A Life for the Stars by James Blish (American, 1962)

Summary:
Planet Earth has become almost uninhabitable. There is a shortage of food and other resources to the extent that having a job does not mean anything anymore. Due to these circumstances, the use of spindizzy technology to flee the planet has increased. Thanks to this groundbreaking technology, a whole city can be literally uprooted and travel through open space. Chris, the protagonist, is the second child of his family, so he has to help to take care of his sick father and his younger siblings. Overwhelmed by this burden and longing for some time for himself, Chris sets towards the limits of his town to see the departure of Scranton City. Nevertheless, minutes before the city takes off, a Scranton patrol takes Chris into the city, as prisoner. The youngster tries to explain he just wanted to watch the city flying away, but his words are dismissed and he is forced to go to Frank Lutz, the city manager. In the short trip to the city hall, Frad Haskins advises Chris to introduce himself as a valuable new member of the community and to think of something in which he is an expert on, in order to avoid heavy labour. Chris follows the older man’s advice and presents himself as an astronomer. After a year or so it becomes clear that Chris' knowledge of astronomy is non-existent, so he is banished to New York City. Frad encourages Chris to take this turn of events as beneficial: since New York is wealthier than Scranton and has a larger population, Chris might as well meet people his age and get an actual education. Once transferred to New York, Chris is hosted by perimeter sergeant Anderson and his wife. Chris soon grows close to his foster parents, so when Anderson disappears, he is quick to take action. Chris finds Anderson and his comrade and helps them escape back to New York, where the three of them warn Mayor Amalfi of a plot to take over the city. Another city, in the verge of famine, has contacted New York under the pretence of hiring them, but their plan is to seize the New York marines, leaving the city defenceless and ready for an invasion. When another city sends a distress signal claiming to be victims of the same kind of piracy from some other city, New York quickly comes to its aid. When they arrive, they realize that the attacking city is Scranton. Anderson and Amalfi agree on recruiting Chris based on the young man's wits and knowledge on Scranton to deal with the situation. Instead of thinking the subject through, as he is asked to do, Chris infiltrates into Scranton, locates his old friend Frad, and urges him to depose Lutz. After hiding for a few days, Frad finds Chris and shares with him the news that Lutz’s government has come to an end. Frad is made Scranton’s city manager while Chris is given the same job in New York City.

Another summary:
A Life for The Stars narrates the future of humanity based on the third millenium as the temporary line where all the events of the novel occur, a very advanced world technologically speaking. In exchange of the enormous progress in technology during the second millenium, humanity made use of all the resources available on Earth and was forced to explore outer space in search of resources, mainly iron. This portraits the facility that man has to waste away the natural resources provided by planet Earth and that the obsession for the development of new technologies leads man to a problematic scenario in which a better future is not included. Approximately in 2200 is when the whole world becomes a unique nation and starts colonizing Mars. Unfortunately, it is not worth colonizing other planets in the solar system since they do not have useful materials to sustain humanity. After five hundred years, they start sending entire cities through space in order to escape from planet Earth and from the bad conditions they provoke. Afterwards, during the third millenium, humanity is economically wrecked and the nations that are not capable of remaining stable on Earth are sent to space. One of these cities, is Scranton, where there used to live a teenager named Chris, who is forcefully separated from his family and friends. He did not have any skills, talent, nor scholarity, which is why it would be difficult for him to be useful to a space city, where the sustainability was the most important thing. This fact also reflects the need of being competent and useful to benefit humanity and be able to ensure one's survival. Later, Chris is sent to New York, where he should do something useful to become a citizen. A citizen can live for an undefined lifetime, since there is a fabricated medicine capable of preventing ageing and suffering from diseases. Although Chris tries everything to become a citizen, he apparently does not succeed until he is presented with a scenario in which he is capable of making decisions quickly in a time of crisis, which was a skill that no other man had in the city. This characteristic makes him the manager of the city.

Another summary:
About one thousand years ago, human beings discovered Spindizzy; an antigravity device that helps the ships to launch. Observing its potential, they begin to use it to send entire cities out into space. These cities were known as Okies, where there exists a nomad life, where people are constantly traveling from star to star and doing any job required in each one. 
 One night Chris, a boy who lives on Earth with his family goes near to Scranton, a city that is about to take flight when the security guards find him. Now Chris is embarked in the city of Scranton and has to leave behind his family and Earth. Soon enough, the authorities find out that although he does not has a lot of formal education, he knows a lot about astronomy and human history, so they decide to send him to the floating city of New York. There, he meets the City Fathers, an artificial intelligence that rules all the cities, their citizens, and the history of those; and not only that, they decide who has a nationality and to whom they give some special medicine that slows down the ageing. Seeing the great performance of Chris, they decide to offer him to study in this city, and then if he is able to prove his strengths and talents by the age of eighteen, they would allow him to have the nationality and the access to the drugs. However, soon enough they discover that everything was a trap from Scranton since they wanted to rule over New York City, now Chris has to go undercover to the city to save his friends calling for a revolution against Scranton. Chris succeeds. Just then he and his friends are called by the mayor of New York City, Amalfi, who, after seeing the outcome, offers him a position of city manager, which means that he has to deal with the history of the city and its future. Chris accepts since he does not miss Earth nor his family.

World view: Describes in a variety of aspects and with some consistency an imaginary state or society which is regarded as better, in some respects at least, than the one in which its author lives.
Future projections: It’s a fearful prediction of the possible outcomes of today’s actions. Thus, it warns us against the terrible disasters (e.g. overpopulation, war, climate change) which would follow if there is no change in direction.
Ideology: The control or suppression of futuristic technology is used as a means to maintain dominance and stability.
Characters, plot and writing style: Black humor and satire are employed to expose, criticize or shame individuals or the society itself into improvement.
Classification: Non-dystopia