Basic goods and rights in times of crisis: An urban perspective

CIDOB Report nº 10

We live in complex times shaped by the concatenation and confluence of multiple and interrelated destabilizing events, including the unfinished postpandemic recovery, the war in Ukraine –and the ensuing food and energy crises, rising inflation or tightening debt–, eroded democratic systems, and the climate emergency.

This convergence and prolongation of crises, alongside tepid global economic prospects, is proving devastating for large swathes of the world’s population, who face sharp limitations in their access to basic goods and rights such as food, water, housing, energy, information and digital connectivity, local democracy, peace and humanitarian protection.

This is the context in which this CIDOB Report sets out to analyse the causes of the current global crisis in access to basic goods and rights, as well as its impacts and the responses to it. The approach is eminently urban, as cities are both home to most of the world’s population and the places where worsening inequalities and vulnerabilities are manifesting themselves most starkly.