“Urban sprawl is a real threat to the future of China, considering the country’s gigantic population and its limited resources, both energy and available land. If we look at the case of Shanghai, we can see that rapid suburban sprawl has not relieved the conditions of overcrowding in the centre. This problem could be solved by changing the land-use regulations that generate overly accelerated development and artificially low densities in inner-ring suburbs. In the Pudong New District, we are now working on revitalising an area that has not even been completed. We are trying to improve its unusually low densities by focusing on small and mixed streets, a local market, open-air theatres for the local community and the overall revitalisation of local culture.”
“Not surprisingly, massive urbanisation and modernisation have put traditional grassroots mechanisms of social control under stress in contemporary Chinese cities. The neighbourhood's cohesion is in decline due to demographic mutations, demolitions and renewal. Culturally, residents show less interest in neighbourhood involvement, watchers for the wealthiest in central district gated communities solve security problems while they “go bowling alone”, and for the middle classes management companies deal with their security. The proliferation of video surveillance cameras, 200,000 in Shanghai and 200,000 more to come, is beginning to become problematic. Another contradiction relates to the presence of unregistered rural migrants. They are part of the city yet they are invisible. They do not have citizenship and they add to the fragmentation of the city. A survey administered by Australian researchers shows that urbanites’ attitudes to migrants influence their perceptions of public security. Crime in urban China is rising in spite of the fact that it is still very low. The challenging questions for the future of the city here are the following: Are Shanghai elites really eager to produce inclusive togetherness in their city? What new identity formation springs from rapidly changing spaces? What is the meaning of community or neighbourliness in a fluid society like this? Will the children of invisible interstitial subjects that have been long deprived of citizenship cope and if not will forces of intimidation be deployed to make them comply? We all know by experience that it is more advantageous to govern by consent than by coercion.”
“In China, the state had a standard for individual living space of 10 square metres per person within a room. All facilities, including bathrooms and kitchens, were meant to be communal and not the personal space of individuals. As recently as last year, this standard was changed. It has been raised to a little over 23 square metres per person and that includes various facilities. The measuring unit is now the apartment rather than the room. What it means, of course, is that we are now leading more private lives rather than a completely public life. So this increase in personal space changes not only how we live but also how we think about urban issues. For me, the role of housing in relation to community, neighbourhood and city is tied to the notion of urban fabric – that is to say housing as fabric. In opposition to the kind of monumental architecture or the architecture of monumentality, the architecture of fabric is an architecture, or urbanism, of democracy.”
