STUDY ON THE CAPACITY OF NINE CITIES IN THE GREATER BAY AREA TO COPE WITH CLIMATE CHANGE BASED ON THE RISK CITY THEORY

Abstract

To a generally acknowledged extent, climate change has changed this world, especially transformed human’s attitudes towards development pattern of modern society and living pattern in man-made environment to more cautious ones, in the meanwhile driving people to realize that so called “inherent differences” among different social groups might collapse because negative effects brought by climate change, or risks in a more academically way, do not just aim at the weakness. Risk society, of which the definition and theory framework have been constructed and developed by Ulrich Beck, Anthony Giddens and many other scholars since 1980s, stresses on this historical transformation, regarding modern society as an aggregation of endogenous risks. It explains that, after modern industrial system was finally established, sources of the main risks that human need to face changed from exterior environment to our interior society, mostly due to shortsighted economic goals. Also, this new type of risks could expand beyond boundaries of space and time and cover all societies globally, which are difficult to predict and control. Therefore, how to recognize and manage these risks should be seriously considered to make the whole society more sustainable. Seen as the most representative creations by human society, cities would support over 75 percent of the global population in 2050, providing them with spaces, facilities and services for daily life and production, while also exposing them to risks related to climate change more frequently. In a word, when cities are planned along modern industrial pattern, potential risks are likely to be overlooked, which would on one hand contribute to climate change and on the other hand cause lacking of capacity to protect people and property from these risks.