IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/envirc/v41y2023i3p466-484.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Architecture, tactics and mobility – Appropriating space at a transport hub in Shanghai

Author

Listed:
  • Xia Hua
  • Kah-Wee Lee

Abstract

Although public transport development has been widely addressed in extant urban research, everyday practices in transport spaces and their broader implications for urbanizing China are relatively less studied. Building on de Certeau’s concept of “tactics†and the literature on urban mobility, this study employs spatial analysis and ethnography to investigate the case of the Shanghainan Railway Station (SHNS) in China that had become underused after its traffic was directed away to new stations in the same network. By 2017, this decline had turned an architectural icon designed for efficiency and speed into a place where many unlikely social groups gathered daily. We followed a charity team serving the homeless seeking shelter there to understand how this modern structure was appropriated to cater to those who survived in the trails of development. The case of the SHNS reveals the uneven consequences of urbanization brought about by increasing connectivity in Chinese society and highlights how tactics can be a form of social infrastructure exhibiting degrees of institutional stability and translocal solidarities. It also points to the theoretical significance of turning our attention from the frontier to the trail of development as a productive space where the state, civil society and marginalized emerge temporarily in pastoral forms.

Suggested Citation

  • Xia Hua & Kah-Wee Lee, 2023. "Architecture, tactics and mobility – Appropriating space at a transport hub in Shanghai," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 41(3), pages 466-484, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envirc:v:41:y:2023:i:3:p:466-484
    DOI: 10.1177/23996544221141270
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/23996544221141270
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/23996544221141270?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dong, Lei & Du, Rui & Kahn, Matthew & Ratti, Carlo & Zheng, Siqi, 2021. "“Ghost cities” versus boom towns: Do China's high-speed rail new towns thrive?," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    2. Hsing, You-tien, 2010. "The Great Urban Transformation: Politics of Land and Property in China," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199568048.
    3. Ken Gwilliam, 2010. "Developing the Public Transport Sector in China," World Bank Publications - Reports 18424, The World Bank Group.
    4. Shahid Yusuf & Weiping Wu, 2002. "Pathways to a World City: Shanghai Rising in an Era of Globalisation," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 39(7), pages 1213-1240, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Shenjing He & Junxi Qian, 2017. "From an emerging market to a multifaceted urban society: Urban China studies," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 54(4), pages 827-846, March.
    2. 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.
    3. 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.
    4. Graeme Lang & Bo Miao, 2013. "Food Security for China's Cities," International Planning Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(1), pages 5-20, February.
    5. Baek, Jisun & Park, WooRam, 2022. "The impact of improved passenger transport system on manufacturing plant productivity," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    6. 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.
    7. 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.
    8. 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.
    9. Sung Li & Long Zhao, 2015. "The competitiveness and development strategies of provinces in China: a data envelopment analysis approach," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 293-307, December.
    10. Ma, Shuang & Mu, Ren, 2020. "Forced off the farm? Farmers’ labor allocation response to land requisition in China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).
    11. 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.
    12. 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).
    13. 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.
    14. 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.
    15. 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.
    16. Peter Taylor & Ben Derudder & Michael Hoyler & Pengfei Ni & Frank Witlox, 2014. "City-Dyad Analyses of China’s Integration into the World City Network," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 51(5), pages 868-882, April.
    17. 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.
    18. 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.
    19. Meina Cai & Jianyong Fan & Chunhui Ye & Qi Zhang, 2021. "Government debt, land financing and distributive justice in China," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 58(11), pages 2329-2347, August.
    20. Lin, Wanlin & Lin, George C.S., 2023. "Strategizing actors and agents in the functioning of informal property Rights: The tragicomedy of the extralegal housing market in China," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).

    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:sae:envirc:v:41:y:2023:i:3:p:466-484. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.