Keywords

3.1 Primitive Market Phase (1990–1996)

This section of the chapter provides a narrative about urban redevelopment in Guangzhou from 1990 to 1996. This phase started in 1990 when Mr. Ziliu Li became the acting Mayor of Guangzhou (this position holds the same authority and duty as the mayor but awaits legal approval from the People’s Congress of Guangzhou). This phase is named as the Primitive Market Phase because of two reasons. On the one hand, the governance mode in this phase was a semi-market mode. On the other hand, market entities were dominant in this phase in social interactions in redevelopment.

3.1.1 Overall Characteristics of Redevelopment in This Phase

Before 1990, there was a ‘six-uniformed’ system in the urban redevelopment process, in which the government administered standardised planning, compensation, design, construction, facility and management elements in redevelopment projects (Huang 2013). Under this ‘six-uniformed’ system there are two categories of redevelopment, the redeveloped declining residential areas for existing citizens, and the redeveloped commercial residential quarter selling to customers outside mainland China (Kong 2008). This system is a government-dominant mode of redevelopment, which has been abandoned by Mr. Li since 1990. He set up a new system which combined a land distribution process based on the personal decision of the leader, with the autonomy of developers in the whole redevelopment process.

From the 1980s, Guangzhou aimed to build up a ‘six-uniformed’ system, which included a uniformed plan and development. However, Mayor Li totally abandoned such a system after the start of his tenure as mayor. Whatever you wanted to do, you needed to speak to Mayor Li. If he agreed with you, you got permission for your project without any other administrative permission (such as urban planning permission). In this situation, most cases of redevelopment are chaotic [out control of governmental planning], except the Jinhua Street project and Dongfeng Street project, which are still in the authorised channels.

(Ye, senior officer, interview, 12/2013).

This phase is named the Primitive Market Phase because of its free market style governance mode and the influential roles of developers in redevelopment projects. This market was active in terms of the large scale of investment and huge numbers of projects. The formal redevelopment process had not been established. Governmental regulation was weak while developers held dominant roles in this phase. The infrastructure-driving redevelopment was the main approach for the local authority to propose redevelopment projects. Historical preservation was in danger in this phase as this held a low priority.

  1. (1)

    Redevelopment as a Hot Spot

In this stage, urban redevelopment had entered maybe the most active period in the history of redevelopment in Guangzhou. Yuan (scholar and planner, interview, 2014) insists that there was more than 2,000 real estate companies active in the early 1990s; 2,208 redevelopment projects had been approved between 1992 and 1998. Parts of the projects had not started until 2006 (Pan et al. 2006). Between 1992 and 1996, 175 km2 of land had been freely distributed to developers. Some developers did not possess the capacity to redevelop such plots of lands; they just wanted to sell the land. Therefore, a huge amount of land had not been used until 2012. During the same period, the Guangzhou government had announced 1,194 notices about removal and demolition.

  1. (2)

    Informal Process of Redevelopment

Redevelopment did not have a defined formal administrative process in this phase. There was no need to gain specific permission from the urban planning and land administrative sectors as all the developers needed to do was obtain the agreement of the local leader. This negotiation has more characteristics as a formal one.

Some developers obtained land through their personal relationships with city leaders or politicians at higher levels of government. In some of these projects land fees for land leasing were not paid until the real estate properties were sold after a few years. Developers could occupy new plots when they get agreement from the mayor without permission from other administrative departments or legal processes. Following the land transaction their permission for construction included just a red line of plot, without any limitation of plot ratio and height of buildings. Sometimes the ownership of land was still unclear when it was sold or distributed to developers. Some of the projects have not been built after several years.

He [Mr. Li] provided so many opportunities to developers who had strong connections with local authorities. These developers came to me with the personal permission of local or central leaders; they told us they were planning to develop Guangzhou. I asked them [some officers] whose permission these developers had got; they told me everyone [in high positions of China’s Communist regime].

(Yuan, scholar and planner, interview, 01/2014).

