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作者

来源

URBAN GEOGRAPHY,Vol.41,Issue10,P.1247-1259

语言

英文

关键字

Urban density,folding,topology,infrastructure,state,Beijing

作者单位

Department of Urban Planning and Management, School of Public Administration and Policy, Renmin University of China, Beijing, China

摘要

This paper engages with discussions on geographies of urban density by investigating the enduring power relations that underlie the (de-)forming of urban densities in Beijing. Articulating a topological framework with the infrastructural lives of socio-spatial reordering in Houchangcun Road, often being labelled “the most congested in the universe,” this paper presents how the authoritarian state manages to sustain its will to power/legitimacy and renders this will a kernel of the geography of power densities. This congestion-density, it turns out, is induced by the state’s folding together of various dimensions of the urban process and is experienced in an infrastructurally disturbing way. The topological consistency of power as such is with broader theoretical implications, since it reminds us of the significance of political mechanisms underlying a world of intensive heterogeneities on the one hand and the limit of verticality as a principal metaphor in talking about urban density on the other.KEYWORDS: Urban densityfoldingtopologyinfrastructurestateBeijingAcknowledgmentsEarlier versions of this paper were presented at the “Rethinking Density” workshop at Durham University (October 2019) and the 2019 Annual Meeting on China Urban Governance at Renmin University of China (November 2019). I would like to thank the organisers, discussants and those in the audience who provided helpful feedback. I am especially grateful for Colin McFarlane, Jenny Robinson and the DenCity team members at Durham who provide me with incisive suggestions. This paper has also benefited a lot from the anonymous reviewers as well as my students at Renmin University, whose thoughtful comments further help me to develop the key arguments here. All remaining errors are my own, though.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.Additional informationFundingThis work was supported by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, and the Research Funds of Renmin University of China (No.19XNF003).