Suchergebnisse

This monograph examines the (sub)urbanization process of seven transitional economies in Southeast, East, and North Asia (SENA), i.e., Siberia of Russia in North Asia, China and Mongolia in East Asia, and Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, and Vietnam in Southeast Asia. In ten chapters, great urban transformation occurred in SENA is discussed, as well as the transitional period which aggravated urban environments in SENA cities and how institutional shift, enabled by movements of urban residents and transitional urban governance, may facilitate the process and improve the urban environmental condition. This book includes land cover and land use data derived from satellite images over the past thirty years and intensive field research in more than thirty cities exploring the rise of these great cities and their environmental challenges. Unlike in western countries, the current urbanization process in Asian transitional economies is a hybrid product of market logic and state legacy and intervention, with these influences sometimes conflicting and at other times enhancing each other, under intensified globalization. This book is of interest to researchers and students interested in landscape, urban studies, environment studies in particularly Asia, as well as planners and policy makers.

As if trying to seek order among the chaos, urban planning exhibition halls, a unique creation of China's planning manifesto during the market reform period, have started to appear on the horizon in many cities since the 2000s. This paper examines the production of planning exhibition halls and evaluates their use. It analyses how local governments have used urban planning exhibition halls to perform a set of functions: to prepare the mass audience for its grand future vision, to legitimate government plans for (re)development, to present the edited local history, to promote/glorify the mega events/projects, to spread particular propaganda and to manipulate citizen participation. Further, it finds that while most visitors are satisfied with the information dissemination function, they are disappointed at limited public participation opportunities, poorly presented cultural heritage and inadequately preserved city memory regarding its past plans.

Through case studies of Huawei and ZTE, this paper finds that Chinese telecom firms have followed the general pathway of technological learning of latecomers, that is: they first developed mature foreign technologies; then moved on to higher level technologies in the consolidation stage in advanced countries; and finally progressed from imitation to innovation, generating emerging technologies in mobile communication and data-network fields. The study demonstrates that (1) latecomers caught up successfully by building innovation capability from the beginning, and (2) collaboration with established partners only came later when they had higher level innovation capability. In addition, R&D globalization was an important technological strategy for Huawei and ZTE. The order and pace of development indicate that their R&D globalization strategy is to tap into global resources and markets that would otherwise be unavailable to latecomers. At the beginning of catching-up, unlike Korean firms in the auto, electronics, and semiconductor industries who developed mature foreign technologies by relying on technology transfer from foreign sources, Chinese telecom firms conducted in-house R&D on switch technology, because of the high cost and unavailability of the technology, their lack of understanding of foreign markets and technology, and foreign firms' interest in China's market. Further, operating in a more dynamic technological regime and a much more integrated global economic environment, Chinese firms were able to adopt some global technology strategies such as joint collaboration, participating in industrial standards organizations, and R&D globalization at a much earlier stage of their catching up than had the Korean firms, mainly to compensate for their limited initial access to global resources.

Both China and India, the emerging giants in Asia, have achieved significant economic development in recent years. China has enjoyed a high annual GDP growth rate of 10 per cent and India has achieved an annual GDP growth rate of 6 per cent since 1981. Decomposing China and India's GDP growth from 1981 to 2004 into the three factors' contribution reveals that technology has contributed significantly to both countries' GDP growth, especially in the 1990s. R&D outputs (high-tech exports, service exports, and certified patents from USPTO) and inputs (R&D expenditure and human resources) further indicate that both countries have been very committed to R&D and their output is quite efficient. Both governments have played an essential role in transforming their national innovation systems so that they can be more adaptable to economic development. The main focus of their reforms has been to link the science sector with the business sector and to provide incentives for innovation activities. Balancing import of technology and indigenous R&D effort is another major theme. Innovation capability development has become more and more critical to the success of biofirms in India and China. Institutional factors have great influence on choice of innovation at the firm level, i.e., the decision at firm level in terms of indigenous R&D or import of technology. Nevertheless, limited financial resources and insufficiently qualified human resources remain two major challenges for domestic companies in both countries.

Despite the advantages of polycentric structure and its rich literature drawn from cities in industialized countries, little attention has been paid to the study of polycentric urban development in developing countries based on land-use information. With Hangzhou used as a case study, the authors investigate polycentric urban development through an analysis of directions of urban expansion, urban–rural gradients, and growth types. The multidisciplinary methodology employed, based on theories and methods in remote sensing, geographic information systems, and landscape ecology, has been proved to be useful in the morphological study of polycentric urban development. It was found that Hangzhou has expanded in different directions at various speeds, shifting to a polycentric urban pattern through radial expansion. Along the main transportation corridors, the values of the mean patch sizes of urban patches displayed multiple peaks, and the landscape-shape index maintained a horizontal trend in urban fringes, reflecting the formation of polycentricity. Further, as edge growth and spontaneous growth accounted for 40%–50% and 30–40% of urban growth, respectively, and infill growth was responsible for only a small proportion of urban growth, it is suggested that dispersed urban patches have been increasingly agglomerated into big ones, especially along road corridors. Hangzhou's polycentric urban development was shaped both by the planning efforts of the government and by market forces. The municipal government guided the polycentric development through drafting and revising master plans, annexing nearby districts, and establishing development zones. Nevertheless, market forces played an increasingly important role in Hangzhou's polycentric development through the implementation of an urban land market, the inflow of migrant workers, and the relocation of industries.