About the Conference


Cities are both drivers of economic, technological and organisational development and the places of remarkable social change. The conference “Urban Europe – Challenges to Meet the Urban Future” reflects the actual urban situations and the main challenges and
outlines outcomes and solutions.

The EU for long downplayed the role of cities in Europe for its economic, cultural and social relevance. With the program Europe 2020, the EU for the first time officially devoted its attention to cities. The Joint Programming Initiative (JPI) “Urban Europe” has a clear focus on urban areas as key elements for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. However, this program has been technologically dominated so far and needs a more interdisciplinary approach from the broad field of social science.

The aim of the conference is to collect critical and practical relevant theses and results to stimulate debates on the European urban future. It particularly addresses the governance of cities who have to deal with contradictory challenges between economic competitiveness and social cohesion, technological aspects of energy management (‘smart cities’) and settlement growth, shrinking cities, increasing segregation and environment protection. There is a need for new forms of governance to integrate the increasingly different interests of heterogeneous urban societies and to come up with growth coalitions that combine competitiveness and responsibilities for balanced developments.








EURA Conference - Urban Europe - Challenges to Meet the Urban Future