  1. (3)

    Waived Regulations

In this stage, urban planning was just a block plan to control redevelopment; however, a block plan is a relatively weak regulation. At the same time, Guangzhou had been listed as a ‘Famous Historical and Cultural City’ in 1982; this also had less impact to regulate redevelopment activities because such recognition did not bring about related legal or administrative methods to protect the historical and cultural heritage in old towns. As a result the scale, density and height of redevelopment were limited by few regulations. The developers had more freedom to maximise their interests.

From Liu’s (2006) perspective, local political leaders are eager to attract investment, especially from Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), into the field of urban redevelopment. To achieve this the whole planning system of regulations in the 1980s, such as laws, rules, standards and the requirements of other involved institutions, were abandoned (Ye 2014, p. 162). Because of waived regulations developers sought to increase the plot ratio in every case, but decrease social services at the same time (Wang 2010).

At that stage, there was not a strict control in historically and culturally sensitive areas. Some projects could not happen under contemporary regulations. At that phase there was just a useless block plan, which was very basic.

(Huang, urban planner, interview, 01/2014).

China has built up a list of ‘Famous Historical and Cultural City’ [to protect historical and cultural areas] since 1998 [in fact since 1982]. However, it just displayed some principles; other things were unclear, such as what should be protected? In which degree they should be preserved? There were no lawful requirements, nor required in planning. Therefore, even though Guangzhou was among the first few cities to have entered the first list of ‘Famous Historical and Cultural City’ there was no consensus in terms of historical and cultural preservation.

(Ye, senior officer, interview, 12/2013).

  1. (4)

    Dominant Role of Developers

Urban redevelopment was mainly supported by private capital. In 1994, 32.22 billion CNY had been invested in redeveloping Guangzhou, of which 15.04% came from Chinese banks; 43.03% was contributed directly by developers; and 30.4% was produced by pre-payment of sold properties from buyers (Wei 1997). From 1992 to 1996, 418,740 households were removed and demolished, of which only 7.792% of the families displaced lost their homes because of public projects. The remaining number of properties, 92.208%, were demolished to make way for private projects (Lin 2012).

In the interaction between government, developers and communities, the developers have occupied dominant roles. They controlled the choice of projects, when and how to redevelop the site, found resources to support projects and shared the majority of profits in the projects. For instance, in the Ximenkou Square redevelopment project, the developer had a primary contract with the local state in terms of distribution of profits; it announced that the developer could obtain 65% and the government receive 35%. However, the developer was unsatisfied and renegotiated with the government to change the conditions of the contract, otherwise they would not invest. The result was that the government made a concession and agreed that the developer could possess 89% of the profits (Wang 2009).

  1. (5)

    Spatial Strategy: Infrastructure-Driving Redevelopment

Based on the marketing-dominate strategy, redevelopment in Guangzhou employed an infrastructure-driving and small-scale spatial strategy; this started a new redevelopment project which was a new proposal for improving the conditions of a road or building underground. Because the local authority lacked funding during this stage, they had to sell some land beside this proposed road to potential developers. The lands designated for sale were divided into small plots before transactions. Developers expected increased land values in the sites sold due to the very possibly improved traffic conditions in the future. Huang (urban planner, interview, 2014) called it ‘a perfect match between developers and government, between free enterprise mode and road driving spatial strategy’.

  1. (6)

    High Density of Redevelopment and Threats to Historical Preservation

The Primitive Enterprise Phase brought prosperity in urban redevelopment; developers had more freedom, and thus more incentives to engage in redeveloping. To maximise their interests with the waived regulations of urban planning, a high density of redevelopment projects were popular in this phase. This is a threat to the traditional landscape in historical areas. It also brought about high pressure on public facilities such as water supply, waste treatment and traffic. Mayor Li has admitted that in this phase historical buildings, such as Daxiao Mazhan and traditional colleges had been destroyed (Zhang 2008). Mr. Shi, the former leader of the Urban Planning Bureau of Guangzhou, also thought historical conservation was problematic in the Line One Underground Project because developers were dominant in this redevelopment (Chen and Li 2007).

3.1.2 Typical Project: Liwan Square Redevelopment (1992–1995)

The Liwan Square Redevelopment Project was the most significant redevelopment project in the 1990s (Jiao 2010; Liu and Fang 2010). This project has been mentioned many times in Guangzhou from a negative perspective (Yuan and Xie 2010). Although there is less information about this case because it happened 20 years ago, it still has a strong impact both on the real landscape in the core of the old town, and in people’s minds who are interested in urban redevelopment.

