Yao Changcheng: Transcending Capital Logic: Innovation and Development of a People-Centered Path for New Urbanization
The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) pointed out that Chinese-path modernization is a socialist modernization led by the CPC, which possesses both the common characteristics of modernization in all countries and Chinese characteristics based on its own national conditions. As the inevitable path for realizing the modernization of a country with a vast population, Chinese-path urbanization—namely, people-centered new quality urbanization—must fully recognize the general characteristics of urbanization across the world while integrating the Chinese characteristics formed by the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Only by doing so can we surpass the capital logic of capitalist urbanization, inherit and develop the "people logic," and forge a modernization path distinct from that of the West. Otherwise, the path of Chinese-path urbanization would likely repeat the mistakes of the "urban crises" seen in Western capitalist countries, making it difficult to achieve people-centered new quality urbanization or the ultimate goals of Chinese-path modernization. To this end, the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Further Comprehensively Deepening Reform and Advancing Chinese-path Modernization," adopted at the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, made work arrangements for further improving the systems and mechanisms of new quality urbanization, and explicitly proposed the core concept that "the people's city is built by the people and for the people." Subsequently, the "Five-Year Action Plan for the In-depth Implementation of the People-Centered New Quality Urbanization Strategy," issued by the State Council on July 31, 2024, proposed that "people-centeredness" is the fundamental principle of the new quality urbanization strategy. It requires that the granting of urban residency to the migrant agricultural population be the primary task, promoting all-round human development and social fairness and justice, so that all residents share the fruits of modernization. On July 15, 2025, Xi Jinping further emphasized at the Central Urban Work Conference [1] that "our country's urbanization is shifting from a period of rapid growth to a period of stable development, and urban development is shifting from a stage of large-scale incremental expansion to a stage primarily focused on improving quality and efficiency of existing stock. Urban work must profoundly grasp and proactively adapt to changes in the situation, transform the concept of urban development, and pay greater attention to being people-centered." In short, profoundly advancing people-centered new quality urbanization is a major strategic decision made by the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core in the New Era; it is the latest theoretical achievement of the Sinicization of Marxism and a major innovation in the political economy of socialism with Chinese characteristics.
I. A Comparative Analysis of Capital's Participation in the Production of Urban Space to Promote Urbanization Development under Different Institutional Frameworks
Looking at the general laws of global urbanization development, it is an unavoidable natural-historical process for any country. It manifests not only as a process of conversion and flow of production factors—such as capital, land, and labor—between urban and rural areas, but also as the process by which these production factors participate in the production of rural and urban space. When the factor of capital combines with factors such as labor and land to complete the production of urban space, the general characteristics of capital lead to a convergence in the development paths of urbanization across countries. However, due to the specificity exhibited by capital under different institutional frameworks, differences in the urbanization development paths of various countries also emerge.
Considering that Marx viewed capital as "self-valorizing value," and this abstract definition is also called the "social-formal determination" (社会的形式规定性) of capital, only the "social-formal determination" constitutes the category that reflects the essence of capital. Therefore, we can refer to the social-formal determination of capital as "capital-in-general" (资本一般). Simultaneously, proceeding from the class content and specific social relations hidden behind this formal determination, we can refer to the social-content determination (社会的内容规定性) of capital as "capital-in-particular" (资本特殊). Marx explicitly pointed out: "Capital, as self-valorizing value... contains within itself a class relation, a specific social character based on the existence of labor as wage-labor. It is a movement, a circuit-process through various stages, which itself comprises three different forms of the circuit-process. It can therefore only be understood as a movement, and not as a static thing." From this, the profit-seeking, mobility, and infinity of capital belong to the category of "capital-in-general"; they are the social-formal determinations of capital and the properties shared by capital across different social formations. On the other hand, Marx used the method of dialectical materialism to profoundly reveal the essence of capital. He did not simply equate capital with money or general value capable of achieving value valorization; rather, he examined it within specific historical dimensions and social relations—this belongs to the category of "capital-in-particular." That is, the nature of capital as determined and influenced by specific ownership relations, or the social-content determination of capital, is "capital-in-particular." In capitalist society, because private ownership of the means of production is absolutely dominant, the exploitative, predatory, and greedy characteristics of capital produced therein constitute the "capital-in-particular" of capitalist society. In contrast, under the influence of socialist public ownership, the "people-oriented nature" (人民性) and positive externalities of capital—moving toward the goal of common prosperity for all the people—constitute the "capital-in-particular" of socialist society.
The general properties of capital's profit-seeking and movement determine that the development of urbanization must be synchronized with industrialization, and that world urbanization must become an important engine for promoting regional economic growth. In the process of combining with production factors such as land and labor, capital commits itself to shortening the circulation and turnover time of urban and rural production factors participating in the production of space, thereby realizing growth in industrial profits and the development of the urban economy. This is the internal driving force of world urbanization. However, under the capitalist institutional framework, the exploitative and predatory nature of capital determines that Western capitalist countries will form an urbanization development model dominated by the logic of capital. Conversely, under the framework of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, the "people-oriented nature" of capital will create a people-centered new quality urbanization development model.
Specifically, in Western capitalist countries, capital is more characterized as a production relation of exploitation and being exploited. At this point, the production of urban space manifests the logic of capital: accumulation for the sake of accumulation, and production for the sake of production. The production of urban space is oriented toward the sole goal of serving the valorization of capital. On the one hand, surplus capital completes a "spatial fix" (空间修复) [2] using the urbanization of land as a carrier; on the other hand, capitalists use the urbanization of people as a means to complete the process of spatial capitalization. Consequently, urbanization is reduced entirely to a means and tool for capitalists to pursue surplus value. Under the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, not only does state-owned capital play a dominant role—weakening the adverse effects brought by the profit-seeking and blindness of capital—but the CPC, with the people's standpoint as its fundamental position, leads state-owned capital to participate in the production of urban space, amplifying the "people-oriented nature" that urbanization construction should embody. At this point, the urbanization process exhibits the characteristics of "a city for the people, built by the people, and shared by the people," and the production of urban space unfolds to serve the people's ever-growing needs for a better life.
