ABSTRACT
International experiences in the 20th century show that the economic modernisation of developing countries is usually accompanied by rapid urbanisation. It is also a popular belief that socio-spatial disparities within socialist cities are lower than in their pre-socialist period as well as in cities in market economies (French and Hamilton, 1979). In China, a new stage of urban development has been reached since the implementation of economic reforms in 1978. Both rapid urbanisation and departure from a socialist urban model have generated new forms of socio-spatial differentiation. Economic reforms, boiling down to the introduction of market mechanisms in the economic system, have brought a large numbers of migrants from the countryside to the cities. At the same time, the reforms have generated a new social class of rich businessmen and well-paid managers of joint ventures and foreign companies. The former were particularly initiated by the rural reforms, the latter more by the urban reforms and the Open Door Policy. Thus, at both ends of the urban social spectrum new groups have increased social disparities. The purpose of this paper is to disentangle the complex interrelations between the economic and political transformations 2 brought about by the reforms and the 286changing urban social structure. Furthermore the paper explores how much this translates into a new spatial structure of the city through specific segregation processes.