After that there was an expansion of numbers of redevelopment in old towns, which included the typical case, Liwan Square.

(Ye, senior officer, interview, 12/2013).

Therefore, the Liwan Square project provided an impetus for the origin of strategic planning in Guangzhou at 2000.

(Y2, scholar and planner, interview, 01/2014).

The Liwan Square Redevelopment Project was located close to Shangxiajiu Pedestrian Street, a popular traditional shopping space in Guangzhou. This project has used 4.5 ha of land to build 140,000 m2 of market and more than 1,000 flats. This project was organised by Mr. Hua Huang, and his South International Group, an enterprise registered in Hong Kong. Liwan Square was located in a rundown traditional commercial area with a complex ownership situation.

In 1992, Mr. Huang attended the introduction of the Liwan Project organised by the Guangzhou government in Hong Kong; the tension between the excellent location and difficult ownership conditions was high (Zhang et al. 2010; Honour 2010). After negotiation, the South International Group and Guangzhou Land Resource and House Management Bureau (广州市国土房地产管理局) cooperated to establish the Suihua Real Estate Enterprise to redevelop this project. In this company 100 per cent of the investment came from the South International Group while the Bureau contributed the land for this project as an investment under the name of Ruihua.

After the project was completed, 165,000 m2 of flats and 30,000 m2 of shops belonged to the South International Group; 15,000 m2 of shops and 30,000 m2 of parking space were distributed to Ruihua (to the Bureau actually) (Liu 2008b).

An underground stop close to Liwan Square was also an important driving force for the redevelopment. According to the developer’s statement they took less than two years to demolish more than 2,000 households, 30,000 shops and 5 factories, and remove more than 8,000 relevant to this redevelopment. The developers have provided incentives for both the owners of demolished properties and the company undertaking the demolition work to cooperate with the developers. The demolition cost around 800 million Hong Kong dollars and 1.2 million was spent in construction and marketing. In 1996 the project was completed (Law of China Net 1993).

After handing the new built properties over to new owners a large number of legal arguments took place. Hundreds of buyers from Hong Kong were unsatisfied with this project in terms of two main issues. Firstly, the buyers received their properties three months later than the date in their contract with developers; secondly, the developers had changed the design of properties which had reduced the value of the properties (Liu 2008a).

Between 1996 and 2001 the buyers took legal action about the two issues, prosecuting the South International Group more than 500 times in different courts (Law of China Net 2001). For instance, on 5 February 1999 in the High Court of Guangdong Province, the prosecution counsel claimed that the developers have cheated buyers in their advertisement of the project, providing properties with a lower specification than previously advertised. However, the lawyers of the developers answered that the advertisement was in Hong Kong newspapers which were outside the duty of the High Court of Guangdong Province. In addition, the developers’ lawyers argued they have official permission to delay this project for three months.

In response, the prosecution lawyers insisted that permission was only reached between the developers and government, not between developers and buyers. After arguments, both sides agreed to make a compromise with each other (Law of China Net 1999). Such lawsuits have continued until Mr Hua Huang was bankrupted in 2001 (Wu 2009). The buyers involved in the disputes suspected that the Guangzhou Land Resource and House Management Bureau had supported Mr. Hua Huang; therefore, they could not win the prosecutions (Liu 2008a, b) (Figs. 3.2 and 3.3).

Fig. 3.1
A map of Guangzhou district highlights the Liwan square. The other areas that are marked in the map are Guangzhou International airport, Guangzhou train station, smart city, old city center, new city center C B D pearl river new town, Guangzhou University town, and high-speed train station.

Source author’s drawing based on http://map.baidu.com/, 2016

Location of Liwan square redevelopment project.

Full size image
Fig. 3.2
Two structural diagrams depict the master plan of Liwan square labeled as a 1 and a 2.

Source Chen 2014

Master plan of Liwan Square (A1 is before redevelopment; A2 is after redevelopment).

