Spatial production and spatial dialectic: Evidence from the New Urban Districts in China

Abstract

New Urban Districts (NUDs) are the important spatial carriers to promote urban expansion or transformation. Since the 1990s, they have been playing a more and more crucial role in China's urbanization. For NUDs in the strict sense we found that: 96% to the east of Hu Line; 56% within the municipal districts; 64% within 36 km from their every city center and below the area of 423 km 2 . The regional distribution follows significant spatial difference as "Eastern Region (50%) -Central Region (42%) -Western Region (8%)", and the provinces with the largest number of NUDs are Guangdong, Henan, Zhejiang, Liaoning, and Jiangsu. Furthermore, their interesting constructed process highlights the typical characteristics of spatial production and spatial dialectic. This paper uses the theory of the production of space, and discovers that the growth of NUDs is a rapid ternary dialectical process of spatial production: "representations of space" is guided by the top-down governmental power; "spatial practice" is reflected in the hierarchical and regional difference of spatial elements, such as the type, pattern, distance and area of NUD; "spaces of representation" embodies the tension between governmental power and urban development rights, as well as the countermeasure mechanism. The extensibility of spatiotemporal sequences ensures the unity and continuity of spatial (re)production of NUDs. However, this is also facing a series of challenges like the management coordination of administrative division and the increasing unbalanced or inadequate development. Thus, critically rethinking the evolution of NUD is the key basis for achieving sustainable urban renewal and regional orderly development in the new era.

The Key Factors Driving the Development of New Towns by Mother Cities and Regions: Evidence from China

“…Therefore, the research on China's new towns has aroused many scholars' discussions. Important papers are as follows: Review and prospects of the development and planning of new towns in China's Shanghai and Taiwan [19,20], the logic of green development mechanism and space production in China's new towns [21][22][23], China's national new district identification standards [24], and comparative study of South Korea and China, India, and China on the development and planning modes of new towns [25,26]. The second category is about the research on the sustainable development indicators and paths of the new town, including prediction of the potential impacts and risks of the development of new towns by SEA (Environmental Strategic Assessment) and ESIA (Environmental and Social Impact Assessment) [27], scenario prediction for the future development of new towns in Kuwait [28], new town planning methods for sustainable development of public space [29], role of participatory landscape in the sustainable development of new towns [30], forecast of carbon emissions for new town planning by system dynamics [31], measurement of diversity of new towns [32], evaluation of new town development sustainability [33], and new town development and sustainable transition under urban entrepreneurialism in China [34].…”

Variegated transnational partnerships: Multi-scalar actor networks in China’s overseas industrial parks

“…The establishment of SEZs has been described as the exploration of place-based policies, regionalism, state territory, etc., and the topic is attracting much attention from researchers given that Southeast Asian countries including Singapore and Vietnam have experienced tremendous economic growth in the last half century (Huang et al, 2016). In particular, China, since the 1980s, has promoted the large-scale development of SEZs, which include industrial development zones, economic and technological development zones, high-tech development zones, bonded zones, border cooperation zones, and free trade zones to stimulate urban and industrial restructuring and the economy (Cheng et al, 2017;Liang et al, 2019). More recent work concerning geographical analysis of SEZs has used the terms 'China Model,' 'Experimentalism,' and 'State Capitalism' (Rithmire, 2013;Liu and Ye, 2015;Meng et al, 2015) to link this neo-liberalization trend with China's economic geographical space (referred to as SEZs), which combines the 'top-down' and 'bottom-up' approaches.…”

A comparison and case analysis between domestic and overseas industrial parks of China since the Belt and Road Initiative

“…Although SEZs have promoted the increase of FDI, they have not attracted domestic investment (Wang, 2013). Spatial isolation, environmental decline and insufficient talents are also challenges (Abubakar and Doan, 2017;Wang and Meng, 2018;Zhuang et al, 2019aZhuang et al, , 2019b. NAs and HTIDZs in China are in imbalanced distribution and uneven development Ye, 2018, 2020).…”