The article presents the chosen results of the research conducted between November 2016 and January 2017 among the councilors and presidents of cities forming the Metropolitan Association of Upper Silesia. The aim of the research was to identify the needs and deficits of knowledge of local government units in their functioning in the Upper Silesian metropolitan area, as well as the tasks that may be carried out by the Observatory of Urban and Metropolitan Processes — a unit established at the University of Silesia in Katowice. The plans (currently implemented) for the creation of the “Górnośląsko‑Zagłębiowska Metropolia” (Upper Silesian and Zagłębie Metropolis) have become a direct impulse for the research. The article also reviews the theoretical considerations relating to the metropolitan area, referring to the specificity of the discussed metropolis.

The establishment on 1st of July 2017 of the first metropolitan union in Poland in Silesian conurbation opens new development opportunities to Silesia Region. In this way, two principal obstacles for sustainable development of this metropolitan area have been taken down, such as the lack of “metropolitan law” and the shortage of additional sources of funding for its activities. The Silesian metropolitan union has both, but would it be enough for efficient and integrated management of the metropolitan union composed of 41 non‑uniform territorial units? According to the author’s assumption, the success of the project of forming Upper Silesian and Zagłębie Metropolis will depend chiefly on nonformal and non‑financial factors connected with the level of social capital of local political decision makers, the degree of confidence and consensuality in their relations. In order to analyze these factors, the author refers to the results of qualitative and quantitative research, identifying former structures and projects of municipal cooperation but also presenting the opinions of city counselors and mayors about the evaluation, priorities and perspectives of their cooperation.

The article presents challenges related to the development of the Upper Silesian and Zagłębie Metropolis in the context of the genesis of the settlement system and the potential of this urban complex. It indicates activities related to the management process resulting from the Act on the metropolitan association of the Silesian Voivodeship. It also emphasizes the requirements that have to be met in order for the studied cities to become a metropolis in a global sense.

The article describes the phenomenon of daily commutes to work occurring in the territory of Upper Silesian and Zagłębie Metropolis. The scale of this phenomenon is best illustrated by the fact that every day several hundred thousand of individuals cross the borders of their place of residence to commute to their work place. This phenomenon has been described on the basis of data of the Main Statistic Office for the years 2006 and 2011 — thanks to this the dynamics of changes occurring in the layout of individual communes has been presented. The text lists the communes of the Metropolis which register positive and negative daily balance of commuters. The communes with clear dominance of those arriving rather than departing are Katowice and Gliwice, which are increasingly gaining the character of supralocal markets. The analysis of congestion of traffic of human resources in the territory of the Metropolis indicates very strong connections of individual communes in terms of commuting with distinctive domination of Katowice, which in 2011 witnessed over 122 thousand individuals arriving to work daily— they were mostly the inhabitants of other communes of the Silesia region. Other cities which attract particularly large numbers of commuters on a daily basis are Gliwice (28 000), Dąbrowa Górnicza (17 000), Sosnowiec (15 000) and Tychy (15 000). Taking into consideration the intensity of daily commuting of the inhabitants of the Metropolitan Union, we may undoubtedly prove the territorial integrity of this area — as a labour market of subregional character. The analysis of the phenomenon of the intensity of the daily commuting has an applicational dimension and it may be used in practice in the course of planning an extension or modernisation of the transport system network between the communes with the highest intensity of commuting.

The article is an attempt to estimate the demographic resources of the “Górnośląsko‑Zagłębiowska Metropolia” (Upper Silesian and Zagłębie Metropolis). Some universal demographic processes can be observed in the communities constituting it, such as population ageing, population outflow, but their dynamics and detailed parameters of vital and migration statistics indicate a wide diversity of demographic potential in the metropolis. The author compares and analyzes selected indicators of demographic potential, such as: total number of population, population density, population structure by sex and age, as well as basic vital and migration statistics for 41 communes of the Metropolis of Upper Silesia and Zagłębie.

The main purpose of the paper is to assess trends in local and regional socio‑economic development in a postindustrial metropolitan region undergoing fundamental change of its development trajectory. The study area consists of the Katowice urban region — the second largest metropolitan region in Poland after Warsaw. The Katowice urban region has been one of Poland’s two main problem areas characterized by environmental, social, and economic problems of national importance. The heavily industrial region experienced a substantial social and economic transformation after Poland became a democratic nation in 1989. Positive processes of socio‑economic development occur selectively across the discussed urban region and large differences in the trajectory of local socio‑economic development constitute significant challenges for the whole metropolitan region. The authors argue that the period of fundamental change of the socio‑economic trajectory in a fragmented system of management and under the extreme neoliberal model of development (as is in the case of the Katowice conurbation after 1989) will lead to the polarization and growing inequalities within the region.

