China Urbanizing: Book Talk and Panel Discussion

On February 9, 2023, the Penn Institute for Urban Research hosted a panel discussion on China Urbanizing: Impacts and Transitions, edited by Weiping Wu and Qin Gao, recently published in collaboration with PennPress as part of Penn IUR’s ongoing series The City in the Twenty-First Century.

China turned majority urban only in the recent decade, a dramatic leap given that less than 20 percent of its population lived in cities before 1980. Together, the book and the panel situated China’s urbanization in the interconnected forces of historical legacies, contemporary state interventions, and human and ecological conditions. The panel explored the complexity of the phenomenon of urbanization in its historical and regional variations, and explored its impact on the country’s socioeconomic welfare, environment and resources, urban form and lifestyle, and population and health.

In addition to the two editors of the collection, Weiping Wu and Qin Gao, the speakers included Alan Smart, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary; Cindy Fan, Vice Provost for International Studies and Global Engagement, UCLA; Piper Gaubatz, Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning, UMASS Amherst; and Scott Moore, Director of China Programs and Strategic Initiatives, PennGlobal, University of Pennsylvania.

For more information on and to order the book, go here.