• •
THE DREAMING
CITY
AND THE POWER
OF MASS IMAGINATION
GERRY HASSAN
MELISSA MEAN
CHARLIE TIMS
THE DREAMING CITY:
GLASGOW 2020 AND
THE POWER OF
MASS IMAGINATION. This book maps out the story
of our cities — the places they
are now and the places people hope they will become.
It is told through the experience of one city — Glasgow.
The Dreaming City contains the journey of an experiment
in opening up a city’s future. The experience of Glasgow
2020 — and a programme of events which reached out
across the city and its citizens — shows that people have
the capacity and imagination to make their own futures.
The project used stories and storytelling to provoke
thinking about the future across the whole city.
This book contains a selection of some of these stories,
as well as examples of other materials. It offers a different
perspective to the world of ‘the ofcial future’ and breaks
new ground in how we think about the future of cities.
Gerry Hassan is Head of Glasgow 2020,
Melissa Mean is Head of the Self-Build Cities
Programme and Charlie Tims is a Senior
Researcher at Demos.
£10

homeless — better housing — health service … and weather ¶ I wish Glasgow to become a leading city ght anti-racist
campaigns in 2020. I wish by that year we can live equally as one in peace and harmony. I wish by then racism is abolished, poverty
is abolished, no one is homeless. I wish that this is not a dream and becomes a reality. ¶ I wish by 2020 that all Glaswegians are proud of
their beautiful city and continue to welcome all its visitors with open arms. ¶ Late night openings of Glasgow museums, art galleries and
shops. ¶ I wish for litter and chewing gum (?) free movements and no beggars. A bigger police presence to deter crimes. Better health education for
all ages. More sports facilities and play areas for children and youths. Creation of more jobs. Total free health care for the elderly. Tolerance and
understanding between all our citizens. Construction of M94 extension. ¶ I wish that Glasgow became a smoke free zone totally and wish Glasgow became a
healthier city to live in. ¶ I wish the G.H.A would check that jobs are done before sending two or three workmen to do a job and it still isn’t done. It took ve calls
before a new light which had a loose screw was xed. ¶ I wish for no one to be homeless. ¶ I wish for a better world. ¶ I wish in 2020 that people see Glasgow for the
fabulous and diverse city that it really is. I hope we are all embracing different cultures and social backgrounds, accepting people for who they are and realise we all have a part
to play to make Glasgow great. I hope we are all proud to call ourselves Glaswegians. ¶ I wish Glasgow’s football teams could be as good as Newcastles! ¶ I wish the powers that
be would do something about dog owners allowing their dogs to fowl up pavement; and spitting on streets it is worse than smokers putting fag buts on the road, and they are being ned
for this. ¶ That all Glaswegians get on better in the future and make it the city it should be. ¶ I wish all the drugs in Glasgow and everywhere to disappear. ¶ I would life to see poverty,
homelessness and such like eradicated. I would also like to see Glasrow Rangers bring home the Champions League. ¶ I wish to see Glasgow a cleaner, healthier, safer city in the years to come. Also
the health of the citizens of Glasgow should be adressed — People in poverty are still dying younger in the 21st Century ¶ I am not yet born yet, due 28/7/06. I wish by 2020 that Glasgow is a safer,
friendly and happier place i.e. no drugs, bigotry, crime etc. ¶ I wish that in the near future that night time in Glasgow became a safe and quite time so that 1 and all could sleep well at night. ¶ I wish that
the youth of Glasgow to be given a belief in their abilities and the courage and self condence to fulll their dreams and aspirations. ¶ I wish the city to be a safer city, regarding crimes, also healthier,
Glasgow is the most friendliest place to be. ¶ In 2020 I wish that all the people of Glasgow are living a healthy lifestyle with a roof over their heads, and enjoying the exact same opportunities as the next
person in education and employment. ¶ I wish to see Glasgow a more healthier and stable/safe enviroment. Smoking ban lifted. Drug Free. My children safe purely, myself in a safe enviroment. ¶ Give
true Glaswegians the once opportunity to tour their city and see the sites that tourists PAY FOR we don’t know enough about our own city. ¶ In the year 2020 I’d hope Glaswegians would all be open
minded to trying everything the city has to offer — art, music, theatre, dance, clubs — only since I’ve opened my mind to things I wouldn’t usually try have I properly appreciated how great Glasgow is.
¶ I wish for a giraffe, smoking a pipe. ¶ I wish for six monkeys a-piece. ¶ I wish for a cleaner (please, please crack down on dog dirt, broken bottles etc and litter dropping), more bike-friendly, less
polluted Glasgow. More opportunities and empowerment of our citizens would be good. A happy, multi-cultural, lively, vibrant city! ¶ I wish to wake in a city that has dynamic buzz, 24-hour culture
and where I feel safe (will that city be Glasgow?) ¶ I wish in 2020 that Glasgow is a friendly happy City. ¶ I wish not to see glass bottles in Glasgow. ¶ I wish for millions of pounds. ¶ My own fall ship
and crew of scoundrels. ¶ I wish I was a pirate. ¶ I wish I was rich. ¶ In 2020 I’d wish for a Glasgow which remembers and is proud of its history. It should also appreciate its diversity and friendliness as
that’s what makes Glasgow what it is. Its also what makes it so memorable to everyone else! ¶ I wish for another forty happy and prosperious years ahead and my children and grandchildren health and
happiness. ¶ In 2020, I wish for a Glasgow that has accepted it’s cultural diversity and continued in its ability to live in the hearts of the people who live there. When I go abroad and people know I’m
from Glasgow I’m proud, I wish for that to continue. P.S — I hope the patter never changes! ¶ I wish that Glasgow’s diverse culture continues to thrive and Glasgow is a city for us all to be proud of. ¶ I
wish all animal and child cruelty was stopped and happiness and health for my children as they grow. ¶ I wish for some Baklava. ¶ I wish the grati artists would be put to use painting senior citizens
houses, and that more money will be spend on keeping Glasgow’s parks the best of the world. ¶ I wish that Glasgow will have, in 2020, some architectural sights to rival the beauty of Edinburgh. Our

