Editing City (section)

=== United Nations System ===
[[File:World Bank building at Washington.jpg|thumb|The [[World Bank]] headquarters in [[Washington, D.C.]]]]
[[File:X World Assembly of Mayors - Quito (01).jpg|thumb|The World Assembly of Mayors at the [[Habitat III]] conference in [[Quito]]]]
The [[United Nations System]] has been involved in a series of events and declarations dealing with the development of cities during this period of rapid urbanization.
* The [[Habitat I]] conference in 1976 adopted the "Vancouver Declaration on Human Settlements" which identifies urban management as a fundamental aspect of [[economic development|development]] and establishes various principles for maintaining urban [[habitat]]s.<ref>"[https://web.archive.org/web/20040915005846/http://habitat.igc.org/vancouver/vp-intr.htm The Vancouver Action Plan]"; Approved at Habitat: United Nations Conference on Human Settlements, Vancouver, Canada; 31 May to 11 June 1976.</ref>
* Citing the Vancouver Declaration, the UN General Assembly in December 1977 authorized the United Nations Commission Human Settlements and the HABITAT Centre for Human Settlements, intended to coordinate UN activities related to housing and settlements.<ref name="Walker2005">{{Cite journal |last=Walker |first=Peter R. |year=2005 |title=Human Settlements and Urban Life: A United Nations Perspective |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1179/105307805807066329 |journal=Journal of Social Distress and the Homeless|volume=14 |issue=1–2 |pages=65–71 |doi=10.1179/105307805807066329 |s2cid=145470124 |issn=1053-0789|url-access=subscription }}</ref>
* The 1992 [[Earth Summit]] in [[Rio de Janeiro]] resulted in a set of international agreements including [[Agenda 21]] which establishes principles and plans for [[sustainable development]].<ref>{{cite journal | last=Satterthwaite | first=David | title=A new urban agenda? | journal=Environment and Urbanization | volume=28 | issue=1 | date=2016 | issn=0956-2478 | doi=10.1177/0956247816637501 | pages=3–12| bibcode=2016EnUrb..28....3S }}</ref>
* The [[Habitat II]] conference in 1996 called for cities to play a leading role in this program, which subsequently advanced the [[Millennium Development Goals]] and [[Sustainable Development Goals]].<ref name=Parnell />
* In January 2002 the UN Commission on Human Settlements became an umbrella agency called the [[United Nations Human Settlements Programme]] or UN-Habitat, a member of the [[United Nations Development Group]].<ref name=Walker2005 />
* The [[Habitat III]] conference of 2016 focused on implementing these goals under the banner of a "New Urban Agenda". The four mechanisms envisioned for effecting the New Urban Agenda are (1) national policies promoting integrated sustainable development, (2) stronger urban governance, (3) long-term integrated urban and territorial planning, and (4) effective financing frameworks.<ref name=Watson2016 /><ref>''[http://habitat3.org/the-new-urban-agenda/ New Urban Agenda] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210428073612/http://habitat3.org/the-new-urban-agenda/ |date=28 April 2021 }}'', Habitat III Secretariat, 2017; A/RES/71/256*; {{ISBN|978-92-1-132731-1}}; p. 15.</ref> Just before this conference, the [[European Union]] concurrently approved an "Urban Agenda for the European Union" known as the [[Pact of Amsterdam]].<ref name="Watson2016">{{Cite journal |last=Watson |first=Vanessa |date=November 2016 |title=Locating planning in the New Urban Agenda of the urban sustainable development goal |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1473095216660786 |journal=Planning Theory|volume=15 |issue=4 |pages=435–448 |doi=10.1177/1473095216660786 |s2cid=151556078 |issn=1473-0952|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

UN-Habitat coordinates the U.N. urban agenda, working with the [[UN Environmental Programme]], the [[UN Development Programme]], the [[Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights]], the [[World Health Organization]], and the [[World Bank]].<ref name=Walker2005 />

The [[World Bank]], a U.N. [[List of specialized agencies of the United Nations|specialized agency]], has been a primary force in promoting the Habitat conferences, and since the first Habitat conference has used their declarations as a framework for issuing loans for urban infrastructure.<ref name="Parnell">{{Cite journal |last=Parnell |first=Susan |year=2015 |title=Defining a Global Urban Development Agenda |url=https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0305750X15002508 |journal=World Development|volume=78 |pages=531–532 |doi=10.1016/j.worlddev.2015.10.028 |quote=Garnered by its interest in the urban poor the Bank, along with other international donors, became an active and influential participant in the Habitat deliberations, confirming both Habitat I and Habitat II's focus on 'development in cities' instead of the role of 'cities in development'.|url-access=subscription }}</ref> The bank's [[structural adjustment]] programs contributed to urbanization in the [[Third World]] by creating incentives to move to cities.<ref>[[Akin Mabogunje|Akin L. Mabogunje]], "A New Paradigm for Urban Development"; ''Proceedings of the World Bank Annual Conference on Development Economics 1991''. "Irrespective of the economic outcome, the regime of structural adjustment being adopted in most developing countries today is likely to spur urbanization. If structural adjustment actually succeeds in turning around economic performance, the enhanced gross domestic product is bound to attract more migrants to the cities; if it fails, the deepening misery—especially in the rural areas—is certain to push more migrants to the city."</ref><ref>John Briggs and Ian E.A. Yeboah, "[http://eprints.gla.ac.uk/169/1/Briggs,J_33.pdf Structural adjustment and the contemporary sub-Saharan African city] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181113035712/http://eprints.gla.ac.uk/169/1/Briggs,J_33.pdf |date=13 November 2018 }}"; ''Area'' 33(1), 2001.</ref> The World Bank and UN-Habitat in 1999 jointly established the [[Cities Alliance]] (based at the World Bank headquarters in Washington, D.C.) to guide policymaking, knowledge sharing, and [[Grant (money)|grant]] distribution around the issue of urban poverty.<ref>Claire Wanjiru Ngare, "[https://ruor.uottawa.ca/bitstream/10393/22844/3/Wanjiru_Claire_2012_researchpaper.pdf Supporting Learning Cities: A Case Study of the Cities Alliance] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304191410/http://www.ruor.uottawa.ca/bitstream/10393/22844/3/Wanjiru_Claire_2012_researchpaper.pdf |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/http://www.ruor.uottawa.ca/bitstream/10393/22844/3/Wanjiru_Claire_2012_researchpaper.pdf |archive-date=2022-10-09 |url-status=live |date=4 March 2016 }}"; master's thesis accepted at the University of Ottawa, April 2012.</ref> (UN-Habitat plays an advisory role in evaluating the quality of a locality's governance.)<ref name=Gupta2015p33 /> The Bank's policies have tended to focus on bolstering [[real estate]] markets through credit and technical assistance.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Frediani |first=Alexandre Apsan |year=2007 |title=Amartya Sen, the World Bank, and the Redress of Urban Poverty: A Brazilian Case Study |url=https://www.rrojasdatabank.info/urban/alexurbpov.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Journal of Human Development|volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=133–152 |doi=10.1080/14649880601101473 |s2cid=14934410 |issn=1464-9888 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180721104755/http://www.rrojasdatabank.info/urban/alexurbpov.pdf |archive-date=2018-07-21}}</ref>

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization ([[UNESCO]]) has increasingly focused on cities as key sites for influencing [[cultural governance]]. It has developed various city networks including the International Coalition of Cities against Racism and the Creative Cities Network. UNESCO's capacity to select [[World Heritage Site]]s gives the organization significant influence over [[cultural capital]], [[tourism]], and [[historic preservation]] funding.<ref name=DuxburyJeannotte2013 />