Contents: Introduction: City regions between global competitiveness and internal viability: the difficult road toward new forms of governance, Klaus Segbers. The Economic Restructuring of Globalizing Cities: Globalization, economic restructuring and local response in Johannesburg - the most isolated 'world city', Christian M. Rogerson; Mumbai: economic restructuring by default, Kedar R. Ghorpade; The tertiary illusion: economic policies in São Paulo in the 1990s, Àlvaro A. Comin and Cláudio R. Amitrano; Shanghai in the process of opening up to the outside world, Xuejin Zuo and Jianfu Huang; Changes In The Institutional Setting: The Redistribution of Property Rights: Property trends and market fluctuations in post-apartheid Johannesburg, Mzwanele Mayekiso; Real estate market in Mumbai - a crawl to convergence, Sudha Deshpande and Lalit Deshpande; Different territories, different policies: property rights and real estate in São Paulo, Renato Cymbalista and Paula Santoro; Institutional arrangements under the dual-market system in Shanghai, Ling Hin Li. The Deregulation of Basic Services: Private Solutions?: World-city transformation or neoliberal commodification? Johannesburg's infrastructure and basic services, Patrick Bond; Between privatization and participation: The provision of basic services in Mumbai, Sudha Mohan; Multiple actors, diverse arrangements: Infrastructure and basic services in São Paulo, Renato Cymbalista and Paula Santoro; The positive effects of privatization and decentralization in Shanghai, Jinzhou Song; Security Provision: Public or Private good?: Dynamics of exclusion: violence and security policies in Johannesburg, Charlotte Boisteau; A relatively stable situation: violence and crime in Mumbai, Kshitij Prabha; Violence in São Paulo: its profile and the responses from the state, private sector and civil society, Nancy Cardia; The evolution of public security in modern Shanghai, Huang Li and Jean Carmalt. The Public Response: From Local Go