Do central state interventions cause urban shrinkage in China?

In China, the stories of urban shrinkage have been ignored and obscured by the dazzling urbanization and modernization processes. This paper intends to find out which prefecture-level cities shrank from 2011 to 2015 and examine the influence of central state interventions on urban shrinkage. By calculating the urban household registered population changes of 283 prefecture-level cities and four municipalities in Mainland China, we identify 76 cities with a declined population and 36 cities that simultaneously suffer from more than 1% population losses and below-average GDP growth. The results of logit regression models show that China is not exceptional in terms of what causes urban shrinkage: low natural growth rate, low wages, low precipitation, and a high proportion of employment in the mining industry significantly contribute to urban shrinkage, whereas central state interventions in the form of preferential policies and state-owned enterprises do not explain why certain cities shrink.