Global city makers : economic actors and practices in the world city network Global City Makers provides an in depth account of the role of powerful economic actors in making and un making global cities. Engaging critically and constructively with global urban studies from a relational economic geography perspective the book outlines a renewed agenda for global cities research. This book conceptualizes global cities as places from where the world economy is managed and controlled and discusses the significance of economic actors and their practices in the formation of the world city network. Focusing on financial services management consultancy real estate commodity trading and maritime industries the detailed case studies are located across the globe to incorporate major global cities such as London New York and Tokyo as well as globalizing cities including Mexico City Hamburg and Mumbai. This ground breaking book will appeal to a broad audience including scholars in urban studies economic geography and international management as well as urban policy makers and practitioners in globalizing firms Contents: Prologue: The global city: enabling economic intermediation and bearing its costs Saskia Sassen 1. Agency and practice in the making of global cities: towards a renewed research agenda Michael Hoyler Christof Parnreiter and Allan Watson 2. Producer service firms as global city makers: the cases of Mexico City and Hamburg Christof Parnreiter 3. Commodity traders as agents of economic globalization Wouter Jacobs 4. Real estate and global capital networks: drilling into the city of London Colin Lizieri and Daniel Mekic 5. Global cities local practices: intermediation in the commercial real estate markets of New York City and London David Scofield 6. The making of transnational urban space: financial professionals in the global city Tokyo Sakura Yamamura 7. The making of Mumbai as a global city: investigating the role of the offshore services sector Bart Lambregts Jana Kleibert and Niels Beerepoot 8. Focal firms grand coalitions or global city makers: globalization vs. new localism in Hamburgs maritime network Markus Hesse 9. Chasing the phantom of a global end game: the role of management consultancy in the narratives of pre failure ABN AMRO Michiel van Meeteren and David Bassens Epilogue: Placing politics and power within the making of global cities Sarah Hall Index.