Location theory in reverse? Location for global production in the IT industry of Bangalore

This paper is a detailed study of the location history of eight software and information technology (IT) enabled service firms, with varying attributes such as age of firm, type of work undertaken, and ownership sited in the southern Indian city of Bangalore. These cases are used to relate urban restructuring occurring in the city of Bangalore to the strategic shifting of location of firms within the urban fabric. While IT firms cannot be strictly classified as producer services, it is possible to contextualise their location decisions in terms of other office-based economic activities, such as producer services. Findings from the case studies are examined in relation to urban growth theories of the 1980s and 90s, which were related to an expansion of the service sector in advanced economies. The literature discussed in this paper explains the role of growth in producer services in suburbanisation of office space and the development of ‘edge cities’ and ‘suburban downtowns’ as alternatives to and in competition with traditional city centres. Studies of office location and contact patterns indicate the retention of management functions in the CBDs, with a consequent relocation of routine office operations to these suburban office spaces. The findings from the firms studied in Bangalore indicate a reverse pattern of peripheralisation of control functions and a retention of routine production functions in the core urban areas. The limited need for face-to-face contacts with actors in the local urban economy and the export-related output of this offshore industry are contributors to this apparent reversal of location dynamics. The paper briefly concludes with directions for future research on such specialised service production activity that is often being located in cities of developing countries, and its impact on the urban structure of these cities.

Location theory in reverse? Location for global production in the IT industry of Bangalore

This paper is a detailed study of the location history of eight software and information technology (IT) enabled service firms, with varying attributes such as age of firm, type of work undertaken, and ownership sited in the southern Indian city of Bangalore. These cases are used to relate urban restructuring occurring in the city of Bangalore to the strategic shifting of location of firms within the urban fabric. While IT firms cannot be strictly classified as producer services, it is possible to contextualise their location decisions in terms of other office-based economic activities, such as producer services. Findings from the case studies are examined in relation to urban growth theories of the 1980s and 90s, which were related to an expansion of the service sector in advanced economies. The literature discussed in this paper explains the role of growth in producer services in suburbanisation of office space and the development of `edge cities' and `suburban downtowns' as alternatives to and in competition with traditional city centres. Studies of office location and contact patterns indicate the retention of management functions in the CBDs, with a consequent relocation of routine office operations to these suburban office spaces. The findings from the firms studied in Bangalore indicate a reverse pattern of peripheralisation of control functions and a retention of routine production functions in the core urban areas. The limited need for face-to-face contacts with actors in the local urban economy and the export-related output of this offshore industry are contributors to this apparent reversal of location dynamics. The paper briefly concludes with directions for future research on such specialised service production activity that is often being located in cities of developing countries, and its impact on the urban structure of these cities

A Global ‘Urban Roller Coaster’? Connectivity Changes in theWorld City Network, 2000–2004

A global "urban roller coaster"? Connectivity changes in the world city network, 2000–2004, Regional Studies. A network model is used to assess the nature of change in intercity relations from 2000 to 2004. Data are collected for 2004 on the office networks of the same global service firms that were used to describe global connectivities for 315 cities in 2000. This allows a new cross-sectional geography of connectivities to be produced for 2004, and for changes in connectivities between 2000 and 2004 to be computed. Simple visualization and statistical techniques are used to explore the data. A distinction is made between "normal change" and "exceptional change" and only two cases of the latter are definitely identified: cities in both the USA and sub-Saharan Africa are generally losing global connectivity in relation to the rest of the world. Thus "normal change" predominates and the paper concludes that contemporary intercity change does not correspond to Castells’ image of an "urban roller coaster"

Exploring the Impact of Complex Multi-Level Governance Structures on the Societal Contribution of Universities to Knowledge-Based Urban Development

The current debate aims to reconceptualize the changing role and missions of the university in today’s knowledge economy and investigate how universities’ knowledge resources can benefit urban development and inform the direction of changes in universities. However, there is a lack of empirical studies exploring how governance networks and the institutional conditions of universities in specific contexts can support, limit and/or incentivize the integration of academic activities into societal development. There is a discussion of the various and paradoxical components of university transformation (institutional and physical), affecting their societal contribution, which conceptualizes a holistic and integrated approach towards governance that previously has not been fully investigated. This paper will examine the co-location case of university campuses in Trondheim to explore the implications of a multilevel governance network for achieving the goals of sustainable and knowledge-based urban development. This paper suggests that engineering effective governance is challenging and that factors related to the culture of the institution and their connecting strategies, government priorities, and temporal factors have a great influence on universities’ contribution to their societies. While investigating governance in this topic requires political, cultural, and periodic review, focusing on the interactions of governance multi-layers, this paper concludes that governments’ control functions or some moderate hierarchical coordination is necessary to avoid the failure of university governance and unbalanced societal contributions

Experiential learning and reflection through video in field-based learning.

