Globalisation and Environmental Sustainabiliy in cities of Developed and Developing Countries

This paper shows how a serious disregard for the environmental impact of economic activity characterises the process of globalisation and which is conspicuously evident in the case of large cities. Focusing on air pollution, the paper offers evidence from cities of developed and developing countries alike concentrating particularly on Mexico City, Houston, Sao Paulo and London. Despite that environmental contamination is certainly not a new phenomenon and globalisation has not initiated it, it has accelerated dramatically in recent years. To better contextualise these changes, the paper looks into various explaination of globalisation, but a political and economic historical analysis is employed as it is thought that it offers more insights into the causes of changes and the favourable and unfavourable environmental impacts of globalisation. The paper raises the increasing demand of fossil fuel as a central issue typical of economic growth and urban pollution. The similarities, but also deep structural differences found between developed and less developed countries are highlighted as central to any discussion of future sustainability. Political analysis as well as scientific information are viewed as necessary to approach the rampant nature of the current process of economic growth and environmental damag