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作者

来源

URBAN GEOGRAPHY,Vol.38,Issue5SI,P.687-707

语言

英文

关键字

Urban planning; eco-city; China; Tianjin; NEOLIBERALISM; CITY; SYSTEM; SUSTAINABILITY; GOVERNANCE; CITIES; STATE

作者单位

[Xu, Jiang] Chinese Univ Hong Kong, Dept Geog & Resource Management, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Peoples R China. Xu, J (reprint author), Chinese Univ Hong Kong, Dept Geog & Resource Management, Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Peoples R China. E-Mail: jiangxu@cuhk.edu.hk

摘要

In much of the contemporary academic inquiry and political discourse on Chinese cities, urban entrepreneurialism and environmentalism often appear to be analyzed disjointedly and unreflectively. They are portrayed as two conflicting interests. Commentators also view urban planners as a homogenous group of professionals and/or state agents being forced to give up environmental goals to pursue economic value of space. Using the case of Tianjin Eco-City planning, this article interrogates the bargaining process between the ecological value and commodity narrative. It offers three major arguments. First, even though the discourse of environmental sustainability has been used to legitimize economic transformation, ecological demands are creating new pressures on entrepreneurial urban governance. Second, rather than treating Chinese planners as a fully constituted, internally coherent, organizationally-fixed, and operationally-consistent group, they should be viewed as hybrid, and diverse entities that represent divergent and sometimes contentious state interests. Third, planners, though still under tremendous pressure from landed interests, can become active players to positively influence urban transformation toward more environmental care.