Abstract
This paper explores the contradictions between the ambition to establish a more effective framework for the development and management of cities, and some of the realities of urban life. It discusses this through the lens of the World Bank’s evolving urban assistance programme during the 1980s and 1990s as it shifted from urban projects to strengthening municipal and metropolitan capacity, and from “supply” to “demand” orientations. The first section sets out the as yet unresolved problems of metropolitan management. The second describes the difficulties and dilemmas that international agencies faced as they developed urban programmes. The third describes the World Bank’s efforts to strengthen urban institutions in different urban and country contexts. The paper concludes by emphasizing the need for more attention to the “material world” - the physical and spatial context of homes and neighbourhoods where urban dwellers spend most of their lives and make most of their investments. To ignore this it to risk cities in the future having even less cohesion than the sprawling metropolises of today.