The first semester of the master program Urban Ecological Planning consists of extensive fieldwork and deep learning. Studying informal settlements of Indian cities require that students think action and are able to reflect upon own experiences. Sensory impressions represent a significant part of the students’ experience, and the course facilitators need to support reflection in an intense and challenging context. The students’ role as outsiders, their ambition to make a difference, and their professional role as future urban planners are challenged when meeting the realities of citizens in Bhopal, India. In fall 2018, a group of students stayed behind in Trondheim to do their fieldwork in the area Lademoen. As an educational experiment, we encouraged the students to not only reflect upon their experiences through written words on paper, but also to try to communicate and reflect visually, and deliver their reflections as videos. The results were beyond our expectations; the students delivered high quality short videos, showing how they interpreted their experiences, the course and the learnings about the communities in which they spent days, weeks and months together with. The students also explained that as they were filming and editing the videos, the process itself ‘did something’ to the way they saw the complexity of the problems in front of them and how they made sense of the whole. This suggests that video reflections can help students complete the cycle of experiential learning[1], something that can help them move towards a stage where it becomes easier for them to act based on their learning.status: Published onlin

Reconciling goals of social and physical sustainability: an examination of spatial dimension of social integration in Trondheim, Norway

Book of proceedings: Annual AESOP Congress, Spaces of Dialog for Places of Dignity, Lisbon, 11-14th July, 2017The paper presents preliminary findings from the first phase of a research project that is aimed at investigating the policy for decentralised local centers (commercial and transport hubs) in the city of Trondheim and an expressed goal of creating inclusive spaces at sub city level, while achieving a reduction in transport related greenhouse gas emissions. We use the case of social integration of refugees in the city of Trondheim to examine the potential of the planned local centers in achieving the expressed goal of creating a sustainable and inclusive city. We situate ourselves in the debate on social integration in the spatial domain viz. social mix versus segregation (Cole and Goodchild, 2001, Fincher et al, 2014 etc.) and the value of creating spaces of encounters (Fincher et al. 2014, Gressgård and Jensen 2015) to study the patterns of interaction among refugee groups in the city and their use of space in the local neighborhoods/ centers for such interactions. We relate these preliminary findings to the plans and policies of the Trondheim Municipality - both spatial and social welfare policies, to contribute to the debates on the role of spatial planning to promote social integration in increasingly diverse medium size cities in Europe. Municipal policy on integration of refugees in Trondheim is limited to the formal and structural aspects of society, while leaving the relational, interactional and cultural aspects to unplanned arenas and selfinitiative by the refugees. There have been some efforts to represent the cultural diversity of the city through food and cultural festivals, with limited outcomes. As is illustrated by our preliminary investigations, most informants experience a sense of alienation and isolation, and interactions are limited to people of similar cultural backgrounds and other refugees, mainly in central locations. One of the main findings discussed in the paper is that refugees experience a sense of isolation in the neighborhoods they are housed in by the Municipality, raising questions to the efficacy of the policies of social mixing followed in Trondheim. We also find that spaces of social encounters in the local area have only limited potential to facilitate long lasting contact between the refugees and the host population, unless more targeted efforts for social network building is undertaken. The window of opportunity of the first five years of the ‘Introduction program’ of the Municipality are critical owing to the close contact refugees have to State authorities. Disregarding the importance of the living environment and social links and bonds in the local community, is a shortcoming in the integration efforts of the Municipality, one which can be easily addressed. In conclusion, the paper raises questions for scholarship on the spatial dimensions of social integration, some of which will be investigated further in the current project.Published versio

Transformative learning of participation in urban planning in tertiary education - the role of visual methods

Participation has become a buzzword in urban development projects. While it is generally accepted as a cornerstone of inclusive development, it often remains a hollow concept: no more than a box ticked in a directive approach, limited to project level informing or consultation instead of actual citizen engagement and empowerment. At the same time, visual methods are considered crucial in participatory urban planning. However, limited research is done on the crucial competencies in participatory and visual methods in urban planning to ensure inclusion of harder-to-reach voices. Therefor this study investigates the role of visual methods in transformative tertiary learning in participatory urban planning. We study how students performing a 3-month urban planning fieldwork in India build competency in participation through visual methods as part of the master program in Urban Ecological Planning at NTNU. Drawing on the perspectives of thoughts, feelings and behavior, we perform a meta-reflection based on students’ reflections and final reports. Building on previous research on this educational fieldwork, we present a worked example of the use of visual methods to study three different neighborhoods in the city of Panaji, India. Our findings indicate that visual methods are a powerful tool in conducting educational urban fieldwork with the objective to enhance a transformation in students. Empirical evidence illustrates that the visual methods do not only result in richer data collection and a deeper engagement with participants, but they also prove to be a valuable tool for reflection and stepping stones for the transformative learning process. The findings can inform teaching and facilitate further fieldwork.status: Published onlin

A Global 'Urban Roller Coaster'? Connectivity Changes in the World City Network, 2000-2004

