Book Tip No. 14 (2015): Arrival City

Munich 2011.

Few books have the potential to significantly enrich and permanently change one’s thinking. Doug Saunders’ book is one of them. Saunders examines the process of migration of the population from the countryside to the cities, or rather to the favelas, slums, banlieus or difficiles.

This process is irreversible, as 99% of the world’s poor population live in the countryside, and they only have a future in the city. Saunders has personally looked around, he has researched scientific studies, and he has conducted many interviews in what he calls the “Arrival City”: Those neighborhoods that initially take in the newly arriving rural population. Largely unnoticed in the public debate are the very different strategies (and different successes!) that have been implemented by the respective governments in London, Tehran, Istanbul, Mumbai, Berlin-Kreuzberg, Nairobi, Rio de Janeiro, Los Angeles, Paris, Toronto or Amsterdam. Several hundred million people will flock to the (arrival) cities in the coming years to escape poverty. And the political strategies in dealing with the arrival cities require an understanding of the economic dimensions as well as the social roots. Perhaps “Arrival City” is the real answer to Thilo Sarrazin.