the streets without fear of attack. ¶ I hope that better
education and youth facilities are made
available. I also hope that people once
again will feel safe in their
communities. ¶ I wish that by
2020 Glasgow was a
bigotry free city.
I
wish
for peace,
health and
prosperity for
everyone. ¶ I wish that by
2020 that, there are no homeless
people in Glasgow, all children are
encouraged to become the best that they
can possibly be and poverty doesn’t exist within
this great city. ¶ I wish people can by 2020 have no
unemployement, no homeless, better education for all, get
on with Black ethnic people, freedom from crime walk streets. ¶
I hope that Glasgow in 2020 is still changing and growing with it’s
people. ¶ I wish that I am still around in 2020 and am able to enjoy the wit
and humour of my fellow Glaswegians. ¶ I wish to see the city free of
unemployment. ¶ I wish to see a Glasgow with fresh air, better health and much less
social and economic inequality. ¶ I want to see more jobs, less deprivation, and much more
childcare facilities. A happy and smiling Glasgow. ¶ By 2020 all ages of Scotland citizens have
real equality and that each part of the city infrastructure genuinely ts together. ¶ I wish that Glasgow
becomes a vibrant city where people can walk safely and enjoy the variety of culture on offer.
Homelessness, poverty and ill health should be key issues addressed by then and people should have the
opportunities to make the most of ¶ I wish by 2020 Glasgow is a better clean city from drugs, with good health, care,

