Dual-track urbanization in a transitional economy: The case of Pearl River Delta in South China

Abstract

There has been a significant transformation in the model of urbanization in post-reform China, a society dominated by a large rural population but with accelerated industrialization and development. This paper argues that a comprehensive dual-track urbanization approach is more realistic for the study of urbanization in the transitional economy of post-reform China with mixed characters of an old planned economy and an emerging market economy. The dual-track model of urbanization is a significant departure from the Maoist model of Chinese urbanization. This paper discusses the emerging political economy of dual-track urbanization in post-reform China. This is followed by an examination of the development and urbanization in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) region. The trend of dual-track urbanization and its implications on spatial development in the PRD are analyzed by making use of the population data from 2000 census. A dispersed urbanization process with selective concentration in new growing SEZ cities in the 1980s and 1990s is revealed. But a new trend of concentrated state sponsored urbanization towards major urban centres has emerged in the PRD since the late 1990s. The complicated realities revealed in this analysis challenge the existing theories of city-based or town-based urbanization.