The socio-cultural impacts of power grid planning on traditional communities: a case study of Wujing Town, Shanghai

This longitudinal ethnographic study examines how power grid planning shapes socio-cultural transformations in Shanghai’s suburban communities. Comparing two villages from 2019 to 2024 – one traversed by high-voltage transmission lines, another excluded from the grid corridor – reveals how infrastructure routing creates divergent development trajectories. Grid planning operates as a mechanism of spatial differentiation, determining where and by whom urbanization’s impacts are experienced. Paradoxically, transmission infrastructure functions as an inadvertent shield against urbanization, preserving traditional agricultural landscapes, multi-generational households, local dialects, and mutual support networks while imposing economic marginalization. Villages outside transmission corridors undergo transformation into urban complexes, gaining material prosperity but experiencing dissolution of clan-based governance and social integration challenges. These contrasting outcomes demonstrate how technical infrastructure standards translate into spatial justice mechanisms, creating zones of inequality. The study challenges conventional narratives about grid planning impacts, revealing complex trade-offs between economic development and cultural continuity in rapidly urbanizing contexts.