¶ Have world’s biggest store by centre of town ¶ Stop sectarianism ¶ Make more places to have a game of football ¶ I wish that school pupils could get makeover lessons to help them look fab ¶ I wish
that school would be better ¶ I wish there was a skatepark in Scoutstown ¶ I wish that these was less raping and sexism ¶ I wish that we could walk alone on the streets of Glasgow and be safe ¶ I wish
that we got rid of pedestrian crossings and replace them with stone bridges so that people do not get hit by cars ¶ I wish that glasgow was drug free ¶ I wish there would be a drug free Glasgow ¶ I wish
that Glasgow’s streets were cleaner ¶ My wish is that would be more sports facilities ¶ My wish would be that Glasgow would be more environmentally friendly ¶ I wish there were sheltered homes for
homeless people ¶ I wish that there would be a toy megastore in the middle of town and hey are good. We also need more place for the homeless to go and to make sure they will have food and
clothes. Also more control over NEDs please. ¶ For glasgow to continue to be an exciting and cosmopolitan city to live in with a community that respects each other and the city they live in ¶
I wish for an end to poverty and for the city to be full of people of all ages, shapes, sizes, colours and religions who all respect each other and want to work together to make Glasgow a
great place to live ¶ I wish for a greener, tolerant and safer city. I wish for free childcare, more tubes and trams and haberdashery departments! Above all I wish for the eradication of
vulnerable people at rish through drugs, alcohol and poverty ¶ I wish for house prices to come down to make life easier for rst times buyers in Glasgow and for Glasgow
Warriors to win the Celtic League and Heineken Cup ¶ I wish for less poor people and less drugs, happy children, sunshine and less working hours ¶ I wish for healthier
city life, fewer cars and fast food. Littering and excess drinking to be socially unacceptable ¶ I wish that glaswegians were mor condent and comfortable giving and
receiving praise ¶ I wish people would understand and make time to play and be happy. Childrens should be free to play anywhere they want ¶ I wish more
people would spontaneously burst into song and dance like in a musical ¶ We wish there won’t be a new museum because this one is fab! ¶ I wish that
it was pollution free with more plant life ¶ I wish everyone had fun everday so we can have peace in the world. Only us can make it a better place
¶ I wish there would be peace throughout the whole town for the rest of the world ¶ We wish there would be no more wars ¶ I wish a lot of
tourists from poland ¶ I wish there were no neds in the city ¶ I wish for a good future ¶ I wish to be the best I can be and number 1 ¶ I
hope for a good future and a happy life and also a nice lotto win as well ¶ good quality, affordable housing for ALL our citizens ¶
Good housing for all, equal rights for all ¶ we wish glasgow to host 2014 commonwealth games. We all vote for glasgow ¶
everybody vote for glasgow is a better place and nice ¶ I wish glasgow was better ¶ I wish that glasgow is beautiful and
not full with rubbish. I want to be a great singer and famous dancer ¶ I wish glasgow was better and nice ¶ to have
lots of nice play parks and games for children to play and raise money ¶ lots of places to come and visit with
my mummy and daddy ¶ I wish that Mick Fli stood in Glasgow ¶ I wish that Glasgow was full of parks
and football parks ¶ I wish Glasgow haf more stuff to tuch ¶ I wish all the cars in Glasgow were
porches ¶ I wish there were more long tunnels in glasgow ¶ I wish that there were lots of
cinemas ¶ I wish I was a pokemon game ¶ I wish ivory place had no litter ¶ I wish I
was smaller ¶ I wish I was taller ¶ I wish my cousin was here ¶ I wishI had an
Xbox 360 ¶ I wish to be a popstar ¶ I wish to be a popstar and a hairdresser
¶ I wish that Glasgow didn’t have rubbish ¶ I wish Glasgow wasn’t that
busy ¶ I wish I had a dog ¶ I wish people were happy, and not in
so much of a hurry. I wish I was a princess Cara. I wish

The latter is a
family designed
in the 1950s by
Herman Zapf.
According to its
creator, it is a an
alphabet design
between a Roman
and a sans-serif.
A successful
hybrid for the
fans and merely a
compromise for its
detractors. In this
present case,
we chose it
because of our
total inability to
predict whether
serif or sans-serif
will be the taste
of 2020.
—
THE
DREAMING
CITY
GLASGOW
2020 AND
THE POWER
OF MASS

PART 4
THE POWER OF STORY 65
THE STORIES 81
PART 5
DESIGN CODE FOR MASS IMAGINATION 145
PART 6
A CITY OF IMAGINATION 169
PART 7
THE OPEN CITY 195
ABOUT DEMOS 234
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
St Mungo’s Mirrorball
Jim Carruth
Does not spin the way you’d like
It jigs between pitch dark and light
It staggers with drink, swaggers with balls
Swoops like starlings over Barras stalls
Sends shipyard shadows on tenement walls
It’s a high rise sway, It’s a smile in the rain
It’s a magic sparkle on the Provost’s chain
Like the clockwork orange beneath the ground
It can change direction go both ways round
March back in time to drums and utes
Past uni students and beggars in suits
And with every turn a revelation
Through the smoke of Central station
Banks are bistros, churches are ats
Their basements are rising damp and rats
Around each corner meet the past

GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—11—
the stories of the future is gathered in this volume.
To everyone who was inspired to take pen to paper
and let loose their creative imagination — whether
at one of our events or as a result of one of our
competitions — thank you.
Third, thank you to the more than 2000 people
who made a wish for Glasgow. Many thanks to the
teachers who spread the wish campaign to schools,
all the organisations who hosted freepost wishcards
and nally to Mark Beever, for binding the wishbook
— an indestructible totem that will live for centuries!
Fourth, we would like to thank the project partners
who made Glasgow 2020 and to also highlight that
none asked to have any veto or nal say on any of our
ndings or outputs. A sincere thanks to Glasgow City
Council, Scottish Enterprise Glasgow, Glasgow Housing
Association, Glasgow Centre for Population Health,
Communities Scotland, Greater Glasgow and Clyde NHS
Board, Firstgroup, Strathclyde Police, Strathclyde Fire
and Rescue, Glasgow University, Glasgow Caledonian
University, Glasgow School of Art, Royal Scottish
Academy of Music and Drama, Scottish Arts Council,
VisitScotland, Scottish Executive National Programme
for Mental Health and Well-Being, Glasgow Anti-Racist
Alliance, Scotland UnLtd and the Evening Times. This
group contains nearly every single signicant public
agency in the city — all of which contributed and
engaged with the project.

the other cities across the world with whom we
collaborated — a humble thank you. This project would
not have been possible without your input, energy,
goodwill and enthusiasm.
Second, to the storytellers and storycreators who
were involved in Glasgow 2020. This has been one of
the dening elements of the project, and a selection of
—12—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—13—
people. Jean Cameron of The Arts Practice was a
passionate and committed advocate of this project as
she is of the art she believes in and coined the idea
‘assemblies of hope.’ Jacqueline Whymark of the Scottish
Adult Learning Partnership helped to make the ‘Creative
Carriage’ a wonderful experience for everyone involved.
Liz Gardner of Fablevision and Russell McClarty,
then the Church of Scotland minister at St Paul’s
Church, were enthusiastic believers in the idea
of story. Karen Cunningham, Head of Libraries,
Culture and Sport Glasgow, and Bridget McConnell,
Chief Executive of Culture and Sport Glasgow,
supported this project through the Glasgow City
Council. Phil Hanlon, Department of Public Health,
Glasgow University, provided enthusiasm and numerous
provocations. A big thank you also to David Leask,
formerly of the Evening Times, and now of the Herald;
Russell Leadbetter, of the Evening Times, and author of
two of the best-selling books on Glasgow in recent years;

of numerous activities with grace. Jenny gained both
a husband and a son during the project — we would
like to thank her especially for her commitment to the
project. Sharon Halliday and Craig Jardine of Innite Eye
designed and modied the project website and were
responsible for our fabulous Glasgow 2020 logo.
Glasgow 2020 inspired a wide range of people
to contribute time and effort, enthusiasm and ideas.
Pre-project, Ken Wardrop, then of Scottish Enterprise
Glasgow, Carol Tannahill, of Glasgow Centre for
Population Health, and Jim McCormick, of Scottish
Council Foundation, gave their thoughts and insights
to aiding the initial project proposal.
Through the course of the project we were
blessed by the valuable advice of many wonderful
—ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS—
—14—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—15—
PART
1
INTRO
DUCTION
communications support; Alison Harvie for her support
in administering the project and in particular, Tom
Bentley in the initial stages, and Joost Beunderman, John
Holden and John Craig subsequently for their valuable
insights. A last word and thought should go to Rosie Ilett
who oversaw the last stage of checking references and

to examine the questions and dilemmas the modern
city faces. Glasgow has shown a remarkable capacity
for civic leadership and pride, past innovation and
reinvention, and therefore makes a compelling site
to ask what might come next in our urban futures.

The Glasgow 2020 project started out to:
develop a whole-city project:
engaging Glasgow’s many different communities of
place, interest and identity as well as civic and public
institutions in a shared project.
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cities elsewhere and for anyone who is concerned with
how we shape our shared futures.
Glasgow is a city which has experienced constant
change and adaptation from its period as an ‘imperial
city’, as the Second City of Empire and the Athens of
the North, to its latter day reinvention as the City of
Culture and Second City of Shopping. This is a city
with pull, buzz, excitement, and a sense of style and its
own importance. It has a potent international reach and
inuence. There are nearly two dozen towns and cities
around the world named after Glasgow, following
the trade threads of Empire — from Jamaica to Montana
and even a Glasgow on the moon.
3
The Glasgow
character has been much written about by people
studying the city from within and outwith, some to
praise it, and others to condemn it.
There is also the Glasgow with historic and
deep inequalities, a city of sharp divisions in income,
employment, life chances, lifestyle and health. In these
relatively good times for the majority in Scotland and the
UK, many of these inequalities have grown wider.
4

