¶ … Ah Cy, president and CEO of SAIC Motors, looked out the window of her executive office on the 210th floor of the newly constructed, multi-billion dollar Celestial Building overlooking the Huangpu River in Shanghai and was pleased with what she saw. In just 20 years, Shanghai had cleaned up its environment, virtually eliminated poverty and had provided modern housing and comprehensive social services for its more than 50 million residents, meaning that it was still the largest city in the world just as it had been in 2015. Indeed, Ms. Cy had good reason to be pleased since these were not insignificant accomplishments and reflected the city's ability to overcome the challenges it faced a half century before. In fact, it had only been in 2040 that scientists had cautioned the Chinese leadership that if actions were not taken immediately, it might be too late to reverse the environmental impact of the meteoric and largely unregulated growth of the Chinese economy over the previous two and a half decades. To their credit, in response to these dire predictions, city leaders in Shanghai implemented a rigorous plan to reverse the environmental effects of centuries of relentless growth on the level of the Manhattan Project. More than $500 billion had been invested in the initial effort, and the total increased to more than $1 trillion by the time city leaders were satisfied with the results. Mandates had been issued to reduce the level of pollution by existing industries and new regulations were enacted to ensure that future enterprises were as green as possible in their operations. Waste management practices were improved to reuse and recycle nearly 100% of the city's waste, and water recycling programs...

Nevertheless, Ms. Cy was justifiably proud that her own company had been in the vanguard of those that implemented the new environmental regulations, even going so far as to exceed their requirements. Although the company's shareholders initially balked at the enormous expense involved in these initiatives, the need for drastic steps to address the fundamental environmental problems facing Shanghai took precedence and the company's investment in greener operating practices had actually paid major dividends over the years.
The city's achievement in reducing pollution levels in the region and improving the quality of the water from the Yangtze River and the Qingcaosha Reservoir in particular had been studied by numerous other countries seeking to duplicate their success. There had also been major additions to the Shanghai infrastructure over the past 40-year period that benefited all Shanghai residents, including the completion of the Lupu Bridge, the Fuxing Tunnel, and numerous additions to the city's metro lines (Shanghai specific issues, 2015). In addition, the deepwater Yangshan Port had been completed and the Shanghai Port had been fully modernized (Shanghai specific issues, 2015).

While these were spectacular accomplishments, Ms. Cy also recognized that the city's political and business leaders could not rest on their laurels because the city…