State or market: the role of the government in urban village regeneration in China

Urban regeneration is a natural response of recycling resources in our urban development strategy to the problem of urban decay. Since urban regeneration invariably involves property rights as well as wealth redistribution, it usually lends itself to a tight scrutiny by the society even though some actors in the process may claim that renewal of old and obsolete physical structures is merely a normal economic activity that can be accommodated effectively within the market mechanism. Urban regeneration therefore becomes a complex process that involves intriguing interaction among various stakeholders in dealing with spatial reorganization due to urban physical and economic decay. In this paper, we will first examine the literature on the state-market dynamics, followed by a general discussion of urban regeneration against the backdrop of the interaction between the state and the market. Finally, the discussion of such statemarket interaction will be channelled to a more focused spatial context of regenerating urban villages in China. In doing so, we hope to contribute to the current literature on how the state, stakeholders and the market interact during this complex process of regeneration.