Urbanisation is one of the most important social processes observed and written about over time. From a variety of beginnings, cities have evolved into sites where more and more complex activities take place. At a certain point historically, the city may look parasitic on the productive countryside, where the balance between human beings and nature is so much better sustained. However, further along the line the city itself becomes the logical home for multitudes of social and economic activities that are fundamental to the material life of mankind. And with that, the balance between city and countryside changes.

Cities attract friends and enemies. The city on the hill is a symbol of wisdom and balance, of the good life, and of democratic politics. The metropolis – Smoketown, Shackland – is the site of alienation and oppression where modernity becomes a prison for men and women. On the whole, this book will try to avoid these kinds of moral judgements, not that they may not lack validity within particular discourses and for particular individuals or types of individuals. Given the author's special interests, much attention will be paid to economic and social processes and where the city fits into them. The city evolves distinctive cultural forms, some of them largely appropriate only to urban life, and I shall try to do some justice to these cultural forms. It also becomes in need of a distinctive politics that fits the dense interstices of urban living.