Take a second to picture your future home: what do you want it to be like? For well over half of humanity, that home will be part of a city. Despite all the pressures of urban life and the new and unprecedented challenges presented by the Covid-19 pandemic, the global trend towards urbanisation looks certain to continue, with the UN predicting that two thirds of us will be city-dwellers by 2050. If we fail to make the most of our metropolitan environments, the majority of humanity will suffer.
So how do we make cities better? From gleaming towers to sprawling slums, from excessive wealth to unimaginable poverty, from green oases to lawless danger zones, cities bring together multiple, interconnected challenges. Mobility, health, water, energy, housing, employment, food, recreation, culture, democracy, climate: everything is interdependent. None of these things can be individually perfected within the complex urban environment, but all can be improved. The 2021 Nobel Week Dialogue will explore the nature of the city, and possible visions of a hoped-for future.
This year’s Nobel Week Dialogue will be a hybrid event with a global digital audience online, as well as a limited audience present in Gothenburg. There will be a mix of speakers participating digitally and physically on stage.
WHEN | 9 December
TIME | 13:00-17:30 CET
PROGRAMME
13:00 – 15:00
THE STATE OF THINGS NOW
Gautam Bhan, Nicolas Buchoud, Ann Legeby, Karen Seto, Jan Vapaavuori
WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM ANCIENT CITIES?
Monica Smith
THE IMAGE OF THE CITY
Anna Blennow
13:50
AN SDG PERSPECTIVE ON AFRICAN URBANISATION
Edgar Pieterse
THE RISE OF THE AFRICAN CITY
Edgar Pieterse, Susan Parnell
SHAPING THE CITY OF THE FUTURE: COMMUNITY ASSEMBLIES
Daniel Urquijo
SHAPING THE CITY OF THE FUTURE: CITIZEN PARTICIPATION
Sanna Ghotbi
DEMOCRACY AND THE CITY
Sanna Ghotbi, Lisa Mastiaux, Paul Romer, Kevin Casas
14:30
WHEN SCIENTISTS TALK TO POLICY MAKERS
Interview with chemistry laureate Frances Arnold
WORKING WITH GOVERNMENT
Jan Vapaavuori, Nicolas Buchoud, Kevin Casas, Susan Parnell
PERFORMANCE PIECE
Modise Sekgothe
BREAK
15:30 – 17:30
THE IMPACT OF CLIMATE CHANGE
Interview with physics laureate Brian Schmidt
FROM EXTRACTING TO INTERSECTING: A POST COVID-19 VALUE PROPOSAL
Nicolas Buchoud
TOWARDS SUSTAINABLE URBANISATION
Nicolas Buchoud, Serge Haroche, Karen Seto, Monica Smith
THE ROLE OF PUBLIC SPACES
Anna Blennow, Ann Legeby, Limin Hee
BUILD BACK FAIRER
Michael Marmot
TACKLING INEQUALITIES
Ann Legeby, Michael Marmot, Edward Glaeser, Gautam Bhan
16:40
PERFORMANCE PIECE
Linn Björnsdotter
ON CREATIVITY
Interview with physics laureate Serge Haroche
THE SENSEABLE CITY
Carlo Ratti
CITIES ARE WHERE THE ACTION IS
Talk with economic sciences laureate Paul Romer
SMART CITIES
Jan Vapaavuori, Monica Smith, Serge Haroche, Carlo Ratti, Edward Glaeser, Paul Romer
Performance piece credits:
Secrets of Cities visual projections by: Matías Ruiz-Tagle, Jotam Schoeman
Secrets of Cities Poetry and Performance by: Modise Sekgothe, Linn Björnsdotter