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Network or Hierarchical Relations? A Plea for Redirecting Attention to the Control Functions of Global Cities

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  • Christof Parnreiter

Abstract

The paper discusses in a personal appreciation of the literature whether the ‘interlocking world city network model’ (IWCNM) has contributed to overcoming the evidential crisis of world or global city research. After a brief summary of the main arguments made by John Friedmann and Saskia Sassen, the paper deduces methodological implications that follow from their economic-geographical conceptualisation of global cities. In the third and fourth sections of the paper I recapitulate the rationale(s) given by Peter Taylor for the IWCNM and assess the model's contribution to empirically corroborating the global city concept. The paper's main claim is that the IWCNM bypasses the theoretical core of the global city paradigm, for which reason an evidential crisis continues to undermine the strength of the global city argument. Accordingly, in the last section of the paper a research strategy is proposed that is apt to take global city studies a step forward.

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  • Christof Parnreiter, 2014. "Network or Hierarchical Relations? A Plea for Redirecting Attention to the Control Functions of Global Cities," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG, vol. 105(4), pages 398-411, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:tvecsg:v:105:y:2014:i:4:p:398-411
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    1. Piotr Raźniak & György Csomós & Sławomir Dorocki & Anna Winiarczyk-Raźniak, 2021. "Exploring the Shifting Geographical Pattern of the Global Command-and-Control Function of Cities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(22), pages 1-15, November.
    2. Thomas J Sigler & Kirsten Martinus, 2017. "Extending beyond ‘world cities’ in World City Network (WCN) research: Urban positionality and economic linkages through the Australia-based corporate network," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 49(12), pages 2916-2937, December.
    3. Allan Watson & Jonathan V. Beaverstock, 2014. "World City Network Research at a Theoretical Impasse: On the Need to Re-Establish Qualitative Approaches to Understanding Agency in World City Networks," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG, vol. 105(4), pages 412-426, September.
    4. Xingjian Liu & Ben Derudder & Frank Witlox & Michael Hoyler, 2014. "Cities As Networks within Networks of Cities: The Evolution of the City/Firm-Duality in the World City Network, 2000–2010," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG, vol. 105(4), pages 465-482, September.
    5. Ozgur Sayin, 2022. "Istanbul: A Global, but Still Industrial, City," Journal of Economy Culture and Society, Istanbul University, Faculty of Economics, vol. 65(65), pages 329-349, June.
    6. Michiel Van Meeteren & David Bassens, 2016. "World Cities and the Uneven Geographies of Financialization: Unveiling Stratification and Hierarchy in the World City Archipelago," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(1), pages 62-81, January.
    7. Christof Parnreiter, 2019. "Global cities and the geographical transfer of value," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 56(1), pages 81-96, January.
    8. Parnreiter Christof, 2017. "Global Cities, globale Wertschöpfungsketten und wirtschaftliche Governance: konzeptionelle Überlegungen und eine Untersuchung der Rolle Mexico Citys," ZFW – Advances in Economic Geography, De Gruyter, vol. 61(2), pages 65-79, September.

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