Complex Perspectives
Neoliberal Urban Redevelopment and Endangered Cultural Heritage in China: A Case Study of Zhaofeng Road Community, Tianjin
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Xue Wang
In post-reform China, urban redevelopment has come into the neoliberal phase, featured by “real-estate-led redevelopment.” The increasingly dominating market-orientation and land-based finance could rapidly reshape cityscapes through massive demolition, eviction, and reconstruction, thus hastening the move away from the old city fabric and traditional lifestyle of local communities. Declined inner-cities are most subject to urban redevelopment because of their deteriorated physical conditions and high location values. Meanwhile, inner-cities hold high historic-cultural value because of the concentration of historic buildings and historical traces of city evolution. Such asymmetric value perceptions underlie the intense conflicts between neoliberal urban redevelopment and heritage preservation in China, whereby utilitarian reconstructions at the sacrifice of urban heritage have become a common occurrence. As interest conflicts are at the basis of this dilemma, it is necessary to figure out the different focuses, actual needs, expectancies, and practical difficulties perceived by different stakeholders. This study identifies the local government, developer, and residents as major stakeholders of urban redevelopment and heritage conservation programs, using a representative case to demonstrate the heterogeneous concerns of multi-stakeholders. The study area is a sharp-cut reflection of the contradictions between historic-cultural value and remarkable location value on commercial development, high market risks for local government and developer, and residents’ living dilemma. This study adopts fieldwork and semi-structured interviews as the research methods. Though clarifying uneven concerns about urban redevelopment and heritage conservation from perspectives of multi-stakeholders, this study explores possible strategies of heritage programs, which could strike a balance among multi-stakeholder interests.
Who’s Opposed to Climate Mitigation Policies? : The Collective (Mis)perceptions of Politically Conservative Americans
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Robert Forbis
The political divisiveness that is endemic across all levels of American governance is particularly acute regarding climate change. This most politically divisive issue has resulted in what has been widely described—and criticized—as resulting in policy stagnation. Utilizing a carbon footprint calculator and revised version of the Yale Climate Opinion Poll, preliminary results of our pilot study suggest that there is a significant shift occurring among political conservatives regarding their climate change beliefs as well as their desire for climate mitigation policies. This also suggests that the Yale Climate Opinion Map is in need of updating. These findings are the result of a survey conducted in what has been described as being the most notoriously conservative county in the U.S.: Lubbock County, Texas. Results of the survey indicate that climate mitigation policies are desired equally across the political spectrum. In turn, this suggests that climate change and in particular climate mitigation policies are more of a nonpartisan issue than the media and elected officials have portrayed. We are now replicating the survey in other notably conservative counties across the Unites States. We anticipate this more comprehensive study will confirm similar patterns of shifting beliefs among conservatives and an equally robust desire for climate mitigation policies. And if similar patterns emerge, it would appear that in terms of the broader American electorate, there is no real political opposition to climate mitigation policies.