Full size image
Fig. 3.3
A photo of Liwan square has a tall building and people who walk on the road.

Source author 2015

View of Liwan Square.

Full size image

Economically, the Liwan Square redevelopment might be a successful project. However, it is famous for its negative influence on historical preservation in the city centre. Many scholars and planners criticised its consequences, such as removing the original communities, destroying the traditional urban context and interrupting the local landscape (Zhu 2003; Peng 2007). This failure in historical conservation was related to the weak urban planning regulations which were in operation during this phase.

Mayor Lin [the mayor following Mayor Li] recognised that in urban redevelopment, projects such as Liwan Square cannot happen again….So ….

(Yuan, scholar and planner, interview, 01/2014).

If you allow capital investors to do whatever they want, Liwan Square will appear everywhere.

(Wang, scholar and planner, interview, 12/2013).

3.1.3 Summary of the Primitive Market Phase

This phase is described as the Primitive Market Mode, which was close to the market mode of governance in terms of several ways:

There were thousands of small developers with thousands of small projects supported by private capital in the field of redevelopment; it was a typical landscape of a primitive capitalist market with less monopoly; redevelopment activities were less regulated; enterprises had more autonomy to make their own decision; interactions between government and developers were more dependent on relative advantages rather than hierarchical orders; the contract is the main method to distribute interests between entities from the state, market and communities; negotiation is the main mechanism to solve problems, in some cases, legal methods were also employed. These characteristics could match features of the market mode as an ideal mode of governance. In some special cases, the government had invested in these projects; the market had less dominance but still occupied an important position.

3.2 Pure Government Phase (1998–2006)

This is the second phase of urban redevelopment analysed in this study. It was famous for the clear announcement from Mayor Shusen Lin: all private developers were forbidden to enter the field of urban redevelopment in Guangzhou after 1998 (Huang 2013). This obvious anti-market policy was applied for several years to totally change the landscape of redevelopment.

3.2.1 Overall Characteristics of Redevelopment in This Phase

In this phase, urban redevelopment projects were established according to political agendas, such as political performance and legitimacy requirements. Public funding was the main resource to support redevelopment activities. Profits were not the priority in individual projects; public interests were considered much more than in the previous phase. During these years land management was reorganised as Mayor Lin had recognised the disadvantages of the Primitive Market Phase, such as disputes over compensation, delayed projects and redevelopment that threatened the landscape of the city centre (Deng 2005).

The governance style in this phase was mainly displayed by Mayor Lin’s attitude to developers. He never attended any dinner organised by developers and never appeared in any developers’ projects. He always thought that developers aimed to maximise their economic interests rather than develop an excellent metropolis. Mayor Lin did not approve any negotiated land-leasing project which was a cheap approach to win land and had been operated in a large number of projects in Mayor Li’s period (Xiang 2006). Mayor Lin is reported to have made jokes with developers in the Fourth session of the Twelfth National People's Congress in Guangzhou in 2006. He mentioned that it was lucky for him that developers had earned a huge amount of money in the last ten years, otherwise, developers would hate him too much because he had forbidden them from obtaining land from negotiation and from redeveloping old towns in the city centre (Yu et al. 2006).

3.2.2 Typical Project: Three Changes of Guangzhou

The ‘Three Changes’ Redevelopment aimed to comprehensively transform the image of the whole of Guangzhou in three stages. The first proposed redevelopment was a small change over one year to demolish illegal buildings. The second aimed at medium-term changes over three years to improve traffic conditions (traffic infrastructure), public squares and appearances of buildings along main roads. The third and most ambitious proposals aimed at long-term changes until 2010 by which Guangzhou should have been transformed into a modern metropolis (Lin 2013).

On 31 July 1998, the leaders of Guangdong Province had organised a conference about urban construction in Guangzhou. In this meeting, Mr. Changchun Li, secretary of the Guangdong Provincial Communist Party Committee as the highest political leader in Guangdong Province, had proposed the ‘Three Changes’ Redevelopment of Guangzhou. On 29 and 30 October 1998 in response to the proposals from the higher political level, Mayor Shusen Lin had signed agreements between the municipal government and district government and other departments; within these agreements the targets and responsibilities in the small-change redevelopments had been defined (Wang et al. 2000).

