Community Bargaining with Urban Growth: The Case of J Village in Guangzhou

Yingyan Xu and Xiaoxing Huang
Additional contact information
Yingyan Xu: School of Public Administration, Guangdong Research Center for Nonprofit Organizations, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou 510006, China
Xiaoxing Huang: School of Sociology and Anthropology, Xiamen University, Xiamen 361005, China

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 13, 1-15

Abstract: The past several decades have seen China undergo a rapid urbanization process. During periods of economic prosperity, cities expropriate outlying lands, often villages, for economic development with the support of various local and national government programs designed to encourage urban expansion. However, the autonomy of the villages has not been paid enough attention. How does incorporation into an urban development zone affect the community identity and autonomy of a village? How does the village bargain with external urban institutions? This research is based on ethnographic research and interviews conducted in 2013, 2014, 2017, and 2021. The results reveal that villagers are generally willing to accept the loss of their collective land in exchange for a larger share of the promised prosperity of industrialization, but over time they tend to find that the immediate benefits of expropriation are outweighed by long-term costs. They lose the support of the state and are exposed to new vulnerabilities, such as pollution and economic instability. Indeed, they agree to undertake unknown future risks in exchange for short-term gains. They cannot gain the right to the city, but gradually lose control of the village.

Keywords: urban growth; community autonomy; vulnerabilities; bargaining with urban growth (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/13/7857/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/13/7857/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:13:p:7857-:d:848539

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().