Building Civilised Cities

Resurgent China, 2009

Transactions in Planning and Urban Research

The state remains central in contemporary environmental politics and policies, although environmental governance increasingly involves neoliberal and non-state mechanisms. Environmental management in China holds features of an ‘environmental state’ and has been undergoing continuous restructuring, manifested by a recent city-regionalism turn. Informed by the theories of eco-state restructuring (ESR) and eco-scalar fix, this paper investigates air pollution management in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Region by tracing the practices of environmental and territorial governance over the past decades. Through the analysis of parameters of the eco-state, this paper conceptualises the air pollution governance in China into three phases, namely pollutants emission control (the 1990s–2005), campaign-style regional governance (2006–2012) and city-regionalism in air quality governance (2013 onwards). We find that the central state plays proactive but different roles in each phase, characterised by...

Borderlands, 2016

This paper makes a contribution to the possibility of thinking about ‘a politics of the air’ by analysing some of the ways in which the air has become a site and subject of governance. I am using China as a case study to show how practical concerns over economic growth and social stability have led to a transformation in the way the Chinese state relates to the air. The paper argues that the state’s historical dependency on economic growth is propelling attempts to keep the air ‘breathable’ and the weather ‘controllable’ so as to maintain social stability. The air has subsequently started to function as a calculable extension of state interests. Climate change and particle pollution are not presented, framed or perceived as a problem of existing politics but rather as a challenge to it. This paper will especially look at the state’s infamous weather modification programme and the way it governs air pollution. I finish the paper by arguing for the possibility of thinking about a different politics of the air as a means to challenge ideas that accept the air as a passive medium of state interest.

This article places the study of rural environmental activism in the wider context of the Chinese government’s promotion of Ecological Civilization (shengtai wenming 生态文明). Ecological Civilization is, we argue, a top- down imaginary of China’s future that opens up space for environmental agency while setting authoritative standards for how to frame protests in a logic of science and social stability. The article compares how residents in a small cluster of villages in Zhejiang province dealt with different sources of air pollution over a span of ten years: how, when and why they chose to negotiate with local officials and industrial managers to prevent or reduce air pollution, and what the outcome was. We found that in addition to a consciousness of the right to protest, villagers had come to regard the ability to evoke science in negotiations with officials and industrial managers as crucial for success. We suggest that the forms of environmental activism we observed were in effect “containable protests” that befit the state-initiated national imaginary of an ecologically civilized world.

Urban Policy and Research, 2016

The scale and speed of China's urbanization translate into major challenges for sustainability. Could the 'eco-city' and 'low-carbon' agendas, and the promotion of related pilot cities drive Chinese urban practice towards more environmentally sustainable solutions? We explore this question through a critical review of experience in China, identifying problems relating to the development of space, the treatment of scale and the pursuit of efficiency (the 'space-scale-efficiency nexus'). China seeks sustainable solutions through eco and low-carbon agendas, but our review finds that current efforts fall short of expectations, and problematic patterns are repeated. We propose that a geo-administrative notion of functional regions could provide a strategic framework to address the range of design, physical and administrative planning problems, ensuring that eco-city and low-carbon city pilots result in comprehensive solutions that can be effectively replicated.

2012

Among the most striking features of this city, any foreigner who ever travelled or stayed in Beijing would immediately mention its incredibly high levels of pollution and its infamous fog. The city’s reputation being seriously damaged, action must be taken to preserve not only the populations from tremendous risks, but also maintain attractiveness for foreign entrepreneurs and improve competitiveness. The bottom line of our recommendations therefore stays in the absolute necessity for Beijing Municipality to increase transparency and implement serious environmental quality assessment mechanisms, in order to develop partnerships and benefit from international cooperation.

Chinese cities have been transforming at a stunning speed and pace over the last thirty years, as a result of the transition from a planned to a market economy launched by Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms in the late 70s (the so called "open door" policy). Such an impressive process is confirmed by the increasing urbanization rates: whilst the share of urban population (out of a total of 542 million) is 11% in 1949, the same has recently reached a peak of 51% (out of a total of 1.4 billion people), with 129 cities in 2010 counting more than 1 million residents (18 in 1981). Given the highly centralized Chinese political system, a national urban agendaembodied in specific five-year national economic planshas been set up since the foundation of the Popular Republic in 1949. Yet, following the economic transition, a number of significant changes have progressively affected such agenda, both in terms of goals and in terms of meanings, roles and values attached to the city. Since Maoist cities were ideologically stigmatized as symbols of consumerism and socioeconomic inequalities (particularly the biggest metropolises of the East Coast), their development processes were held back in order to create centres of heavy industry and enhance the development of inner western Provinces. On the contrary, starting with the economic reforms, and in the 90s more than ever, cities have quickly become the engine of China's impetuous economic growth. The massive physical transformation of Chinese cities has also generated a number of significant challenges for policy-makers, both at a national and at a local level. Although still confined to the technical and political arena (and so poorly socialized), an intense debate has nevertheless been ongoing over the last years in order for new development goals to be brought into the urban agenda. In this perspective, new issues such as environmental sustainability, pollution, migrations, ageing of population, welfare and urban regeneration forcefully emerge. After thirty years of heavy urbanization, Chinese cities seem to be concentrating more on their stabilization and quality, rather than on "quantitative" growth. This paper strives to stimulate a discussion about the directions of the new national urban agenda, by analyzing the most important documents provided at a central level. It is aimed at discussing the priorities and tools of such agenda, as well the actors involved in its preparation and implementation. In addition, the case of the city of Shanghai is used as a way to test to what extent such policy debates are translated into concrete practices of urban planning.

The China Quarterly

The heavy smog suffocating China's cities is increasingly being perceived as a threat by both the population and the authorities. Consequently, political action aiming at regulating ambient air pollution has become increasingly comprehensive and rigid in recent years. Even measures limiting consumption and production seem to become acceptable as China is facing an airpocalypse. Does this suggest a genesis of real “authoritarian environmentalism” (AE) in China? Taking this as a heuristic point of departure, we present findings from research on the implementation of air pollution control measures in Hangzhou city. We offer a critical examination of the concept of AE and, in particular, of local policy implementation strategies vis-à-vis the general public. Two measures in Hangzhou's air policy portfolio are analysed that reveal considerable variation: restrictions on the use of private cars and the (re)location of industrial facilities. Describing the conditions that have help...

Atmospheric Environment, 2009

As the world gets ready to begin the second decade of the twenty-first century, global climate change has been recognized as a real threat to civilization as we know it. The rapid and successful economic growth of developing nations, particularly China and India, is contributing to climate change. The route to initial economic success in China followed that of the developed nations through the development of industries. Unfortunately, China's environmental protection efforts have not been the same as in developed countries because China is vastly different culturally, socially, economically and, especially, politically from developed nations. When China started to deal with environmental concerns in the late 1970s, it took advantage of the experiences of other countries in establishing environmental standards and regulations, but it did not have a model to follow when it came to implementing these standards and regulations because of the abovementioned differences. Economically, China is transitioning from an agricultural base into an industrial base; however, even now, 60% of the population remains farmers. China has been and still is heavily dependent upon coal for energy, resulting in serious atmospheric particulate pollution. While growing efforts have been expended on the environment, at this juncture of its economic development, China would be well served to revisit the traditional “develop first and clean up later” approach and to find a balance between development and protecting the environment. Against this backdrop, a reflective look of the effort to manage air quality from 1949–2008 (with an emphasis on the past 30 years) in China is presented in this paper. The environmental component of the 2008 Olympic Games is examined as a special example to illustrate the current measures being used to improve air quality in China.