ABSTRACT
The ongoing process of massive land development in China since the reforms has essentially been driven by a combination of forces emanating from two sources, namely continuing sprawl of large cities from above and a widespread industrialization and urbanization of the countryside from below. The expansion and restructuring of the urban space in large cities have significantly contributed to the conversion of rural land for concentrated urban development, as documented in the foregoing chapter. However, a more phenomenal conversion of land from agriculture into various non-agricultural activities has actually been taking place in the countryside. One of the important characteristics of the transformation of the Chinese space economy in recent decades has been the fact that urbanization is based not simply on the expansion of existing cities but more on a scattered and dispersed growth of non-agricultural activities in a wider regional extent. Increasingly, Chinese urbanization has been recognized for its dual-track character – a city-based urban growth at the top overlaying with a region-based settlement transition at the bottom1 In many respects, the process of industrialization and urbanization of the countryside is no less significant than what is going on in large cities. Historically, rural industrialization and town development took place earlier than the phenomenal expansion of large cities simply because economic reforms were initiated in the countryside. Geographically, rural industrialization and urbanization have involved a greater areal extent, a larger population, and a bigger amount of land than that in the cities partly because population migration to large cities continues to meet persistent institutional barriers and partly because a less regulated environment in the countryside allowed for changes to be made more easily and expeditiously than in the city. To understand the complex pattern of land use change identified in the previous part, it is necessary to move out of large cities and navigate into the vast countryside where an industrial and urban revolution affecting the land and people of a huge magnitude is just in the making.
