Urban governance in the globalization includes a multitude of possible social configurations. It is the subject of a strong tension between a technicist dimension (economy of choices) and a democratic dimension in its participative sense. After having reviewed three currents of thought that developed singular approaches between globalization and the urban governance, this paper consider the question to know how institutions and structures can develop shared strategic objectives and answer to the new demands of collective action. It requires to follow an outline of the conditions for establishing a link between citizen participation, local governing and participatory democracy. These conditions can be summarised in six points, each defining one cultural dimension for participation. Finally, our effort will be to try and understand which are the common challenges to face in the near future for the development of urban governance in the context of globalization.

• INDEX
  • 1. Introduction
  • 2 Three currents of thought
  • 3 The conditions of participatory governance in globalization
  • 4 Three opposing tensions: a reading of current urban transformations in globalization
• Bibliografy