Furthermore, looking at the production of space under the conditions of a commodity economy, "space can be sold; it possesses exchange value and use value." The use value of space refers to its utility—the function of space to satisfy people’s experiences and daily needs. In addition, the saving of time afforded by space can also be regarded as a spatial use value. As Henri Lefebvre pointed out, [the purchaser] is "buying a place to live... what is being bought is also a certain distance—the distance from the purchaser’s home to other places, to commercial centers, workplaces, leisure spots, and centers of culture and decision-making. Here, time plays a role once again." Regarding the exchange value of space: "Exchange value—as Marx explained following the 'classical economists' regarding products—is expressed in money. In the past, people bought or leased land; today, what people buy (and, less frequently, lease) is the volume of space: rooms, floors, apartments, housing units, balconies, and various facilities (swimming pools, tennis courts, parking garages, etc.). Every exchangeable place is incorporated into the chain of commercial transactions involving supply, demand, and price." Therefore, it refers to the abstract value embodied by space as a commodity exchanged in the market, usually measured by rent, land price, or commercial profit (e.g., real estate prices, office rents, housing transaction prices). Considering that the dialectical contradictions of space constitute the internal mechanism of the operation of social relational contradictions, and that "without an understanding of the contradiction between use and exchange (use value and exchange value), it is impossible to understand everyday life," a critical examination of the binary opposition between spatial use value and exchange value in the context of spatial commodification not only reveals the spatial logic of capital accumulation but also provides a key theoretical lens for deconstructing the heterogeneity of urban space production and the divergence of urbanization paths under different institutional frameworks.
Under the framework of the capitalist system, capitalist urbanization development is mostly characterized by "exchange value swallowing use value." In this process, the producers of urban space (primarily capitalists) focus more on how to obtain growth in spatial exchange value through the production of urban space, while the spatial use value concerned by the consumers of urban space (primarily laborers) is relegated to a subordinate position or ignored. At this point, the production of capitalist space and the process of capitalist urbanization fall completely into the capital logic trap of "accumulation for the sake of accumulation, production for the sake of production." The production of urban space and the urbanization process are no longer for the use of space (use value) but for the exchange of space (exchange value); accumulation is no longer for social needs but for capital expansion. This spatial production mechanism, detached from actual use requirements and the foundation of industrial development, often leads to a structural imbalance in resource allocation and the idling or waste of spatial resources, eventually triggering a crisis of relative overproduction in spatial production. This causes urbanization to fall into the predicament of "new towns" becoming "dormitory towns" (卧城), "empty cities," or even "ghost cities."
For example, to cope with the crisis of the falling rate of profit caused by the over-accumulation of capital and to seek new growth points for the spatial exchange value of surplus capital, the British government promulgated the New Towns Act in 1946, planning to restructure the spatial layout of the Greater London area by building 10 satellite new towns. However, due to the lack of industrial support and service facilities, many new towns became "dormitory towns." Among them, Welwyn Garden City, even after more than half a century of development, had not reached its planned population goal of 50,000 by the early 21st century, becoming a classic example of inefficient spatial utilization. Furthermore, Tokyo, Japan, and Stockholm, Sweden, had similar experiences. In 1958, Japan issued the Capital City Region Strategy Act, aiming to plan multiple new towns within a 100-kilometer radius of Tokyo. While Tama New Town attracted an influx of population, its industrial functions were weak, and other infrastructure was relatively insufficient, eventually making it a typical "dormitory town." Similarly, Kista in Stockholm, planned in the 1970s, developed into an inefficient "dormitory town" due to a lack of job support. Moreover, the phenomenon of "new towns" turning into "ghost cities" due to real estate overdevelopment is common. Spain once planned to turn the Seseña development area in the suburbs of Madrid into a large satellite town accommodating 30,000 people with 13,000 housing units through real estate development. However, in the end, only 5,100 units were built, and the vast majority remained unoccupied, becoming a representative "ghost city" in Europe. Likewise, in Australia, official Bureau of Statistics data from 2023 showed nearly 23,982 residences in Sydney officially identified as vacant; the number of vacant houses in the suburbs of the Melbourne metropolitan area (such as Burwood) doubled within a few years, reaching approximately 10,000 units. Although these problems can be temporarily alleviated through "spatial fixes" and the "tertiary circuit of capital" [3] (such as urban renewal and functional replacement), the root of the crisis has not been eliminated. It will recur periodically and become an unresolvable structural and institutional problem restricting the development of capitalist urbanization.
Unlike the logic of the production of urban space under the capitalist system, which emphasizes spatial exchange value, the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics pays more attention to the use value of space.
...practicing the core philosophy that "cities are built by the people, for the people, and shared by the people." As proposed at the 2016 Central Economic Work Conference, we must adhere to the positioning that "houses are for living in, not for speculation." Subsequently, General Secretary Xi Jinping further pointed out at the 14th meeting of the Central Financial and Economic Affairs Commission that we "must accurately grasp the residential attribute of housing." The introduction of the "houses are for living in, not for speculation" philosophy marks a historic transition in China's housing policy from commodification toward the prioritization of people's livelihoods. From the dimension of policy evolution (see Figure 1), this philosophy is neither an isolated event nor a goal achieved overnight; rather, it represents a systematic sublimation of a series of regulatory policies since the 1998 housing commodification reform, including the "Eight National Measures" (2005), the "New Eight National Measures" (2011), the "Six National Measures" or "Fifteen National Measures" (2006), the "New Five National Measures" (2013), and the "Three Red Lines" (2020) [4]. This policy shift has effectively curbed the tendencies toward financialization and speculation in the housing market through institutional correction, fundamentally establishing the policy dominance of "use value" in space. At the level of theoretical connotation, the return to spatial use value emphasizes that the essence of housing is to provide residents with stable, safe, and accessible living space—that is, the satisfaction of living space is the prerequisite and foundation for conducting other activities of spatial production. The establishment of the "houses are for living in, not for speculation" philosophy is not merely an update of a policy slogan, but a profound reshaping of urban spatial values. Empirical evidence also shows that accurately grasping the residential attribute of housing and returning to the use value of space can greatly promote the sustainable development of the real estate market and urban space. Taking Guangdong Province as an example: driven by "houses are for living in, not for speculation" policies, the structure of real estate development investment has been continuously optimized, and the proportion of residential investment has significantly increased. Specifically, residential development investment grew from 497.532 billion yuan in 2012 to 1.243831 trillion yuan in 2021, with its share rising from 54.7% to 71.2%. During the same period, the proportion of residential investment in Yunnan Province's development investment also rose from 64.7% in 2012 to 73.7% in 2021. Under the impetus of the "simultaneous rental and purchase" [5] policy, pilot cities such as Guangzhou and Shenzhen have effectively promoted the standardized development of the rental market by establishing government housing rental platforms.
