Reconceiving China's urban economic transition through symbiotic state-firm dynamics: An integrated perspective from urban governance and global production networks

Abstract

China's urban economic transition since the 2000s has garnered considerable scholarly interest. Two distinct bodies of scholarship, namely urban governance and global production networks, have investigated this phenomenon, each offering unique insights either from an endogenous state-centric or exogenous firm-centric approach. The former has justifiably accentuated the centrality of the state in shaping Chinas urban-regional economic reconfiguration but lacks exploration of the multifaceted ways in which state apparatus engages with a spectrum of quotidian firm-level activities and the negotiation power these firms wield. The latter embraces an exogenous firm-centric perspective on the economic transition in East Asia latecomer regions, stressing forces of globalisation, foreign investment, and intra/inter/extra-firm networks, but tends to bracket the state into the institutional background and, therefore, downplays its agentic role. By initiating a dialogue between these two theoretical frameworks, this paper formulates a dialectical state-firm relational approach, offering a revitalised, integrative comprehension of China's urban economic transformation. Employing Dongguan - a globally recognised hub for ICT manufacturing - as an empirical focal point, it elucidates how the relational state-firm dynamics evolve temporally, differ spatially across territories and scales, and display distinct contrasts between high-value-added and labour-intensive sectors within the ICT industry.