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This book looks at the New Urban Agenda and prospects of its implementation. In 2016, the New Urban Agenda was endorsed by the General Assembly of the United Nations after having been adopted by the United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development (Habitat III) in Quito, Ecuador. Together with the Sustainable Development Goals, it provides a comprehensive and ambitious roadmap for global debate and action related to sustainable urbanisation during the coming decades. As mature economies and ageing societies, Japan and Germany can make considerable contributions to the implementation of the New Urban Agenda. Both countries share a number of similar challenges for environmentally sustainable and resilient urban development under conditions of social change. Furthermore, they have vast experience in actively promoting urban transformation towards a more sustainable urban future. At the same time the authors are making a contribution towards implementing the New Urban Agenda. Other countries may build up on the experience provided and the 20 examples described in this book. The work is based on a longstanding cooperation between the Graduate School of Environmental Studies of the Nagoya University (Japan), the Leibniz Institute of Ecological Urban and Regional Development (Germany) and the Technische Universität Dresden (Germany).

Resilience is increasingly becoming a catchword in current discussions about urban and regional development. While there has been a strong research focus on sustainability, there is a lack of understanding of the processes and factors that make cities and regions more vulnerable and others more resilient, for example, when dealing with climate change, demographic decline and ageing, as well as economic crises. The German Annual of Spatial Research and Policy 2010 sheds some light on this by discussing examples of how actors deal with change. On the one hand, concepts are described and analysed which are oriented towards increasing urban regional resilience, for example regarding energy consumption, climate change, and urban decline. Moreover, institutional aspects are discussed. On the other hand, barriers for using the concept of resilience in planning are described and suggestions are made about how to deal with these barriers in strategic planning.

In the course of the tremendous political and economic upheaval starting in 1989/1990 many industrial cities and regions in Central and Eastern Europe have been confronted with profound problems. This book presents eleven detailed national reports which describe the situation in such cities and regions as well as the strategies which have been employed to cope with structural change. The country reports are complemented by short case studies of selected cities and regions. An introduction gives background to such topics as structural change and the ramifications of EU enlargement. Finally some conclusions are drawn and recommendations offered for future policy.