Acknowledgements 1. Introduction 1.1 Reconsidering the global city debate 1.2 Scrutinizing the global city debate: major issues 1.2.1 The changing economic base of cities 1.2.2 Advanced producer services and labour demand 1.2.3 The new international division of labour and immigration 1.3 Scrutinizing the global city debate: blind spot 1.4 Research questions 1.5 Research framework 2. The changing economic base of cities 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Three scenarios on employment growth in the advanced producer services 2.2.1 The two clustering arguments in the global city theoretical framework 2.2.2 The clustering argument in the global city debate 2.3 Assessing employment growth in the advanced producer services 2.4 What drives deindustrialization and a growth in services? 2.5 Conclusions 3. Advanced producer services and labour demand 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Polarization, professionalization and mismatch 3.2.1 The polarization thesis 3.2.2 The professionalization thesis 3.2.3 Polarization and professionalization in Dutch cities 3.3 Assessing the impact of advanced producer services on labour demand 3.4 A consumerist alternative: cultural amenities and demand for low-skilled labour 3.5 Disentangling a productivist and consumerist explanation for unemployment among less-educated urbanites 3.6 Conclusions 4. Foreign direct investment and immigration 4.1 Introduction 4.2 Immigration in the global city theoretical framework 4.3 Assessing the push and pull factors of the new immigration 4.3.1 Assessing Dutch FDI as a push factor for immigration 4.3.2 Assessing the growth of advanced producer services as a pull factor for immigration 4.4 Conclusions 5. Immigration and unemployment 5.1 Introduction 5.2 The substitution thesis 5.2.1 The substitution thesis: theory and evidence 5.2.2 The substitution thesis and the urban economy 5.3 Assessing the substitution thesis on unemployment 5.4 Conclusions 6. Conclusions and discussion 6.1 Introduction 6.2 After the unravelling: theoretical and empirical implications 6.2.1 The changing economic base of cities 6.2.2 Advanced producer services and labour demand 6.2.3 The new international division of labour and immigration 6.2.4 The impact of immigration on urban labour markets 6.3 The new conceptual architecture reconsidered 6.4 Globalization or neo-liberalization? On science versus politics Epilogue: The current financial crisis and its aftermath Appendix A: Polarization and professionalization studies Appendix B: Data & operationalization Variables introduced in Chapter 2 Variables introduced in Chapter 3 Variables introduced in Chapter 4 Variables introduced in Chapter 5 Appendix C: The employment shares in manufacturing for each metropolitan area 1995-2007 Appendix D: Robustness checks Robustness checks on the findings in Table 3.1 Robustness checks on the findings in Table 3.3 Robustness checks on the findings in Table 5.1 Notes