Michael Leaf

A Tale of Two Villages Globalization and Peri-Urban Change in China and Vietnam

Abstract The effects of globalization on cities are complex, multifaceted and geographically diverse. As a result of national policy changes over the past two decades, the urban impacts of increasing global connectivity in China and Vietnam have been sudden and swift, in contrast to the more gradually formed transborder linkages of cities elsewhere in Asia. In each country, the shift to a market economy, opening up to outside investment, and the subsequent acceleration of economic change have prompted the rapid expansion of urban spatial economies. As one means of examining the implications of these changes, this paper looks at the evolving situation in two peri-urban villages now undergoing urbanization and integration, one on the edge of Quanzhou, Fujian, China, the other on the periphery of Hanoi, Vietnam. In each instance, it is seen that local spatial transformations are generated by fundamental economic and social changes, and that the influences of globalized processes in these settings are felt primarily through diffuse, opportunistic, and indirect channels. The one example of a large foreign-funded project, in the Hanoi case, indicates the need to emphasize local level administrative reforms in the interest of improved governance in contexts such as these.

Inner city redevelopment in China: Implications for the city of Beijing

Abstract After a decade of economic reforms and the consequent relaxation of social controls, Chinese cities are in the midst of an extraordinary transformation. An essential question is whether the major cities of coastal China are now beginning to adopt spatial and social characteristics typically associated with other Third World cities. Will Chinas transition to a market economy — particularly a market system for the allocation of urban space — result in spatial polarization of social groups within cities? This paper focuses on changes in processes of housing production as a means of examining this question. The assertion here is that China has entered a new period of housing construction, which emphasizes the redevelopment of the long neglected inner cities. The case of Beijing is looked at in detail, not as a means of describing ‘typical’ processes, but of showing how the administrative decentralization which is inherent in the reform process allows for a return to localized processes of housing and urban development.

The Price of Land for Housing in Jakarta

In spite of its potential value to governments, detailed information as to how land prices vary spatially within Third World cities is usually lacking. This paper discusses the distribution of land prices in Jakarta using information provided on a neighbourhood basis by experienced real estate brokers. Appraised prices were given for different types of residential plot distinguished by tenure and infrastructural provision. Analysis of the data in Jakarta shows the relative importance of infrastructural provision and tenure (land title) for land prices. Examination of such data over time makes it possible to test whether and where there has been a spiralling of land prices, and in the case of Jakarta it is found that recent price increases have been consistently greater in suburban areas and in informal-sector plots, arising from the massive demand from low-income households for affordable housing. The paper concludes by drawing out policy implications.

Urban Planning and Urban Reality Under Chinese Economic Reforms

Economic reforms in China have significantly changed both the processes of urban development and the practice of urban spatial planning. Changes in these aspects of urbanization, however, have not occurred in concert. The reassertion of planning as a profession has resulted in a reintroduction of a form of master planning, while the states virtual monopoly over urban investment and decision making has steadily eroded. In Chinese cities, the practice of urban planning may have passed from irrelevance under the command economy of the past to gross ineffectiveness in the socialist market economy of today. In this paper I review major urban trends arising from Chinese economic reforms and discuss the problems and prospects of a planning response to these trends.

Building the Road for the BMW: Culture, Vision, and the Extended Metropolitan Region of Jakarta

Recent writings on Asian urbanization have stressed how the continuing outward expansion of the largest metropolitan regions has been eroding the long-standing distinction between rural and urban, particularly in terms of land use and economic structure. In this paper I examine the cultural implications of this phenomenon by looking at recent changes in the extended metropolitan region of Jakarta, Indonesia. Over the course of the 1980s, urbanization trends in Jakartas periphery have resulted in a greatly expanded interface between urban and rural components of Indonesian society. Although this has created the opportunity for much broader popular participation in the urban economy, it may also be fostering a new perception within Indonesian society—that the primary social dichotomy lies not between the city and the countryside but between socioeconomic classes.

