Un-gating the gated community: The spatial restructuring of a resettlement neighborhood in Nanjing

Abstract

The urbanization of China has been coupled with a massive transition of farmers to urban citizens. To accommodate landless farmers in urban areas, many resettlement neighborhoods have been developed in the form of gated communities. After landless farmers moved in, however, these resettlement neighborhoods experienced spatial restructuring associated with un-gating. This article examines the case of Xianlin New Village (XNV) in Nanjing, China, in order to shed light on and better understand the driving forces underlying the phenomenon of un-gating the gated community; these forces include commercialization, studentification, the continuation of rural lifestyle, and the lack of collective goods inside the neighborhood. The findings of this research imply that the policymakers need to more thoroughly consider the resettled residents when they plan resettlement neighborhoods. Furthermore, though resettlement neighborhoods are supposed to be physically permanent and are meant to increase the beauty of the urban environment, the policymakers behind them need to rethink how to best to prevent the resettlement neighborhoods from becoming urban informalities. The findings here also suggest that it is necessary to improve on the existing institutions of land acquisition and implement a more people-oriented urbanization policy. This research can advance our understanding of the urbanization process related to landless farmers at the neighborhood scale.