This is an empirical paper that measures and interprets changes in intercity relations at the global scale in the period 2000-08. It draws on the network model devised by the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) research group to measure global connectivities for 132 cities across the world in...

Central place hierarchies have been the traditional basis for understanding external urban relations. However, in contemporary studies of these relations, a new emphasis on urban networks has emerged. Rather than either abandoning or extending central place thinking, it is here treated as...

There is a consensus in China that industrialization, urbanization, globalization and information technology will enhance China’s urban competitiveness. We have developed a methodology for the analysis of urban competitiveness that we have applied to China’s 25 principal cities...

A number of researchers have recently tried to map the contours of a transnational urban network. Although these empirical studies have great merits in making a closer connection to theoretical ideas on a genuine urban network, they sometimes fail to recognise that the whole idea of cities as...

This article presents an analysis of the determinants of connectivity change in the world city network (WCN). Drawing on the theoretical research of Saskia Sassen and the subsequent empirical research of the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) group, connectivity in the WCN is measured through...