The three-year medium-term changes (1998–2001) were the focus of the ‘Three Changes’ Redevelopment because 2001 was the year to host the 9th National Games, and it was important for Guangzhou to present achievements of redevelopment. In addition, 2010 was outside Mayor Lin’s term of office; the policy about the ‘Three Changes’ Redevelopment might be changed.

Efforts to improve the urban image under the three-year medium-term changes focused on 109 projects. These 109 projects had originated in 1997 when Mayor Lin had required the General Director of Guangzhou Urban Planning Bureau, Mr. Feng Dai, to design projects to improve the urban image. It was decided that this project should spend relatively less funding to impress citizens in terms of changing the image of Guangzhou. In March 1998, 109 individual projects that aimed to upgrade urban appearances had been identified by the Urban Planning Bureau to Mayor Lin (2013).

The redecoration of Beijing Pedestrian Road, in one of the first group of 109 individual projects, was constructed between May and September 1999 under the supervision of the Yuexiu District Government. This project took only 123 days to finish because it aimed to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China on 1 October 1999.

To accelerate such a fast-track construction, the Management Office of Beijing Pedestrian Road, led by district leaders, cooperated with various departments and construction companies. Shangxiajiu Pedestrian Road was another important project in the image improvement projects. These two projects cost 66 million CNY of public funding. Before the 9th National Games hosted in 2001, 2.16 billion CNY governmental money had been spent in redecorating more than 6,000 buildings among main roads (Liu 2016).

Garden Square was one special case in improvement projects in the three-year medium-term changes. Proposals for the square had been made in 1998 to create a public space in Huanshidong Road with a budget of 300 million CNY from the Municipal Construction Committee. In 1999, a design competition for the square had produced several plans to build it. One of the proposals planned to construct the square between July 1999 and August 2000 with a budget of 388 million.

This design was attractive to the Guangzhou government; however, Mayor Lin and other leaders no longer supported the project. This was due to several reasons. Firstly, the budget set aside for the square was a large investment for Guangzhou which should be spent on more urgent projects, such as redeveloping roads. Secondly, the construction might adversely affect traffic and the everyday life of people around the square. Thirdly, it was proposed that in the future an underground station would be constructed under the square. It was therefore felt it would be risky to build a large-scale project before the design of the very probable station (Lin 2013). This is typical hierarchical decision-making in terms of rational calculation and risk avoidance.

From September 1998 to September 2001 the Guangzhou government spent 60.5 billion Chinese Yuan in the ‘Three Changes’ project (Ye 2014). By September 1999, 3,280,000 m2 of illegal buildings had been demolished; green space had increased to 3.83 million square metres; 53.5 kms of roads had been redeveloped.

In 2003, most of the targets of three-year medium-term changes had been achieved. The building environment in some important areas, such as the two sides of main roads, had been improved. However, the communities inside and rundown areas remained unchanged; the core problems of old towns have not been overcame (Huang 2013). Mayor Lin (2013) was proud of the ‘Three Changes’ Redevelopment. In his book he indicates that on 18 October 2001 the Prime Minister, Mr. Rongji Zhu, had mentioned that Guangzhou was something between rural and urban space, while dirty, chaotic and poor several years ago the situation had been completely changed after the ‘Three Changes’ Redevelopment. Now the Pearl River in Guangzhou for him was in some sense as beautiful as the Seine in Paris (Lin 2013; p. 40).

3.2.3 Summary of the Pure Government Phase

This phase is described as the Pure Government Phase because the government had held the dominant role in urban redevelopment except for a few cases involving SOEs and redevelopment. Governance in this phase has several aspects that are similar to a hierarchical mode. Governmental actors are the main rulers in terms of managing projects; these actors are controlled by government rules and norms.

This means that minimising risks and fear of punishment are important incentives for these public actors, such as what has happened in the Garden Square Project. They prefer to make plans and design mechanisms to operate projects in a top-down process of decision-making and implementation. Expert rational consideration is important in the actors. In the planning and design activities, anticipation of obstacles and organising coordination are crucial elements. In the organisation of projects, a high-level governmental committee often plays a central position in the highest authorities and with the largest number of resources. Leaders provide commands to control subordinate actors in unilateral interaction in some cases.

