Many cities are becoming translocalities, substantially divorced from their national contexts. These cities fall into two types: those major economic centers that are so deeply involved in foreign trade, finance, diplomacy and media that they have become cultural island with very weak national referents: Hongkong, Vancouver, and Brussels are examples of this type of city. Whether because of global economic processes that tie these cities together more than they tie them to their hinterland or because of implosive, transnationally driven civil wars, other cities are becoming translocalities, weakly tied to their national hinterlands: Saraievo, Beirut, Belfast, and Mogadishu are examples of this second type I shall return to the relevance of translocalities at a subsequent point in the argument.