Urban Transformation in China, 1949 – 2000: A Review and Research Agenda

Abstract

Through a review of the literature, the author identifies the achievements as well as the deficiencies in the study of China's urbanization and urbanism in the second half of the 20th century. A number of issues that merit scholarly research are suggested and the need for theorization is emphasized. During the last half century, Chinese cities underwent dramatic transformations as a consequence of two major systemic changes. During the first three decades after the socialist revolution of 1949, sustained low levels of urbanization and a brief episode of antiurbanism accompanied centralized planning and city-based industrialization. Since the economic reforms of 1978 Chinese cities have witnessed major economic and spatial shifts away from the socialist patterns. Among the many facets of urban transformation since 1978 are a more heterogeneous urban population, rural – urban migration, spatial reorganization through urban land-use change, new housing development, globalization, suburbanization, polycentric restructuring of urban form, and changes in the spatial/administrative systems of cities. It is argued that, as the Chinese economy is inherently political, political economy perspectives should be foregrounded to enrich our understanding of the complexity of China's economic and urban transformation. In this regard, the continuously powerful and multiple roles of the Party-state as the ultimate decisionmaker, regulator, and participant in the urban economy should be emphasized, despite globalization and decentralization of administrative and fiscal powers from the central to local levels. The Chinese trajectory of urban development is seen as more different from than similar to the experiences of other economies undergoing structural change away from socialism, and context-based country-specific theorization of urban change is called for. More general theories of urban transformation which are applicable to a number of former socialist nations, and which transcend the idiosyncrasies of individual countries, should be developed where possible. A closer engagement among scholars working on the urban development of China and those working on other former socialist countries is necessary if ‘the socialist city’ is to become a firm typology of cities.