Designed to succeed:building authorising environments for fast-growing cities

Cities are where prosperity is won or lost. They can either be the engines of economic growth, or dysfunctional sites of congestion, crowding, and discontent. One of the main differences is due to the quality and effectiveness of policy decisions: some city governments can take effective, timely decisions that support the productivity-enhancing features of cities, while others cannot. Drawing on cross-country experiences and academic literature, this paper describes the policy options that can improve the urban authorising environment, with a focus on formal decision-making structures.