International and Transnational Perspectives on Urban Systems

Céline Rozenblat is professor of urban geography at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, and chair of the Urban Commission of the International Geographical Union (IGU). She develops studies of cities’ systems on a world scale, multinational firms’ networks, inter-urban dynamics, comparative urban data, mapping and visualization of networks in geography, and spatial analysis. Her research is mainly directed at the relations between local evolutions and networks dynamics into city systems. In a comparative perspective, she has built many databases on large European city samples and on world networks. In particular, since 1990 she had handled databases on localized multinational firms networks, on cities’ properties, and their evolution at the European and global levels in a multi-dimensional and long-term approach. Diachronic and dynamic studies supply materials to develop spatial and dynamic models and visualizations. For several years she has dealt with the relation betweennetworks’ developments and multi-level urban processes. She has participated in European projects such as ESPON FOCI 2008–2011, FP7 FET Insite (2011–2013) and Multiplex (2012–2016). She also participates in the EuropeAid project with China MEDIUM (2015–2019) on medium-size cities in China and recently has begun a new project, LOGIICCS (FNS 2015–2018), on the modelling of Indian and Chinese cities’ integration into global networks of multinational firms and innovation.

Denise Pumain is emeritus professor at the University Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne, and director of Cybergeo, European Journal of Geography . She was chair of the Commission on Urban Development and Urban Life of the International Geographical Union (1992–2000) and director of the European Research Group “Spatial Simulations for Social Sciences” at CNRS. She specialized in urban modeling and theoretical geography. Her main scientific contribution regards building an evolutionary theory of urban systems and transferring concepts and models from self-organizing complex systems towards social sciences.

She has received several academic awards (e.g., International Prize for Geography Vautrin Lud 2010; Corresponding member of the Austrian Academy of Science; Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy; an honorary doctorate in Lausanne and Liège Universities) and is holder of an ERC Advanced Grant (2010–2016). In her ERC-funded research she is looking at city system dynamics in the world by analyzing and modeling the geographical diversity of cities and systems of cities.

Dr. Elkin Velásquez Monsalve is the director of the Regional Office for the Caribbean and Latin America (ROLAC), UN-Habitat, in Rio de Janeiro. He is co-leading a coalition of regional partners towards enabling the implementation of the New Urban Agenda in LAC, particularly promoting a new Ecosystem of Funds for Sustainable Urban Development. Before this appointment in 2013, he served as leader of the Regional and Metropolitan Planning Unit in the Urban Planning and Design Branch at UN-Habitat HQ in Nairobi.

He is a native of Colombia. Having studied public administration at the ENA (French National School of Public Administration), he obtained his Ph.D. in geography, specializing in territorial policy and planning, at the University of Grenoble (France). He also did graduate work in engineering at the School of Mines, National University of Colombia in Medellín.

Since 2009 he has led important global programs: He was UN-Habitat senior manager in the Nairobi HQ. In addition to work with the Regional and Metropolitan Planning Unit, he was chief of the Urban Governance Section from 2010 to 2011, and he was coordinator of the Safer Cities Program from 2009 to 2011. He also was responsible for the Gender Unit and established the flagship Initiative on National Urban Policies.

His vast experience includes working in Argentina, Bolivia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, France, West Indies, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru, and Venezuela. He also extensively backstopped and advised on projects in Africa and Asia on the New Urban Agenda, particularly on metropolitan planning and a new generation of national urban policies.