[Figure 1: Timeline of Major Housing Market Policies since 1998]
II. Critique and Reflection on the Capital-Logic Centered Path of Urbanization in the West
Throughout the history of global urbanization, the improvement of urbanization levels has been accompanied by the global advancement of industrialization. As the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, Western capitalist countries became the earliest typical practitioners of the urbanization path. This also aligns with the general characteristic analysis concluded above regarding how capital participation in the production of urban space drives urbanization. Therefore, when analyzing the urbanization process, Marxist scholars often take the urbanization of capitalist countries as their starting point. Through profound analysis and critique of the capital-logic centered urbanization path in capitalist countries, they reveal the limitations and maladies of the capitalist urbanization development path.
David Harvey pointed out: "Within the framework of capitalism, I insist on interpreting the urban development process through the twin themes of accumulation and class struggle. ... An important insight of Marxists lies in seeing the profit generated by capital's dominance over labor, and further seeing that if the bourgeoisie is to survive and reproduce itself, it must constantly expand the basis of profit." He believes that capitalist urbanization involves not only the circulation, circuit, and turnover of capital (including the transformation of money capital, productive capital, and commodity capital), but also the spatial organizational forms of production and the transformation and adjustment of relations of production within space. Thus, capital accumulation or the logic of capital is, on the one hand, the internal driver for the development of urbanization in capitalist countries and, on the other hand, an important condition for the survival of capitalist relations of production. In other words, under the capitalist institutional framework, the capital-logic centered urbanization process is built upon the principles of accumulation for the sake of accumulation and production for the sake of production. To increase the turnover speed of capital and obtain more surplus value, capitalist urban space can be expanded, renewed, or rearranged without regulation—this is the concrete manifestation of capital-logic centered urbanization. Certainly, capital accumulation in the urbanization process achieves not only expansion in scale and extension in space but also generates the risk of further expanding the relations of production between the exploiter and the exploited. However, the fundamental contradictions inherent in the capitalist system can never be completely eradicated through capital-logic centered urbanization. "The more capitalism desperately seeks a 'spatial fix' [6] for its internal contradictions, the more tense the pressure becomes to overcome spatial contradictions through the production of space. The greater the overaccumulation, the faster the subsequent territorial expansion, and the more rapid the pace of transformation of the geographical landscape." Although the crisis of relative overproduction caused by the overaccumulation of capital can be resolved in the short term through the urbanization process, in substance, this merely imposes the excessive debt burden of municipal districts onto rural areas. "In the long run, these only exacerbate the problem of overaccumulation and cause it to spread to a wider area. Due to the gap between trade imbalances and the balance of payments, when the collapse arrives, it will trigger a chain of events."
(1) The capital logic of urbanization leads to "land urbanization" outpacing "people's urbanization"
As shown in the previous analysis, considering the differences in the roles played by various factors of production in the production of urban space, world urbanization can be characterized as a dual process of "land urbanization" and "people's urbanization." This is a general rule of urbanization development. The former primarily takes the conversion of land factors between urban and rural areas as its prerequisite, manifested as the conversion of rural land into urban land, and increases the production of urban space from the supply side through the expansion of urban land and spatial sprawl. The latter, however, takes the flow of labor factors between urban and rural areas as its prerequisite, manifested as the transfer of the surplus rural labor population to cities, and increases the consumption of urban space from the demand side through the expansion of urban population scale and market scale.
Under the framework of the capitalist system, the urbanization process driven by the logic of capital is essentially the completion of urban spatial expansion and sprawl during the process of surplus capital seeking a "spatial fix." Therefore, in the process of urban spatial production, the "spatial fix" of surplus capital will focus more on alleviating the pressure of capital valorization—caused by the falling average rate of profit in municipal districts—through the method of "land urbanization." Meanwhile, "people's urbanization" is merely regarded as a means of participating in the capitalization of space, and against the background of machinery and equipment constantly replacing labor, this role also appears to be changing. Consequently, the capital logic of urbanization easily falls into a fixed mindset of focusing on "land urbanization" rather than "people's urbanization." Urban space becomes a sacrifice in the process of capital alienation; people's urbanization also becomes a means to serve land urbanization rather than the goal itself.
