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Rethinking displacement in peri-urban transformation in China

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  • Mi Shih

Abstract

This article examines the spatiality of peri-urban villages in Guangzhou, offering an analysis that critically rethinks displacement as a phenomenon that need not be bracketed by the narrow spatial understanding of “physical uprootedness.†Building on ethnographic fieldwork research in Yonghe village, this article identifies and examines three mechanisms and forms of marginalization and dispossession that Chinese villagers have experienced during in situ urbanization: (1) large-scale expropriation of farmland to economic development zones in the mid-1980s; (2) subjection of collective assets to industrial land use by the planning authority since 1991; (3) on-going exposure to industrial pollution. The analysis shows that each of these factors is contingent on the previous one, and that villagers’ engagement with recent injustices cannot be separated from their disadvantaged positions in the past. This article argues that, while overt displacement by state-led development is a clear violation of the “right to the city,†in situ marginalization and dispossession without physical uprooting is equally problematic and exploitative.

Suggested Citation

  • Mi Shih, 2017. "Rethinking displacement in peri-urban transformation in China," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 49(2), pages 389-406, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envira:v:49:y:2017:i:2:p:389-406
    DOI: 10.1177/0308518X16670158
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Hsing, You-tien, 2010. "The Great Urban Transformation: Politics of Land and Property in China," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199568048.
    2. Shenjing He, 2012. "Two Waves of Gentrification and Emerging Rights Issues in Guangzhou, China," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 44(12), pages 2817-2833, December.
    3. Ananya Roy, 2009. "The 21st-Century Metropolis: New Geographies of Theory," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(6), pages 819-830.
    4. Lisa M. Hoffman, 2014. "The Urban, Politics and Subject Formation," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(5), pages 1576-1588, September.
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