Urban Ills: Place Matters: Contextualizing Health Using a Social Determinants Model

Book excerpt: Urban Ills: Twenty First Century Complexities of Urban Living in Global Contexts is a collection of original research which focuses on critical challenges and dilemmas to living in cities. Volume 1 examines both the economic impact of urban life and the social realities of urban living. The editors define the ecology of urban living as the relationship and adjustment of humans to a highly dense, diverse and complex environment. This approach examines the nexus between the distribution of human groups with reference to material resources and the consequential social, political, economic and cultural patterns which evolve as a result of the sufficiency or insufficiency of those material resources. They emphasize the most vulnerable populations suffering during and after the recession in the United States and around the world. The chapters seek to explore emerging issues and trends affecting the lives the poor, minorities, immigrants, women and children.