Specifically, the urbanization process driven by the logic of capital, due to the alienated nature of capital, makes urban space an alienated object that controls human production and life. It breaks away from its attribute as a man-made object that satisfies human needs and obscures the important characteristic where the labor production process in urban space gives way to the capital valorization process. As Marx said: "Because of the alienated nature of capital, its antithesis to labor is transferred outside the actual process of exploitation, namely to interest-bearing capital... exploited labor and exploiter labor both become the same thing as labor." To obtain more surplus value, the inherent scarcity of land and the huge potential for its exchange value growth make "land urbanization" the primary form of urbanization advancement driven by capital logic. At this point, spatial exchange value overrides spatial use value. As one of the most important spatial units, the use value of housing (the attribute of satisfying residential needs) is ignored, while its investment attribute is amplified. This logic of urban spatial production dominated by "spatial exchange value" causes housing prices to climb continuously and ultimately triggers real estate bubble crises. Taking the real estate bubble crisis in Japan from the 1950s to the 1980s as an example: data shows that between 1955 and 1989, the average urban land price in Japan rose by about 54 times, while in the six major cities including Tokyo, it soared 128 times; however, during the same period, wholesale prices, consumer prices, and wage levels rose by only 2, 5, and 21 times respectively. The continuous rise in land prices spawned large-scale land speculation and caused serious social and economic problems. With the bursting of the Japanese property bubble in 1991, one of the most disastrous real estate crashes in human economic history occurred, and the Japanese economy has since fallen into a slump lasting 30 years. On the other hand, the demand for labor is ignored or weakened; even the living space of the labor force may be converted into commercial space, and the labor force itself faces the possibility of being marginalized and evicted. For instance, in the process of urban gentrification, low-income residents in old urban areas are evicted and replaced by high-income capitalists who re-enter the old city centers. "People's urbanization" eventually gives way to "land urbanization" and becomes a subsidiary product of the latter.
(2) The capital logic of urbanization leads to the risk of urban-rural spatial imbalance
The urbanization process driven by capital not only brings about the exchange of urban and rural production factors and facilitates the formation of a unified national market, but also brings the risk of unequal exchange between urban and rural areas. This is the inevitable result of spatial exchange value overriding spatial use value in the process of capitalist urbanization, where capitalist spatial production exists for the sake of accumulation and production. To seek new growth points for surplus value, surplus capital will turn to new geographical spaces for a "spatial fix," which undoubtedly further exacerbates the phenomenon of unequal exchange. In the international trade system, unequal exchange is one of the main reasons why developed countries occupy the "center" or dominant position while developing countries occupy the "periphery" or dependent position. Arghiri Emmanuel, in analyzing the problem of imperialist trade, explained that "there exists unequal exchange and value transfer between developed and developing countries, emphasizing that the existing international division of labor forms the economic dependence of developing countries on developed countries," and "unequal exchange is due to the 'institutional' differences in the rate of surplus value across regions, establishing the difference ratio of various equilibrium prices through the equalization of profits." However, besides the difference in the rate of surplus value being a major factor affecting unequal exchange, the organic composition of capital [7] also plays an important role. As Emmanuel stated, there is another form—which he calls unequal exchange in the strict sense—"characterized by the inequality of both wages and the organic composition." Although Emmanuel proposed the theory of unequal exchange under the assumption of the existence of international prices of production, and Marx's theory of the formation of prices of production requires the premise of the sufficiently free mobility of capital factors, the application of the unequal exchange theory in the international trade system remains quite controversial. However, if one considers unequal exchange within a city, the sufficiently free mobility of capital factors makes the process of forming the average profit—that is, the formation of the price of production—relatively smooth, making the occurrence of unequal exchange more widespread.
Looking at the generalized unequal exchange caused by changes in the organic composition of capital: since capital can flow freely within the same city, under the internal drive of capital accumulation, municipal districts gradually become highlands for the concentration of capital, and their ratio of organic composition of capital continuously rises compared to rural areas. "Marx pointed out that since the rate of profit tends to equalize, the surplus value taken by capitalists in each region is not produced by the workers of those two regions respectively; because the total surplus value produced by workers in these two regions will be distributed by the capitalists of these two regions not in proportion to the total number of workers provided by each region, but in proportion to the total amount of capital invested in each region." Based on this, influenced by the different ratios of organic composition of capital between urban and rural areas, municipal districts occupy a more dominant position in the distribution of surplus value compared to rural areas and are allocated relatively more surplus value. This highlights the problem of the urban-rural development gap caused by unequal exchange.
Regarding wage differences...
Viewed from the perspective of unequal exchange caused by differences in the rate of surplus value: as urban-rural transportation networks become increasingly perfected, the flow of factors between urban and rural areas has become more frequent. At this stage, commodity trade is no longer confined within municipal districts or rural areas; rather, integrated urban-rural development constitutes a larger-scale market. Consequently, the standard for socially necessary labor time, which determines the magnitude of a commodity's value, undergoes a corresponding change. The standard should no longer be the socially necessary labor time within a municipal district, but should shift toward the socially necessary labor time determined by the urban-rural community.
This is similar to the situation Marx described regarding the world market and international value within the international trade system: "In the world market, where the component parts are individual nations, the situation is different. The average intensity of labor varies from country to country; it is higher in some, lower in others. Thus, the national averages form a scale whose unit of measure is the average unit of universal labor. Therefore, the more intense national labor, as compared with the less intense, produces in the same time more value, which expresses itself in more money." It is precisely this difference that generates variations in national wages, while the deviation of national value from international value gives rise to international trade. Although value deviations between international trades may be influenced by differences in the value of money, "even apart from such relative differences in the value of money in different countries, it will be found... that the price of labor, as compared with surplus value and the value of the product, is higher in the latter country than in the former." Therefore, within a certain region, as there exist both individual product values determined by municipal or rural areas and social product values determined by the urban-rural community, an average rate of profit eventually forms social prices of production within the scope of that community. As Marx pointed out, "The industrial capitalist always has the world market before him and compares his own cost prices not only with domestic market prices, but with those of the whole world, and he must do so constantly." Trade between urban and rural areas achieves value transfer through the deviation of individual value from social value, and social value from social prices of production. Municipal districts with lower rates of surplus value obtain a larger distribution of surplus value, while rural areas with higher rates of surplus value retain a smaller portion.
III. People-Centered New-Type Urbanization as the Sublation and Transcendence of the Capital-Logic-Dominated Urbanization Path
As the above analysis demonstrates, urbanization is essentially a process of producing rural and urban spaces by utilizing productive forces such as land, labor, and capital during the conversion and flow of urban-rural factors. Given capital's dual attributes as both a relation of production and a productive force, once capital combines with factors like land and labor, it leads to different urbanization models due to the specificities of capital. Under the framework of the capitalist system, the logic of capital drives the conversion and flow of urban-rural factors in a manner conducive to the circuit of capital; that is, the allocation of land resources and the flow of labor factors in the production of urban space serve or yield to capital circulation.