—INTRODUCTION—
—18—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—19—

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develop a project that was not just about
Glasgow but about cities more widely:
using activities in Glasgow to develop a wider set of
conversations in other cities, enabling the sharing and

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—INTRODUCTION—
—20—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—21—
able to act in the present. By building up people’s
capacity and condence to think about the future,
futures literacy helps us challenge our everyday
assumptions and leads to better decision-making.
Becoming a futures-literate city means connecting
individual and collective aspirations for the
future at a scale and within contexts that people
nd meaningful and can participate in practically
— in neighbourhoods, public spaces and public

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design and execution of the project.
The rst step to a better future is imagining one:
Thinking about the future is not something that can be
left to futurologists or experts inside big institutions.
Instead it needs to be open, participative and
democratic. The idea of futures literacy means
thinking imaginatively about the future but also being
—INTRODUCTION—
‘
—22—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—23—
urban entrepreneurship. The result is a growing mismatch
between the kind of cities people want and what cities
are able to offer. This means there is a real danger that
the current resurgence of cities will prove cyclical and
short-lived rather than structural and sustained.
The stories we tell matter:
The stories that we tell matter because they indicate how
we see the world, and whether we believe we have the
power and capacity to shape it for the better. Stories are
one of the main ways that we make sense of the world,
and understand and interpret our lives and experiences.
Stories and engaging people’s imagination are potentially
a powerful way to open up the futures of cities in
democratic and creative ways.
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—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—25—
This book invites you to join us on the journey of
Glasgow 2020. Over the course of the project the city of
Glasgow underwent signicant institutional and public
policy change:
• The smoking ban was introduced across Scotland
on 26 March 2006 — ahead of the rest of the UK.
• Glasgow City Council’s Culture and Sport
Department became an independent charitable trust
in April 2007.
• Proportional representation was introduced for
Scottish local authority elections on 3 May 2007
— the rst part of Great Britain to have PR for town halls.
None of these changes was the result of the
activities of Glasgow 2020, but they illustrate the
changing nature and dynamism of the city in a relatively
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of producing collective goods over to its people.
This project has tried to show what this means
for one facet of expanding democracy in the city
— of collectively imagining the future. The book shares
the outcomes of this mass imagination experiment and
begins to map out how the process can be expanded
and deepened into the everyday governance, culture,
service design and planning of cities.
When the project found a pessimistic story about
the future of cities it has been about institutions running
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short timespan. The smoking ban changed the city
landscape in relation to public houses, concerts and
numerous social activities, especially as Glasgow

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often alluringly synthesised into a simple story of decline
and renewal. One account of the city’s decline manages
to atten 50 years of history into two sentences:
‘ Stalinist post-war planning decanted half the population into
new towns in the green belt, and the economy naturally
imploded. The Labour council then raised taxes and the
middle class ed, turning the city into a vast wasteland.’
11
Over recent years there have been numerous
proclamations of the city’s turnaround. Some come
from public agencies based in the city, others from
external sources such as the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development.
12
One authoritative
arbiter of city fortunes world-wide, Fodor’s Travel Guide,
declared that:
‘ Modern Glasgow has undergone an urban renaissance:
trendy downtown stores, a booming and diverse culture life,
stylish restaurants, and air of condence make it Scotland’s
most exciting city.’
13
‘ Glasgow is a great city. Glasgow is in trouble.
Glasgow is handsome. Glasgow is ugly.
Glasgow is kind. Glasgow is cruel.’
— William McIIvanney
6

Glasgow’s story weaves in and out of a global urban
tapestry. Often abbreviated to a simple story of decline

—32—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—33—
Glasgow. This campaign is widely credited with changing
the way that Glasgow was perceived within Scotland
and across the UK, and helped Glasgow secure the 1988
Garden Festival and the 1990 Capital of Culture.
Capital of culture:
Glasgow became the sixth European city to be
awarded Capital of Culture status by the European
Union, which put it alongside the previous cultural
heavyweight hosts — Amsterdam, Athens, Berlin,
Florence and Paris. The city staged over 3400 public
events, by artists from 23 countries, 40 major works
were commissioned in the performing and visual arts,
and 60 world premieres in theatre and dance took place.
Glasgow’s Capital of Culture became a reference point
for other cities looking to use culture and the arts to
promote themselves and boost their international prole.
The Armadillo:
Boosterism requires iconic symbols. Glasgow has a
high concentration of residential high-rises — more than
any other city in the UK. But the building increasingly
used to promote Glasgow is the Clyde Auditorium.
Designed by Sir Norman Foster and completed in
1997, it sits alongside the banks of the Clyde and hosts
conferences, concerts and exhibitions. For visibly
obvious reasons it is known locally as the Armadillo.
Festivals:

