Planning megaregional futures: spatial imaginaries and megaregion formation in China

The expansion of globalizing cities into larger city-regions and, most recently, megaregions is posing fundamental questions about how best to plan and govern 21st-century urban regions. Nowhere is this challenge more acute than China, yet there is no clear understanding of Chinese megaregionalism. Debunking some inherent assumptions surrounding megaregions in China, this paper broadens the horizons beyond the narrow focus on what people have come to assume are China’s megaregions to consider megaregionalism as an always evolving political–economic project. The paper argues the importance of distinguishing between planning megaregions (as discursive and imagined) and megaregional planning (as concrete and actual).