However, under the framework of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, state-owned capital plays a dominant role, which significantly weakens the profit-seeking and blind nature of capital. Simultaneously, the Communist Party of China (CPC) takes the "people's standpoint" as its fundamental position. The participation of state-owned enterprises or state-owned capital under its leadership in urban construction amplifies the "people-centered" character of urbanization. In this context, "land urbanization" and "the urbanization of people" exhibit the characteristics of "a city for the people, built by the people, and shared by the people." Within the practice of people-centered new-type urbanization, "land urbanization" is increasingly reflected as a means rather than an end; "the urbanization of people" further evolves into "the granting of permanent urban residency [8] to the migrant population." This means it focuses not only on the transfer of surplus rural labor but also on the residency status of the transferred population. As the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee pointed out, "We must improve the systems and mechanisms for promoting new-type urbanization and accelerate the granting of permanent urban residency to the rural population who have moved to cities." Furthermore, "housing is for living in, not for speculation" serves as a core principle of people-centered new-type urbanization, emphasizing the use-value attribute of housing over its speculative attribute, thereby helping the logic of use-value in the production of urban space return to its dominant position.
In short, under the framework of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, no matter how urban space production proceeds, the people exist as the subject. That is, the flow of labor guides and determines the flow of capital and the allocation of land resources. When both the producers and consumers of urban space are laborers rather than capitalists, their demands tend to align under the framework of the basic socialist economic system: seeking the synchronized growth of spatial use-value and spatial exchange-value. Therefore, the path of urbanization with Chinese characteristics revolves around the "people-centered" nature of space production, focusing on the use-value of space production, highlighting the attribute of "appropriated space [9]," and following the basic principle of ensuring the rights of citizens—namely, the rural migrant population—through spatial justice.
(1) People-centered new-type urbanization highlights the coordinated advancement of "land urbanization" and "the urbanization of people"
The contradiction between "land urbanization" and "the urbanization of people"—or more specifically, whether the production of urban space can complete the reproduction of urban space through urban spatial consumption—is the general internal driver of global urban development. Therefore, this contradiction also exists in China’s process of people-centered new-type urbanization. When "land urbanization" outpaces "the urbanization of people," it produces a crisis of overproduction in urban space, leading to a waste of spatial resources. Conversely, one of the key tasks of people-centered new-type urbanization is to focus on the transfer of surplus rural labor to cities, emphasizing intensive and intrinsic development. This effectively alleviates the problems caused by the rapid development of "land urbanization." On the other hand, when "the urbanization of people" outpaces "land urbanization," it causes a relative deficit in urban space production, leading to "big city diseases" such as traffic congestion, skyrocketing housing prices, environmental degradation, and resource shortages. The key tasks of people-centered new-type urbanization also focus on the optimal allocation of urban-rural land factors, increasing the supply of urban spatial use-value (including public services like education and healthcare, and spatial consumer goods like entertainment, culture, and housing), and urban renewal actions like the optimization of urban spatial resources and the metabolism of public resources. This provides the material guarantee for the rapid development of "the urbanization of people." In summary, within the framework of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, people-centered new-type urbanization can balance the internal contradiction between "land urbanization" and "the urbanization of people," promoting high-quality development.
Specifically, in the process of "land urbanization," although the general profit-seeking characteristics of capital still play an important role, problems like the disorderly expansion of urban space, redundant construction, and structural imbalances in resource allocation are regulated due to effective supervision by a "capable government." Meanwhile, incentivized by an "effective market," "land urbanization" follows the basic requirement of increasing spatial production efficiency from the supply side. Guided by national territorial spatial planning, it promotes the reasonable growth of spatial exchange-value, providing a solid material foundation for new-type urbanization. In the process of "the urbanization of people," the "people-centered" character of capital reinforces the residency demands of the rural migrant population. That is, the urbanization of people follows the basic principles of ensuring farmers are "willing to enter the city, able to stay, and able to integrate." From the demand side, it guides the growth of urban spatial use-value according to the demands for granting permanent residency to the rural migrant population, thereby satisfying the people’s needs for a better life. Thus, "the urbanization of people" further develops into "the granting of permanent urban residency."
Furthermore, due to its socialist nature, the contradiction between space production and space consumption is no longer an irreconcilable one under the framework of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Because socialist urban space belongs to the people, both space production and space consumption are created and realized by the people. The urban space products created in the urbanization process meet both the individual needs of residents and the needs of all members of society. Additionally, as the drivers of urban construction, state-owned enterprises under the leadership of the CPC will adjust the direction of state capital’s demands to highlight its people-centered nature. This further consolidates the consistent demands of "land urbanization" and "the urbanization of people." Crises of relative overproduction of urban space caused by the contradiction between the two are no longer systemic; they can be resolved within the framework of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics.
Finally, under the framework of the socialist market economy system, people-centered new-type urbanization must still be built upon the exchange of spatial commodities. This requires that while realizing the growth of spatial use-value and promoting "the urbanization of people," new-type urbanization must also pay attention to the growth of spatial exchange-value and continue to advance "land urbanization." This is because the "people-centeredness" of new-type urbanization is intrinsically realized through specific capital circulation models and relies on the guidance of a "capable government" and the incentives of an "effective market." The logic of capital is granted institutional constraints, and the general profit-seeking characteristics of capital are directed toward serving people-centered new-type urbanization. Even if, at certain stages of development, spatial use-value and exchange-value deviate to some extent, or if "land urbanization" and "the urbanization of people" appear out of sync, these problems will achieve self-correction through the policy practices of socialist market-oriented reforms.
