Historians are not noted for their collaborative approach to research and publication. This volume is thus unusual, the outcome of a long-term collaborative project in which participants were selected for their knowledge of cultural responses to the development of the world's great cities at the end of the nineteenth century. Though not a synthesis, each of the five authors involved produced their contribution to a template which focused on a number of inter-related key themes. Focusing on the last three decades of the nineteenth century, the contributors – drawn from art history and history of science – explore the idea of ‘cultural innovation’ in Paris, London, Chicago, Berlin and Tokyo. In practice, the articles are structured around a few key themes: the international exhibition; the growth of higher technical education; urban planning initiatives linked to the promotion of the city and the role of networks of urban elites connecting and driving these initiatives.

The applicability of this model varies from city to city. Levin's discussion of Paris does illustrate the importance of exhibitions in reshaping and promoting the city in the aftermath of the Commune, raising it to (possibly) the capital of the world. However, it is not clear that this transformation was achieved under the leadership of conventional urban elites, given the hybrid nature of French municipal governance in this period. Forgan's assessment of London is undoubtedly the most successful examination of the themes. Although London did not have a world-ranking exhibition like Paris or Chicago, the development of exhibition spaces, the creation of a heritage response to world city status and the shaping of a scientific ‘quarter’ in South Kensington based on museums, galleries and educational provision all indicated an interaction of science, culture and urban innovation. The absence of unified government for London until the end of the 1880s meant most of the initiatives discussed by Forgan were generated by interlocking networks of individuals who could be described as a form of urban elite – though not one with a particular role in the government of the city. Kargon's exploration of Chicago around the time of the Columbian Fair of 1893 is the most effective in describing the interaction of exhibition, planning and a core group of urban leaders. Based around the city's Commercial Club, a ‘civic culture of modernity’ emerged in which the interests of capitalism were seen as being intimately bound up with the creation of the city beautiful. Hessler's discussion of these themes in Berlin, like Low's investigation of Tokyo, finds rather less evidence of a civic culture of modernity in capitals very much shaped by autocratic tradition rather than the new forces of capitalist science. Despite rapid urban growth and its emergence as the capital of Europe's rising economic and political power, Berlin failed to modernize along the lines apparent in Chicago or Paris or even in more conservative London. In Tokyo the situation was even more restricted. Japan's rapid emergence as the dominant power in east Asia was not matched by the creation of new forms of government at the local level, clearly illustrating the significant differences of urban form and governance between Asia on the one hand and the United States and Europe on the other.

Overall, this book provides rather less than its provocative title offers. It does demonstrate the diversity of forms of urban governance and leadership operating in the world's largest cities at the end of the nineteenth century. In particular, it suggests that capital cities, and especially imperial capitals, were rarely self-governing entities, experiencing significant interference and shaping from central government and acting to attract groups and networks of influential public intellectuals rarely found in the provinces. It does demonstrate in some cases – especially Paris and Chicago – the importance of major world expositions in the development of urban amenities and as a stimulus to the development of scientific infrastructures. But in the case of the new imperial capitals of Berlin and Tokyo such developments were less obvious, whilst in London a mix of tradition and modernity suggested a different path in which heritage began to emerge as a key component of urban identity. Individually, these essays provide some interesting insights and collectively the enterprise is commendable in attempting a structured, side-by-side approach to a set of key themes, but overall these themes are not sufficient to provide a radical new understanding of late nineteenth-century urban modernity.