The “Third Spring” of Urban Planning in China The Resurrection of Professional Planning in the Post-Mao Era

Social and economic changes resulting from the introduction of market allocation processes in the post-Mao era have been enormously consequential in accelerating China’s urbanization. Central to such changes have been the fundamental reconceptualization of the role of the city vis-a-vis national development strategies and the consequent revitalization of the practice of urban spatial planning after years of disrepute and dissolution. This article examines the current state—the “third spring”—of urban planning practice relative to ongoing changes in urban China, particularly the rapid expansion of urban spatial economies and the local impacts of administrative and fiscal decentralization. Instead of seeing the new position of urban planning as indicative of a sharp discontinuity with past practices, we argue that the rise of professional planning should instead be understood in terms of its conceptual continuity with the past. Analysis of current developments in planning practice indicates growing tensions over questions of control, both between central and local states and with regard to the diversification of actors shaping the political economy of urbanization at local levels.

City life in the Village of Ghosts: A case study of popular housing in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Abstract The cities of Vietnam have been undergoing tremendous change since the introduction of doi moi (economic reform) policies in the late 1980s. One significant outcome has been the growth of ‘informal’ or ‘popular’ housing settlements. Popular housing can be looked upon as intrinsically a doi moi phenomenon as it arises from such policy changes as the loss of housing subsidy, the relaxation of controls on population movement and the institutionalisation of land markets to stimulate urban development. This paper reports on research on one recently established popular settlement in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnams largest city. The experiences of this settlement — Xom Ma, or the ‘Village of Ghosts’ — illustrate the socio-economic and physical effects of these changes and give a picture of an important component of Vietnams urban future.

Localizing a global discipline - Designing new planning programs in Sri Lanka

In order to be relevant and useful in a fragmented developing country context, community and regional planning needs to shift away from the use of rigid tools to more flexible, adaptive approaches. An international review of planning curricula indicated a widespread consensus with respect to key competencies required of planners. This understanding was used in the development of new teaching programs at three Sri Lankan universities. Complementing the technical core knowledge areas, strong emphases on problem structuring, critical and strategic thinking, and the understanding of the political and institutional contexts appear to be crucial to making the agenda of “planning for sustainable development” more than a fashionable cliché. In order for these core areas to have relevance in a developing country context, however, planning curricula need to achieve a balance between local priorities and a “global” perspective.

Power, power, everywhere: Pipe Politics in comparative perspectiveBjörkmanLisa, Pipe Politics, Contested Waters: Embedded Infrastructures of Millennial Mumbai. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015; 296 pp.: 978-0-8223-5962-2,

hydraulic infrastructure to work. On the other hand, blaming ‘corruption’ for the evident difficulty in obtaining reliable access to water is a pervasive idiom. Indeed, even engineers may encourage the idea that problems with the delivery of water are due to corruption rather than due to their own lack of knowledge, maps, or competence. Corruption is commonplace, but the commonplace talk about corruption also turns out to be a way of evading discussion of the materiality of the hydraulic infrastructure. A second conclusion is that the focus of Björkman’s study, although it is not explicitly theorized, is not exactly the pipes themselves, or even water, but the presence or absence of a core property possessed by water when it is contained in pipes— namely pressure (13). The challenge for the engineers, plumbers, and residents of Mumbai is to find where there is pressure in the network and where there is an absence of pressure. Lacking maps of the network as a whole, the focus of engineers and residents, as well as the ethnographer, is on the problem of how to locate and enhance water pressure. Democracy plays the role of a ‘political device’ that might enable the pressure of the hydraulic infrastructure to be raised, whether in specific locations or in general. One test of a good ethnography is whether the material it generates challenges its readers to think differently. Certainly, Pipe Politics highlights the limitations of dominant geographical accounts of urban politics and government. However, my sense is that the range of concepts deployed here, including infrastructure, embeddedness, and materiality, don’t quite do justice to the richness of this ethnography and its empirical preoccupations. By focusing on the everyday work of engineers, sounding men, plumbers, and local politicians, Björkman’s study directs us to acknowledge both the political significance of their expertise and the importance of sights, sounds, and pressures that may otherwise be unrecognized.