.png){kind=small}
Distinguished Webinar Series in Urban and Regional Research
Sponsored jointly by Department of Geography and Department of Urban Planning and Design, HKU
Please first register through the following link: https://hkuems1.hku.hk/hkuems/ec_hdetail.aspx?guest=Y&ueid=78720
(Zoom link will be emailed to registrants after the close of registration)
Title of the talk:
Beyond growth machine dynamics: rethinking state politics in China’s urban redevelopment
Large-scale urban expansion and demolition have been ubiquitous in fast urbanising China. Recently, China has seen a new wave of urban redevelopment. The dynamics of redevelopment are often attributed to the growth machine. The politics of redevelopment is often seen as secondary, derived from local entrepreneurial governance. This talk, based on a joint research paper on three redevelopment projects in Guangzhou, Nanjing, and Wuhan, pays more attention to the changing national political context. These cases reflect local responses to the national campaigns for rural vitalisation, heritage preservation, and community participation. We argue that these redevelopment projects are inherited from and associated with, but at the same time go beyond, growth machine politics. They represent ‘state entrepreneurialism’ to achieve extra-economic objectives through market instruments and the role of the national state in development politics.
Speaker:
Professor Fulong Wu
Bartlett Professor of Planning, UCL
Fulong Wu is the Bartlett Professor of Planning and a joint coordinator of China Planning Research Group at University College London. He completed his PhD in Urban Planning at the University of Hong Kong in 1995. Before coming to UCL, he taught in Southampton University and then in 2005 became Professor of East Asian Planning and Development and the director of Urban China Research Centre at Cardiff University. Dr. Wu’s research interests include urban development in China and its social and sustainable challenges. He is currently the principal investigator of European Research Council (ERC) advanced grant – Rethinking China’s Model of Governance (ChinaUrban).
