RIGHTS OF CITY & CITIZEN

In preparation for the Inaugural Convening in September 2016, Dr. Benjamin Barber has offered a working paper on the Rights of Cities and Citizens.

The Importance of Rights Claims and the Argument for a Right of the City to Self-Government Rights language remains crucial to establishing the legitimacy of political authority. In an interdependent world in which cities govern locally, but—through intercity cooperation—are also demonstrating the capacity to govern globally, and where urban public goods often define global public goods, rights language captures in a powerful way the emerging global governance role of cities.

It is because the authority and legitimacy of city governance is founded not just on capacity but on rights claims that a Global Parliament of Mayors is a unique form of intercity association — marking a true governance revolution by establishing a novel form of political authority rooted in universal rights claims.

Download the working paper of Dr. Barber about the Rights of Cities and Citizens.