Stapleton, Kristin, “Foreigners and China's Modern Cities” (1998)

Title : “Foreigners and China's Modern Cities”

Author(s) : Stapleton, Kristin

Year : 1998

Type : Journal article

Subject : History

Keywords : foreigners;political

Journal : Journal of Urban History

Volume : 24

Number : 6

Start page : 768

End page : 774

Language:Name : English

Support : Print

Abstract : Reviews Tsuen Wan: Growth of a "New Town" and its People (1994), by James Hayes; the Making of a Chinese City: History and Historiography in Harbin (1995), by Soren Clausen and Stig Thogersen; and Shanghai, 1927-1937: Municipal Power, Locality, and Modernization (1993), by Christian Henriot. Although all three books trace the development of major Chinese industrial cities, they do so in different ways. Hayes provides a partial memoir and focuses on the 1970's and 1980's. Clausen and Thogersen examine Chinese historiography in describing the growth of Harbin. Henriot explores the municipal bureaucracy in Shanghai in the early Nationalist era. All three books have merit, but more studies are needed on the causes of urban growth and the role of the Chinese themselves in shaping urban development.