Co-sponsored by the UC Berkeley Center for Community Innovation and the Center for Latin American Studies
Metropolitan governance is at the center of current urban debates in Colombia due the emerging interaction of multiple administrative units within landscapes of accelerated urban growth. Colombia has an administrative and political territorial organization based on subnational divisions with a diffuse normative definition of urban and rural therefore complicating any attempts at coordination. In this context the metropolitan category is understood, defined and use as association agreements of “municipios” cooperating in specific topics but in practical terms this does not occur. The recent deployment of a National Urban Policy based on the concept of “System of Cities” has focused the attention on the lack of adequate definition of territorial concepts that reduce the capacity of interaction and articulation of government units and multiple other social actors.
Diego Silva Ardila will present contemporary municipal, urban and metropolitan debates and experiences in Colombia along with the process of construction of a National Urban Policy to discuss its successes and failures in certain areas. Particular emphasis will be given to recent development of urban transportation systems (based on BRT technologies) that link the local arenas with global policy mobility networks in order to have an interesting conversation around the global narratives of the Colombian urban “success”.
David Silva Ardila is a Professor and Researcher at the Urban Management and Development Program at Universidad del Rosario in Bogotá, Colombia. His research interests include urban policy, mobilities, metropolitan governance and urban history. An economist and historian, he has masters degrees in Economics from Universidad de los Andes and a Masters degree in Political Economic and International Affairs at Universidad Externado de Colombia. In addition, he earned his PhD in Urban Planning and Policy at the University of Illinois at Chicago with emphasis in urban economics, public and collective allocation of goods and services in urban spaces and local development. He has had work experience in the private sector, government and academia at the national and local scales with strong analytical skills. He was the Former Deputy Director of the Colombian National Statistical Office (DANE) and former Board President of the Colombian National Geographic Institute (IGAC). He currently works as Advisor for the Development Plan of Bucaramanga, Director of the city Culture Secretary, and Consultant for UN-Habitat, Inter-American Development Bank, CEPEI (Policy Think-Tank) and other multiple local agencies.