ABSTRACT
This paper aims first, to develop a methodological framework for the study of the management of urban regeneration and conservation in China; and second, to evaluate current management practice. Shanghai has been chosen as a case study, as it has experienced large-scale urban regeneration and its urban conservation system is relatively advanced. China has experienced rapid socio-economic development during the last two decades. Similar to the situation in many other Asian countries, large-scale urban regeneration has been undertaken in most Chinese cities and this has seriously threatened the traditional and vernacular built environment of those cities. To protect its built heritage and environment, China established an urban conservation system in the late 1980s. However, the national policy framework of the system is largely incomplete and the urban conservation practice varies between different local authorities. The balance between urban regeneration and conservation has become a hard task for China’s local planning authorities. Furthermore, the study of China’s urban regeneration and conservation is only at a beginning and lacks a theoretical foundation.
