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This is what Jane Jacobs taught us long ago in her book The Economy of Cities. This is what the Nobel Prize winning economist Robert Lucas meant when he formalized Jacob's argument into a theory of "human capital externalities" that stem from the dense clustering of people in cities as the basic mechanism of economic growth. Cities themselves power economic progress, driving artistic, technological, and overall economic growth at one and the same time.

UN-HABITAT's programmes are designed to help policy-makers and local communities get to grips with the human settlements and urban issues and find workable, lasting solutions. The organization's mandate is outlined in the Vancouver Declaration on Human Settlements, Habitat Agenda, Istanbul Declaration on Human Settlements, the Declaration on Cities and Other Human Settlements in the New Millennium, and Resolution 56/206. UN-HABITAT's work is directly related to the United Nations Millennium Declaration, particularly the goals of member States to improve the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by the year 2020, Target 11, Millennium Development Goal No. 7, and Target 10 which calls for the reduction by half of the number without sustainable access to safe drinking water.

Experts from around the world-in academic, business, and public sectors alike-have shown that strategically investing in communities is a critical element to long-term economic development and quality of life in the 21st century. The future of communities in Michigan and elsewhere depends on their abilities to attract and retain knowledge-based workers, entrepreneurs and growing industries. Central to attracting these important commodities is the concept of PLACE. To be successful communities must effectively develop and leverage their key human, natural, cultural and structural assets and nurture them through enacting effective public policy. That's one (long) answer.  Another one is, with a tip of the cap to Fred Kent at the Project for Public Spaces, "turning a place from one that you can't wait to get through into one that you never want to leave."  I like this one better.

The idea of a Complete Street is compelling in almost every way, but when the engineering profession begins to adopt it wholesale, we need to pause and look at the outcomes. Are we getting Complete Streets, or are we getting Complete Roads. The difference is tremendous and will impact the financial viability of an approach to building places that is long overdue.

To get a higher return on our public investments requires an understanding of what it takes to build great towns and neighborhoods. The following are principles of placemaking for Strong Towns.

Three basic principles Empowerment. SeeClickFix allows anyone to report and track non-emergency issues anywhere in the world via the internet. This empowers citizens, community groups, media organizations and governments to take care of and improve their neighborhoods. Efficiency. Two heads are better than one and 300 heads are better than two. In computer terminology, distributed sensing is particularly powerful at recognizing patterns, such as those that gradually take shape on a street. Besides, the government can't be in all places at all times. We make it easy and fun for everyone to see, click and fix. Engagement. Citizens who take the time to report even minor issues and see them fixed are likely to get more engaged in their local communities. It's called a self-reinforcing loop. This also makes people happy and everyone benefits from that.

Smart Growth America advocates for people who want to live and work in great neighborhoods. We believe smart growth solutions support businesses and jobs, provide more options for how people get around and make it more affordable to live near work and the grocery store. Our coalition works with communities to fight sprawl and save money. We are making America's neighborhoods great together.

The problem of poverty More than 46 million Americans live below the official poverty line-which is now approximately $22,314 for a family of four-and 16.4 million children are poor in this country. Inequality of wealth has reached record highs-it is greater than at any time since 1929. Growing portions of the nation's wealth are concentrated in the possession of a small fraction of households, while more than one third of the U.S. population is trying to get by on incomes less than 200 percent of the federal poverty line-or about $44,000 for a family of four. Well before the current economic crisis, 6 million low-income households were paying more than half their income on rent and utilities, or lived in severely substandard housing. And the most recent data for 2010 revealed that 48.8 million people, including 16.2 million children, lived in a household struggling against hunger.

Kumu is a visual data platform that allows you to map your relationships. Get started today by visiting kumu.io. Relationships matter to everyone - whether you're mapping your competitive landscape, developing networks of people, or creating system maps to change the world. Store your most important relationship information in Kumu and create maps that bring the big picture to life.

As our politics and public life have become increasingly divisive and toxic, too many Americans no longer see their realities reflected and no longer believe that they can make a difference. Real progress in communities can be hard to come by. And yet, across the country, people yearn to believe that we can get things done together and make hope real for everyone. It is this belief in people's innate ability to come together and create authentic hope, that sparked a then 27-year-old Richard C. Harwood to found The Harwood Institute for Public Innovation and dedicate himself to making the case for a different kind of public life and politics. For more than 20 years, through innovation, on-the-ground efforts, and ground-breaking research, we know what it takes to get things done in communities and strengthen our civic culture. We help people develop into Public Innovators, build Boundary Spanning Organizations, grow common spaces for innovation and learning, and cultivate the conditions, norms, and productive narratives that help their communities move forward. Today, our approach is being used by tens of thousands of individuals in communities across the U.S. and around the globe. But more is needed. We have an audacious strategy to make a case for a different kind of public life and politics and to spread these ideas, insights, and approaches so that people can make them their own. Of course, no single organization or individual can make these changes on their own; but, together, we can.

