城市化是有益于社會的“印鈔機”

Joan Clos, one-time doctor and former mayor of Barcelona, is hoping to encourage politicians to see cities not as problems but as opportunities for lifting entire populations from poverty.

醫(yī)生出身、擔任過巴塞羅那市長的霍安•克洛斯(Joan Clos)希望鼓勵政治家們將城市看成是使廣大民眾擺脫貧困的機遇之地，而不是問題的來源。

“Urbanisation is not a passive outcome of development but a creator of value . . . [it] is like a money-printing machine,” says Dr Clos, executive director of UN-Habitat, which studies human settlements.

“城市化并不是城市發(fā)展所產生的被動結果，而是創(chuàng)造價值的過程……城市化就像一臺印鈔機，”克洛斯表示，他目前擔任聯合國人居署(UN-Habitat)執(zhí)行主任，該機構主要研究人類居住問題。

The organisation has been looking at how to cater for the urban population explosion. “From now until 2050 we’re going to double the current level of urbanisation. Another 3bn people will be living in cities,” says Dr Clos.

聯合國人居署近年來一直在研究如何應對城市人口爆炸。“從現在開始到2050年，我們現有的城市化水平將會翻一番。未來還將有30億人遷至城市生活，”克洛斯說道。

“Most thinking and writing about urbanisation is about the problems, poverty, housing and so on — there’s not enough about the value that the urban tissue generates.”

“絕大多數關于城市化的思考和著述都著眼于城市化所帶來的問題、貧困、住房緊張等等——對于城市所創(chuàng)造出的價值卻缺乏充分的探討。”

The idea that cities can generate wealth and help tackle rising inequality are messages he intends to convey to delegates at Habitat III in Quito, Ecuador, in October. This, the latest in a series of conferences that are held every 20 years, will examine the link between urban planning and the human condition.

城市能夠創(chuàng)造財富、幫助化解收入不平等日益加劇的問題，是克洛斯希望傳遞給第三次聯合國住房和城市可持續(xù)發(fā)展大會(Habitat III)與會代表的觀點，此次大會將于今年10月在厄瓜多爾首都基多(Quito)召開。作為每二十年召開一次的系列會議中最新的一屆，本次大會將探討城市規(guī)劃與人類生活狀況之間的關系。

For example, in London, New York and Paris there has been increasing economic segregation and exclusion of the poor from their centres. In the UK capital there has been much reporting of how the poor and even the middle classes are being priced out.

例如，在倫敦(見上圖)、紐約和巴黎等城市，經濟因素導致的社會割裂日益加劇，窮人被排擠出了城市中心地區(qū)。在英國首都倫敦，有大量關于窮人甚至中產階級因無力承擔昂貴的生活成本被迫遷離市區(qū)的報道。

Many experts say there is no effective UK social housing policy, which they argue has been handed over to the private and charitable sectors despite the need for government and municipal attention.

很多專家表示，英國缺乏行之有效的社會住房政策，相關領域問題被交給了私人部門和慈善組織解決，雖然這一狀況急需得到國家和市政當局的關注。

The irony, Dr Clos says, is London was arguably the first world city to seriously address housing in the 19th century. Tackling housing need was at the centre of strategy and much of the housing stock created in the centre of cities has retained its desirability.

克洛斯指出，這其中的諷刺之處在于，倫敦可以稱得上是第一個嚴肅應對住房問題的國際大都市，早在十九世紀就出臺了相關政策。滿足住房需求曾是相關對策的核心內容，而在城市中心建造的大多數房屋直到今天仍然適宜居住。

“If we look at public housing in London, or in Amsterdam or Vienna from the 19th century, we see that it was so successful that it has now become desirable for the bourgeoisie,” says Dr Clos. “Today’s mass housing is not economically active, it is a dormitory, outside the city, on poor land and poorly located. It is stigmatised and the result is, when someone becomes slightly better off, they leave, only to be replaced with more poor people. It stays poor.”

“如果我們考察十九世紀以來倫敦、阿姆斯特丹或者維也納的公共住房，我們會發(fā)現它們是如此成功，以至于現已變得對中產階級頗有吸引力，”克洛斯稱。“如今的公共住宅在經濟上并不吸引人，這種住宅只是宿舍，位于城市郊外，環(huán)境和地理位置都很糟糕。住在這種房中讓人感到屈辱，由此導致的結果是，一旦個體的境況略有好轉，他們就會選擇離開，取代他們入住的是更加貧困的人。這一住宅區(qū)也就因此一直陷于貧困。”

Examples of such places can be found across the globe, from Paris to Detroit. However, he praises some US cities such as Los Angeles, which is attempting to revitalise its once-seedy downtown and suburban centres.

