Cities and Environmental Change

William Solecki (Ph.D. Geography) has studied the interaction of urbanization and climate change for almost thirty years. He has served as an author on several Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessments and is a co-founder of the Urban Climate Change Research Network (UCCRN). He is a Fellow of the American Association of Geographers.

'Part of the fascination of urbanization is the ability of urban places to simultaneously be a source of crisis, and also its solutions. Solecki's analysis brings this tension to the fore. He helps the reader to scrutinise trajectories of urban risk and resilience as expressions of imbalance in power, knowledge and action. This is an important book for all those interested in the progressive potential - and wary of the regressive danger - of cities: students, scholars, policy makers and committed city dwellers. This is a guide to understanding the forces shaping who wins and losses (including the non-human), in struggles for sustainability across the urbanized world we are making together.' Mark Pelling, University College London

• Foreword Debra Roberts; Acknowledgments; Part I. Framing Chapters: 1. Setting climate change within the narrative of urban environmental crises and transformation; 2. Why do cities face environmental crises?; 3. What about cities make them places for environmental problem solving?; 4. Framing how urban systems change; Part II. Application Case Chapters: 5. Natural resource supply and scarcity: securing urban drinking water; 6. Environment degradation and quality: urban air quality; 7. Public health: disease and epidemics; 8. Environmental risk and hazards: acute and chronic events; 9. Resource use efficiency and pathways to environmental sustainability: the three R's (reduce, reuse, recycle); 10. Mobility, Livability and Sustainability: Balancing economics, ecology, and equity; Part III. Synthesis Chapters: 11. Urban environmental crises and policy transitions; 12. Opportunities to advance environmental policy transitions and transformative climate action; References; Index.