(2) People-centered new-type urbanization responds to the core demand of appropriated space for spatial justice
In his critical reflection on the production logic of space, Henri Lefebvre proposed an approach that replaces the bourgeois logic of exchange with a logic of "appropriation." In his view, true use is not possessive but non-exclusive "appropriation," and this mode of use endows urban space with diversity of time, difference in rhythm, and richness of practice. Corresponding to the logic of "appropriation" or the logic of use-value is "appropriated space," which is what Lefebvre called "the space of enjoyment" (L'espace de la jouissance). Considering that under the framework of socialism with Chinese characteristics, rights belong to the people, and urban space production emphasizes "people-centeredness" and a return to the logic of use-value, urban space in China will focus more on "appropriated space" rather than "dominated space." If dominated space is led by power subjects such as capital, serves the goal of capital accumulation, and exhibits characteristics like standardization, functional division, and instrumental rationality, then "the more space is functionalized, that is, the more thoroughly it is dominated by 'institutions' and rendered monofunctional under their manipulation, the less sensitive it becomes to appropriation." In "dominated space," the logic of "appropriation" or use-value is replaced by the logic of exchange. Conversely, "appropriated space" is appropriated—rather than possessed or dominated—by practitioners of everyday life and social groups. It emphasizes use-value, spatial diversity, and differentiation, as well as the "right to the city"—the rights of urban space users to actual intervention, expression, and reconstruction of space. Starting from this point, appropriated space calls for spatial justice and, under the logic of spatial justice, advocates that urban space should serve as a field for negotiated use, collective participation, and free practice by social members. Looking back, capitalist urban space is increasingly being disciplined by instrumental rationality and the logic of profit maximization. Urban space is being eroded of social equality and spatial diversity, leading to a serious lack of spatial justice. This urbanization path dominated by the "logic of capital" clearly deviates from the original intent of urban construction: to satisfy the people’s aspiration for a better life. Therefore, under the logical framework of people-centered new-type urbanization, it is urgent to take spatial justice as the core concept to promote the systemic transformation of the city from dominated space to appropriated space.
First, emphasize balanced spatial development. Balanced spatial development requires that the economic, cultural, and ecological construction of urban and rural areas within a given space proceed in tandem, with relative gaps controlled within a certain range. However, the process of urban spatial expansion driven by capital accumulation does not occur simultaneously in time, nor does it unfold uniformly across geography; this easily leads to developmental disparities between urban and rural areas, where municipal districts expand blindly while counties or rural areas lack sufficient momentum. This clearly violates the logical connotation of "people-centered" urbanization, turning the development of urbanization toward serving capitalists rather than the whole people. The report to the 20th CPC National Congress [10] emphasized that Chinese-path modernization is the modernization of common prosperity for all people. Thus, "people-centered" new quality urbanization requires a capable government to curb the drawbacks of capital accumulation in the urbanization process. When conducting urban development planning, the government must give greater consideration to the development of counties and rural areas, alleviate the contradictions of imbalanced urbanization, and step up the pace of coordinated urban-rural development, allowing both urban and rural residents to share in the fruits of urbanization.
Although there have been problems in China's urbanization process regarding urban-rural dual segmentation [11] and disparities in economic development caused by unequal exchange, the reasons for the formation of unequal exchange differ greatly from those under the capitalist institutional framework mentioned above. Consequently, the resulting spatial imbalance is not institutional. China's urban-rural dual segmentation was more a result of the planned economy period when, to accelerate industrialization, the state used administrative means—such as mandatory unified state purchasing and marketing of grain and the "scissors expansion" [12] between industrial and agricultural products—to transform agricultural surplus into industrial accumulation. On the other hand, it restricted the migration of the rural population to cities by establishing the urban-rural household registration (hukou) system to maintain the rapid development of capital-intensive urban industry. This created a dual governance system and a segmented market system. Subsequently, with the continuous improvement of the socialist market economy and the hukou system, as well as the deep promotion of agricultural and rural modernization and the implementation of urban-rural integrated development strategies such as "industry supporting agriculture and cities leading the countryside," the long-standing problems of the urban-rural dual structure and economic development gaps will be gradually and fundamentally resolved. Finally, in the process of improving the socialist market economy, a certain degree of unequal exchange will inevitably emerge between urban and rural areas due to differences in the organic composition of capital. However, unlike capitalist countries where private capital dominates and a few capitalists seize the profits of unequal exchange, in socialist China where public ownership is the mainstay, this portion of the proceeds is used more for rural construction and improving people’s livelihoods, ultimately giving back to the people. This constitutes the essential difference between unequal exchange under the two social systems.
Second, emphasize the fairness of interest distribution within space. In the process of urban spatial production, economic subjects from different strata are involved. There is obvious inequality in the distribution of interests among these subjects regarding urban space, which not only leads to serious wealth gaps but also results in spatial segmentation by class. According to the theory of class-monopoly rent, wealthy groups live in urban centers with superior conditions and enjoy the best public goods, while impoverished groups can only reside in economically deprived areas like county towns or "slums" in the city center, lacking opportunities to use high-quality spatial resources to enhance their own development advantages. Even more severe is that under the capitalist framework, urban residents' right to possess space often has strong inheritability, leading not only to the intergenerational transmission of space usage rights within a class but also further solidifying the social class structure and exacerbating the persistence of spatial inequality. This inequality embodies the typical characteristics of "dominated space" criticized by Lefebvre—space is used as a tool for the operation of power and capital to reinforce existing class structures; it lacks the attribute of "appropriated space" that serves all members of society. In contrast, new quality urbanization under the framework of socialism with Chinese characteristics pays more attention to promoting the realization of spatial justice through the coordinated action of a "capable government" and an "effective market." Specifically, the state effectively eases inequality in developmental opportunities between classes within urban space by increasing investment in public infrastructure, expanding the supply of educational resources, and improving fiscal transfer payment mechanisms. This practice aims to ensure that all citizens have equal access to the basic right to use urban space—such as the actual right of urban users to intervene in, express, and reconstruct space—thereby continuously promoting spatial equity and building an "appropriated space" suitable for people-centered new quality urbanization.