However, this phase still had some characteristics similar to a market mode, such as negotiation between various actors from government, market and society was still important. Besides, actors mainly considered how to maximise their interests even when the state had already defined rules of redevelopment; competitive advantages were important in making strategies.

The government held the dominant role in the interaction between entities from the state, market and communities for a few reasons: redevelopment projects are mainly chosen by the government from political considerations; the majority of funding in redevelopment were from public resources; speed and scale of redevelopment were controlled by the government; redevelopment projects aimed to produce public goods for some specific groups, which led to less contradictions and conflicts.

3.3 Multiple Players Phase (2006–2015)

3.3.1 Overall Characteristics of Redevelopment in This Phase

In this phase, Mayor Zhang has announced that developers are welcome to enter the field of urban redevelopment in 2007 (Ye 2014). The ‘Three Old Redevelopment’ (TOR) policy was established in this phase which fundamentally changed the landscape of urban redevelopment through engaging more capital. Developers were once again active and contributed to the field of urban redevelopment in terms of their capital, management skills and experiences of development.

In this phase, the number of urban redevelopment projects increased; developers returned and contributed to redeveloping various urban spaces. Communities, supported by other social actors, such as mass media, NGOs and scholars, played a more important role in redevelopment. Historical preservation now had a higher priority in the governance of urban redevelopment. In 2010, the Office of the Committee to Protect the Historic City in the Guangzhou Government (历史文化名城保护委员会办公室) was established (Liu 2016). The Rules of Protecting Historical Buildings and Historical Areas in Guangzhou (广州市历史建筑和历史风貌区保护办法) and the Rules of Protecting Guangzhou as a Historic City (广州市历史文化名城保护条例) were approved in 2014 and 2015 (South Daily 2014; The Standing Committees of People’s Congress in Guangzhou 2015).

The TOR policy, established in Guangzhou, Dongguan and Foshan in 2009, is the first systematic policy in municipal level to support urban redevelopment. The core of the policy is the permission to lease state-owned land through negotiation, rather than open auctions. Open auctions often lead to much higher price when negotiation has been forbidden in commercial usage land-leasing by the central government after 2004. It’s a policy exception to apply negotiation in Guangzhou Province to encourage more capital to redevelop urban land.

Another crucial elements in TOR policy is the ‘interests sharing mechanism’ between various stakeholders, especially involving communities (Li and Liu 2018). In redevelopment of urban villages, old neighborhood and old factories, the local government set the table for developers to invest through land-leasing negotiation; community members have engaged in decision-making to share increased land income; but the renters of properties in these redeveloped sites have been excluded. The TOR policy has formulated a broader engagement between multiple players in redeveloping urban space. Particularly, in redevelopment of urban villages, communities have become the leading role within their interaction with developers and government.

The TOR policy is a ongoing process within several distinct phases; changes between these phases are dramatic (Li et al. 2022). Therefore, it is still too early analyse this continuing policy as a whole until 2022.

3.3.2 Typical Project: Enning Road Redevelopment (2006–2015)

The Enning Road redevelopment project is not a TOR project; however, it is the typical case in the third phase because it indicated the rising of community power and the formulation of multiple players in a jointed mode of governance. This project was located in the centre of an historical area in the Liwan District. On the project site buildings in the Xiguan style (the style from the west part of the historical city of Guangzhou) were everywhere. It is also the place of former homes for several famous Chinese people, such as Bruce Lee and several Guangdong Opera stars (Tan 2013). Besides these historical buildings the majority of housing in this area were private housing constructed before 1949. It is a typical old town in the city centre.

In 2006, in response to the mobilisation from the municipal governmental to improve the building environment in central Guangzhou under the spatial strategy ‘adjusting the centre’, Liwan District Government started the Enning Road Project (Zhou, urban planner, interview, 2013). The Enning Street redevelopment project is famous for its historical significance for Guangzhou, and its changeable process of planning and public discussion. The roles of mass media and semi-NGOs, as new elements in the field of urban redevelopment, are both crucial in such changes (Fig. 3.4).

