Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-03T00:02:40.084Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Land Politics and Local State Capacities: The Political Economy of Urban Change in China*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 October 2013

Meg Rithmire
Meg Rithmire*
Affiliation:
Harvard Business School. Email: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Despite common national institutions and incentives to remake urban landscapes to anchor growth, generate land-lease revenues and display a capacious administration, Chinese urban governments exhibit varying levels of control over land. This article uses a paired comparison of Dalian and Harbin in China's north-east to link differences in local political economies to land politics. Dalian, benefiting from early access to foreign capital, consolidated its control over urban territory through the designation of a development zone, which realigned local economic interests and introduced dual pressures for enterprises to restructure and relocate. Harbin, facing capital shortages, distributed urban territory to assuage the losers of reform and promote economic growth. The findings suggest that 1) growth strategies, and the territorial politics they produce, are products of the post-Mao urban hierarchy rather than of socialist legacies, and 2), perhaps surprisingly, local governments exercise the greatest control over urban land in cities that adopted market reforms earliest.

Keywords

land politicsurban planninglocal governmentnorth-east Chinaproperty rights
Type
Articles
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 216 , December 2013 , pp. 872 - 895
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

I gratefully acknowledge funding support from the Institute for International Education, the Chinese Ministry of Education, and the Harvard Academic Real Estate Initiative. In addition, I wish to thank Elizabeth Perry, Alan Altshuler, Timothy Colton, Kristen Looney, Jonas Nahm, Chris Bramall and Andy Harris for comments on versions of this article.