從巴黎到底特律，類似這種公共住宅區(qū)的例子在世界各地都能找到。但克洛斯稱贊了洛杉磯等一些美國城市，洛杉磯正試圖重振一度破敗不堪的城市中心商業(yè)區(qū)和市郊中心區(qū)。

Dr Clos says successful urban policies need to be set nationally and have three elements: rules and regulations, urban design and financial planning. “We talk of the rule of law,” he says, “but we also need a rule of urban law. There might be inadequate legislation, or too much unclear legislation, or a lack of enforcement. We need regulations to ensure we have decent public space, we have urban building rights and development, and we have building codes and standards to regulate quality.”

克洛斯指出，成功的城市化政策應在國家層面制定，并同時具備三大要素：規(guī)則和監(jiān)管、城市規(guī)劃以及財務安排。“我們討論依法執(zhí)政，但我們同樣需要城市發(fā)展的相關法規(guī)。在這一領域或許存在立法不足、法規(guī)條文中不夠明確的地方過多以及執(zhí)法不力等問題。我們需要監(jiān)管力量來確保我們擁有體面的公共空間，保障我們擁有城市建設和開發(fā)權，同時保證我們具備建筑準則和標準來規(guī)范建筑質量。”

Public space is especially important to the less well-off who may lack gardens and other private areas for recreation and leisure.

公共空間對于那些不太富裕的人群而言尤為重要，這一群體可能缺乏花園以及其他可供娛樂休閑的私人空間。

“The final issue is the financial plan,” he says. “There can be no successful urbanisation without a budget. We need to think about local authority taxation systems as well as some subsidies from central government to sustain the city.”

“最后一個問題是財務安排，”他表示。“成功的城市化必須做好預算。我們必須考慮地方政府的稅收體系以及中央政府為維持城市發(fā)展所提供的某些補助。”

Since joining UN-Habitat in Nairobi, Dr Clos has become embroiled in a controversy. His efforts to transform the organisation, including eliminating senior staff privileges and reducing costs by 40 per cent, were followed by allegations of misconduct and racism, which Dr Clos’ spokesman says are false and unsubstantiated. An official UN investigation was announced earlier this year but it has yet to publish any conclusions.

自從加入總部設在內羅畢的聯合國人居署以來，克洛斯就卷入了一場爭議。他為推動聯合國人居署改革所做的努力，包括取消高級職員特權以及將辦公成本縮減40%，使他遭到了行為不當和種族歧視的指控，這些指控被克洛斯的發(fā)言人駁斥為虛假和毫無根據的。今年早些時候聯合國宣布對此事啟動一項官方調查，但到目前為止尚未公布任何結論。

Dr Clos’ supporters may feel that an ideal city might look like Barcelona, where he was mayor from 1996 to 2006. This now has generous streets and dense, robust “city blocks” that embody the idea of mixed-use development and have been able to absorb changes in the way the city works, as well as parks, squares and a beach that was once a dock.

克洛斯的支持者們可能認為，巴塞羅那或許就是理想城市所應有的樣子，克洛斯曾在1996至2006年間擔任巴塞羅那市長。如今的巴塞羅那擁有寬闊的街道以及密集而富有活力的“城市街區(qū)”——這種布局體現出了混合用途開發(fā)的理念，并且能夠吸收城市運轉方式的變化——還有公園、廣場以及由一座碼頭改造而成的海灘。

Although Dr Clos criticises the “technocratic approach of Asian cities” he says their success cannot be ignored. China has, according to the World Bank, taken 600m people out of poverty thanks to urbanisation between 1981 and 2004. Dr Clos says this is a staggering testament to the power of city planning to create wealth and reduce inequality — a population larger than that of Europe has been lifted from subsistence farming to urban existence in barely a generation.

雖然克洛斯批評“亞洲城市技術掛帥的發(fā)展方式”，但他指出這些城市所取得的成就不應被忽略。來自世界銀行(World Bank)的數據顯示，中國依靠1981至2004年間的城市化進程，帶領6億民眾擺脫了貧困?？寺逅怪赋觯@是一個令人震驚的例證，展現出了城市規(guī)劃在創(chuàng)造財富和降低收入不平等方面的巨大能量——僅僅用了一代人的時間，人數超過歐洲總人口的民眾就因城市化而脫離了勉強糊口的農業(yè)生產，享受到了城市生活。