Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Figures and Tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Neighbourhoods for the City
- 2 The Political Economy of Cities in Pacific Asia
- 3 The Logic of Comparisons in Multi-Sited Research Designs
- 4 Sungmisan: The Power of Village Social Enterprises
- 5 Mahakan: Neighbourhood Heritage Curation Attempts
- 6 Tangbu: Saving the Old Sugar Warehouses
- 7 Langham Place: Mega Project-Led Inner-City Regeneration
- 8 Tampines Central: Government-Resident Partnerships at Work
- 9 Neighbourhood Action, Metropolitan Politics, and City Building
- Index
- Publications / Asian Cities
2 - The Political Economy of Cities in Pacific Asia
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 November 2020
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of Figures and Tables
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Neighbourhoods for the City
- 2 The Political Economy of Cities in Pacific Asia
- 3 The Logic of Comparisons in Multi-Sited Research Designs
- 4 Sungmisan: The Power of Village Social Enterprises
- 5 Mahakan: Neighbourhood Heritage Curation Attempts
- 6 Tangbu: Saving the Old Sugar Warehouses
- 7 Langham Place: Mega Project-Led Inner-City Regeneration
- 8 Tampines Central: Government-Resident Partnerships at Work
- 9 Neighbourhood Action, Metropolitan Politics, and City Building
- Index
- Publications / Asian Cities
Summary
Abstract
This chapter considers the broader political, economic, and cultural changes that impact cities and their neighbourhoods. Large cities are the engines of economic growth for the country, the repositories of a country's or a region's culture and heritage, the seat of government, and the centre stage of political action. These changes impact the city and make their way into the neighbourhood. And the capacity of neighbourhoods to act, in turn, also depends on the ways they are treated by city governments. This treatment is moderated by a number of political processes happening at the metropolitan level: democratic movements and the decentralization of authority; the post-political tendencies of the state; and the metropolitanization of politics.
Keywords: urban politics, democratic movements, government-neighbourhood links, post-politics, urban economy, urban heritage
If neighbourhoods are more active in their capacity to engage city governments, it is because of political developments in this region of the world. Within Pacific Asia, South Korea and Taiwan, currently represent a historical moment in which democracy, place, and politics matter more than ever before (Park, 2008; Read, 2012; Chuang, 2013).
In the context of Pacific Asia, it is important to note the role of the state in economic development. Rodan (1996: 4) calls the state the “Midwife” of industrial capitalism in the countries of Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan. Scholarship has shifted in the three decades since the developmental states literature emerged. Much of the rethinking has to do with the changing economic role of the state as well as the growing democracy movements in East Asia, particularly South Korea and Taiwan.
Cities as Engines for Growth and Loci for Consumption
Scott and Storper (2015:6) highlighted the role of economic synergies in explaining the foundation and growth of cities. These synergies are subsumed under the concept of agglomeration and they cite Duranton and Puga's (2004) useful elaboration of agglomeration as involving the mechanisms of sharing, matching, and learning activities. Daniels, Ho, and Hutton (2012) noted how agglomeration mechanisms continue to play an important role in creating significant economic interdependences that favour the primate and capital cities of Pacific Asia.
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- Information
- Neighbourhoods for the City in Pacific Asia , pp. 35 - 56Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2019