Taylor P. J. and Aranya R. A global 'urban roller coaster'? Connectivity changes in the world city network, 2000-2004, Regional Studies. A network model is used to assess the nature of change in intercity relations from 2000 to 2004. Data are collected for 2004 on the office networks of the same global service firms that were used to describe global connectivities for 315 cities in 2000. This allows a new cross-sectional geography of connectivities to be produced for 2004, and for changes in connectivities between 2000 and 2004 to be computed. Simple visualization and statistical techniques are used to explore the data. A distinction is made between 'normal change' and 'exceptional change' and only two cases of the latter are definitely identified: cities in both the USA and sub-Saharan Africa are generally losing global connectivity in relation to the rest of the world. Thus 'normal change' predominates and the paper concludes that contemporary intercity change does not correspond to Castells' image of an 'urban roller coaster'. [image omitted] Taylor P. J. et ARANYA R. Des 'montagnes russes urbaines' mondiales? Les changements de la connectivite du reseau de grandes villes a l'echelle mondiale, Regional Studies. On se sert d'un modele de reseau pour evaluer le caractere du changement dans les rapports intervilles de 2000 a 2004. On recueillit des donnees pour 2004 aupres des reseaux de bureau pour les services aux entreprises mondialises qui ont ete employes afin de decrire la connectivite mondiale de 315 grandes villes en 2000. Cela permet la realisation d'une nouvelle geographie transversale de la connectivite pour 2004 et le calcul des changements de la connectivite entre 2000 et 2004. On emploie de simples techniques de visualisation et statistiques pour examiner les donnees. On fait une distinction entre le 'changement normal' et le 'changement exceptionnel', et on n'identifie indubitablement que deux cas de ce dernier: en regle generale, les grandes villes aux Etats-Unis et en Afrique-Noire perdent de la connectivite mondiale par rapport au reste du monde. Ainsi, le 'changement normal' predomine et on conclut que le changement interville contemporain ne correspond pas a l'image des 'montagnes russes urbaines' d'apres Castells. Mondialisation Grandes villes a l'echelle mondiale Reseau de villes a l'echelle mondiale Changement mondial Taylor P. J. und Aranya R. 'Eine weltweite ,urbane Achterbahn'? Anderungen im Weltstadt-Netzwerk, 2000-04, Regional Studies. Mit Hilfe eines Netzwerkmodells bewerten wir die Art der Veranderungen in zwischenstadtischen Beziehungen im Zeitraum von 2000 bis 2004. Erfasst wurden Daten des Jahres 2004 uber die Niederlassungsnetzwerke derselben weltweit tatigen Dienstleistungsfirmen, die im Jahr 2000 zur Beschreibung der weltweiten Verknupfungen fur 315 Stadte genutzt wurden. Hierdurch konnte eine neue, sektionsubergreifende Geografie der Verknupfungen fur 2004 erstellt werden, und die Veranderungen der Verknupfungen zwischen 2000 und 2004 liessen sich berechnen. Zur Analyse der Daten kamen einfache Visualisierungs- und Statistiktechniken zum Einsatz. Unterschieden wurde zwischen einer ,einfachen' und einer ,aussergewohnlichen' Veranderung; von der letzteren liessen sich nur zwei Falle definitiv identifizieren: Die Stadte in den USA und im subsaharischen Afrika verlieren generell an weltweiten Verknupfungen im Verhaltnis zum Rest der Welt. Die ,normalen' Veranderungen herrschen also vor, und wir ziehen den Schluss, dass zeitgenossische zwischenstadtische Veranderungen nicht Castells' Bild einer ,urbanen Achterbahn' entsprechen. Globalisierung Weltstadte Weltstadt-Netzwerk Globale Veranderung Taylor P. J. y Aranya R. Una 'montana rusa urbana' global? Cambios de conexion en la Red Urbana Mundial, 2000-04, Regional Studies. Con ayuda de un modelo de redes evaluamos la naturaleza de cambio en las relaciones interurbanas de 2000 a 2004. Recogimos datos para 2004 en las redes de oficinas de las mismas empresas de servicios globales que se utilizaron para describir las conexiones mundiales para 315 ciudades en 2000. Esto nos permite crear una nueva geografia transversal de conexiones para 2004 y calcular los cambios en las conexiones entre 2000 y 2004. Para explorar estos datos utilizamos tecnicas sencillas de visualizacion y estadistica. Se distingue entre 'cambio normal' y 'cambio excepcional' y solo dos casos de este ultimo se han identificado de modo definitivo: las ciudades en los Estados Unidos y en Africa subsahariana estan perdiendo normalmente conexion global con relacion al resto del mundo. De este modo predomina el 'cambio normal'. Terminamos argumentando que el cambio interurbano contemporaneo no se corresponde con la imagen que da Castells de un 'montana rusa urbana'. Globalizacion Ciudades del mundo Red urbana mundial Cambio globalGlobalization, World cities, World city network, Global change,