XIAO Chaowei: Promoting Coordinated Regional Development to Achieve a Chinese Path to Urban Cluster Modernization

The report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China emphasized “promoting coordinated regional development and deeply implementing the strategies for coordinated regional development and major regional strategies”, as well as “optimizing the layout of major productive forces and building a regional economic structure and a territorial space system that is complementary in strengths and promotes high-quality development”.

How, then, can coordinated regional development be achieved and modernization be realized through a uniquely Chinese path? This requires transitioning from the general framework of overall planning into the concrete projects of high-quality development. By focusing on key regions and leveraging their leading role, we can drive modernization across the country as a whole.

Specifically, China’s key strategies for coordinated regional development include the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and the integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta. These mainly correspond to China’s three major urban clusters: Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the Yangtze River Delta, and the Pearl River Delta.

Compared with other countries around the world, China’s development shows a clear pattern of regional stratification and gradients. Traditionally, industrial chains, such as manufacturing, needed to be transferred and upgraded across countries, for example, moving from Europe and the U.S. to Japan and South Korea, then to China and even Southeast Asia. However, within China, such transfers and upgrades can now be completed domestically across regions.

Therefore, urban clusters, as hubs of capital, centers of innovation and talent, transportation nodes, and cultural centers, are set to become the stabilizing force for China's future economic growth.

(The above views are excerpted and translated from an article by Associate Professor XIAO Chaowei of the National Academy of Development and Strategy at Renmin University of China, published on zhonghongwang.com, titled “Promoting Coordinated Regional Development to Achieve a Chinese Path to Urban Cluster Modernization”.)

Original article link: https://www.zhonghongwang.com/show-257-255378-1.html

Translator: ZHANG Yuqing

Editor: ZHANG Jingjing