cartoon creations, the Mr Men. The character’s smiling
expression and bright yellow colour was seen as a
positive, fun image, which people of all ages could
identify with. In 1987 David Steel, David Owen,
Margaret Thatcher and Neil Kinnock agreed to appear
alongside Mr Happy in a series of adverts promoting
—THE URBAN EVERYMAN—
—34—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—35—
For example, in 2006 the city was nominated by
Frommer’s Travel Guide as one of their top ten world
destinations
19
(the only European destination on the list)
and readers of Conde Nast Traveller voted Glasgow their
favourite UK city.
20
With a sense that major events and
civic promotion is working for Glasgow, the city now has
its eye set on hosting the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
21

THE LIMITS OF THE
CULTURAL ARMS RACE.
The relentless positive
rhetoric of the
booster
city is partly responsible for the uncomplicated

Executed with considerable gusto, the boosterism
strategy has led to gains for Glasgow. The Miles
Better campaign was originally devised to change the
perceptions of external audiences, particularly middle-
class media, business decision-makers and opinion
formers in London. It is widely regarded as having
succeeded in this. For example, The Economist wrote in
2004 that the campaign, along with ‘I Love New York’,
is ‘one of the few successful city rebranding advertising
campaigns. Tourists came ooding in, halting years of
economic decline.’
15
Tourism now accounts for 7.6 per
cent of all jobs in Glasgow,
16
serving 2.8 million tourists.
17
Michael Kelly, former Lord Provost and one of the
architects of the campaign, talks about the welcome
but unintended side-effect of the campaign’s popularity
with people and businesses inside Glasgow, helping
prompt more positive self-perceptions of the city.
18

These perceptions were given sustenance by new jobs
and services coming to Glasgow and a much needed
clean-up programme of many of its public buildings.
Fifteen years on Glasgow is still pursuing the same
strategy, seemingly with some continued success.
—THE URBAN EVERYMAN—

has not involved the centre rethinking itself or its
relationship with other bodies in terms of consistently
shifting power downwards and outwards.
27
Second, there has been little progress in mapping
out how the localism agenda ts with the realities,
needs and aspirations of our towns and cities.
While cities — rather than rms or nations

— are recognised as the primary units driving economic
offering thin. One serious charge turns on what all
this culture and creativity is for? Some of the booster
city’s harsher critiques accuse it of co-opting culture in
the name of increasing property values and high-end
consumers. For example, during the late 1980s and early
1990s a group of artists and writers formed a group
called the Workers’ City
22
and campaigned against the
amount of money spent on what it saw as a sanitized,
publicly sanitised art.
23
Glasgow is not alone in nding the city boosterism
formula wanting. In 2004 Barcelona fell out of love
with its culture and big-event-led strategy. Although the
strategy had worked well to mobilise and transform the
city around the 1992 Olympics, by 2004 the Forum de
Culture it had lost its power to engage and the event was
widely regarded as a failure and prompted much soul-
searching in the city about its future direction.

limitations of much of the mainstream urban response of
the last 20 years. Many of these problems are shared by
cities elsewhere.
Growing economic, social and spatial inequality:
European cities across the board are experiencing
growing inequalities and entrenched social exclusion.
This is not unusual; the protability of many city spaces
in North America and Western Europe has been
coupled with sharpening socio-economic inequalities
and what Gordon McLeod has called ‘the institutional
displacement and social exclusion of certain
marginalized groups’.
29
Glasgow is a city of extremes and contrasts, of
huge wealth concentrations as well as extreme relative
poverty. In 2006 the city contained 1,076 millionaires
— the fth highest total in the UK; Edinburgh had 1,301
millionaires — the second highest.
30
Greater Glasgow
has nine of the top 20 property streets in Scotland.
31

In 2005 according to Scottish Business Monitor 113 of
Scotland’s top 500 companies (23%) were located in
Glasgow.
32
Glasgow’s housing tenure has changed dramatically
with owner occupation rising from 24 per cent in 1981
to 49 per cent in 2001. This transformation has been

