Global cities' competitiveness factors among the Asian countries This article identifies the factors of global cities' competitiveness, focusing on Asian countries. First, it describes the importance of global cities in the economy, particularly those competiveness factors, which are originated from spatial concentration, which can be implemented in the development strategy, or considering the negative externalities, which should be avoided or at least handle them to reach sustainability. In the next phase we describe the various methodologies applied for measuring competitiveness. The third part of the study covers the detailed description of the Asian global cities' competitive characteristics. We focus on the globalization, the economics growth and competitiveness; we also mention key factors, like tourism. Considering history cities have always played a determining role in the economy of a country, so do they in nowadays society. The world population in cities keeps on growing, the metropolis areas have become the centers of innovation and development, that is why their analysis is appropriate. Regional economics has been dealing with the question of cities for a long time, which has become an emphasized research field. The focus is on the spatial concentration, their integrated economy, the capital and the information. In our century a determining part of the population is townsman, where the service sector is dominant. The concentration of consumer - and labor market can be experienced in megacities: the local extern effects generate economic advantages, while the transportation costs shrink. The competition between cities has become fierce: the biggest cities try to attract transnational companies and FDI. A complex analysis of the cities' competitiveness contributes to the establishment of economic, social and environmental sustainability. As there is a pattern of global cities the network of cities has divided into two parts: the global cities spatial relations are integrated into the world economy and loose contact with the local and traditional smaller cities in their region. The smaller cities tend to be smaller, they are out of the economic circulation, and they are endangered by depletion. This road leads to social and economic inequality, the differences between the cities in and out of the global network grows dramatically. The goal of our study is to describe the various methodologies applied for measuring competitiveness, and to bring awareness to the challenges of the near-future caused by the developing, emerging Asian cities. Key words: competitveness, Asian global cities, urban externalities JEL codes: R11, Q19, Q56
