Contributor(s): Ricky Burdett, Bruce Katz | LSE Cities and the Brookings Institution have carried out new research on how cities and metropolitan areas are responding to current economic challenges. Ricky Burdett will discuss how selected European and Asian cities - Torino, Barcelona, Munch and Seoul - have overcome crises in the recent past and shown significant progress in urban economic development over the past two decades. Bruce Katz will outline a vision of the next American economy, one that is driven by exports, powered by low carbon, fuelled by innovation and rich with opportunity and led by major metropolitan areas, which concentrate the nation's economic assets. This will include connecting lessons of economic restructuring from abroad to the challenges facing US metros. A central finding of the research is that cities will continue to play a critical role in creating and sustaining stable economies that foster social inclusion and environmental equity, but only if metropolitan governance is active and aligned, and cities continue to invest in social capital, job creation and quality of place. Ricky Burdett is Professor of Urban Studies at LSE and Director of LSE Cities. Bruce Katz is Vice President at the Brookings Institution and Founding Director of the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program, and a Visiting Professor of Social Policy at LSE. Alexandra Jones is Chief Executive of the Centre for Cities. LSE Cities is an international centre that carries out research, education, outreach and advisory activities in the urban field. The recently established centre (1 January 2010) builds on the interdisciplinary work of the Urban Age, extending its partnership with Deutsche Bank's Alfred Herrhausen Society for a further five-year period. LSE Cities extends LSE's century-old commitment to improving our understanding of urban society, by studying how the built environment has profound consequences on the shape of society in an increasingly urbanised world where over 50% of people live in cities. LSE Works is a new series of public lectures, sponsored by SAGE publications, that will showcase some of the latest research by LSE's Research Centres. In each session, LSE academics will present key research findings, demonstrating where appropriate the implications of their studies for public policy. A list of all the LSE Works lectures can be viewed online.