References

Besley, Timothy. 1995. “Property rights and investment incentives: theory and evidence from Ghana.” Journal of Political Economy 103 (5), 903–937.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bo, Xilai. 2003. “Ruhe jingying chengshi zhefen guoyou zichan” (How to operate a city as state asset). In Liu, Changde (ed.), Chengshi jiaoxiang: Dalian shi linian yu shixian (Symphony of a City: The Idea and Practice of Dalian City). Beijing: Qinghua University Press.Google Scholar
Cai, Xuefu, Fang, Wang and Jiazhan, Deng. 1992. “Chu yijiang Dalian shi jiangshe chengwei xiandaihua guojixing chengshi de fazhan moshi” (Considering building Dalian city's form to become a modern international city). Chengshi guihua April, 52–55.Google Scholar
Cai, Yongshun, and Shi, Fayong. 2006. “Disaggregating the state: networks and collective action in Shanghai.” The China Quarterly 186, 314–332.Google Scholar
Cao, Hongtao (ed.). 1990. Dangdai Zhongguo de chengshi jianshe (Contemporary China's Urban Construction). Beijing: Academy of Social Sciences, 108–110.Google Scholar
China Statistical Bureau Population and Employment Bureau (ed.). 2008. China Labour Statistical Yearbook 2008. Beijing: Zhongguo tongji chubanshe.Google Scholar
Chovanec, Patrick. 2011. “China's real estate bubble may have just popped,” Foreign Affairs, 18 December.Google Scholar
Chung, Jae Ho. 1999. “Preferential policies, municipal leadership, and development strategies: a comparative analysis of Qingdao and Dalian.” In Chung, Jae Ho (ed.), Cities in China: Recipes for Economic Development in the Reform Era. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Chung, Jae Ho. 2004. “China's ‘city system’ in flux: explaining post-Mao administrative changes.” The China Quarterly 180, 945–964.Google Scholar
Chung, Jae Ho, Lai, Hongyi and Joo, Jang-Hwan. 2009. “Assessing the ‘Revive the Northeast’ (zhenxing dongbei) programme: origins, policies and implementation.” The China Quarterly 197, 107–125.Google Scholar
Dalian Historical Gazetteer Office (ed.). 2003. Dalian shi huanjing baohu zhi (Dalian City Environmental Protection Annals). Dalian: Dalian ligong daxue chubanshe.Google Scholar
Dalian Historical Gazetteer Office (ed.). 2004. Dalian shi zhi: chengshi jianshi zhi (Dalian City Construction Gazetteer). Beijing: Fangzhi chubanshe.Google Scholar
Dalian History Office (ed.). 2004. Dalian shi zhi: waijing waimao zhi (Dalian City Foreign Trade and Opening Gazetteer). Beijing: Fangzhi chubanshe, 518–539.Google Scholar
Dalian Patriotic Cleanliness Campaign Committee (ed.). 1999. Dalian shi aiguo weisheng yundongzhi, 1988–1998 (Dalian Patriotic Cleanliness Campaign, 1988–1998). Dalian: Dalian shi aiguo weisheng yundong zhi bianweihui.Google Scholar
Dalian Statistical Bureau (ed.). 2009. Dalian shi tongji nianjian 2009 (Dalian City Statistical Yearbook 2009). Beijing: Zhongguo tongji chubanshe.Google Scholar
Dalian Yearbook Committee (ed.). 1986; 1994. Dalian nianjian 1986; 1994. Dalian: Dalian chubanshe.Google Scholar
Duckett, Jane. 1998. The Entrepreneurial State: Real Estate and Commerce Departments in Reform Era Tianjin. New York and London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Fan, C. Cindy. 1997. “Uneven development and beyond: regional development theory in post-Mao China.” International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 21(4), 620–639.Google Scholar
French, Howard. 2007. “In China, fight over development creates a star,” New York Times, 23 March.Google Scholar
Gallagher, Mary. 2005. Contagious Capitalism: Globalization and the Politics of Labor in China. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Gaubatz, Piper Rae. 1995. “Urban transformation in post-Mao China: impacts of the reform era on China's urban form.” In Davis, Deborah S., Kraus, Richard, Naughton, Barry and Perry, Elizabeth J. (eds.), Urban Spaces in Contemporary China: The Potential for Autonomy and Community in Post-Mao China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Glaeser, Edward. 2008. Cities, Agglomeration, and Spatial Equilibrium. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gu, Wanming. 1987. “Yizhi chengshi bing: Haerbin chengshi gaizao lüeji” (Treating urban illness: Harbin city's renovation strategy). Liaowang 44(3), 21–22.Google Scholar
Hamer, Andrew. 1990. “Four hypothesis concerning urbanization.” In Kwok, R. Yin-wang, Parish, William L., Yeh, Anthony Gar-on, Xueqing, Xu (eds.), Chinese Urban Reform: What Model Now? Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Harbin City Gazetteer Editorial Committee (ed.). 1998. Harbin shi: chengshi guihua, tudi, shizheng gongyong jianshe zhi (Harbin City Construction Gazetteer). Harbin: Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Harbin City Management Department. 1984. Harbin City 1985 Master Plan. Harbin: Archives of the Urban Planning Society of Municipal Harbin.Google Scholar
Harbin City Urban Planning Research Institute. 2004. Haerbin shi kaifaqu xinqu zongti guihua zhuanti baogao (Harbin City Development Zone New Zone Master Plan Report). On file with author.Google Scholar
Harbin Daowai District Statistical Bureau (ed.). 1988. Haerbin shi Daowai qu shehui jingji fazhan tongji zonghe nianjian, 1978–1987 (Daowai District Social and Economic Development Statistical Yearbook, 1978–1987). Harbin: Haerbin shi Daowai qu tongji bu.Google Scholar