28
—THE URBAN EVERYMAN—
—40—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—41—
with workers in knowledge and creative industries
pulling away but increasingly dependent on an army of
service workers to facilitate their lifestyles. Pacic Quay,
the location of the new media centre in Glasgow,
provides a telling example. As some have pointed out,
a media and science centre was never going to provide
work for the ‘de-skilled, benet-dependent, ageing
population of Govan’.
37
Instead, as the self-titled ‘Friend
of Zanetti’ continued, there is ‘a widening income and
opportunity gap between professional and managerial
workers and those at the lower end who lack the skills
for the new economy’.
38
In post-regeneration Govan,
the population has fallen by more than 20 per cent in the
last decade and 51 per cent of adults are unemployed,
all this in the shadow of gleaming new industrial units
and ofces.
39
Breakdown of trust among people:
The most recent social values survey found that just 26
per cent of us believe that most other people can be

education was 21 per cent compared with a Scottish
average of 31 per cent.
35
These escalating inequalities nd form in the
physical spaces and places of Glasgow. One such place
is Crown Street in the Gorbals. Here commentators have
argued that although this award-winning regeneration
scheme was developed with civic purposes in
mind it has ended up reinforcing social polarisation.
‘ Elite designers have taken Crown Street’s working class
landscape, idealized it and estranged it from its roots.
Likewise, they have empowered the young, the middle
class and the outsider at the expense of the vulnerable,
the working class and the local.’
36
Deepening divisions and
fragmentation within the labour market:
In addition to the socio-spatial fragmentation that has
emerged in Glasgow and other cities, new divides are
appearing in the labour market as the skills gap widens.
With more and more emphasis on knowledge-intensive
sectors, a kind of ‘labour apartheid’ develops,
—THE URBAN EVERYMAN—
—42—
—THE DREAMING CITY—
GLASGOW 2020 AND THE POWER OF MASS IMAGINATION
—43—
unemployed or found work in the service sector
with a signicant effect on self-identity formation.
The Glasgow economy now has some of the highest

We need to imagine just what a clean, safe, efcient,
Gap between people and public institutions:
Cities have adapted well to an economy based less
around mass-reproduced products and more around
the creation of customised end experiences. From call
centres to gyms, tanning salons to PC repair shops,
new season ticket deals to personalised concerts,
and life coaches to falafels, cities are thriving on the
spending power and life-style demands of individuals
searching for individual, personalised experiences.
42

But for all their dynamism and ability to connect with
people’s material aspirations, our cities are struggling
to congure themselves to help resolve more everyday
social and environmental needs. Public bodies, quangos
and services struggle to nd ways to communicate with
and inspire changes in public behaviour while people
remain untrusting, or simply cannot see the results of the
activity undertaken on their collective behalf.
At the same time political engagement is in crisis in
Scotland and the UK. The last two UK general elections
saw the lowest turnout in post-war times — 59.4 per
cent in 2001 and 61.2 per cent in 2005.
43
Fault lines
are opening up along the lines of place and class: in
the 2005 UK election the turnout level was 70 per cent
among the AB group and 54 per cent among the DE
group, the largest gap ever recorded at a UK election.

restricted rules of an essentially closed system.
If cities are to break free from the closed city,

they will need to begin to imagine a different future
and engage the most abundant and potent source
of new ideas and practices a city has — its people.
In order to do this, cities have to be open to asking
some big questions. What kind of cities do we want
to live in? Who has the energy and impetus to make
change in them happen? How will people be involved
in the process of change? What kind of support do they
need to help shape their shared futures? These are all
political questions.
If the challenge for the future of cities is political
dynamic, stimulating, just city would look like concretely
— we need those images to confront critically our masters
with what they should be doing — and just this critical
imagination of the city is weak.’
47
Sennett points the nger at modernism for creating
‘closed’ urban landscapes through an ‘over-determination’
of our cities’ visual forms and social functions. He
describes Le Corbusier’s 1922 Plan Voison for Paris
as ‘a portent of the freezing of the urban imagination’.
48

Its masterplan conceived of replacing most of the centre
of Paris with uniform buildings and eliminating most
human-scale street-level activity. Sennett argues that
since then zoning, regulation and rules have proliferated

turn next.
PART
3
THE
OFFICIAL
FUTURE
The pictures in this section are illustrated
wishes made by 6 year old’s (who will be 21 in 2020).