Rankings and lists for cities appear weekly covering most every conceivable topic, yet in an increasingly interconnected and competitive global economy, are they mere booster-dressing or do they provide something more substantial? In the case of the Global Power City Index (GPCI), issued annually by the Institute for Urban Strategies at the Mori Memorial Foundation in Tokyo, the aim is for the latter. GPCI project managers hope that their list is not merely a power ranking, but rather a tool that identifies elements city leaders can use to establish strategies and create policies to help a city achieve its full potential.
Using a scorecard based on six core fields that the project managers refer to as functions—Economy, R & D, Cultural Interaction, Livability, Ecology & Natural Environment, and Accessibility—the GPCI ranks 35 world cities in a composite list as well as within each function category. Each of the six core functions relies on indicators, e.g., the function labeled as economy utilizes four indicators: market attractiveness, economic vitality, business environment, and regulations and risks. Each indicator in turn possesses its own roster of sub-indicators that inform the indicator. A total of 69 indicators (53 statistical and 13 based on a questionnaire survey) inform the six functions. The GPCI then ranks each city based on five types of users that the project managers refer to as actors—Manager, Researcher, Artist, Visitor, and Resident.
New York, London, Paris, and Tokyo emerge as the top four cities according to the GPCI-2010, and a sizable gap exists between these four and the remaining 31 cities on the list. However, within each of the six core functions, some interesting variations appear as cities lower on the composite list skyrocket within specific functions.
New York is number one for Economy, but Beijing is fourth even though it occupies the 24th slot in the composite list. New York also dominates R&D, but Boston (21st on the composite), comes in fourth. London triumphs in Cultural Interaction and Paris ascends in Accessibility, while Vancouver (16th on the composite list) and Zurich (12th), lead in Livability and Ecology & Natural Environment, respectively. From the actor perspective, London is number one for Managers and Visitors, New York for Researchers, and Paris for Artists and Residents. The GPCI is not the definitive list as cities are far more complex than six core functions and six types of actors, but it does provide interesting insight that can help a city assess its strengths and weaknesses.
See, Global Power City Index - 2010, for a complete list and description of the rankings of cities.
The “Global Power City Index - 2010" session was moderated by Takayuki Kubo, Senior Researcher, Institute for Urban Strategies, the Mori Memorial Foundation. The panelists were Hiroo Ichikawa, Dean, Professional Graduate School Meiji University; Takayuki Kubo, Senior Researcher, Institute for Urban Strategies, the Mori Memorial Foundation; and, Hiroo Mori, Senior Managing Director, Mori Building Company, Ltd.
