Preindustrial cities

(noun)

While ancient cities may have arisen organically as trading centers, preindustrial cities evolved to become well defined political units.

Related Terms

Examples of Preindustrial cities in the following topics:

  • Preindustrial Cities

    • Preindustrial cities had important political and economic functions and evolved to become well-defined political units.
    • London is an example of a city that was well established in the preindustrial era as a political and economic center.
    • While ancient cities may have arisen organically as trading centers, preindustrial cities evolved to become well defined political units, like today's states.
    • Not all cities grew to become major urban centers.
    • Examine the growth of preindustrial cities as political units, as well as how trade routes allowed certain cities to expand and grow

  • Neighborhood

    • In some preindustrial urban traditions, basic municipal functions such as protection, social regulation of births and marriages, cleaning, and upkeep are handled informally by neighborhoods and not by urban governments; this pattern is well documented for historical Islamic cities.
    • Neighborhoods in preindustrial cities often had some degree of social specialization or differentiation.
    • Ethnic enclaves were important in many past cities and remain common in cities today.
    • This was a continual process for preindustrial cities in which migrants tended to move in with relatives and acquaintances from their rural past.
    • This image is of Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City.

  • Preindustrial Societies: The Birth of Inequality

  • The Earliest Cities

    • Mesopotamian cities included Eridu, Uruk, and Ur.
    • Early cities also arose in the Indus Valley and ancient China.
    • Some ancient cities grew to be powerful capital cities and centers of commerce and industry, situated at the centers of growing ancient empires.
    • Why did cities form in the first place?
    • Cities may have held other advantages, too.

  • Shrinking Cities and Counter-Urbanization

    • In developed countries, people are able to move out of cities while maintaining many of the advantages of city life because improved communications and means of transportation.
    • White flight during the post-war period contributed to urban decay, a process whereby a city, or part of a city, falls into disrepair and decrepitude.
    • Thus, suburbs were built—smaller cities located on the edges of a larger city, which often include residential neighborhoods for those working in the area.
    • Around 1990, another trend emerged, called exurbanization: upper class city dwellers moved out of the city, beyond the suburbs, to live in high-end housing in the countryside.
    • Baltimore, Maryland is an example of a shrinking American city.

  • Industrial Cities

    • During the industrial era, cities grew rapidly and became centers of population growth and production.
    • During the industrial era, cities grew rapidly and became centers of population and production.
    • In 1800, only 3% of the world's population lived in cities.
    • Rapid growth brought urban problems, and industrial-era cities were rife with dangers to health and safety.
    • The greatest killer in the cities was tuberculosis (TB).

  • New State Spaces

    • One of the most prominent theories in this field is that of global cities.
    • A global city is a city that is central to the global economic system, such as New York or London.
    • The most complex and central cities are known as global cities.
    • Not only are global cities important economically, but they are also politically unique.
    • In some ways, global cities are more intimately connected to the global economic system and to other global cities than they are to surrounding regions or national settings.

  • U.S. Urban Patterns

    • For example, city governments often use political boundaries to delineate what counts as a city.
    • Different definitions may also set various thresholds, so that in some cases, a town of just 2,500 may count as an urban city, whereas in other contexts, a city may be defined as having at least 50,000 people.
    • Because this definition does not consider political boundaries, it is often used as a more accurate gauge of the size of a city than the number of people who live within the city limits.
    • For example, the city of Greenville, South Carolina has a city population under 60,000 and an urbanized area population of over 300,000, while Greensboro, North Carolina has a city population over 200,000 and an urbanized area population of around 270,000.
    • In the United States, the largest urban area is New York City, with over 8 million people within the city limits and over 19 million in the urban area.

  • The Process of Urbanization

    • Consequently, huge numbers of rural dwellers migrated to Mexico City, making it an extremely densely populated city of nearly 9 million.
    • Urbanization is the process of a population shift from rural areas to cities.
    • Growing cities also alter the environment.
    • In developed countries, people are able to move out of cities while still maintaining many of the advantages of city life (for instance, improved communications and means of transportation).
    • Suburbs, which are residential areas on the outskirts of a city, were less crowded and had a lower cost of living than cities.

  • Urban Decline

    • Urban decline is the process whereby a previously functioning city or neighborhood falls into disrepair.
    • In many countries outside of the West, urban decline manifests as peripheral slums at the outskirts of cities.
    • In contrast, in North American and British cities, the impoverished areas begin to develop in the city center as individuals relocate their residences to suburban areas outside of the city.
    • Cities tend to grow because of momentary economic booms.
    • Many cities used city taxes to build new infrastructure in remote, racially-restricted suburban towns.