IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v196y2018icp1-9.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Bringing urban governance back in: Neighborhood conflicts and depression

Author

Listed:
  • Fu, Qiang

Abstract

Urban governance and its impact on contentious politics have received remarkably little attention in existing studies on mental health. Drawing on a measure of neighborhood conflicts developed in a survey of thirty-nine urban neighborhoods in Guangzhou, China, this article investigates the potential link between urban governance and mental health. Net of sociodemographic, relational, and environmental measures, it finds that among residents' conflicts with different entities of urban governance, only those with local/grassroots governments are significantly associated with more depressive symptoms. Moreover, these subgroups of government-oriented conflicts associated with more depressive symptoms are related to neighborhood planning and communal properties, reflecting a dilemma in the Chinese model of urban governance. By offering a relational interpretation of neighborhood conflicts, this study not only challenges the previous view that community building in China improves mental health, but calls attention to the significance of urban governance in research on mental health.

Suggested Citation

  • Fu, Qiang, 2018. "Bringing urban governance back in: Neighborhood conflicts and depression," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 196(C), pages 1-9.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:196:y:2018:i:c:p:1-9
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.10.035
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953617306524
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.10.035?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jin, Lei & Wen, Ming & Fan, Jessie X. & Wang, Guixin, 2012. "Trans-local ties, local ties and psychological well-being among rural-to-urban migrants in Shanghai," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 288-296.
    2. Qiang Fu, 2016. "The persistence of power despite the changing meaning of homeownership: An age-period-cohort analysis of urban housing tenure in China, 1989–2011," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 53(6), pages 1225-1243, May.
    3. John Friedmann, 2007. "Reflections on Place and Place‐making in the Cities of China," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(2), pages 257-279, June.
    4. Fulong Wu, 2002. "China's Changing Urban Governance in the Transition Towards a More Market-oriented Economy," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 39(7), pages 1071-1093, June.
    5. Hsing, You-tien, 2010. "The Great Urban Transformation: Politics of Land and Property in China," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199568048.
    6. Shen, Yuying, 2014. "Community building and mental health in mid-life and older life: Evidence from China," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 209-216.
    7. Qiang Fu & Nan Lin, 2014. "The Weaknesses of Civic Territorial Organizations: Civic Engagement and Homeowners Associations in Urban China," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(6), pages 2309-2327, November.
    8. Song, Lijun, 2015. "Does who you know in the positional hierarchy protect or hurt? Social capital, comparative reference group, and depression in two societies," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 136, pages 117-127.
    9. Yushu Zhu & Werner Breitung & Si-ming Li, 2012. "The Changing Meaning of Neighbourhood Attachment in Chinese Commodity Housing Estates: Evidence from Guangzhou," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 49(11), pages 2439-2457, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Pykett, Jessica & Campbell, Niyah & Fenton, Sarah-Jane & Gagen, Elizabeth & Lavis, Anna & Newbigging, Karen & Parkin, Verity & Williams, Jessy, 2023. "Urban precarity and youth mental health: An interpretive scoping review of emerging approaches," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 320(C).
    2. Tianlan Fu & Sanqin Mao, 2022. "Individual Social Capital and Community Participation: An Empirical Analysis of Guangzhou, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(12), pages 1-14, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Cheng, Zhiming & King, Stephen P. & Smyth, Russell & Wang, Haining, 2016. "Housing property rights and subjective wellbeing in urban China," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 45(S), pages 160-174.
    2. Dror Kochan, 2015. "Placing the Urban Village: A Spatial Perspective on the Development Process of Urban Villages in Contemporary China," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(5), pages 927-947, September.
    3. Qiang Fu, 2016. "The persistence of power despite the changing meaning of homeownership: An age-period-cohort analysis of urban housing tenure in China, 1989–2011," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 53(6), pages 1225-1243, May.
    4. Chan, Randolph C.H. & Mak, Winnie W.S., 2020. "Empowerment for civic engagement and well-being in emerging adulthood: Evidence from cross-regional and cross-lagged analyses," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 244(C).
    5. Qiang Fu & Nan Lin, 2014. "The Weaknesses of Civic Territorial Organizations: Civic Engagement and Homeowners Associations in Urban China," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(6), pages 2309-2327, November.
    6. Siu Wai Wong, 2015. "Urbanization as A Process of State Building: Local Governance Reforms in China," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 39(5), pages 912-926, September.
    7. Fulong Wu, 2016. "China's Emergent City-Region Governance: A New Form of State Spatial Selectivity through State-orchestrated Rescaling," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(6), pages 1134-1151, November.
    8. Xiaorui Wang & Shen Hu, 2024. "How do organizations in Chinese agriculture perceive sustainability certification schemes? An exploratory analysis," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 42(3), May.
    9. Graeme Lang & Bo Miao, 2013. "Food Security for China's Cities," International Planning Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(1), pages 5-20, February.
    10. Siu Wai Wong & Bo-sin Tang & Jinlong Liu & Ming Liang & Winky K.O. Ho, 2021. "From “decentralization of governance†to “governance of decentralization†: Reassessing income inequality in periurban China," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 53(6), pages 1473-1489, September.
    11. Hyun Bang Shin & Loretta Lees & Ernesto López-Morales, 2016. "Introduction: Locating gentrification in the Global East," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 53(3), pages 455-470, February.
    12. Nan Guo & Edwin Hon Wan Chan & Esther Hiu Kwan Yung, 2020. "Alternative Governance Model for Historical Building Conservation in China: From Property Rights Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(1), pages 1-16, December.
    13. Yang Xiao & Yanjie Bian & Lei Zhang, 2020. "Mental Health of Chinese Online Networkers under COVID-19: A Sociological Analysis of Survey Data," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(23), pages 1-17, November.
    14. Ma, Shuang & Mu, Ren, 2020. "Forced off the farm? Farmers’ labor allocation response to land requisition in China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).
    15. Xuanyi Nie, 2023. "The ‘medical city’ and China’s entrepreneurial state: Spatial production under rising consumerism in healthcare," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 60(6), pages 1102-1122, May.
    16. Nguyen, Quang & Kim, Doo-Chul, 2020. "Reconsidering rural land use and livelihood transition under the pressure of urbanization in Vietnam: A case study of Hanoi," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 99(C).
    17. Si-ming Li & Sanqin Mao & Huimin Du, 2019. "Residential mobility and neighbourhood attachment in Guangzhou, China," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 51(3), pages 761-780, May.
    18. Siu Wai Wong, 2016. "Reconsolidation of state power into urbanising villages: Shareholding reforms as a strategy for governance in the Pearl River Delta region," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 53(4), pages 689-704, March.
    19. Jennifer Robinson & Katia Attuyer, 2021. "Extracting Value, London Style: Revisiting the Role of the State in Urban Development," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(2), pages 303-331, March.
    20. George CS Lin & Amy Y Zhang, 2015. "Emerging spaces of neoliberal urbanism in China: Land commodification, municipal finance and local economic growth in prefecture-level cities," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 52(15), pages 2774-2798, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:196:y:2018:i:c:p:1-9. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.