The Urban Health and Wellbeing:
Systems Approaches series is based on a 10-year global interdisciplinary
research program developed by International Council for Science (ICSU), and
sponsored by the InterAcademy Partnership (IAP) and the United Nations University
(UNU). It addresses up-to-date urban health issues from around the world and
provides an appealing integrated urban development approach from a systems
perspective. This series aims to propose a new conceptual framework for
considering the multi-factorial and cross sectorial nature of both determinants
and drivers of health and wellbeing in urban populations and takes a systems
approach for improving the understanding of the interconnected nature of health
in cities. The systems approach includes an engagement with urban
communities in the process of creating and transferring knowledge. Further, it
aims at generating knowledge and providing the evidence that is relevant to
people and policy-makers for improving integrated decision making and governance
for the health and wellbeing of urban dwellers. The methods applied, come from
various epistemological domains in order to improve understanding of how the
composition and functioning of urban environments impacts physical, mental and
social heath and how inequalities can be reduced to improve the overall quality
of urban life.
The systems
approach is applied to science and society and defined by a deep investigation
into disciplinary knowledge domains relevant for urban health and wellbeing, as
well as an inter- and transdisciplinary dialogue and shared understanding of
the issues between scientific communities, policy makers and societal
stakeholders more broadly. It involves one or more of the following elements:
1) the development of new conceptual models that incorporate dynamic relations
among variables which define urban health and wellbeing; 2) the use of systems
tools, stimulation models and collaborative modelling methods; 3) the
integration of various sources and types of data including spatial, visual,
quantitative and qualitative data.
Like the first book, the coming
books will all address the topic of urban health and wellbeing, specifically by
taking a systems approach. The topics range across all urban sectors and can,
for example, cover the following areas:
(1) transportation, urban planning
and housing, urban water, energy and food, communication, resources and energy,
urban food systems, public service provision, etc.
(2) the related health disorders in
physical, social and mental health
(3) the methods and models used and
the type of science applied to understand the complexity of urban health and
wellbeing.
