'Sustainable Cities': No Oxymoron

Are urban societies unsustainable per se? So far most analyses of urbanization have been ethno and temporocentric, concentrating on modern industrial and post-industrial cities of the West. The potential sustainability of cities should not be determined with reference to correct consumption patterns, and the structures of capitalism and industrialism, nor under an autarkic view. To answer the urban sustainability question the characteristics of urban societies need to be defined and isolated.