赶 is often translated as “to overtake”, but can also mean “to drive away”. It first appeared in Chinese political discourse in 1957 when Mao Zedong responded to Nikita Khrushchev’s statement that “the Soviet Union would overtake the United States in 15 years” by saying that “In 15 years the PRC would overtake England”.  In 1958, Liu Shaoqi supported the Great Leap Forward with the idea of “Surpassing England and overtaking the United States (超英赶美)”. Indeed, in Shenzhen’s previous incarnation as Baoan County, there once were two communes named Surpass England and an Overtake America, respectively.

In many of the online interpretations of 赶英超美 (here and here, for example) Reform and Opening (改革开放) is offered as the correct policy for achieving surpassing and overtaking. This scenario is one way of understanding both the importance of Shenzhen (first and largest experiement in reforming and opening the planned economy) and why it is often experienced as “not Chinese”. Indeed, residents have often asked me how similar the United States and Shenzhen are.

赶 reappears in Shenzhen popular discourse in the late 80s and early 90s in the expression “plans can’t keep up with change (计划赶不上变化)”, which comments sarcastically on the governments inability to implement its urban plans. In Shenzhen, for example, the overall plans have been done in 15 year bursts. This has meant that what is planned isn’t built for years. More often than not, village developers and others have taken advantage of this situation to errect their own buildings. Thus, in the 90s, I frequently heard the expression “计划赶不上变化” to explain this situation.

During the 80s and 90s, de facto independence from government plans in Shenzhen resulted in a kind of pioneering exuberence that was often called “the Shenzhen spirit (深圳精神)”, but also found expression in slogans such as “little government, big society (小政府，大社会)” that moved with Shenzhen mayor Liang Xiang to Hainan in 1986 and which continues to inspire debates about changing the relationship between the government and the people (here, here, and here).

However, in conjunction with urban village renovation [administratively located in “Urban village (old village) renovation offices (城中村（旧村）改造办公室)]，the government has  recently begun razing buildings that were erected on these unused sites, justifying their actions (with or without compensation depending on various) with respect to the plan. This means that Shenzhen may have entered a period of that could be called “plans overtake change (计划赶超变化)”, whereby neighborhoods of several years are being razed to make way for roads and other public infrastructure (the subway) that have been planned for years.

I am interested in how “plans overtake change” because it describes several of the important contradictions that over time have taken root and flourished in Shenzhen.

1. The period of “plans can’t keep up with change” was the time frame in which Shenzhen’s urban villages became viable economic institutions. It was also the time when daring entrepreneurs created strong economic lives in parallel with the government. However, the period of “plans overtake change” seems to be characterized by the re-entrenchment of government power.  Thus, there are major players in Shenzhen that have historically different relationships to the city’s construction, administrative infrastructure, and economic policies.

2. The period of “plans can’t keep up with change” was a time when political legitimacy was defined in terms of efficacy (实干) and speed (深圳速度). In contrast, the new era of “plans overtake change” seems to be defined through planning (规划) and regulation (管理), which in turn, has made corruption more obvious. Thus, Shenzhen residents often speak of three kinds of officials: those who take a reasonable amount of money and do what they promise (好官); those who take too much money, but still deliver on promises (坏官); and those who just take money (贪官). Among Old Shenzheners, there is often a nostalgia for 1980s leaders like Yuan Geng, who is remembered as not taking money and working alongside everyone else. Relative poverty is the proof of that generation’s honesty.

3. The period of “plans can’t keep up with change” was the era in which Shenzhen’s prototypical architecture and neighborhoods were built. Part of Shenzhen’s recent push to write a standard history for the city has included the tricky question of how to represent places like Nine Streets, Dongmen, and the urban villages which flourished because of a lack of government regulation. Indeed, in these sites, Chinese history is represented through popular appropriations of local, regional, dynastic, and colonial histories for diverse and not necessarily condoned purposes. Thus, the period of “plans overtake change” is also a fight over not only what Shenzhen’s history is, but also how this history should be built into and represented in the city.

4. The period of “plans can’t keep up with change” was the era of massive migration to Shenzhen. The period of “plans overtake change” seems to be the era of bringing all these people into some kind of post- or modified hukou regulatory system. Thus, constant debates over who has rights to the city and ongoing negotiation of Shenzhen’s internal (二线) and external (with Hong Kong) borders.

5. The period of “plans can’t keep up with change” was the era of industrial manufacturing. The period of “plans overtake change” is the era of cultural industries. Over the past decade, Shenzhen has been increasingly investing in cultural production, ranging from Dafen Oil Painting Village and the Guanlan Block Print Village to the annual Shenzhen Creative Industries Fair, the Architectural Bienniale (with Hong Kong), the establishment of OCT Loft as a center of  art, and the general promotion of design, digital innovation, and even the performance art (yeah! Fat Bird benefits!)

Once upon a time, I had just arrived in Shenzhen, and Old Shenzheners, who had lived and worked in the SEZ for at least a decade enthused about the possibility that had been realized here. Critical theorists at Shenzhen University spoke about how productive Shenzhen’s borders were: at the edges between village and urban development, agriculture and industry, squatters and established communities, Cantonese and Mandarin, land and sea – all sorts of possibilities errupted. Today, those possibilities are being standardized and codified, which is redefining what Shenzhen may or may not mean for future residents.

Importantly, standardization of the possibilities that Shenzhen once was  is solidifying the differences produced as class difference. It is more difficult to realize the transformation of oneself by passing through these borders (from village to city, or Cantonese to Mandarin, for example) than it used to be. There are now noticibly more beggars and poorer squatters in Shenzhen, which leads to a final thought.

6. The era of “plans can’t keep up with change” was an era, which celebrated equal opportunity for all migrants and residents. Ideologically speaking, early Shenzhen was a place that did not “exclude (排外)”. Instead, it was a place where most anyone with ambition and ability could transform themselves. Importantly, most early migrants are now established and well-off Shenzheners. In this sense, there was a convergence of ideology and everyday experience.

However, the “plans overtake change” era values social stability and class harmony. Ideologically speaking, Shenzhen is now a place that ranks ambition and ability (排名). Indeed, Shenzhen puts out more “top ten” lists than I want to count. Shenzhen now strikes me as a place all too much like the United States, where years of possibility obscured the emergence of an entrenched class structure. Importantly, one of the effects of previous history is that the ideology of equal possibility lingers despite obvious inequality. Moreover, those who benefited from earlier opportunities are now shoring up their gains through standardization and regulation, even as they use their personal experience to testify to the ongoing validity of the Shenzhen dream.