Goldsmith Talks: Wing Commander Gordon Pendleton, Project Leader - NATO Urbanisation Project

In 2008, the world as a whole passed the 50% threshold of individuals living in cities as opposed to the countryside.  The western world is already urbanised, with 78% of people living in urban areas. Developing countries are experiencing a rapid rate of Urbanisation, and this combined with large population growth means that the urban population in the developing world will jump from 2.9 billion in 2015 to 4.3 billion in 2035.  History has shown that military operations tend to be where the population resides, whether it is assistance in the event of a natural disaster or crisis response during a period of unrest.

This presentation offers an overview of the efforts by NATO Allied Command Transformation to examine the impact on operations of potential crises situations in future urban environments—an endeavor that includes participants from 17 NATO nations, 16 NATO Centres of Excellence (COE), academia, industry, and Allied Command Operations (ACO).  This talk is connected with Allan Shearer’s current “Futures and Cities” seminar.

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Goldsmith Talks is an open-format series of presentations organized by UTSOA faculty, staff, and students. the series aims to encourage and promote presentations that are outside of the scope of the main lecture series. Examples are: invited seminar presentations, book talks, lectures by designers and scholars who may be in Austin for another engagement, round-table discussions, film screenings, product demonstrations, or any other activity related to research, scholarship, and teaching activities and at the school. The format provides a platform for encouraging the dissemination of work by visitors and members of our community. The goal is to raise awareness, increase access, and better integrate such events within the public life of the school.