Thriving

Between 1970 and 2021, the number of people living in cities
increased from 1.19 billion to 4.46 billion, while the Earth’s
surface temperature climbed by 1.19 degrees Celsius above
its preindustrial levels. Because of the prosperity they helped
generate, cities have been a major cause of this climate change.

However, it is also in cities that many of the solutions to the
climate crisis—in terms of both adaptation and mitigation—will
be found, not least because by 2050, almost 70 percent of the
world’s population will call cities home. As such, cities are the
key to arguably the greatest public policy challenge of our times.

To take stock of how green, how resilient, and how inclusive
cities globally are today, Thriving: Making Cities Green, Resilient,
and Inclusive in a Changing Climate defines a global typology of
more than 10,000 cities. It finds that there is wide variation in
how green, resilient, and inclusive cities are around the world.
It asks how climate change impacts cities and, conversely, how
cities affect climate. Vicious cycles in development could occur
as cities become more vulnerable to extreme events and the
challenges compound and cascade. Finally, this report provides
a compass for policy makers on policies that can help cities not
only survive but also thrive in the face of the perils of climate
change. Policy makers can and must act now to chart a more
sustainable trajectory.