The PLACE Program fosters policy change that supports healthy, safe, and active environments for all Los Angeles County residents. We recognize that the design and structure of our cities, communities, neighborhoods, work sites, schools, and streets can impact how much physical activity we get, what we eat, the safety of our streets, and the quality of the air we breathe. How we choose to design or improve various aspects of our environment plays an important role in preventing injury and many chronic conditions - such as obesity, heart disease, diabetes and asthma - whose risk factors include physical inactivity, poor nutrition and exposure to air pollution. As more Angelinos face the threat and reality of developing these chronic conditions, the PLACE Program supports the development of healthier communities by fostering policy change that improves the places where people live, work and play.

It's time for the arts to get the respect and the resources they deserve. It is becomingly increasingly obvious that the arts make major contributions to the quality of life of our communities and societies, but it is also clear to us that arts have a major role in helping us discover those innovative ways of operating and being with each other that will allow us to build a truly sustainable future.

OK, this post is already way too long, but one final thing. Physicists, I think, become even more drawn to economics when we look into economics and see broad resistance to research pursuing this "complexity" perspective. It seems instead that most of mainstream research tries to get around system complexity with mathematical tricks, rather than facing up to it. I'm thinking about ideas like representative agents, or rational expectations. The assumptions make it possible to build models without having to deal with the complexity of interactions and the emergent structures they create; but the resulting models, naturally, look very pale and questionable as models of anything real. When physicists see that a small minority of ("heterodox") economists also find the standard approach hugely limiting, they feel an urge to help out. And they believe that some of their ideas can help.

Welcome to the Change Management Toolbook! This site has been around since 1997, and we remain focused on the founding vision of offering really useful and free change management content to our web visitors. This is the fourth (and we believe the best!) major revision of the website - it's a lot simpler and much prettier, and we think you will find that it is easier and quicker to get to the information you want. The changes are not limited to the "look and feel" - we've added some really good additional content, and we look forward to ongoing high-quality contributions by our growing global network of contributors.  We hope your visit will be rewarding and hope to have you as a frequent visitor!

Family Independence Initiative (FII) is a national nonprofit which leverages the power of information to illuminate and accelerate the initiative low-income families take to improve their lives. Using hard data and compelling stories, we are sparking a movement to transform the stereotypes, beliefs, practices, and policies that undermine families' efforts to get ahead. FII believes that our country is greatly underestimating the ability of low-income families to lead their own change. FII has tracked the progress of hundreds of families over the last decade and found that the lack of upward mobility is not the result of a lack of initiative but can be traced to two other factors: 1. Lack of information, and therefore lack of investment, in the initiatives low-income families take on their own or collectively. In order to access services and programs, families have to show neediness instead of initiative(bolstering already prevalent negative stereotyping). 2. Negative stereotypes and the focus on individualism have led to government and charitable practices that discourage families from turning to one another and developing the mutuality that historically built America's middle class.

I love systems thinking - it's one of the best tools we have to develop a more detailed, dynamic and divergent perspective of the way the world works. I hope that these words and insights from my years of working with and teaching systems, sustainability and design can help you develop a systems mindset as well.

Placemaking, a collaborative process by which we (residents, architects, activists, community leaders and planners alike) shape our public realm together, is fundamentally about inclusion and shared community ownership.

The Guide shows how to get your school working with Participatory Budgeting (PB). The PB process creates an experiential learning environment for community engagement at a local level. Students are challenged to think about community needs and issues, exploring their environment. They are then empowered to design and implement a solution, taking shared ownership of their school community. They will gain a new attachment to their community; a sense of pride that comes with civic contribution. And they will build a stronger, more collaborative relationship with school administration, one another, and the community at large.

C-ROADS Pro is designed for technical users looking to analyze specific greenhouse gas emission reduction policies in various forms for up to 15 regions simultaneously. Available for download to Windows and Mac. Download C-ROADS Pro and watch C-ROADS Pro Video Tutorials to get started.

"The how, where, why, and when we communicate. Long form asynchronous? Real-time chat? In-person? Video? Verbal? Written? Via email? In Basecamp? How do we keep everyone in the loop without everyone getting tangled in everyone else's business? It's all in here. "