"[...] In this monographic issue, we particularly focused our attention on metropolises and large cities of Southern Europe, and on two smaller cities in Italy, namely Bari and Lecco. In the hierarchical system of world rankings (Global Power City Index, Globalisation and World Cities, etc.), metropolises and large cities of Southern Europe often occupy a peripheral position when compared to the most consolidated global cities. In spite of this, they have undergone processes of urban funding and application of international standards and have become places where the urban policies of the last decades - especially those directed to urban branding, above all in the fields of culture and tourism and of competition in the European and in the global market - have produced significant transformations. Not only this, but also transformations linked to the aforementioned crises must be taken into account, since they are having an impact on contexts that had not yet overcome their own structural fragilities. [...]"