IV. Transcending the Logic of Capital to Promote the Development of People-Centered New Quality Urbanization
Transcending the logic of capital to promote the construction of people-centered new quality urbanization requires not only avoiding problems that may arise in the process of urban spatial production—such as "land urbanization" outstripping "human urbanization" and urban-rural spatial imbalances—but also emphasizing the coordinated progress of "land urbanization" and "human urbanization" to respond to the core demand of appropriated space for spatial justice. Realizing these goals requires deepening the understanding of capital, moving from "utilizing capital" to further developing "harnessing capital"—that is, improving the ability to harness capital through institutional innovation, optimization of capital operation rules, and multi-subject collaboration to deal with the general characteristics of capital’s profit-seeking and blindness, thereby assisting in the development of people-centered new quality urbanization and the realization of Chinese-path modernization goals.
(1) Strengthen Top-Level Design to Leverage Financial and Social Capital into Counties and the Countryside
The 2024 Central Economic Work Conference proposed that "we must coordinately promote new quality urbanization and comprehensive rural revitalization to promote urban-rural integrated development" and "promote the construction of new quality urbanization with the county seat as an important carrier to form a new pattern of urban-rural integrated development." Furthermore, common prosperity for all people is an inherent requirement of people-centered new quality urbanization. Therefore, people-centered new quality urbanization must follow the path of urban-rural integrated development, organically combining rural and urban development rather than pitting them against each other in an "either-or" mindset. The key to coordinating urban-rural development lies in the equal exchange, two-way flow, and efficient allocation of various elements (especially capital) between urban and rural areas during the urbanization process. However, considering the general profit-seeking nature of capital, capital’s circulation mode must be established on a profitable basis, especially when guiding capital flow under the conditions of a socialist market economy. At the current stage, as profits from spatial production in municipal districts continue to decline, it becomes increasingly important to guide surplus capital, especially financial capital, into counties and villages. On the one hand, financial and social capital can be leveraged to penetrate county seats and rural areas through scientific planning and policy guidance (such as issuing bonds, equity financing, and government guidance funds). This can effectively alleviate environmental carrying capacity pressure in municipal districts, reduce efficiency losses caused by excessive competition, and promote the prosperity of the rural economy. On the other hand, taking comprehensive land consolidation across the entire region as a starting point, we can promote the reform of the rural land system (such as the reform allowing rural collective construction land to enter the market) and guide financial and social capital into counties and the countryside to serve urban-rural integrated development.
(2) Guide Social Capital to Serve Public Needs and Optimize Urban Public Service Supply
As shown in the analysis above, people-centered new quality urbanization emphasizes the process of "the urbanization of people," and the key link in the "urbanization of people" lies in whether sufficient urban public services can be provided to meet the growing needs of the transferred surplus rural population. Typically, the general profit-seeking nature of capital results in a relative shortage of capital supply in the public service sector due to its weak profitability. Although under the framework of socialism with Chinese characteristics, public services such as healthcare and education are core areas of national livelihood and can be dominated by state-owned capital, relying solely on state-owned capital to provide public services will prove inadequate compared to the ever-growing demand. Based on this, it is necessary to promote the formation of a modern public service investment pattern guided by public capital, with social capital as the mainstay and diverse investments coexisting, to enhance service capabilities in urban education, healthcare, and elderly care. This includes making good use of ultra-long-term special national bonds and local government special bonds to play the leading role of government investment and guide various types of capital to increase investment in public service projects. Additionally, it is necessary to improve the multi-level medical insurance system, such as further relaxing and widening household registration restrictions for participating in basic medical insurance in places of permanent residence and employment. Finally, we must deepen the reform of the educational system and mechanisms, such as encouraging various forms of kindergarten management to effectively solve the problem of preschool being difficult and expensive to access. In short, by continuously deepening institutional reforms to increase the supply of urban public services, meeting the multi-level needs of the migrating agricultural population, and closing the gap between the urbanization rate of the registered population and that of the permanent population, the optimal allocation of public resources can be achieved, assisting in the goal of people-centered new quality urbanization.
(3) Regulate Capital Operation Rules and Emphasize both Urban Renewal and Protection
Urban renewal is an inevitable process in the history of urbanization development. Urbanization involves not only the transfer of surplus rural labor but also the issue of urban renewal. When urbanization reaches a certain stage, urban spatial resources need to be optimally allocated through "metabolic" methods such as maintenance, renovation, demolition, and the improvement of public resources to meet the people's growing needs for a better life. On January 3, 2025, an executive meeting of the State Council emphasized that "urban renewal is related to the improvement of urban appearance and living quality," and that we must "strengthen the guarantee of factors such as land and funds, revitalize and utilize low-efficiency stock land, coordinately use fiscal and financial resources, improve market-oriented financing models, and attract social capital to participate in urban renewal." This is not only an inherent requirement for high-quality development but also a necessary path for promoting the construction of people-centered new quality urbanization. Based on this, capital operation rules must be reasonably regulated in the urbanization process. On the one hand, by establishing a "traffic light" mechanism, we can guide the orderly flow of capital to achieve the coordinated development of urban renewal and cultural protection. On the other hand, we must strengthen legal supervision and strictly limit the excessive exploitation of historical and cultural resources by capital to ensure that urban renewal proceeds on the premise of protecting the city's cultural heritage. Furthermore, we must improve the financial support system and optimize the financing environment for urban renewal projects. For example, we should increase financing support for urban renewal projects that meet planning requirements and have sustainable development prospects, and guide financial institutions to provide credit services for projects where conditions are ripe.
V. The Urbanization Dilemma of Developing Countries and the Enlightenment of China's New Quality Urbanization Path
Urbanization is an important engine for promoting regional economic growth and an inevitable path for a country to achieve modernization. However, as the population of developing countries rapidly migrates to cities...
