Public Lecture by Ben Derudder

Australian Cities in the World City Network, 2000-2016

A public lecture by Ben Derudder, Professor of Human Geography, Ghent University and 2016 Institute of Advanced Studies Short Stay Visiting Fellow.

In this public lecture, Dr Ben Derudder will use the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) research network’s state-of the-art methodology and tailored data gathering to present a large-scale analysis of the trajectories of individual cities and regions in the world city network between 2000 and 2016. The GaWC methodology examines cities’ evolving network centralities by examining how advanced producer services firms “interlock” cities through their worldwide distributions of offices. The analyses are thereby not limited to a set of putative “world cities”, but incorporate 259 cities from all world-regions into a comprehensive global urban analysis. Absolute, relative and standardized measures of change are developed to reveal the major dimensions of geographical shift in an increasingly urbanized global economy. In the overview of results, specific attention is given to the position of Australian cities. Finally, drawing on findings from a long-term research project conducted by The University of Western Australia’s School of Earth and Environment examining the impact of globalisation on Perth and the role of Australian cities in the world city network, the need for parallel approaches that are better tailored to understanding Australian cities will be discussed.

Ben Derudder is Professor of Human Geography at Ghent University’s Department of Geography, and an Associate Director of the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) research network. He has been a Marie Curie Fellow under the European Union’s H2020 Programme, and a Senior Visiting Professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Nanjing. His research focuses on the conceptualization and empirical analysis of world city networks, specifically its economic, transportation and production components. His work has been published in leading academic journals, and the second edition of World City Network: a Global Urban Analysis, arguably the key text in this scientific literature, was published earlier this year with Routledge (together with P. Taylor). He collaborates with researchers at The University of Western Australia’s School of Earth and Environment and the School of Geography Planning and Environmental Management at the University of Queensland to unpack the as yet poorly understood role of Australian cities in world city networks.

Professor Derudder is a 2016 Institute of Advanced Studies Short Stay Visiting Fellow. 

24 Nov: Masterclass with Professor Derudder - Disentangling Agglomeration and Network Externalities: typology and applications