Studies of the city traditionally posit a division between a city's economy and its culture, with culture subordinate in explanatory power to work. However, post-industrial and globalizing trends are dramatically elevating the importance of culture. Cultural activities are increasingly crucial to urban economic vitality. Models to explain the growth of cities from the era of industrial manufacturing are outmoded. Citizens in the postindustrial city increasingly make quality of life demands, treating their own urban location as if tourists, emphasizing aesthetic concerns. These practices impact considerations about the proper nature of amenities that post-industrial cities can sustain.Our classic theories of urban growth and decline are out of date. Not all need be scrapped but most need significant updating. Why? Because of globalization, the most dramatic force restructuring our cities around the world. The power of the process is no less if we ignore it; we do so at great risk. Mayors, developers, political party leaders, and even social scientists need to rethink their paradigms about how cities grow, decline, and redevelop. It is painful for everyone.This article briefly sketches the broader changes accompanying globalization then highlights the critical role of amenities and urban political choices about amenities, suggesting where and how they can dramatically shift urban growth dynamics. Data

New forms of social stratification are emerging. Much of our thinking about stratification - from Marx, Weber, and others - must be recast to capture these new developments. Social class was the key theme of past stratification work. Yet class is an increasingly outmoded concept. Class stratification implies that people can be differentiated hierarchically on one or more criteria into distinct layers, classes. Class analysis has grown increasingly inadequate in recent decades as traditional hierarchies have declined and new social differences have emerged. The cumulative impact of these changes is fundamentally altering the nature of social stratification - placing past theories in need of substantial modification. This paper outlines first some general propositions about the sources of class stratification and its decline. The decline of hierarchy, and its spread across situses, is emphasised. The general propositions are applied to political parties and ideological cleavages, the economy, the family, and social mobility. These developments appear most clearly in North America and Western Europe, but our propositions also help interpret some of the tensions and factors driving change in Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union, and other societies.

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Social classes have not died, but their political significance has declined substantially; this justifies a shift from class-centred analysis towards multi-causal explanations of political behaviour and related social phenomena. This contribution extends key propositions from Clark and Lipset and adds new empirical evidence to the commentaries by Hout et al. and Pakulski. Four general propositions are stated concerning where and why class is weaker or stronger. The propositions are then applied to several areas, considering how class has weakened in its impact, especially on politics. We cite several writers of Marxist background to show how they have converged with others in interpreting central developments. The paper notes the impact of organisations like parties and unions, independent of classes, in affecting political processes. It points to the rise of the welfare state as generally weakening class conflict by providing a safety-net and benefits. The diversification of the occupational structure toward small firms, high tech and services weakens class organisational potentials. So does more affluence. Political parties have correspondingly shifted from class conflict to non-economic issues like the environment. The Socialist and Communist Parties have drastically altered their programmes in dozens of countries, away from traditional class politics toward new social issues, and often even toward constraining government. New nationalist parties have arisen stressing national identity and limiting immigration. These developments cumulatively weaken class politics.