Modern cities around the world are increasingly complex and chaotic. As urban populations grow, city governments are faced with a host of associated challenges, from traffic jams to rising crime rates. These problems, in turn, can hamper private investments, thus impeding economic development, decreasing tax revenues, and leading to still other challenges, from decaying infrastructure to troubled school systems.

So, how can city governments cope with these challenges? Collaborative efforts with other layers of government, non-profits, and private organizations are one part of the answer, but the complexity of the problems faced by modern cities also requires that they be managed from a multidisciplinary perspective, which is where the International Program on Urban Governance (IPUG) comes in.