This dissertation employs the theory of self-organizing criticality (SOC) into the study of
Chinese cities. SOC was proposed at the end of the 1980s to explain system complexity
by combining both self-organizing and critical behaviors. SOC has been broadly used in
explaining phenomena in physical and social sciences. However, few attempts have been
made to connect urban studies with SOC because of the extreme complexity of urban
phenomena. This study develops a generalized SOC to study Chinese cities at both the
inter-urban and the intra-urban levels.
At the inter-urban level, this study finds that the rank size distribution of Chinese cities
has followed Zipf's law since 1984. In addition, the rank size dynamics of Chinese cities
experienced a spatiotemporal shift. Before 1996, city rank increases in a few small- and
middle-sized cities because of favorable economic policies offered by the central
government. After 1996, a majority of the Chinese cities began to be involved in this
rank size shuffling. Cities with increasing ranks present clustered distribution, mainly along the south and east coastal areas. Part of the reason is that the market economy
mechanism has transcended policy factors in determining the city competitiveness.
At the intra-urban level, the study shows that Shenzhen's urban physical development is
currently facing physical environmental thresholds, shifting the development strategies
spatiotemporally from fringe and isolated growth to fringe and infill growth. The
resulted urban patches show power law relationship both in the area-perimeter
distributions and the magnitude-frequency distributions.
In summary, this research proves the applicability of the generalized SOC in urban
studies. At both the inter-urban and the intra-urban levels, the Chinese cities present the
characteristics of SOC. Given a stable condition of power law, shifts occur in the inside
dynamics of China's urban system and Shenzhen city.
This study is one of the few empirical urban studies based on SOC. The study
contributes to the literature on SOC theory and provides theoretical breakthroughs in
studying Chinese cities. Finally, this study has potential implications on urban policies
and urban development strategies.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:tamu.edu/oai:repository.tamu.edu:1969.1/ETD-TAMU-2009-05-714 |
| Date | 2009 May 1900 |
| Creators | Li, Shujuan |
| Contributors | Sui, Daneil |
| Source Sets | Texas A and M University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Book, Thesis, Electronic Dissertation, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
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