Fig. 3.4
A map of Guangzhou district highlights the Enning road. The other areas that are marked in the map are Guangzhou International airport, Guangzhou train station, smart city, old city center, new city center C B D pearl river new town, Guangzhou University town, and high-speed train station.

Source author’s drawing based on http://map.baidu.com/ 2016

Enning road redevelopment.

Full size image

The Enning Road project comprised 11.37 ha of land, 1,352 buildings and more than 1,900 households. Of these buildings, 297 were in public ownership, 831 were private ones, and the ownership of 224 was unclear (Wang et al. 2011). Redevelopment in Enning Road has taken place in different stages. In the first stage there were two plans in 2006 and 2007 by the district government to demolish buildings in Enning Street and store the land so cleared in its land storage. These lands could be leased to developers for fiscal income (Tan 2013; Lin, resident of Enning Road, interview, 2014).

In May 2007, the Bureau of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation of Guangzhou and Liwan District Government had organised the 2007 New Spring Business Conference of Guangzhou (2007 广州荔湾新春招商会) in Hong Kong. The Enning Road redevelopment project was introduced in this conference and Ruian Real Estate Ltd had expressed their interest in the project (Chen and Peng 2007).

In July 2007, the Detailed Development Control Plan (DDCP) of Duobao Road was displayed on the official website of the Bureau of Urban Planning of Guangzhou for its public participation procedure before its approval. The plan had been criticised because it would destroy the historical landscape not only by demolishing historical buildings, but also through its new planned roads with 18–26 m width to separate the whole historical area which included Enning Road.

In September 2007 an announcement about demolition was posted in Enning Street and was also met with criticism. The announcement was posted earlier than the approval of the planning document for this area and it had less consideration about historical preservation.

Under the plan in this stage, 1,950 householders would be displaced by the demolition process. The majority of the householders signed the agreement with the government agreeing to the terms of compensation, but 183 householders were unsatisfied. They wrote a public letter to the district government to protest about the planning document because there was more consideration of commercial than public interests (Tan 2013). Their motivations were questioned as it was suspected that they aimed to increase the price of compensation through the excuse of historical preservation and public interests (H2, official, interview, 2014; Y2, scholar and planner, interview, 2014).

Due to such criticism from communities and mass media, the principles of planning were modified from a focus on fiscal income to an emphasis on historical preservation in the second stage of the project. During this period, a semi-NGO (non-governmental organisation), Eninglu Concern group investigated and supported historical and cultural activities in Enning Street.

This group included university students, journalists and independent artists; they connected with external resources, such as mass media and lawyers, to help community members who insisted on staying in the partly destroyed area of Enning Street. Mass media needed news from the Enning Road Redevelopment Project to attract people’s attention while the project satisfied the desire of expression to protest against the government. These householders tried to understand the purpose of mass media and used them to announce their requirements.

In 2012, Mr. Ziliu Li, the former mayor of Guangzhou, put forward a suggestion to build a museum of traditional drama of Guangzhou. His idea was supported by the new mayor, Mr. Jianhua Chen; therefore, this redevelopment project in Enning Street seemed to become a cultural project. The government cannot obtain an income from it; but needed to spend millions of pounds on the costs of building it (Doris, semi-NGO member, interview, 2013; Xing, journalist, interview, 2013).

Mr. Zhang as a community member knows many journalists with their mobile numbers; he really can remember these numbers. At the very beginning, he called me every time in terms of small issue such as in which family the electricity has been stopped, or the water supply has been paused. Later on, they have realised the strategy of mass media that media would not report some small issues; therefore, these residents would find some good reasons for the issues they want to be reported, not just small issues.

(Xing, Journalist, interview, 12/2013).

Enning Road is significant for its involvement with social groups, such as semi-NGOs, mass media, lawyers and scholars, even those from overseas. These groups had increased the capacity of community to negotiate with the local state when developers were not participating in the main process. The local state and its sectors had to change their policy about planning, demolition and re-establishment because of pressure from residents and social forces. At the same time, a few community members made too many demands because of social support from outside.

