Tag Archives: shenzhen identity

Utopian Shenzhen, 1978-1982

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Below I summarize thoughts about the importance of Shenzhen in shaping China’s post Mao utopianism.

In the heady rush of hyperbole, it is tempting to describe the SEZ’s first thiry years as the – Unprecidented! Miraculous! Epic! – jump of a lowly county from the lowest escholon in the state apparatus to one of the highest. More prosaically, the systemic re-invention of Baoan County as Shenzhen Municipality took place over a series of administrative adjustments and concomitant reallocation of authority, responsibilities, and fundamentally, rights to the national allocation of people, services, and goods. From 1978-1982, the Central Government and/or Guangdong Province restructured Baoan County four times. Each restructuring had a different ideological meaning and aimed to created a different form of post Mao utopia. These ideological differences – more precisely different understandings of the utopian content of modernization – continue to vex the development of Shenzhen.

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Shenzhen’s neoconfucian movement seeps into official discourse, again

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Last night at a bus stop, happened upon Shenzhen’s latest universiade campaign and yes, its Confucian quotes about welcoming guests and behaving in civilized fashion. The neoconfucian quotes are part of a larger campaign that is using the universiade to teach Shenzhen residents how to properly inhabit the city. In the subway, for example, posters show event mascot UU lining up and waiting his turn to get onto the subway. Elementary schools are teaching students to smile openly “in a western way” to great foreign guests in a friendly manners; indeed, in one of my favorite news stories, the Binhe Elementary principal explained the creation of the schools’ Smile Angels and then winning angels analyzed the characteristic that made their smile uniquely welcoming – sweet, like a bow, and so open I end up squinting.

This campaign deepens and expands upon popular neoconfucianism throughout Shenzhen. As mentioned in an earlier post, for example, some schools and many families require children to memorize the three character jing in order to cultivate filial and more intelligent children. The SEZ’s 30th Anniversary was also celebrated with Confucian quotes. I’ve also noticed that recent advertising campaigns have stepped up the filial piety quotient, moving from generalized “care for your parents by using our product” formulae to the following structure – a mother tries to help a son, the son rejects her help, and then discovers his mistake. Product placement underscores the twin moments of maternal care and the son’s enlightenment.

The Confucian Merchant (儒商) has long figured in Shenzhen public discourse about how the newly wealthy should behave, focusing on business ethics and philanthropic responsibility. Then came a grassroots movement among the middle class to teach children Confucian classics. However, the Universiade campaign underscores that the Municipality’s public discourse is growing even more explicitly neoconfucian, which in turn, points to the flexible soft side of municipal ideology and its intersections with culture and commerce – hegemony in the sense of unquestioned common sense.

大望: Culture Highland

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Yesterday, I visited the Dawang Culture Highland (大望文化高地). This is the second year that Dawang has been part of the Cultural Industries Fair; like Dafen, Dawang is using art and international art markets to urbanize. Unlike Dafen, however, Dawang is located at the foot of Wutong Mountain and is promoting a more natural and original art experience.

Dawang refers both to a particular village and the cluster of villages that nestle against the foot of Wutong Mountain and so development in the area tends to be village by village, leading to both unexpected convergences and contradictions. Importantly, the spatial layout of the area suggests interesting (if familiar) transitions between rural and urbane Shenzhen as well as the integration of neidi migrants and artists into the city. On the one hand, Maizai, for example, is the village closest to mountain footpaths and has developed a cobblestone pedestrian street for Shenzhen urbanites looking for weekend relaxation and local Hakka cuisine. Other villages specialize in selling lychee honey. There is limited, small scale production and commerce. On the other hand, transportation to the area is inconvenient, which means that land is cheap. Consequently, both artists and squatters have nestled into the edges of Dawang lychee orchards.

This layout highlights the important social function of urban villages in incubating new kinds of Shenzheners: locals as a new kind of renter class, artists as the up and coming middle class, and squatters as the lowest of the city’s urban proletariat. Importantly, the area’s distance from the city center means that its one marketable asset is precisely the feature it wants to destroy – its rural and undeveloped nature (in all senses of the world).

Dawang and its Culture Highland are featured in That’s PRD’s introduction to new artspaces in Guangzhou and Shenzhen. Pictures of the lay of the land, below.

