How are our fates in society like hikers on a mountain, climbing together? In our ever increasingly interconnected world how can one balance the rewards of a connected planet against the perils that come with it?

Ian Goldin is an Oxford University Professor of Globalisation and Development, Senior Fellow at the Oxford Martin School, and the author of several books. His upcoming book is titled, Age of the City: Why our Future will be Won or Lost Together.

Greg and Ian discuss intertwined nature of global connectivity and the systematic risks it poses. Ian explains how pandemics, like COVID-19, highlight these vulnerabilities, emphasizing the need for global cooperation and resilience. Greg and Ian explore modern urbanization, emphasizing how the future is increasingly urban and the challenges and opportunities this presents for sustainability and community within cities. At the end Ian leaves us inspired to adopt global stewardship in our daily lives, in a lesson he learned working with Nelson Mandela.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Episode Quotes:

Is the future more urban?

39:55: Cities are going through a transformation, but one thing I would bet on is that the rate of urbanization will not decrease, and that's true in the U.S. and it's true elsewhere around the world. Where the most growth of cities is in developing countries with big challenges, the pandemic posed a big challenge, climate is a massive challenge. Cities are hotter than other places, so how they cope with heat stress, with water stress, with flooding becomes important. Ocean rise is a massive challenge for seaboard cities…So, big challenges, but the future will be more and more urban.

Cities are the future

40:55: Cities are the future, but making them livable and sustainable is a massive challenge; getting to zero carbon will make them resilient to climate pressures.

Why do people flock to urban Centers for choice and community?

45:37: People want to be near other people who are like them, creative, and where they'll have high efficiency. What we find in cities is that we have many more options. We can choose the lifestyle we want, whether you are young or old, have sexual preferences, religious preferences, fashion preferences, music preferences, or food preferences. All of these things can be satisfied in a city, which they never could in a small town, let alone in the countryside. And so, the more that we move into a world where our own preferences become important and we can be anywhere, we're going to be in a big city because that's where we're going to satisfy our preferences.

Is there always going to be a trade off that when we increase connectedness, we are necessarily increasing risks?

03:12: Entanglement is the underbelly, the other side of connectivity, and I think it happens at all dimensions. If you think about it, one's own life, the more you get to know other people and get involved in them, it brings great joy and many benefits, but it can also bring great sadness. And I think it's like that at a macro scale as well, that we now increasingly recognize that we are entangled around the world in multiple ways. And that means that we can benefit enormously. A vaccine can be developed in one place and be around the world, or the worldwide web can join us all. We can hear new music or fashion, go to other places, meet incredible people, and benefit from incredible ideas, but we are also more vulnerable as a result. And so the great challenge of globalization, I think, is how does one harvest the upside and manage the downside.

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