The function of Eninglu Concern Group in the early stage is a recorder; we record something in Enning and spread them by mass media. In the later stage, we have our own position; we often express our viewpoint to the government and mass media. Recently, because the demolishment process has been accelerated, in order to deal with these demolishment, we organise some special activities, such as setting poster in the site of demolishment with live telecast in Weibo (a Chinese social media, like Twitter). It works; the demolishing activities in this site pause.

We invited some friends with lawyers background to help residents in Enning.

(Doris, semi-NGO member, interview, 12/2013).

The mass media, in particular, the New Express (xinkuaibao) has played a crucial role to support communities in Enning. From the beginning, the editor of the New Express has suggested residents to write the letter to national congress to protest local government who had broken the Property Law. Besides, loads of reports have been published in newspaper, TV programs and other media to criticise the government, support community members and appeal for historical preservation.

After all the resistances against the state-led demolision and redevelopment, Liwan District has changed the plan; a new one emphasising historical protection has been approved in 2012. On the day of approval, all main newspaper in Guangzhou has put this news in their first pages. It indicated communities, with supports from media, NGOs and scholars, have become a crucial force in urban redevelopment in Guangzhou.

The new plan with more historical considerations met difficulties to attract investment due to its strict regulation and low density. After 2 years pause, the former mayor Li Ziliu has suggested to build the museum of Canton Opera in the site. Such a museum is in the process of construction after the former mayor suggested it should be built as part of the project. The redeveloped area became a chaotic place after demolition; the physical condition of the environment is horrible for the residents who insisted on remaining there. The site is still waiting for redevelopment. The Eninglu Concern Group has been disbanded because they found there was nothing to do after 2012. Community members and mass media have stayed in the site to continue their influences over redevelopment in the future.

3.3.3 Summary of the Multiple Player Phase

This phase is described as the Multiple Player Phase because the local state, the market players and communities had all played important roles with various resources and strategies. Governance in this phase has some characteristic which were similar to the network style governance. In this governing process, the relative power of entities from communities had increased their influences. It was a more balanced power structure between the state, market and communities than exhibited in the previous two phases.

The Multiple Players Phase (2006–2015) has many characteristics consistent with a network mode of cooperation. First at all, various actors from the state, market and communities coordinate their activities in terms of exchanging resources. The government is one of the players in such resource-exchange networks. Various actors have built reciprocal connections which are based on exchange but have surpassed the meaning of exchange. Trust is important in such connections and actors learn to adapt to one another’s strategies and uncertain environments. Actors use persuasion to negotiate with rebellious actors in such networks, or disruptive actors are expelled if negotiation does not work. These networks have informal rules and a soft structure. Their structures can be changed, for instance, participants in the networks may change for better results and acceptance.

Therefore, the degree of flexibility in networks is medium; it is higher than in the hierarchical mode and lower than in the market mode. In these structures, actors enter into transactions with one another in multilateral ways. In these ways, actors are interdependent under the coaching and support of higher levels.

3.4 Guangzhou Style of State-Market-Community Relations

Entities from the state, market and communities have been in different relations in the three phases. These relations are reflected by social interaction between entities from the state, market and communities. These relations have formulated the Guangzhou style of state-market-communities relations. This Guangzhou style is also closely connected to the Chinese authoritarian regime.

In the Primitive Market Phase (1990–1998), the market holds the dominant role in urban redevelopment. The local state has more or less organised an informal coalition with private investors to pursue economic growth in redeveloping central Guangzhou.

In the Pure Government Phase (1998–2006), the local state is the sole player in redevelopment. Other actors from the market and communities may join these projects in different ways. However, their attendance cannot change the nature of this phase in which the Guangzhou government is the only player making major decisions and supervising other actors to achieve governmental targets. There is no coalition in this phase; market players and community members are assistants of the local state in social coordination.

In the Multiple Players Phase (2006–2015), market players have come back and entities from communities have risen up to the level of governance in urban redevelopment. These two categories of players do not just participate in the redevelopment; they also have shared power in decision-making, crucial resources and possible returns from the redevelopment. Therefore, coalitions between entities from the state, market and communities have been established to support urban redevelopment. The third phase has more characteristics as a phase in which strong coalitions operate.