From Eco-Civilization to City Branding: A Neo-Marxist Perspective of Sustainable Urbanization in China

Martin de Jong
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Martin de Jong: Erasmus School of Law & Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Postbus 1738, 3000 DR Rotterdam, The Netherlands

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 20, 1-14

Abstract: While the national discourse on ‘eco-civilization’ drives conceptual thinking on sustainable urban development in China, in practice a systematic implementation gap appears to exist when it comes to local implementation. This paper examines how the leakage occurring in the trajectory from central government ideas to municipal and district level construction projects can be explained. More specifically, it aims to spot whether it is merely the result of mismatches resulting from ineffective interactions among players in the policy process, institutional misalignment between policy goals and policy instruments, or even if the mobilization of bias in the policy process is systematic enough to justify a neo-Marxist explanation of the abovementioned implementation gap. I found two main sources of structural bias: capital accumulation in the mechanisms for urban development and power accumulation in the mechanisms underlying the administrative process.

Keywords: eco-civilization; city branding; neo-Marxism; mobilization of bias; capital accumulation; power accumulation; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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