How to handle the five relationships well in the new urbanization
Qin Shuo said that urbanization is a process of natural development; not every place can remain at the peak of urbanization forever, nor is every place suitable to serve as a thriving zone. Many places do not have such a strong carrying capacity in their natural ecological environment, so pursuing urbanization is not necessarily appropriate either.
Mr. Qin Shuo, founder of China Business Network's Yicai Daily, said in Nanjing recently that in developing China's new urbanization, attention must be paid to handling five relationships well.
Qin Shuo made the above remarks at the “Third Yangtze River Delta Urban Development Forum” held in Nanjing, Jiangsu. This year's Yangtze River Delta Urban Development Forum, with the theme “Small Cities, Big Future,” was jointly held by the Zhejiang Yangtze River Delta Urban Development Data Research Institute, the School of Management of Fudan University, and Yicai Daily. It aimed to discuss the major trends in Yangtze River Delta urban development, explore the opportunities, models, methods, and paths for all parties to participate in urbanization construction under the background of new policies, and support the development of new urbanization in the Yangtze River Delta.
Qin Shuo said that urbanization is a process of natural development; not every place can remain at the peak of urbanization forever, nor is every place suitable to serve as a thriving zone. Because many places do not have such a strong carrying capacity in their natural ecological environment, pursuing urbanization is not necessarily appropriate either.
He said that under the dual drive of China's urbanization and industrialization, over the past 20 to 30 years, the number of towns across China has grown by about 10 times, from 2,713 in the 1980s to 20,113 in 2013.
Qin Shuo said that China's urbanization has now entered a period of key development. Whether it is China's new urbanization, healthy urbanization, or civilized urbanization, several relationships must be handled well.
The first is the relationship between the external and the internal. This refers not only to the surface image of a city, but also to its relationship with the city's internal structural mechanisms, and to the relationship between the local population and the migrant population. If this relationship can be handled well, our urbanization can achieve a huge leap in quality. Take Dongguan as an example. A very important issue there is the coordination between non-local and local populations. Local residents feel that we are the builders here, while non-local residents think they are merely renters here, so this relationship is very uncoordinated.
Next is handling the relationship between things and people. When people talk about urbanization, they think of development zones, industrial parks, and so on, but we must also consider social indicators related to people, such as education, health, culture, medical care, employment, and social security. If people cannot interact and connect with one another, their social existence is greatly weakened.
Next is the relationship between building and cultivating, that is, the relationship between construction and cultivation. Qin Shuo said that in Western urbanization, as well as in many small towns in many places, little has changed for many years, and Chinese people laugh at them for developing too slowly. In fact, in those places one always feels very comfortable. It is like cultivating nobility; this is a very long-term thing that includes culture, inheritance, and social conditions. If a town only wants to build and does not want to cultivate, that is not a good mindset.
There is also the issue of the ancient and the modern. Today China has fewer and fewer towns and fewer and fewer rural landscapes, and traditional festivals and gatherings with a sense of ritual are also becoming fewer and fewer. Urbanization has wiped out the cultural thread and the culture that was left behind, and this may cause us to lose very precious wealth.
Finally, there is the relationship between the same and the different. Many places have become a thousand cities with one face and a thousand towns with one face. In fact, every town must seek its own characteristics and must be identifiable, and this requires innovation in many models.