This book undertakes the first systematic multi-country investigation into how regimes of
place equality consisting of multilevel policies institutions and governance at multiple
scales influence spatial inequality in metropolitan regions. Extended diversified
metropolitan regions have become the dominant form of human settlement and disparities among
metropolitan places figure increasingly in wider trends toward growing inequality. Regimes of
place equality are increasingly critical components of welfare states and territorial
administration. They can aggravate disparities in services and taxes or mitigate and
compensate for local differences. The volume examines these regimes in a global sample of
eleven democracies including developed and developing countries on five continents. The
analyses reveal new dimensions of efforts to grapple with growing inequality around the world
and a variety of institutional blueprints to address one of the most daunting challenges of
twenty-first century governance.
