The Century of Cities

The Century of Cities welcomes Carl Nightingale, Professor Emeritus of Urban History and World History at the University of Buffalo, coordinator of the Global Urban History Project, and author of Segregation: A Global History of Divided Cities and Earthopolis: A Biography of Our Urban Planet. Spanning more than 6,000 years of urban history, Carl examines the profound relationship between cities, h...

The Century of Cities continues its conversation with Professor Sir Paul Collier, Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the University of Oxford, in Part Two of a two-part episode about the forces shaping the cities of the future. This time, the conversation turns to migration, belonging, and the challenge of building cities that can absorb rapid population growth while creating shared ident...

The Century of Cities welcomes Professor Sir Paul Collier, Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford, and Academic Director of the International Growth Centre. Drawing on his work on economic development, regional renewal, and places left behind, he explores how cities and regions can break cycles of decline, and why the hardest part may b...

The Century of Cities welcomes Shiro Muchiri, London-based interior architect and founder of SoShiri, whose work explores the intersection of culture, craft, and the built environment. She examines how culture has shaped urban regeneration, and why cities must now move beyond creating destinations to cultivating a deeper sense of identity and belonging. As cities continue to evolve, Shiro challeng...

The Century of Cities welcomes Joan Clos, elected twice as Mayor of Barcelona, former Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, and Executive Director of UN-Habitat, for a conversation about the forces that shape cities and the leadership required to transform them. Reflecting on Barcelona's transition from dictatorship to democracy, he explores how political consensus, public participation,...

The Century of Cities welcomes Yu-Ning Hwang, Singapore's first Chief, Urban Innovation & Excellence at the Ministry of National Development and Executive Director of the Centre for Liveable Cities, as our special series continues in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. A key figure in Singapore's urban development, Yu-Ning reflects on the decis...

This episode of The Century of Cities brings together the moderators of the 2026 World Cities Summit Mayors Forum. Greg sits down with his fellow moderators, Winston Chow and Tamara Singh, to reflect on the priorities for action they heard from 120 mayors as they confronted some of the biggest challenges facing cities today. Recorded in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the...

The Century of Cities brings together Bohan Chen of KPF in New York, Borane Gille of The Business of Cities in London, and Sagar Jadhav of BMC in Mumbai as part of our special series recorded in Singapore in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. They bring three very different vantage points to the same question: what will it take to create bette...

The Century of Cities welcomes Clarence E. Anthony, CEO and Executive Director of the National League of Cities, as part of our special series recorded in Singapore in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. Clarence takes us from the emergence of local power and civic engagement in the 1980s to a very different urban landscape today, where cities...

The Century of Cities welcomes Mayor Ana Abrunhosa of Coimbra, Portugal, as part of our special series recorded in Singapore in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. A city shaped by more than seven centuries of university life and a remarkable cultural heritage, Coimbra has spent decades confronting suburban sprawl, car dependency, industrial de...

The Century of Cities welcomes Mayor Van R. Johnson II of Savannah, Georgia, as part of our special series recorded in Singapore in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. Once marked by economic decline and a fading downtown, Savannah has reinvented itself through its history, creativity, institutions, and diverse communities. Today, it is balanci...

The Century of Cities welcomes Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui of Cambridge, Massachusetts, as part of our special series recorded in Singapore in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. A city once shaped by manufacturing and industrial decline, Cambridge has reinvented itself as a global centre for research and innovation. But that success has brought a ne...

The Century of Cities welcomes Mayor Raisa Treñas of Iloilo City as part of our special series recorded in Singapore in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. Once a major sugar-exporting centre, Iloilo experienced economic decline and underinvestment before embarking on a remarkable revival rooted in good governance, environmental restoration, he...

The Century of Cities welcomes Mayor Hillary Schieve of Reno as part of our special series recorded in Singapore in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. Convening mayors and urban leaders from more than 100 cities, the Summit focused on one central challenge: how to turn ambitious urban ideas into meaningful action. For Mayor Schieve, transforma...

The Century of Cities welcomes Mayor Ciprian Ciucu of Bucharest as part of our special series recorded in Singapore during the World Cities Summit 2026, in association with the World Cities Summit Mayors Forum and the Centre for Liveable Cities. Bringing together mayors from more than 100 cities under the theme Liveable and Sustainable Cities: ACT Now!, the Summit provided a global platform for ci...

The Century of Cities welcomes Sanjay Shukla, Managing Director of the National Housing Bank of India, as part of our special miniseries in collaboration with UN-Habitat. Sanjay explores a critical question: if the need for housing is clear, why does finance remain out of reach for millions? As cities grow, he suggests that solving the housing crisis depends as much on transforming financial syste...

The Century of Cities welcomes back Edgar Pieterse, Founding Director of the African Centre for Cities and Co-Chair of the African Mayoral Leadership Initiative, as part of our special miniseries in collaboration with UN-Habitat. As Africa becomes the world's fastest urbanizing region, Edgar examines one of the defining questions of this century: can the continent transform unprecedented urban gro...

Jonathan Reckford, CEO of Habitat for Humanity International, joins The Century of Cities as part of our special miniseries in collaboration with UN-Habitat. Building on conversations emerging from World Urban Forum 13 in Baku, Jonathan reflects on a world where rapid urbanization, climate pressures, migration, and rising construction costs have combined to create a housing crisis affecting cities...

Anaclaudia Rossbach, Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) at the Under-Secretary-General level and the very first guest on The Century of Cities, returns to explore why housing has become one of the defining tests of urban leadership in the 21st century. Drawing on insights from World Urban Forum 13 in Baku and the newly launched World Cities Report 202...

Meric Gertler, former President of the University of Toronto and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at the School of Cities, joins The Century of Cities to reflect on the remarkable evolution of cities and the institutions that help shape them. He recalls a time when cities were widely viewed as unmanageable, financially strained, and in decline, before emerging as globally recognized engines of i...

Ruchita Bansal, urban planner, founder of SheCity India, and host of The Human Cities Podcast, joins The Century of Cities to explore how cities are often designed around a narrow idea of who urban life is meant to serve. Reflecting on India's rapid urban transformation, she argues that much of urban planning still defaults to the able-bodied male commuter, leaving women, caregivers, migrants, and...

Marc Canal, Senior Fellow at the McKinsey Global Institute and co-author of A Century of Plenty, joins The Century of Cities to explore why cities have been among the greatest engines of human progress. From divided and economically uncertain cities to today's global hubs of talent, innovation, and culture, Marc explains how density, connectivity, and urbanization accelerated prosperity, productiv...

Marta Foresti, Founder and CEO of LAGO Collective and Chair of the Global Creative Economy Council, joins The Century of Cities to explore the evolving relationship between cities, creativity, migration, and growth. Reflecting on her upbringing in Milan and her work across Europe and Africa, Marta traces the shift from car-dominated, exclusionary cities toward more open and creative urban environm...

The Century of Cities welcomes András Szörényi, Senior Policy Advisor at Global Cities Hub, to explore how cities are becoming increasingly influential actors in global cooperation. Drawing on his diplomatic career, András reflects on the shift from traditional city-to-city partnerships to today's networks of multi-level and multi-stakeholder collaboration. From climate adaptation and migration to...

Cristina Bueti, Counsellor on Smart Sustainable Cities, AI-enabled Citiverse & Virtual worlds at International Telecommunication Union, joins The Century of Cities to explore a new phase of urban intelligence. She traces the shift from cities that once operated without real-time awareness to systems that can now sense, learn, and adapt. Yet even as cities solve major challenges, they remain expose...