Of Belts and Ladders: State Policy and Uneven Regional Development in Post-Mao China

Abstract This paper investigates the driving forces that have brought about recent changes in China's regional development. I review the dramatic shifts in development philosophy during the post-Mao period, and discuss the role of Western neoclassical theories in influencing state regional policy and their relevance in predicting patterns of regional development in China. In contrast to the Maoist period, Chinese development philosophy since the late 1970s has emphasized efficiency rather than equity, and open-door rather than self-reliance. The regional policy that ensued has favored the eastern region and selected coastal provinces and cities. Despite this spatially biased regional policy, the literature has observed a decline in regional inequality in China. The empirical analysis in this paper resolves this paradox by investigating changes in uneven development at multiple scales of resolution. Specifically, inter-provincial inequality declined because a new growth corridor emerged along the southern and southeastern coast as a result of large state and foreign investments and state preferential policies, while the old economic core in the north and northeast experienced much slower growth. State policy is critical in bringing about regional selectivity in economic growth. That the strong spatial restructuring found in Guangdong is not found in other provinces underlines the differential impacts of regional policy and illustrates the importance of foreign investment and the state's specific political-economic concerns in south China. These findings suggest that neoclassical theories based on market economies are not capable of predicting or explaining regional development in China, and that contemporary regional development theories should give greater attention to the role of the state. Future studies need to scrutinize the relevance of the literature on the geography of production and investigate the ways that capitalist firms may impact the economic landscape of China's open zones.