Cities are open systems, continually exchanging resources, products and services, waste, people, ideas and finances with the hinterlands and broader world. Cities are complex, self-organising, adaptive and constantly evolving. Cities also encompass multiple actors with varying responsibilities, capabilities and priorities, as well as processes that transcend the institutional sector-based approach to city administration. Cities are embedded in broader ecological economic, technical, institutional, legal and governance structures that enable or constrain their systemic function, which cannot be separated from wider power relations. Urban processes of a physical, social and economic nature are causally interlinked, with interactions and feedbacks that result in both intended and unintended impacts on emissions. See also City region, Peri-urban areas and Urban.
IPCC
Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability
IPCC Report