Reproducing Spaces of Chinese Urbanisation: New City-based and Land-centred Urban Transformation

Abstract

China's spaces of urbanisation in the 1980s and early 1990s were occupied primarily by the interests of rural industrialisation and town development. Since the mid 1990s, China's urban spaces have been reproduced through a city-based and land-centred process of urbanisation in which large cities managed to reassert their leading positions in an increasingly competitive, globalising and urbanising economy. This study analyses changes in China's nonagricultural land in relation to the growth and structural changes of Chinese cities. A systematic analysis of three sets of data reveals a high intensity and great unevenness of non-agricultural land use in the country. China had 29.5 million hectares of non-agricultural land in 1996, which accounted for only 3 per cent of the national land mass. Over 80 per cent of the recent increase in non-agricultural land use was caused by the expansion of urban and rural settlements, industrialisation and numerous 'development zones'. A comparative analysis of land use data and Landsat images identifies two concurrent processes of urbanisation and non-agricultural land use change. Rapid urban sprawl of large cities, driven by the expansion of ring-roads and setting up of 'development zones', has contributed to the conversion of farmland into nonagricultural uses. At the same time, rural industrialisation and a housing boom have given rise to a dispersed pattern of non-agricultural land development all over the country. Given the pervasive influence of the forces of continuing urbanisation and globalisation, the state's attempt to protect China's dwindling farmland will not reverse the trend of increasing non-agricultural land use, but are likely to slow the pace of land conversion. Anecdotal evidence such as 'hollow villages' and idle land in numerous encircled 'development zones' suggests that there exist ways for China to use its non-agricultural land more efficiently and economically than hitherto.

The spatio-temporal patterns of urban–rural development transformation in China since 1990

“…In the first stage, the township enterprises have played a vital role under the dual-track economic system, which has promoted rural urbanization of small towns. In the later stage, the urbanization of a city-based and land-centered progress accelerated the gathering trend of urbanerural space after the mid-1990s (Lin, 2007). During this process, urbanerural development experienced dramatic transformation (Table 4).…”

“…Generally, urban and rural areas in post-reform China have been experiencing dramatic transformation across a range of indicators such as population migration, land use and landscape changes, economic growth and living style (Chen, Zhang, Liu, & Zhang, 2014;Li, Chen, Wang, & Liu, 2014;Liu, Kuang et al, 2014;Li, Long, Liu, & Tu, 2015;Li, Zhang, Hans, & Liu, 2015;Lin, 2007;Long, Liu, Hou, Li, & Li, 2014;Siciliano, 2012). These transformations have dramatically changed the urbanerural territory system, and posed challenges to urbanerural integrated development.…”

Deepening Reform for China's Long-term Growth and Development

“…Initially, in the late 1990s, large-scale industrial park and urban construction unfolded in coastal areas. Since the early and mid 2000s, inland areas have started to catch up in this industrialisation and urbanisation drive (Lin 2007). Inland localities did not join the regional manufacturing competition in the beginning due to relatively poor endowments such as infrastructure.…”

“…Therefore, in each locality, there are two parallel land ownership regimes and only local governments have the power to cross this line and convert rural land to urban use. It is illegal and strictly forbidden for village collectives to directly lease land to urban users (Lin 2007;Zhu and Prosterman 2007;World Bank 2005;Lin and Ho 2005). This de facto regional monopoly of land supply allows local officials to discriminate against certain land users and leverage land for development.…”

Spatial–Temporal Patterns and Driving Factors of Rapid Urban Land Development in Provincial China: A Case Study of Jiangsu

“…The process was conceptualized as government-engineered and land-centered urbanization [27]. Recent studies have focused on the political economy of urban development in China, especially within the framework of neo-liberalization, to investigate the motivation behind land commodification [28]. Some studies paid particular attention to the roles of different levels of government in the process of urban land development.…”