Cities and talent

Abstract

Sydney functions as a global city and a gateway for migration. Sydney as Australia’s foremost global city plays a vital role in the national economy. This role relies on Sydney’s ability to attract and retain global talent. A global city connects its nation state with the world, so Sydney as a global city expands Australia’s global outreach. This thesis argues that migration and the global city are intrinsically linked. It does so by critically examining the relationship between migration, global talent and the global city, using Sydney as the empirical case. Despite a considerable amount of literature on the urban transformations of global cities in recent years, this research is the first comprehensive, in-depth, empirical examination of the role of new
migration in global cities during the global era. An exploratory factor analysis of a survey of global talent reveals the factors that influence Sydney’s capacity to attract global talent, and in turn the factors that drive global talent migration. The analysis of the global talent shows the main factors that underpin the decision of global talent to work in a global city. The analysis revealed the importance of non-monetary factors in influencing the structure of the global city hierarchy, with the main influencing factors for moving made up of a diverse mix of the lifestyle and cultural dimensions of a global city, as well as personal determinants. The thesis establishes global talent as the lens through which a holistic understanding of the relationship between migration and global cities can be better understood.

Date of Award	2019
Original language	English
Supervisor	Richard HU (Supervisor), Lain DARE (Supervisor), Robert TANTON (Supervisor) & David Marsh (Supervisor)