Shenzhen: On and Beyond China’s Fastest Growing City
On Friday, February 15th, the Graduate Program in International Affairs in conjunction with Parsons Department of Architecture, Interior Design and Lighting and the India China Institute, hosted Vexed Urbanism: A Symposium on Design and Social Practice. The symposium was designed as an open conversation; one in which social scientists and architects discussed the shifting contours of dynamic urbanization in modern China. Panelists included David Harvey, Grahame Shane, Keller Easterling, Mary Ann McDonnell, Brian McGrath, Vyjayanthi Rao, Adriana Abdenur, Jonathan Bach, Stephen Fong and Ernie Wang. Emphasis was placed on urbanization, city planning and the role of the built space in two major Chinese cities: Beijing and Shenzhen. The purpose of the event was to bring together two seemingly divergent fields of inquiry together, in the hope of making sense of the “vexed urbanism” on display in modern China. After each architect presented a short synopsis of their current work on urbanization in China, David Harvey, one of the most distinguished geographers of the 20th century, presented his analysis of the state of urbanization in China. His first observation was if anyone in the room was disturbed by the visual displays of massive urban projects in Shenzhen and Beijing. Harvey portrayed modern China as an environmental disaster; warning that a chaotic factory system and rapid class formation has led to unstable social conditions. According to Harvey, China represents a global urbanization project. As late capitalism, on display in China and Dubai, dictates the drive towards “crazy” urbanization, cities become the geographical and social concentrations of surplus capital. Harvey warned that the form of urbanization on display in cities like Shenzhen is often criminal in relationship to the society that inhabits the city. He gave a final warning not to succumb to the images of urban development coming out of China, epitomized by the newly affluent strata in the middle shopping in modern, glass covered shopping malls. This process, according to Harvey, is terrifying and violent for so many people. When one puts violence back into the urbanization equation, not only the images but also the built environment hides the inequalities present in the urbanization of modern China. Harvey’s analysis served as the catalyst to a lively discussion, one that left the attendees without resolution to what can only be characterized as vexed urbanism.