Identity as a weapon in the battle between cities

The city is the place where money, products and ideas come together. No wonder cities all around the world compete with eachother for the favours of inhabitants, business, visitors and talent. This calls for urban attraction strategies. And in order to be attractive as a city, your identity in this competition is more important than ever. The future of cities lies in their distinctive character, not in a karaoke strategy copying others.

By Roy van Dalm


Globalisation has created a level playing field for cities. Or so we thought. For, the playingfield may be levelled, but the players are certainly not equally distributed across the turf. Talent and capital have a tendency to concentrate and multiply in some places and be drawn and sucked away from others. In the global competition between cities we get to see what we call the Matthew Effect: to those who have shall be given and in abundance, but from those who do not have anything, even what they have shall be taken.

The effect is a diminishing number of fast growing and flourishing cities, and a growing number of cities on the losing side. On this effect in the US, urban specialist Carol Coletta, from the CEO’s for Cities network, told me that out of the 51 American megaregions only 16 are growing. The other 35 are actually shrinking. This concentration of capital, creativity and talent poses a definite threat to middle-sized cities. Do they have the power and critical mass to withstand the competition? Take the extreme example of the eastern German city of Hoyerswerda. This former socialist model city was the fastest growing city of the German Democratic Republic. Until the wall fell. Now it has shrunk from 70.000 inhabitants to barely 35.000. Everyone with any talent and ambition has long since left. Empty tenement buildings are now being inhabited by wolves, slinking in from across the Polish and Czech borders. And this is Germany, not some third world country.

Stay away from karaoke
In order to be successful in this fierce competition, cities need to have – what Simon Anholt calls – a competitive identity. ‘Dare to be different’ says Carol Coletta. In many cases however, city authorities do not go for distinctive character, but for karaoke. They choose to imitate for instance the concept of the creative city, believing that artists and designers are the cure to all urban ails. But the real point of the creative city is that creativity is used not as and end but as a means to address urban challenges.

If a city wants to succeed, it should follow the concept of what I call the Triple A City: Authentic, Activating, All-inclusive. It has to be authentic in the stories it tells about itself. It has to stimulate people to be actively participating. And it should include all people. In the end this means that every city eventually can only succeed by being itself.

Written for: Future Cities Forum Ostrava