Harbin Urban Planning Bureau and Harbin Urban Planning and Design Research Institute. 2002. “Haerbin shi Songbei xinqu zongti guihua fang'an, 2010–2020” (Harbin city Songbei new area master plan draft, 2010–2020). In Harbin Urban Planning Bureau (ed.), Haerbin xin shiji chu chengshi guihua zuopin xuanji (Selected Works of Harbin City Planning in the Beginning of the New Century). Harbin: Haerbin chubanshe, 144–45.Google Scholar
Harbin Statistical Bureau (ed.). 2009. Harbin Statistical Yearbook 2009. Beijing: Zhongguo tongji chubanshe.Google Scholar
Harbin Yearbook Committee (ed.). 1999; 1998; 1995; 1992; 1990. Haerbin nianjian 1999; 1998; 1995; 1992; 1990 (Harbin Yearbooks 1999; 1998; 1995; 1992; 1990). Harbin: Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Heilongjiang Province Statistical Bureau (ed.). 2004. Heilongjiang sheng minying qiye jingji nianjian (Heilongjiang Province Private Enterprise Economic Yearbook). Harbin: Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Herbold, Robert. 2011. “China vs. America: which is the developing country?” Wall Street Journal, 9 July.Google Scholar
Hess, Christian. 2011. “From colonial port to socialist metropolis: war, imperialism and the making of ‘New Dalian’.” Urban History 38(3), 373–390.Google Scholar
Ho, Peter. 2001. “Who owns China's land? Policies, property rights, and deliberate institutional ambiguity.” The China Quarterly 166, 394–421.Google Scholar
Ho, Samuel P.S., and Lin, George C.S.. 2003. “Emerging land markets in rural and urban China: policies and practices.” The China Quarterly 175, 681–707.Google Scholar
Hoffman, Lisa. 2006. “Urban transformation and professionalization: translocality and rationalities of enterprise in post-Mao China.” In Oakes, Tim and Schein, Louisa (eds.), Translocal China. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Hsing, You-Tien. 2006. “Land and territorial politics in urban China.” The China Quarterly 187, 575–591.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hsing, You-Tien. 2010. The Great Urban Transformation: Politics of Land and Property in China. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hu, Ying. 2006. “Chengshihua jincheng zhong shidi nongmin zuizhong shenghuo anzhi wenti de kaolü” (Reflections on the problem of allocating support to peasants made landless during urbanization). Nongye jingji June, 56–57.Google Scholar
Hurst, William. 2009. The Chinese Worker after Socialism. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lee, Ching Kwan. 2007. Against the Law: Labor Protests in China's Rustbelt and Sunbelt. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Li, Jingyu. 2004. “Dongbei diqu chengzhang wei Zhongguo disi da jingji zhengzhanji de zhanlüe sikao” (Strategic thinking towards making the north-east the fourth economic engine for China). Jingji yanjiu cankao 6, 31–32.Google Scholar
Lin, George C.S. 2009. Developing China: Land, Politics and Social Conditions. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Liu, Changde (ed.). 2001. Dalian chengshi guihua yibai nian 1899–1999 (Dalian City Planning 100 Years, 1899–1999). Dalian: Naval Affairs University Publishing House.Google Scholar
Liu, Changde (ed.). 2004. Chengshi jiaoxiang: Dalian shi linian yu shixian (Symphony of a City: The Idea and Practice of Dalian City). Beijing: Qinghua University Press.Google Scholar
Logan, John, Fang, Yiping and Zhang, Zhanxin. 2011. “The winners in China's housing reform.” In Yanyun Man, Joyce (ed.), China's Housing Reform and Outcomes. Cambridge, MA: Lincoln Land Institute.Google Scholar
McKinsey Global Institute. 2008. “Preparing for China's urban billion,” http://www.mckinsey.com/mgi/publications/china_urban_billion/. Accessed 21 August 2010.Google Scholar
Nathan, Andrew. 2008. “Medals and rights: what the Olympics reveal, and conceal, about China,” The New Republic, 9 July.Google Scholar
Segal, Adam. 2003. Digital Dragon: High-Technology Enterprises in China. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Shao, Qin. 2010. “Waving the red flag: cultural memory and grass-roots protest in housing disputes in China.” Modern Chinese Literature and Culture 22(1), 197–232.Google Scholar
Urban Planning Bureau of Harbin Municipality and Urban Planning and Design Research Institute. 2004. Haerbin chengshi guihua zongti guihua (2004–2020) shuoming shu (Master Plan of Harbin, 2004–2020: Manual), chapter 8. On file with author.Google Scholar
Yang, Liu. 2005. “Jingti tudi jiufen baolihua miaotou” (Guarding against a trend of land dispute violence). Liaowang 29(18 July), 32–33.Google Scholar
Yu, Binyang (ed.). 2002. 21 shiji Haerbin chengshi guihua duice yanjiu (21st Century Harbin City Planning Measures Research). Harbin: Harbin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Zhang, Yue. 2008. “Steering toward growth: symbolic urban preservation in Beijing, 1990–2005.” Town Planning Review 79(2–3), 187–208.Google Scholar
Zhao, Dingxin. 2001. The Power of Tiananmen: State–Society Relations and the 1989 Student Movement. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Zhu, Yongquan. 1996. Haerbin tudi guihua yu guanli (Harbin Land Planning and Management). Shenyang: Liaoning University Press.Google Scholar