I think that the feeling one has about a city being "alive" (perhaps a poetical image) is necessary for a successful scientific study of the city, though this may sound paradoxical. We have made too many errors by ignoring the fact that a city is more than just something we plan and build. It is a part of a complex and diverse world in which we live and which depends on the objective laws of development Only by realising this simple truth and by making it the starting point of our thinking will we be able to understand its laws and leam how to guide its development. To do this is impossible within the present set up in which the study of the problems of the city does not have any place in the various academic disciplines. These problems are also bypassed by the "construction manuals" . There is a need to have systematically planned and well co-ordinated work done on the subject by large research groups where it might be possible to have, under one roof, geographers, economists, sociologists, mathematicians, historians, lawyers, doctors, arhitects and engineers and others. I think that this work is so important for our countly as a whole that it requires an interdisciplinary programme called "The City". This article appeared in the Soviet journal: Znanie—Sila 1984 N. 5 Translated by Kalpana Sahni 74 . April-June, 1984