Plan and market mismatch: Urban redevelopment in Beijing during a period of transition

Abstract

With the emergence of the real estate market since 1990, the operation Beijing's economy has led to a re-shaping of its inner city. By reviewing the Old and Dilapidated Housing Redevelopment (ODHR) programme in Beijing in the 1990s, this paper seeks to uncover the forces that led to the prevailing large-scale urban redevelopment which induced serious environmental and socioeconomic problems. By analysing conflicts between major stakeholders of the ODHR programme, the paper finds that the root cause of these problems was embedded in the 'mismatch of plan and market' by which local officials and local developers utilised their privileges inherited from a planned economy to benefit from the emerging real estate markets. As a result, the hidden agenda of local elites was facilitated during the urban redevelopment process.

Contesting Spatial Modernity in Late‐Socialist China

“…With fiscal decentralization, local governments have gained more autonomy in decision making regarding land use and economic development, but at the same time they have to be responsible for generating their own revenue. A new strategy for doing so is to become a broker of urban and suburban land by selling use rights to developers (see also Fang and Zhang 2003). Use-rights fees are levied in a lump sum at the time of the transaction, making it possible for local governments to assemble a huge amount of cash quickly to finance other projects.…”

Regeneration of the Historical Urban Center and Changing Housing Market Dynamics: ‘Fener-Balat’

“…Almost all studies reach a common conclusion that renovation or reconstruction of old buildings will, in the long run, increase home ownership, decrease the stagnation in the area, change the physical structure, and increase property prices (Ding, Simons et al, 2000;Abraham, 2001;Criekingen and Decroly, 2003;Fang and Zhang, 2003;Keskin, 2008).…”

China’s Globalizing Primary Cities as a Contested Space: An Introduction

“…• The occupational hierarchy in the emerging labour market, which brings a widening wage gap between the skilled and unskilled workers (Solinger 2006 ) • The socio-spatial stratifi cation of housing consumption in the emerging real estate market, which is shaped by the departure of high-income groups from dilapidated public tenements, as well as the relocation of inner-city and suburban low-income groups to outlying areas (Huang and Jiang 2009 ;Fang and Zhang 2003 ;Wu et al 2013 and • The devolution of power and decentralization of risks and responsibilities to the regional level in order to stimulate local development, whilst at the same time opening up free-riding opportunities in order to allow cadres easier access to plan-allocated low-priced public products. This is the danwei -based inequitable treatment in favour of the privileged few inside the 'plan track', which has excluded a mass of ordinary people from the state plan during the transitional era 8 (Hsing 2006 ;Nee and Cao 1999 ).…”