Detailed Program

Scope and guiding questions of the conference.

Megacities worldwide are an outstanding feature of urbanization and are culprits and victims of dramatic global change processes at the same time. They do not only involve unprecedented population growth and density, but also produce a complex variety of simultaneous and interacting processes and functions, for example the tremendous consumption of resources, the production of waste and pollution or social integration/disintegration. They turn the urban habitat into both a space of risk and a space of opportunity with consequences on the prospects for achieving urban sustainability.

• What does sustainable development mean for Megacities?
• What risks are associated with this trend towards  mega-urbanization and what are the driving forces behind it?
• How can we predict and describe the transformation of the complex risk habitat Megacity?
• How vulnerable is the mega-urban system and how  are risks distributed across cities and social groups?
• What strategies can steer the urban system towards  sustainable development and what institutional and  organizational preconditions need to be in place for effective implementation of these strategies?
• How can the interrelation of megacities with their hinterland and with global change processes be assessed and conceptualized?