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原创－the sz cultural industries fair

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The Seventh Shenzhen Cultural Industries Fair (文博会) opened three days ago. Of note is the ongoing institutionalization of types of creativity; by Hall theme, various Shenzhen ministries recognize and promote the following types of cultural industry:

  1. Integrate Culture and Science and technology, Advance Industry and Market Development 文化与科技相融合，产业与市场相促进
  2. Creativity, Taste, Life 创意 • 品味 • 生活
  3. New Media, New Life, New Future 新媒体 • 新生活 • 新未来
  4. Inheritance, Craft, Products, Preservation 传承•技艺•产品•保护
  5. [No Hall 5]
  6. Design, Branding, Quality 设计 • 品牌 • 价值
  7. News Publications 新闻出版馆
  8. Culture, Collision, Exchange 文化·碰撞·交融
  9. Creativity, Challenge, Going Beyond 创意·挑战·跨越

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universiade facelifts

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All the universiade mandated upgrades have us walking through and between construction sites. Today’s pictures from Coastal City and Seaworld.

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Old Shenzhen

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Last Friday, took friends on an almost tour of Shenzhen — almost because the tour was planned, but then it rained and so we drank coffee instead and talked about what we would have seen… Anyway, here’s the point. I mentioned some of the “really old” areas and when asked, “how old?” answered, “25-28 years.” And the reply was, “Hmm. That’s not old in Europe.”

It’s not old in Shenzhen either. There are Ming Dynasty ruins to be walked in Zhongshan Park, next to Nantou (or Jiujie) and there are traces of 1,000 years of salt and oysters to be pursued; archaeological digs suggest pre-historical human settlements in the area. However, in terms of post Mao reforms, 1980 architecture is as old as it gets and the first compounds were not finished until 1981-82.  Continue reading →

statutory planning and opportunistic urbanization

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How to interpret the following soundbite?

The spokesman for the Municpal Planning and Land Council stated that through 2010, the City had approved 96 proposals to raze 832.77 hectares and build on 637.08 dedicate hectares, and plans to build 32.77 million square meters of architecture.  市规划国土委有关负责人介绍，截至２０１０年，全市累计批准拆除重建类改造规划９６项，涉及拆除用地面积约８３２．７７公顷，建设用地面积约６３７．０８公顷，规划建筑面积约３２７７万平方米。 Continue reading →

on loneliness

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Before she came to Shenzhen, my neighbor taught middle school English in Heilongjiang. Her son learned well and came to Shenzhen, where he was able to use his skills. Indeed, his ability to speak with his American boss in English remains a source of pride for Teacher Liu. And like many who came to Shenzhen, he brought his mother as soon as he could. However, opportunities in California called him and now Teacher Liu lives in Shenzhen, alone, reading, watching TV, and taking walks in the courtyard. Her daughter calls, but doesn’t believe a foreigner can speak Chinese; I have promised to meet her the next time she comes to Shenzhen.

Teacher Liu decided not to return to Heilongjiang because she is older and the weather here is better. At one time, she thought she would take care of her grandson, but her son and daughter-in-law left and are waiting for a more opportune time to have a child. When I ask why she doesn’t join them in California, where the weather is also nice, Teacher Liu shrugs and says, “They’re good, the two of them. I don’t want to go.” Nevertheless, she is alone and lonely and desires a way of participating in the community. “If I had something to do,” she repeats, “then I could be useful.”

Teacher Liu’s loneliness speaks to me. In part because my parents are older and elsewhere. In part because I too depend on the goodwill of friends, rather than deep kinship ties. And also in part because I see something fundamentally human in her condition. The care she takes to dress nicely, to go for walks, and keep her apartment clean — the work is the work that makes us recognizably human.

manhole covers

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For several years, I have been taking pictures of manhole covers because they suggest how decentralized Shenzhen planning and development were back in the day. One of the “five connections and one leveling” or “seven connections and one leveling” was setting up a sewage system and so many early sewage connections were made by developers, rather than the city. Below, a sampling of manhole covers, ranging from village level through enterprise and district areas to the city itself.

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cleaning up Shenzhen: were there more than 80,000 dangerous people in the city?

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The published facts demand interpretation:

According to reports, as of April 6 in the “One Hundred Days Movement”, municipal police have gone out 284,000 times; they have made over 330,000 inspections of rental housing, 32,000 inspections of internet bars, 60,000 inspections of tourist agencies, 20,000 inspections of clubs, and 40,000 inspections of other spaces. As a result, over 2,300 landlords have been penalized [for infractions] and over 1,180 illegal internet bars, travel agencies, and other spaces have been closed, effectively cleansing areas that have had difficulty insuring public safety.

据悉，截至４月６日，在“百日行动”中，我市警方共出动警力２８．４万人次；检查出租屋３３万余间（次）、网吧３．２万余家（次）、旅业６万余家（次）、休闲娱乐场所约２万家（次）、其他场所４万余家（次）；处罚出租屋主２３００余人，停业整顿、取缔黑网吧、旅业及其他场所１１８０余家，有效净化了社会治安难点地区。 Continue reading →