Urban China talks: Two Experiments in Theorizing

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Two Experiments in Theorizing (with) Urban China

Shaun SK Teo, Assistant Professor, Department of Geography, National University of Singapore

Is Chinese urbanization unique? What can we learn from Chinese urbanization? How might cases in urban China be integrated into global discussions on urban governance and transformation? This talk addresses these burning questions. Chinese urbanization presents rich cases for an engaged pluralism in urban studies. It has the potential to contribute to the revision of existing theoretical frameworks and to create new starting points for analysis between urban China and a wider range of contexts globally. These arguments are instantiated through two experiments to build concepts from and with a case study of a collaborative urban redevelopment project in Shenzhen. The first experiment is a comparative analysis between Shenzhen and a similar case in London. The second experiment builds elements for the re-theorization of Chinese state entrepreneurialism by conceptualizing from the ground in Shenzhen. Both experiments contribute to studies of urban governance by demonstrating the variegated logics and forms of emerging post-growth state programs and politics, including those which allow parts of society to selectively influence policymaking.

 Shaun SK Teo is Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography, National University of Singapore. His research focuses on urban governance and its underpinning state-society politics, theorizing from a ‘global East’ perspective. Ongoing research topics include municipal statecraft, gentrification and informality. Shaun’s current research is a comparative analysis of the geographies of youth urban activisms  in Taipei, and Bangkok and Singapore, thinking specifically about how we can rethink urban activisms through the variegated practices of youth.