The article aims at analyzing the issue of importance of the category of „Lower Silesia” in the process of forming collective identity (and its spatial aspect) of the city and the people of Wrocław. There is a twofold justification for asking such a question. Firstly, there are new challenges that urban settlements need to tackle since they are facing shrinkage of external resources and an increasing necessity to rely on internal resources and to build up resilience against crises. Secondly, Wrocław is an example of a city which is now facing a crisis of its identity as the meeting place and is looking for new identification. The background for presenting the latest results of empirical research is a historical one — it is comprised of the description of postwar political efforts to deliver a collective identity and integrate a loose set of people who settled in a completely strange region of regained territories. The article concludes with statements on the usefulness of the Lower Silesian aspect of identity for the inhabitants and for the city — a potential metropolis — of Wrocław.

The aim of this article is to investigate the phenomenon of semantic design (I. Kozina, Z. Oslislo‑Piekarska) and discuss its role in shaping contemporary Silesian identity. The author explores why certain projects, namely the gadgets, are prone to commodification and therefore likely to involve in mechanisms similar to self‑colonization (A. Kiossev). She refers to the concept of ‘New Silesians’ (Z. Oslislo‑Piekarska) in order to indicate the role of local cultural leaders and designers in aforementioned processes. In conclusion, the author points out the conditions under which semantic design has the chance of working effectively by fostering modernization and social change.

In a rapidly changing environment due to globalization, we are constantly looking for appropriate paths and strategies for cities and regions in accordance with affirmation of growth factors territorialisation. As a result, we observe an inflation of development conceptions that seek to define the conditions for urban resilience resulting in sustainable development despite the unstable environment. The author places his reflections in the context of Upper Silesia conurbation development challenges. He examines the current path of the region development and analyzes the role that the application of smart city and creative city concepts could play in this process. He does not decide which paths should be chosen but rather suggests a reflection on the proportions between different bundles inside the development process. He also highlights the limits of a smart city concept and shows to what extent those limits can be exceeded through the application of a creative city strategy. Specific conditions offered by the Upper Silesian metropolitan area related to its economic and social diversity provide a significant opportunity for the development of creative economy that could determine the competitive advantage of this area in the coming decades.

The aim of the paper is to bring to one’s attention some disproportions in common thinking about presumed functions of city’s public spaces. The paper covers both the adequacy of said spaces, regarding the needs of those socially excluded or homeless, and attitudes toward them presented by the “normal” city center users. The paper in some way also considers the adequacy of the excluded to shared public spaces. For it is crucial to realize the scale of unspoken exclusion of those who are not primary recipients of the city center’s spaces.

The “communautéurbaine” of Saint‑Etienne Métropole reaches the status of Metropolis in 2018. This paper aims at showing that the intermunicipal cooperation in Saint‑Etienne metropolitan area is the result of a relatively recent and conflicting process, in particular for the recognition of the structuring role of the main city. The metropolitan frame of reference remains dependent on the municipal one, and still represents a major challenge to “speak with a single voice” in the context of the rescaling of public policies in France.

This article specifies the outlines of the French territorial reform (2015) in the light of the case study of Lyon metropolitan area. Within this context, the “Decision Support” of urban planning agencies has to be reconsidered especially with the focus on territorial representations. The paper highlights how urban planning agencies, especially UrbaLyon, deal with the issue of the representations of new territorial configurations, as well as their role in regional planning.

This article deals with social construction of metropolises through the security issues related to them. Big cities concentrate the main part of the contemporary security attention, which are mainly based on an expert approach and functionalist principles. Therefore, certain stakes remain set back from the public debate: social relations within the security policy, increase of the new places of consumption or culture specific to the metropolitan identity and the practical devices of safety that they involve, but also the limits of the full political involvement in the political construction of the metropolitan democracy. The reinstatement of the social dimensions of the security in the new policy of intercommunality seems nevertheless essential to the civic legitimization of a metropolitan identity.

In 2006 and 2016, Canada’s two largest cities, Toronto and Montreal, have received a special status in their respective provinces (Ontario and Quebec). This paper proposes to analyze and compare the legislative and administrative frameworks behind these new statutes (City of Toronto Act, 2006 and the Bill to increase the autonomy and powers of the City of Montreal, a metropolis of Quebec with an intergovernmental agreement called RéflexeMontréal). The paper analyzes the legal framework of metropolitan construction in order to understand the possibilities and the limits of the new powers acquired under these new statutes. The article concludes that these new statutes allow to reorganize relations between municipal and provincial governments differently but not necessarily significantly. The article also reveals how these differences have their origins in the English and French legal traditions.

Bratislava is a capital with very rich history that has gone through empires and regimes until becoming the center of the emancipation efforts of the Slovak nation. A historical and political recontextualization of Bratislava’s development makes it possible to understand the functioning of the governance of this capital in Central Europe. Inspired by the dominant models of Western Europe, the decentralizing wave that followed authoritarian centralism has had consequences for the political organization of the city of Bratislava, which today has heterogeneous districts with wide autonomy. In the context of growing competition between metropolises as a result of globalization, an ambitious administrative reform could allow Bratislava to acquire governance tools that could enable an achievement of increased cohesion.