In the process of promoting the spatial concentration of the population (the urbanization of people) and the continuous expansion of urban space (the urbanization of land), the urbanization of people failed to transform into their genuine "citizenization" [N1] (shìmínhuà), while the urbanization of land lacked the support of industrial development. Consequently, the urbanization process eventually fell into a structural dilemma where growth and disorder coexisted. Taking Latin America as an example: since the acceleration of urbanization at the end of the 19th century, the proportion of the urban population in the Latin American region rose from 25% in 1900 to 41.6% in 1950, reaching 65.6% by the 1980s—approaching the levels of developed European countries. Despite this high level of urbanization, the proportion of the population employed in industry during the same period was only 20% to 30%. This typical model of "over-urbanization" [N2] was clearly unable to provide sufficient employment support for the transferred urban population; instead, it exacerbated the spread of slums in cities and brought about the continuous deterioration of the rural economy. For instance, in 1987, approximately 2.5 million people in Brazil lived in slums, while the population of slums in metropolitan areas like Rio de Janeiro exceeded 1.5 million. At the same time, land annexation occurred frequently in rural areas. Having gone bankrupt and lost their land, large numbers of peasants were forced to enter cities to seek new means of survival, leaving rural areas mired in the developmental predicament of total "hollowing out" (kōngxīnhuà). This predatory model of "over-urbanization" led to "urban-rural fragmentation" and "spatial imbalance," features that became a true reflection of the urbanization process in developing countries like those in Latin America.
Distinct from the imbalance in Latin American urban spatial systems, urbanization in Southeast Asia presents the dual dilemma of "urban-rural blurring" and "spatial marginalization" (jiāfènghuà). Their urban development mostly relied on export-oriented industries—that is, the development of labor-intensive manufacturing in cities. Given national conditions of limited land and large populations, the population could only concentrate in a few large cities. However, due to lagging urban planning and rigid land-use systems, a large number of "gray zones" formed around the periphery of cities. These areas were neither formally incorporated into the urban administrative system nor could they continue to be preserved as agricultural land. As a result, they became institutionally "neither city nor village," where public services could not effectively reach, creating a vacuum in urban social governance. This structural exclusion fixed a large number of grassroots migrant workers at the institutional periphery, making it difficult for the "urbanization of people" to achieve a substantive leap toward "citizenization."
In contrast, during its rapid urbanization process, China has creatively constructed a multi-center, multi-level urban spatial system with urban clusters as the main body and county seats as important carriers. It has proposed a New-type Urbanization development model characterized by an impoverished people-centered approach, urban-rural integration, and the interaction of "the two -izations" [N3] (industrialization and urbanization). This provides a solution for the urbanization of developing countries that possesses both Chinese characteristics and universal value.
(1) China’s New-type Urbanization emphasizes the construction of urban cluster systems and the strengthening of county-level functions to form a spatial system of coordinated multi-center development. Unlike the "single-center expansion" or "over-urbanization" models of other developing countries, since the New Era began, China has explicitly proposed a New-type Urbanization development strategy of "taking urban clusters as the main form and county seats as important carriers," promoting the formation of a multi-centered, networked regional development pattern. For example, in the Yangtze River Delta urban cluster, Shanghai is no longer the sole growth pole; rather, through high-speed rail networks and industrial gradient layouts, it forms a close division of labor and collaboration with small and medium-sized cities such as Suzhou, Wuxi, and Nantong, jointly absorbing population and industrial transfers. This model can provide new ideas for developing countries to alleviate the "urban maladies" (dàchéngshì bìng) [N4] caused by over-urbanization.
(2) China’s New-type Urbanization focuses on bringing the management of capital and the safeguarding of people's livelihoods into an institutionalized, standardized, and normalized track to prevent urbanization from devolving into a process of spatial exclusion driven by the logic of capital's pursuit of profit. Regarding the urbanization of land, the establishment of a comprehensive national spatial planning system has effectively avoided land speculation and disorderly spatial sprawl. Regarding the urbanization of people, through the continuous improvement of the equalization of basic public services and the strengthening of institutional designs such as subsidized housing, and by guiding social capital to serve public needs and optimizing the supply of urban public services, the state has helped the migrant population transition from "citizens by status" to "citizens by rights." This provides a new model for developing countries to coordinate the relationship between the urbanization of land and people and to resolve the insufficient supply of infrastructure and public services.
(3) China’s New-type Urbanization follows a mechanism of urban-rural coordination to achieve the dual goals of urban development and rural prosperity, thereby avoiding rural decay and "urban-rural fragmentation" caused by "predatory urbanization." For example, by guiding industry and capital to sink into the hinterlands of metropolitan areas, the capacity of small and medium-sized cities and county seats to absorb the rural transferred population has been effectively enhanced. Furthermore, through the equalized distribution of public services such as education, healthcare, and elderly care across urban and rural areas, the "bottlenecks"—where the transferred population "enters the city without settling their household registration (hukou) or receiving services"—have been cleared. This also facilitates the return of the urban population to the countryside to support rural industrial development. This new model of integrated urban-rural development not only relieves urban pressure but also enhances the resilience and inclusiveness of the entire national urban spatial governance system, offering new ideas for developing countries to resolve the dilemma of "urban-rural fragmentation" and eliminate vacuums in urban spatial governance.
(4) China’s New-type Urbanization emphasizes mutual support and deep synergy with "new-type industrialization" to avoid the problem of industrial "hollowing out" and over-urbanization that occurs when the urbanization of land outpaces the urbanization of people. By establishing an interactive model where industrial gradient layouts match local employment, China promotes the coordinated advancement of industrialization and urbanization, forming a development pattern with sustainable industrial development and guaranteed employment. For instance, energy-rich regions are guided to cultivate emerging industrial clusters such as new energy and big data, while regions with abundant labor and convenient locations are guided to optimize and upgrade traditional industrial clusters with high employment capacity, such as food processing, light industry, and textiles. This enhances regional employment support and the capacity to absorb the transferred population while simultaneously promoting the development of emerging industries and the transformation of traditional ones. This model of coordinated advancement between New-type Urbanization and new-type industrialization provides new ideas for developing countries to solve the hollowing out of urban industries and alleviate over-urbanization.
Author Biography: Yao Changcheng is an Associate Professor at the School of Economics, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics. Source: Teaching and Research (Jiāoxué yǔ Yánjiū), Issue 11, 2025. Editor: Huihui