Urban

The term is used in two senses – demographic and sociological. Demographically, the focus is on the size and density of population and nature of work of the majority of the adult males. Sociologically, the focus is on heterogeneity, impersonality, interdependence and the quality of life.

Rural and Urban Population Growth (1961-2011)

Urbanism

Urbanism has been defined by various scholars as patterns of culture and social interaction resulting from the concentration of large populations into relatively small areas. It reflects an organization of society in terms of a complex division of labour, high levels of technology, high mobility, interdependence of its members in fulfilling economic functions and impersonality in social relations (Theodorson, 1969).

Urbanism as way of life, Louis Wirth believes, may be empirically approached from three interrelated perspectives:

• as a physical structure with a population base, technology and ecological order;
• as a system of social organization with a structure and series of institutions (secondary contacts, weakening of kinship ties etc.);
• as a set of attitudes, ideas and constellation of personalities (increased personal disorganization, suicide, crime, delinquency and corruption).

Urbanization

Urbanization as a structural process of change is generally related to industrialization but it is not always the result of industrialization. Urbanization results due to the concentration of large-scale and small scale industrial and commercial, financial and administrative set up in the cities; technological development in transport and communication, cultural and recreational activities. The excess of urbanization over industrialization that makes it possible to provide employment for all persons coming to urban areas is, in fact, what sometimes leads to over urbanization.

Urbanization implies a cultural and social psychological process whereby people acquire the material and non-material culture, including behavioural patterns, forms of organization, and ideas that originated in, or are distinctive of the city. Although the flow of cultural influences is in both directions – both toward and away from the city – there is substantial agreement that the cultural influences exerted by the city on non-urban people are probably more.