China's Regions, Polity, & Economy: A Study of Spatial Transformation in the Post Reform Era. (Book Reviews).

CHINA'S REGIONS, POLITY, & ECONOMY: A Study of Spatial Transformation in the Post Reform Era. Edited by Si-ming Li and Wingshing Tang. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press (in association with the University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI). 2000. ix, 413 pp. (Graphs, charts.) US$28. 75, paper. ISBN 962-201-854-8.

This book is one of the latest additions to the studies of regional development in China. An emerging body of literature has attempted to address regional development in China to answer research questions arising from post-Mao economic reforms and to remedy the inadequacy of the existing literature on developing countries. Those publications, including the current volume, have greatly advanced our understanding of regional development in China.

This book has at least four major characteristics. First, the contributors to the volume are interdisciplinary, including geography, sociology, economics, anthropology and political science. Such an interdisciplinary approach can bridge discipline-based perspectives, and it provides a thorough analysis of regional development issues. Chapter 4, for example, analyzes Japanese investment in China and is co-authored by an economist based in Japan and a geographer in Hong Kong. It provides rich information on both source country (Japan) and the destination of investment (China), which is hard for a single author to accomplish.

Second, the scope of this book is geographically balanced. It examines the issue of regional development at both macro and micro- geographical scales, and in both coastal and interior regions. While most of the chapters deal with coastal China, there are chapters analyzing localities that are less examined by scholars, such as villages in Henan (chapter 11) and less significant places in the ZhuJiang Delta (chapter 9). Such a scale of analysis, on one hand, allows readers to understand broad regional transformation in China. On the other hand, it allows the authors to examine the underlying mechanisms of regional transformation in great detail, including foreign investment, the capital construction system, the administrative system, the shortage economy and fiscal decentralization, to name a few.

Third, this book provides rich information on regional development in China and also analyzes mechanisms underlying the transformation. A detailed account of regional development in China is necessary and, in fact, requires a lot of work. This is important, since China's transition is a complicated, multi-dimensional process that cannot be explained by theoretical speculation. At the same time, authors also explain factors and mechanisms of regional transformation in China. While some chapters are more descriptive and others are more analytical, I believe that both types of work are needed for a better understanding of regional development in China.

Fourth, this book joins the efforts of other scholars working on China in an attempt to analyze regional development issues theoretically. As highlighted by the editors, the book analyzes China's regions with concepts such as time-space convergence, desakota region, geographic transfers of values and of revenues, totalization/localization, local capitalism and micro-mechanisms of post-communist transformation. I notice that in explaining factors of regional development, the titles of the sections indicate dominant mechanisms underlying regional development in China, i.e., foreign investment, government policies and forces operating at local and individual levels. This book joins a list of other recent books on China that analyze process and mechanisms of regional development in China (e.g., G. C. S. Lin, Red Capitalism in South China. Vancouver: University of British Columbia, 1997; and Y. H. D. Wei, Regional Development in China: States, Globalization, and Inequality. London: Routledge, 2000).

This book includes five sections and fourteen chapters. The introductory section discusses related theoretical issues and research on China and introduces the chapters. Section II, including chapters 2-5, analyzes foreign direct investment (FDI) and regional development in China. The authors stress the geographical unevenness of open-door policies and foreign investment in China and examine global and local factors underlying the location of foreign investment They also analyze the impact of FDI on China's urban, regional and industrial development.

Section III deals with government policies and regional development and includes chapters 6-8. Chapter 6 examines the change of regional inequality in China and the role of government policies. Chapters 7 and 8 analyze regional implications of central vs. local resource control, and central and local policies towards FDI in the automotive industry.

Section IV (chapters 9-12) analyzes spatial transformation at the urban and rural levels. Chapter 9 is a case study of spatial transformation in Panyu in the Zhujiang Delta. Chapter 10 criticizes the application of the desakota model to the understanding of urban-rural transition in China. Chapter 11 studies predatory land policy and forged industrialization in Henan province of interior China. Chapter 12 analyzes the extent of, and institutional factors responsible for, the loss of farmland in the Pearl River Delta. Section V (chapters 13-14) analyzes transformation issues at the level of the individual. Chapter 13 is an ethnographic study of women workers in Shekou industrial zone and chapter 14 examines the relationship between economic development and fertility in two counties in Guangdong.

The book is supported by high-quality maps, graphs and tables. It offers an informed, thorough and insightful examination of regional development in China. Editing a monograph is a challenging undertaking and Li and Tang should be congratulated for their successful efforts. I highly recommend this book to students and scholars of urban and regional development in China.