The extended metropolitan regions of Southeast Asia are the dynamic cores of their national economies and societies and the frontiers of accelerating globalization. The City in Southeast Asia explores ways of moving beyond outmoded paradigms of the Third World City or a Southeast Asian city "type". It begins by contrasting the acknowledged world cities of Singapore and Hong Kong with the aspiring world city of Kuala Lumpur and the still disorganized cities of Bangkok, Jakarta and Manila, and draws comparisons with the national second cities of Chiang Mai, Surabaya, Penang and Cebu.

The authors analyze the changing relationships between people and place brought about by temperature controlled environments, the industrialization of consumption through large-scale shopping malls, the role of cities as platforms for the globalization strategies of Asian multinational corporations, and the transformation of public space into private space. They also examine public policy in terms of markets, land use and urban planning, and draw out the implications for research, business and policy-makers. This joint effort by a geographer and an economist will be of interest to economists, geographers, planners, political economists and sociologists.


Peter J. Rimmer is a Geographer and internationally recognized authority on urban and regional development in the Asian Pacific region. Since 2000 he has been Professor Emeritus and Visiting Fellow in Pacific and Asian History in the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies at the Australian National University, Canberra.

Howard Dick is an Economist and Economic Historian at the University of Melbourne. He has been an Advisor and Consultant to the Commonwealth Government of Australia, Harvard International Advisory Group and the World Bank.