Chinese cities have experienced dramatic growth and transformation since
the initiation of economic reforms in 1978. One of the main characteristics of
contemporary urban development in China has been the massive expansion of
urban land, which has become one of the most important means to generate fiscal
revenue and promote local economic growth. The existing literature on urban
China has addressed issues such as China’s urbanization, changing urban land use
and changing public finance. What is missing from the existing literature is the
interrelationship among these three processes. The links between urban socioeconomic
development and land use change remain poorly understood, and the
discussion of the relationship between institutional changes and urban land
development has been rather limited. This thesis takes a political economy
perspective to investigate the relationship among institutional changes, urban land
development and urban socio-economic changes in Chinese cities, using Beijing
as a case. The main argument made in this study is that urban land development
has worked as an important medium to channel the effects of institutional changes
toward shaping the pattern of urban economic and social development.
During the period of 1996 -2008, Beijing experienced large-scale urban
expansion. The area of agricultural land and unused land dropped by 1.1% and
2.9% respectively while the land used for construction increased by 5.6%, and the
urban built-up area in 2008 was 2.75 times of the area in 1996. My research has
found that the peak of Beijing’s urban land development occurred in the period of
2001 to 2004 when both the growth of urban construction land and the transaction
volume of land conveyance reached their climax. Much of the newly increased
construction land was converted from agriculture for industrial use. Over space,
urban land development in Beijing was concentrated in the northwestern and
eastern regions. My detailed analysis of the sources and dynamics of urban land
development in Beijing has identified profound institutional changes made in the
central-municipal fiscal relations as the most important driving forces responsible
for the temporal, structural, and spatial characteristics of land development
demonstrated in Beijing. My further assessment of the effects of urban land
development in Beijing has revealed a mixed picture of improved economic
efficiency and persistent social and spatial disparity. The efficiency of Beijing’s
economic growth has improved significantly when compared with its past and
with other cities in the region. However, the internal variations in urban socioeconomic
development in the Beijing city-region has been worsen. By
establishing the relationship among the three elements, namely urban land
development, institutional changes and urban socio-economic development, this
research challenges the conventional wisdom that sees land development as
simply the passive outcome of economic growth and suggests that land should
better be seen as the “medium” to connect and materialize the effects of changes
in the political and institutional arena upon urban social and economic
transformation. / published_or_final_version / Geography / Master / Master of Philosophy
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:HKU/oai:hub.hku.hk:10722/180814 |
| Date | January 2011 |
| Creators | Zhang, Yueming, Amy., 张玥明. |
| Publisher | The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) |
| Source Sets | Hong Kong University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | PG_Thesis |
| Source | http://hub.hku.hk/bib/B47752531 |
| Rights | The author retains all proprietary rights, (such as patent rights) and the right to use in future works., Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License |
| Relation | HKU Theses Online (HKUTO) |
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