A planet of slums

The attachment ORIENTERING – "A Planet of Slums" (autumn 2022) reflects that new and targeted thinking and action must be taken both locally and globally when it comes to the megatrend of urbanisation. 18 richly illustrated articles, including photos by the world-renowned photographer Eduardo L. Moreno, show that our world is a world with many crises. Problems related to poverty, pandemics, war, conflict, climate, energy, food, flight, floods and fear are unfolding almost simultaneously on every continent. But they meet in the cities where population growth bursts all boundaries and creates connected urban corridors across national borders and regions. Poverty is the main driving force behind this ongoing urbanization of the periphery.

According to the EU's and the World Bank's definitions, the world is already 80% urbanised. Where people live and how many there are has consequences for how meetings with a crisis-ridden world are planned. Where and how are we going to build the new cities that will spring up on every continent in the coming decades. The cities' exponential growth means that the follow-up to the UN's sustainability goals will have an urban primary framework. It will involve more than the Sustainability Goals' proposal for nimble technological and organizational measures. "En Planet av Slum" shows with many of its proposals how that road should be built.

It is the first time in a Norwegian context that the breadth of global urban challenges is discussed in a magazine that ORIENTERING. The articles are characterized by innovative thinking and creativity that breaks with conforming "mainstream" communication.

The appendix reflects that new and targeted action must be taken both locally and globally by actors who have hardly done so before. In the absence of a state, urban-oriented foreign and development policy, the global work of Norwegian cities and regions becomes an important prerequisite for investing and securing transparent capital placements, promoting trade interests, bringing home industrial establishments and jobs, or winning cultural events.

Nowhere are people's safety, security and rights challenged to a greater extent and more permanently than in the world's cities. Neglecting and not being prepared for the urban challenges we face will have serious consequences.