- The Impact of Globalization on the Cities of Southern Africa: A Case Study of Cultural Identity and spatial Segragation in the Port Elizabeth Metropolitan Area   45 kb by    Mc Lachlan, Gavin & null, null & null, null | gavin@upe.ac.za    Short Outline Abstract sent by fax and inserted by ISoCaRP 1. What is the case study about? The impact of globalisation on the culturally and racially complex cities of Southern Africa. 2. What makes it interesting for participants? The impact of globalisation on the unique mixed European and African cities of Southern Africa. The impact of globalisation on African people who are recent urban immigrants. The pervasive and far-flung influence of the global economy. 3. Sketch how I envisage presenting the content. The paper will deal with the following topics. The broad context of Southern Africa and its cities, the broad context of the Port Elizabeth metropolitan area and of the communities that live there. The impact of the global economy and its information systems on the various communities will be described and assessed, especially its spatial impact, which has been dramatic. Culturally all communities have been changed by contact with the materialism and values of the global economy. The rapid decline in traditional culture once old traditional ideas are challenged by contemporary information, and the local increase in crime seem here to be related. Spatially, the segregated patterns inherited from the apartheid era have generated certain privatopias in parts of the city while in other parts a new urbanism is emerging. The old urbanism of Euro-Africans engaging with the new urbanism of Africa itself. The spiral of information and the global economy changing all. Rich and poor co-exist in mutual exclusion and new urban elements are introduced with little insight into their full impact. Informal settlements mired in poverty near to glistening shopping malls, Shell and BP filling stations and McDonalds fast food outlets. In these cities a new urban form is being born with all the attendant birth pains of the global economy. A live birth or stillborn, that is the question? 4. How are you involved in it personally? As planner/architect, academic and citizen; through practice, research and teaching. Abstract Globalization has effected cities in Southern Africa in many ways. The case study of Port Elizabeth is used to chart some of these changes. Globalization is effecting the cities economy, its social and cultural life, its political realization and its physical form. The implications for cities in Southern Africa include economic pressure favouring coastal cities, the hastening demise of traditional life, the loosening of the grip of the State and the growth of competitive urban regions. Keywords - Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2001: Honey, I Shrunk the Space   Click to open the full paper as pdf document   Click to send an email to the author(s) of this paper