12th EastAsiaNet Research Workshop

Sean Golden, a member of the Inter-Asia research group, gave a talk at the 12th EastAsiaNet Research Workshop organised by the Institut d'Asie Orientale - Sciences-Po Lyon and the Institut d'Etudes Transtextuelles et Transculturelles - Université Jean-Moulin Lyon 3, on 17-18 October 2013, dedicated to: 

Future Cities and Space Reconfiguration in East Asia: Practices and Representations, Risk and Opportunities 

on the topic of:

Urban policies and governance of the risks of urban environmental calamities and urban development: a discourse analysis of official and non-official communication

Abstract

This paper will present a case study of three sources of discourse for the communication of urban ecological risk in the PRC and its subsequent management. The three sources are: the discourse of informal, nongovernmental or emergent civil society communication of ecological risk (social movements, protest movements, critical analysis of risk and governmental policy); the discourse of formal or academic, nongovernmental communication of ecological risk (academics, advisers, opinion-makers); the official, governmental communication of ecological risk (official think tanks, ministry documents). New political terminology is emerging, whose analysis can reveal contemporary tensions in social, economic and political policy-making. One the one hand, terms such as “social construction” 社会建设  shèhuì jiànshè, “social system reform” 社会體制改革 shèhuì tízhì gǎigé“ or social self-governance” 社會自治 [社会自治] shèhuī zìzhì might imply a growing role for Chinese "civil society" 民间社会 mínjiān shèhuì. On the other hand, terms and statements such as  “social management” 社会管理  shèhuì guǎnlǐ, "stability preservation" 维护稳定 wéihù wěndìng/维稳 wéiwěn or “‘civil society’ is a ‘Western pitfall’” “公民社会”是西方陷阱 gōngmín shèhuì shì xīfāng xiànjǐng seem to imply serious opposition to social or political reform. In 2010, 习近平 Xi Jinping told Party members in a speech at the Central Party School that “power is given by the people, and power is used for the people.” In 2011, 周本順  Zhōu Běnshùn, secretary of the Party’s Central Politics and Law Commission, attacked the idea of social organizations working independently of the government, saying China had to avoid the “pitfall of ‘civil society’ designed for us by certain Western nations.” Now the debate is centering around what the "Chinese Dream" 中國夢 Zhōngguó mèng might be. Three cases of urban planning and governance --Chongqing 重慶, Guangzhou  广州 and Wukan 烏坎-- provide three contrasting visions of urban policies and governance of the risks of urban environmental calamities and urban development.