The ‘Game’ of Landed-Property Production and Capital Circulation in China's Transitional Economy, with Reference to Shanghai

The complex process of landed-property production in postreform China is examined with reference to Shanghai. In the specific context of a transitional economy, where planned and market elements coexist, the flow of capital into and out of the built environment is not automatically conditioned by the production sphere, or relative profitability, as suggested by Harvey's original theory of capital switching in an advanced market economy, but rather is dependent upon active involvement of various agents or ‘game players' with different vested interests and motivations. Attention is focused on intertwined local and global forces in the ‘game’ of production of new urban space. It is argued that capital circulation is the intrinsic dynamic rather than the precondition of the game. The new phase of urban development is characterised as property-led rather than industrial surplus-driven development. Specifically, I examine the role of central and local governments, state-owned enterprises, and foreign investors in urban land development and reveal that the predominant role of the state is now being substituted by complex interactions among these actors in a local context of globalisation.