Slow Cities - Theme Cities: Solutions for Urban Problems - page 568

what makes the movement distinctive is that it enrols local government in slow liv-
ing, while Radstrom believes it should be viewed as an organization rather than a
movement.
Both Slow Food and Cittaslow have previously been described as movements. In fact, Cit-
taslow is more accurately defined as an organization of small cities which have voluntarily
signed on to be members. … This is a unique organisation of cities, moving forward with
a common interest that spans borders, cultures and city identities. Whereas Slow Food can
be seen as operating as a grassroots movement, Cittaslow is more formally organized and
operates on a city policy level. (2011, p. 94)

15﻽6 Cittaslow: An International Network

The organization refers to itself as an international 'Cittaslow network' of towns.
Since 1999 it has grown to include 147 members distributed across four continents,
although the vast majority, namely 128, are located in Europe of which 68 are in
Italy”. Figure 15.2 shows the growth in Cittaslow membership since 1999, obtained
by personal correspondence between the author and Cittaslow International. Data
on the year that cities joined the movement was provided for 105 towns in the net-
work; unfortunately information was not available for 25 towns in Italy, 1 town in
New Zealand and 4 towns in Poland. Given that records on the date of membership
for 25 of the 68 member towns in Italy are missing, the peaks shown in 2007 and
2008 can only be estimates. As towns in Italy were the first members of the move-
ment, it is nevertheless probably correct to assume that there has been an annual

Fig. 15.2 Growth and location of Cittaslow members. (Source: Compiled from survey by author
in 2011)