World Mayor

World Mayor is a biennial award organized by the City Mayors Foundation since 2004. It intends to raise the profile of mayors worldwide, as well as honour those who have served their communities well and who have contributed to the well-being of cities, nationally and internationally. The organisers make it plain that the award has no connection with any city or organization and is run on strictly non-commercial lines. Helen Zille and Leopoldo Lopez discussed their 2008 nominations on the BBC World Service programme Outlook. The Guardian looked at contenders for the 2014 prize.^[1] The 2018 World Mayor Project was dedicated to women mayors.^[2] The 2020 World Mayor Project is dedicated to mayors who have made the relief of poverty one of their top priorities.^[3] The winner of the 2021 World Mayor Prize Ahmed Aboutaleb was presented with his award at a ceremony held in the Dutch Senate by its President Jan Anthonie Bruijn.^[4]

The 2023 World Mayor Prize was dedicated to Friendship between Cities. It will be awarded to a mayor and city that have made outstanding contributions to friendship and cooperation between towns and cities at home and across borders.

The 2025 World Mayor Prize is dedicated to 'Mayors Fighting Poverty'. The organisers of the World Mayor Project are seeking mayors from large cities, towns and villages who have put measures in place to support the least well-off in their communities. We are looking for initiatives that other towns can apply. The initiatives may be small-scale or have the potential to provide poverty relief beyond the mayors’ communities.

The 2025 World Mayor Project will be run on the World Mayor 2025 and Women Mayors platforms.

The City Mayors Foundation commissions the trophy presented as the World Mayor Prize. The trophy was conceived by Tann vom Hove. It was designed by artist Manuel Ferrari and is handmade out of steel by the metalworker Kaspar Swankey.^[5]

Notable recipients

Notable winners include (subsequent political offices): Edi Rama (Prime Minister of Albania), Dora Bakoyannis (Greek foreign minister) and Marcelo Ebrard (Mexican foreign minister), while runners-up (or top 10 finalists) have included Andrés Manuel López Obrador (President of Mexico), Job Cohen (Dutch Labour opposition leader), Joko Widodo (President of Indonesia), Gavin Newsom (Governor of California), Leopoldo López (Venezuelan opposition leader), Cory Booker (US Senator) and John Hickenlooper (US Senator and former Governor of Colorado).

Riace (Italy) mayor Domenico Lucano, who came third in the 2010 poll, was arrested in October 2018 on various immigration-related charges. The mayor of Gdańsk Paweł Adamowicz, who was assassinated in January 2019, had ranked ninth in the 2016 poll.

The 2025 World Mayor Project will be run on the World Mayor and Women Mayors platforms.

City Mayors Foundation

The City Mayors Foundation, also known as City Mayors, is an international think tank dedicated to urban affairs.^[6] It has been active since 2003 and runs the biennial World Mayor Prize, as well as providing pro bono consultancy services. Unlike Eurocities and United Cities and Local Governments it is wholly independent of any city.^[7]

Winners of the World Mayor Prize

Year	Name	Mayor of	Reference
2004	Edi Rama	Tirana	[1]
2005	Dora Bakoyannis	Athens	[2]
2006	John So	Melbourne	[3]
2008	Helen Zille	Cape Town	[4]
2010	Marcelo Ebrard	Mexico City	[5]
2012	Iñaki Azkuna	Bilbao	[6]
2014	Naheed Nenshi	Calgary	[7]
2016	Bart Somers	Mechelen	[8]
2018	Valeria Mancinelli	Ancona	[9]
2021	Ahmed Aboutaleb	Rotterdam	[10]
2021	Philippe Rio	Grigny	[11]
2023	Elke Kahr	Graz	[12]

Runners up (Commendations)

Year	Name	Mayor of	Reference
2004	Andrés Manuel López Obrador, Hazel McCallion, Martin O’Malley, Gavin Newsom	Mexico City, Mississauga, Baltimore, San Francisco	[13]
2005	Hazel McCallion, Álvaro Arzú, Oscar Samson Rodriguez, Gavin Newsom	Mississauga, Guatemala City, San Fernando, San Francisco	[14]
2006	Job Cohen, Stephen Reed, Jejomar Binay, Michel Thiollière	Amsterdam, Harrisburg, Makati, St Etienne	[15]
2008	Elmar Ledergerber, Leopoldo Eduardo López, Phil Gordon, Ulrich Maly	Zürich, Chacao, Phoenix, Nürnberg	[16]
2010	Mick Cornett, Domenico Lucano, Dianne Watts, Campbell Newman	Oklahoma City, Riace, Surrey, Brisbane	[17]
2012	Lisa Scaffidi, Joko Widodo, Régis Labeaume, John F Cook	Perth, Surakarta, Québec City, El Paso	[18]
2014	Daniël Termont, Tri Rismaharini, Carlos Ocariz, Jed Patrick Mabilog	Ghent, Surabaya, Sucre, Iloilo City	[19]
2016	Wolfgang Müller [de], Georgios Kaminis, Giusi Nicolini, Richard Arnold	Lahr, Athens, Lampedusa, Schwäbisch Gmünd	[20]
2018	Ros Jones, Nathalie Appéré, Charlotte Britz, Beng Climaco	Doncaster, Rennes, Saarbrücken, Zamboanga City	[21]