Abstract
Second Cities challenges the “world cities” narrative and demonstrates that global cultural, political, and economic processes are best understood on the ground, can be observed in “lesser” urban centers, and shape local politics. Using a sociological framework, Hodos provides an innovative, engaging, and readable analysis of two cities—Philadelphia (United States) and Manchester (United Kingdom)—that have shared converging histories and common global trajectories. Specifically, the author charts how these cities that reside in the shadows of New York City and London have evolved over time and ultimately emerged in the 21st century as a critical type of urban center within the functional hierarchy of the World City Hypothesis (WCH). Although second cities may not be home to international finance or high culture, the book elegantly underscores that all cities are part of inherently integrated global communities linked to one another by people, capital, and ideas.
The introductory chapters frame the concept of “second cities” within the context of the WCH. Hodos accomplishes this through the skillful deployment of anecdotes, symbolic images, and hard data. For example, Hodos tells the story of Philadelphia’s failed bid to attract the United Nations (Chapter 1) and shares a photo of the Second National Bank (Chapter 2). Yet the strength of the book is the fashion in which storytelling is combined with data and social theory. Indeed, Hodos provides data-rich accounts of selected economic, demographic, cultural, and political attributes that clearly establish both Manchester and Philadelphia as major global centers. In doing so, the author demonstrates that the social construction of “second” cities has been the result of processes that began in the 1770s, concretized through the 1840s, and dramatically restructured throughout the latter half of the 20th century.
In contrast to world cities that are characterized by deep financial sectors, abundant corporate headquarters, and cultural elites, second cities properly lay claim to specialized industries, sizable flows of migrants, concentrated foreign direct investment, and dominant cultural forces that have shaped not only the cities themselves but also their countries and the world. Put succinctly, capital, people, and ideas connect second cities, their politics, and institutions to global structures. Thus, second cities play a critical role in the spatial division of labor, the global flow of capital, and the formation (and reproduction) of world culture(s).
The critical component of Hodos’s argument lies in the agency-afforded local institutions. To that end, Hodos references historical and contemporary institutions such as the Central Philadelphia Development Corporation and the Central Manchester Development Corporation to illustrate the agency-afforded cities in a global world. The relative economic success of second cities contradicts the WCH, which suggests “. . . globalization produces a serious and growing gap between places in terms of their economic success, ability to determine their own fate, and degree of [global] economic integration” (p. 46). Chapter 3 details how the regional economies of Manchester and Philadelphia have evolved over time, specialized, and concentrated foreign direct investment in strategic sectors—specifically manufacturing. The key to the success of these local economies lies in the ability of both Manchester and Philadelphia (and their associated politics) to adapt, change, and specialize.
Themes of change are reinforced in Chapters 4 (demographics) and 5 (culture). In Chapter 4, the author makes a compelling argument that second cities, like world cities benefit from demographic diversity. However, Hodos expands the definition of diversity to include internal ethnic constituencies, such as African Americans in Philadelphia and the Irish in Manchester, and to emphasize their unique urban demography. Indeed, the population dynamics of second cities, identity politics, intermittent ethnic conflict, and more recent absolute declines have served to mobilize local actors and create the conditions for a more global local politics that inevitably has been broadened to include regional partnerships. In terms of culture, Chapter 5 demonstrates the role of each city, their institutions, organizations, and ethnic neighborhoods in driving innovation, popular culture, and applied learning. For Hodos, second cities and their institutions are uniquely positioned to make major contributions to science, technology, the professions, and popular culture—thus becoming the global leaders of working class culture.
Chapter 6 titled “Municipal Foreign Policy: Planning for Global Integration” makes an interesting—if at times overstated—case for the importance of local or urban growth coalitions to ensure the maintained relevance of both Manchester and Philadelphia. Hodos argues that cities and their leaders actively cultivate international connectivity to enhance their overall place competitiveness. The chapter details the importance of early transportation networks and efforts of city leaders to deepen the connectivity of second cities to the global economy. For that reason, local politics need to not only be mindful of international connectivity but also to continue to invest and compete for public infrastructure investments at the national scale.
The closing chapters serve to crystallize the core argument that cities—all cities—matter in a world dominated by elite global cities. Chapter 7 focuses on the importance of “secondness” as a shared identity that drives local agents to compete (perhaps more effectively) for resources nationally and globally. According to Hodos, secondness is both materially and symbolically on display in the built environment, metropolitan politics, and cultural programming. Today, both cities have embraced the entrepreneurial brand of secondness in the international place market and continue to leverage the brand to maintain their status as provincial capitals. The final chapter closes with a summary of main themes and with the notion that globalization and urbanization are tandem, simultaneous, and mutually informing processes.
In the end, Second Cities is an enjoyable, albeit familiar read. Specifically, the book echoes the extensive entrepreneurial local politics literature, as well as research associated with the United Kingdom’s Changing Urban and Regional Systems (CURS) initiative (circa 1984). Additionally, I would note the book, although an effective comparative account of Manchester and Philadelphia, is at times more about Philadelphia than it is Manchester per se—which is a common but difficult (if not impossible) to avoid limitation of any comparative study particularly given the author’s acknowledged personal geography. Nevertheless, the book’s emphasis on migration, culture, and identity makes it a unique and innovative contribution insofar as it reformulates familiar themes and concepts from across the social sciences. Although no doubt some may find Hodos’s analysis a bit fuzzy or too case specific, the book’s thesis effectively provides an “urban agency” twist on the grand theory of globalization (p. 185). More important though, from the perspective of any practicing economic development professional, Second Cities suggests action on the ground matters and the dynamics of globalization are not simply unidirectional forces that structurally limit the horizons of economic development in places such as Tulsa, Terre Haute, Toledo, Tupelo, or even Tamworth. For more academic readers, the book’s novel refinement of big theory may inspire others to rethink the relationship between theory and practice. In short, Second Cities demonstrates that agency and sustained local action still count.