Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 7.6
Global city rankings
Global city
2004
population
(000s)
7
2008
Global
City Index
Global
financial
centre
Population
(000s)
2008 Global
Financial
Centre Index
London
7400
79.17
London
7400
795
New York
18,700
72.77
New York
18,700
786
Tokyo
34,200
66.60
Hong Kong
7000
695
Singapore
4000
66.16
Singapore
4000
675
Chicago
9400
65.24
Zurich
2500
665
Hong Kong
7000
63.94
Frankfurt
5600
642
Paris
11,200
63.87
Geneva
450
640
Frankfurt
5600
62.34
Tokyo
34,200
628
Seoul
23,500
61.83
Sydney
4200
621
Amsterdam
7500
60.06
Boston
4400
618
Madrid
5600
58.34
San Francisco
4200
614
Sydney
4200
58.33
Dublin
1600
613
Toronto
4700
58.16
Paris
11,200
612
Copenhagen
2400
57.99
Toronto
4700
610
Zurich
2500
56.86
Washington
5100
597
Sources:
Global City Index (Mastercard 2008); Global Financial Centre Index (COL
2008); City Populations (OECD 2006); World Bank (2008b);
8
McCann and Acs (2011).
system is discussed in terms of the extent of its global 'connectivity' (Sassen
2002), whereby 'connectivity' refers not only to the various aspects of the
knowledge and information exchanges which take place between particu-
lar locations, but also to the discretionary decision-making power to act
on those exchanges. Incidentally, this argument can be extended to differ-
ent geographical levels by combining the innovation systems' perspective
with that of system openness, discussed in Chapters 4 and 5 respectively.
As such, global connectivity may be manifested via a variety of different
mechanisms such as corporate headquarter functions, foreign subsidiar-
ies, decision-making links, human capital mobility patterns, research col-
laboration, trade exchanges, transport networks, financial linkages, and
asset management roles (e.g., Reed 1981; Friedmann 1995; Beaverstock et
al. 1999; Godfrey and Zhou 1999; Taylor 2004; Sassen 2006; Taylor and
Aranya 2008; Taylor et al. 2011).
In order to provide an index of this much broader concept of connectiv-
ity it is possible to apply weighting measures and algorithms to data on
these various connectivity characteristics (Taylor 2004; Taylor et al. 2008)
and use them to rank cities according to their degrees of global connectiv-
ity. Both the global-city centres of commerce rankings (Mastercard 2008)
