The World and Türkiye in 2025

Aydın Tiryaki (December 31, 2025)
(Gemini AI was used as a data compilation and writing assistant)

Abstract: The year 2025 has been a year where 57% of the world’s population lived in cities, yet megacities were shaken by a profound “housing and sustainability” crisis. This article analyzes urbanization models on a continental basis, the social destruction caused by exorbitant rent increases in Türkiye, and the “reverse migration” movement triggered by economic necessity.

1. Global Urbanization: Diverging Models Across Continents

As of the end of 2025, urbanization is being shaped by different socio-economic dynamics in each continent:

• Asia: The Rise of “Mega-Regions”: Home to more than half of the world’s megacities, Asian cities are now merging to form massive “mega-regions.” Structures like the Pearl River Delta in China, with populations approaching 100 million, have turned into the largest settlement complexes in history. However, this growth has also created areas where air pollution and social surveillance technologies are most intensely felt.
• Africa: Uncontrolled and Rapid Growth: In 2025, Africa became the fastest-urbanizing continent in the world. Cities like Lagos (Nigeria) and Kinshasa (Congo) are growing at a pace far beyond infrastructure investments. This deepens the gap between the “modern city” and “slums,” carrying a significant potential for humanitarian crises.
• The Americas: Gentrification and the Suburban Paradox: In North America, 2025 was a year where low-income groups were pushed further to the peripheries due to “gentrification” projects in city centers. In South America (Brazil, Argentina), high-density urbanization combined with economic crises has led to “favela” type settlements becoming permanent fixtures.
• Europe: Aging Cities and the “15-Minute City” Vision: European urbanization in 2025 is more “quality” oriented. Population growth has stalled; cities like Paris, Berlin, and Barcelona have focused on “green and compact” city models, where every service is reachable within a 15-minute walk, reducing the carbon footprint.

2. The Housing Crisis in Türkiye: Rent as a Social Problem

The most burning urban issue for Türkiye in 2025 is uncontrollable rent increases and the resulting class displacement:

• Urban Exclusion: The fact that rent prices in major cities have reached 70-80% of average salaries has forced essential public personnel, such as teachers, police officers, and healthcare workers, to flee city centers. This is a serious “public safety” issue that threatens the quality of urban services.
• The Right to Housing Debate: The year 2025 has been recorded as the year when the debate over whether housing is an “investment tool” or a “fundamental right” was most fiercely contested.

3. Reverse Migration: New Mobility Born of Economic Necessity

In 2025, the decades-long trend of “rural-to-urban migration” in Türkiye showed signs of breaking:

• Escape from the Megacity: Especially retirees and young professionals with remote-working opportunities are turning toward smaller cities in Anatolia or rural areas to escape the pressure of rent and cost-of-living in megacities.
• Economic Exile: For many low-income families, this situation is an economic necessity resulting from the “inability to hold on in the megacity” rather than a choice. This mobility creates unexpected demand pressure on the infrastructure and housing stock of smaller Anatolian cities.

4. İstanbul and Earthquake-Resilient Planning

İstanbul, the economic heart of Türkiye, stands at the intersection of earthquake risk and the housing crisis in 2025:

• Economic Barriers to Transformation: Although momentum has been gained in urban transformation, high construction costs prevent citizens from accessing safe housing. Secure buildings have unfortunately become a “symbol of income level” in 2025.
• Ecological Threshold: İstanbul’s water resources and green spaces are in a process of irreversible destruction due to uncontrolled population density.

Conclusion

The data from 2025 shows that cities worldwide must shift from being “economic growth” oriented to “human livability” oriented. The vision for Türkiye in 2026 should be to support strategic reverse migration policies that distribute the demographic load of large cities across Anatolia, resolve the rental crisis through structural reforms, and rebuild cities not just as “piles of concrete” but as “resilient life ecosystems.”

APPENDIX: AN ACCOUNTING OF URBANIZATION, MEGACITIES, AND LIVABLE CITIES

While the urban growth rates and smart city projects discussed in this article are of vital importance in light of the fact that the majority of the world’s population is concentrated in metropolises in 2025, it is necessary to note the following unofficial fractures affecting the soul and livability of cities beyond statistical growth:

1. The Global Housing Crisis and the Risk of Ghettoization In 2025, the rise of housing prices to unreachable levels in all megacities from London to Tokyo caused the exclusion of the middle class from city centers. The finance-oriented growth of cities alone triggered new security and justice problems by disrupting the social fabric. The most fundamental requirement for livable urbanization on a global scale is to stop treating housing as a tool for rent and to accept it as a fundamental human right.

2. Türkiye: The National Security Dimension of Urban Transformation Specifically for Türkiye, the year 2025 has been a year where the effort to build earthquake-resilient cities, especially in metropolises like İstanbul, collided with economic constraints. It has been understood that urban transformation is not just about renewing buildings, but a requirement to create an overall safe living space. The success of this process depends on the correct management of national resources and staying away from rent-oriented approaches.

3. The Transportation Paradox and Diesel Costs The transportation requirement, which increases in parallel with population density in metropolises, faces infrastructure inadequacies and high costs. In particular, increases in diesel costs in logistics and public transportation networks have led to a more expensive urban life and disruptions in the supply chain. Transitioning to smart transportation systems is not just a technological choice but an economic necessity.

4. Meritocracy and Academic Norms in Urban Planning The year 2025 has shown that the fate of cities is too complex to be left solely to the initiative of local governments. It is a fundamental requirement that urban planning processes are carried out by meritocratic personnel, adhering to the academic norms of geology, sociology, and architectural disciplines. Every zoning decision that excludes scientific data and ignores meritocracy invites a social disaster in the future.

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A Note on Methods and Tools: All observations, ideas, and solution proposals in this study are the author’s own. AI was utilized as an information source for researching and compiling relevant topics strictly based on the author’s inquiries, requests, and directions; additionally, it provided writing assistance during the drafting process. (The research-based compilation and English writing process of this text were supported by AI as a specialized assistant.)