The Chinese City

✍ Scribed by Weiping Wu; Piper Gaubatz

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 313
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

China's cities are home to 10 percent of the world's population today. They display unprecedented dynamism under the country's surging economic power. Their remarkable transformation builds on immense traditions, having lived through feudal dynasties, semicolonialism, and socialist commands. Studying them offers a lens into both the complex character of the changing city and the Chinese economy, society, and environment.

This text is anchored in the spatial sciences to offer a comprehensive survey of the evolving urban landscape in China. It is divided into four parts, with 13 chapters that can be read together or as stand-alone material. Part I sets the context, describing the geographical setting, China's historical urban system, and traditional urban forms. Part II covers the urban system since 1949, the rural-urban divide and migration, and interactions with the global economy. Part III outlines the specific sectors of urban development, including economic restructuring, social-spatial transformation, urban infrastructure, and urban land and housing. Finally, part IV showcases urbanism through the lens of the urban environment, lifestyle and social change, and urban governance.

The Chinese City offers a critical understanding of China's urbanization, exploring how the complexity of the Chinese city both conforms to and defies conventional urban theories and experience of cities elsewhere around the world. This comprehensive book contains a wealth of up-to-date statistical information, case studies, and suggested further reading to demonstrate the diversity of urban life in China.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
The Chinese City
Copyright
Contents
List of figures
List of tables
List of boxes
Introduction
History and context
Contemporary forces
Understanding China’s urbanization
Using this book
Bibliography
Part I History and
context
1 Geographical setting
The physical environment
Economic base
Population and peoples
Conclusion
Bibliography
2 The historical urban system
Thinking about the historical Chinese urban system
How many Chinese cities were there? How large were they?
The early traditional period (206 BC–AD 589)
China’s “medieval urban revolution” (589–1368)
Cities of the late imperial period (1368–1911)
Foreign empires expand into China: Treaty Port cities (1911–1949)
Conclusion
Bibliography
3 Traditional urban forms
Urban plan and layout
Monumental structures
Neighborhoods and markets in traditional Chinese cities
Treaty Port (1842–1949) and Republican (1911–1949) eras
Conclusion
Bibliography
Part II Urbanization
4 The urban system since
How big are China’s cities? How many cities are there?
Shifting urban development in the Maoist period (1949–1979)
The urban system during the reform era
The Chinese urban system today
Conclusion
Bibliography
5 Urban–rural divide, socialist institutions, and migration
Urban–rural divide and its roots
Population mobility and migration
Migrants in the city
Conclusion
Bibliography
6 Cities in the global economy
Toward an open economy
Becoming “factory of the world”
Moving toward knowledge-based and consumer economies
Conclusion
Bibliography
Part III Urban
development
7 Urban restructuring and economic transformation
Revamping the urban economic landscape
Harnessing human resources
Redistributing economic growth
Conclusion
Bibliography
8 Social–spatial transformation
Changing urban forms
Work and accessibility
Spatial reconfiguration and expansion
Conclusion
Bibliography
9 Urban infrastructure
The state of urban infrastructure
Financing urban infrastructure
Challenges
Conclusion
Bibliography
10 Urban land and housing
Legacies of state socialism
Transition into land leasehold
Housing reforms and implications
Conclusion
Bibliography
Part IV Urban life
11 Environmental quality and sustainability
State of the urban environment
Strategies for environmental sustainability
Environmental management
Conclusion
Bibliography
12 Lifestyle and social change
Shopping and consumerism: changing landscapes and lifestyles
Public spaces and entertainment
Growing old in urban China
Crime and urban neighborhoods
Communities of difference: sexual preference, ethnicity, and art
Conclusion
Bibliography
13 Urban governance and civil society
Reorganization of the state
Developmental state in the making
Evolving state–society relations
Conclusion
Bibliography
Conclusion: looking toward the future
Future urbanization
Challenges for China’s cities
Implications for the world
Bibliography
Index