily understood anxiety that most of us can empathise with, particularly as the recovery from the world’s financial crisis of 2008 continues in the West at a feeble and rather unconvincing pace, particularly in the UK and the USA. This also provides a good chance to reflect critically about the modern status quo of our towns and cities however. The papers in this issue of the