Urbanization and City-Size Distribution in China
Reprinted with the authors' permission from Urban Studies, 39(12), pp. 2317–2327. The paper was first presented at the International Conference on China's Urbanization, Xiamen, Fujian, China, June 2001. The authors are grateful to participants for their comments and thank Guest Editor Kenneth Small and two anonymous referees of Urban Studies for their helpful comments and suggestions.
China has been experiencing rapid urbanization since the economic reform starting in 1978. The number of cities increased from 191 in 1978 to 667 in 1999, while the urban share of national population increased from 18 percent to 31 percent. This paper examines China's urbanization and the evolution of its city system. It uses city-level data from 1991 and 1998 to investigate China's city-size distribution and its changes. It also discusses how economic and institutional factors affect the urban system and the patterns of city growth.
