Any modern city consists of housing, streets, electric and water utilities and transportation facilities. In different societies, however, cities look radically different. For although cities themselves grow like communities, following a process similar to that of nature, the process of city creation requires planning and public investment, and so the characteristics of the planning investors themselves influence the character of the city. If a city’s natural growth process is curtailed and relies on power to plan, design and control, the city will of course take on the shadow of power. Understanding the dynamics of power in the construction and management of a city gives us a general idea of what the city will look like.
How old is Old Beijing?
Examining Beijing from this perspective is not really one city, but an amalgamation of several.
Beijing in the mid-Qing Dynasty was nothing more than a large military camp. The main function of the city was to serve the emperor and his ministers in their political deliberations and lives. The other inhabitants of the city existed only as the end of the supply and service chain. In terms of volume, the emperor and his ministers were the mammals of the city, while the others were the ants, bees and mosses necessary to ensure the ecological cycle.
In traditional societies where a centralized bureaucracy governs society, all cities in the empire are central hubs of regional control. Whether in the capital or in the regions, cities were paramilitarized, open during the day and closed at night with gates and alleys, making them castles.
In keeping with the northern political ethos since the Yuan Dynasty, Beijing was more strictly planned and controlled, starting from the idea that it would not only fulfill peacetime needs, but also serve as a military base for logistical redeployment in times of war. The Manchu control, because of racial differences, stipulated that the inner city was the residential area for the eight Manchu banners, while the outer city was the residential area for the Han Chinese only.
Under the strict land and crowd control system, the development of civil society was extremely limited and confined to one or two commercial streets. What we call the old Beijing culture had not yet emerged at all.
After the 1860s, the loosening of the imperial system, the entry of foreign powers, and the changes in society made it impossible to strictly enforce Beijing’s control. The entry of railroads and automobiles changed the transportation system, but also the fabric of urban growth. The circulation of people in the city became easier and there was a greater demand for convenience. The inner cities were no longer off-limits to the Manchus. In the zones where the control of power was forced to shrink, civil society developed rapidly and found ways to nestle with the rigid system.
As a result, the culture of old Beijing is taking root and developing day by day.
The Xinhai Revolution saw the abdication of the Emperor. The change of power not only left a greater void in the control of Beijing, but also meant the collapse of the system that had sustained the original urban pattern. In the traditional system, the Qing Dynasty had a specialized rationing system to maintain the needs of the Manchu aristocracy in the inner city. When this rationing system disappeared, the operation and maintenance of the mansions became the biggest burden for the nobles. Selling houses naturally became a trend.
However, the decline and disorganization of power gave an opportunity for the growth of civil society. The cultural life dependent on the citizens began to grow explosively. As the old man at the actors’ training course in the movie Farewell My Concubine said, “You’ve caught up with the good times.
In this process, Manchu children played a subtle role. During the Qing dynasty, Manchu children were completely subordinate to the ruler, and their relationship with the emperor was more or less like that between a worker bee and a queen bee. The constraints they were subjected to were essentially in the form of prohibiting individuals from integrating into Han society outside of the system. This certainly maintained the purity of the worker bees, but when the hive collapsed, the worker bees went up in flames with it.
In the late Qing period, Manchu children had access to more social resources than the private sector through a rationing system that had not yet collapsed, and controls had been relaxed. There was room for contact and dialog between them and the Han-dominated civil society, which was beginning to develop. Because of their power and status, Manchu children naturally became the leaders of the civil society in terms of style and fashion, and also became important patrons of literary and artistic activities. However, after the collapse of the Manchu Qing Dynasty. However, after the fall of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, the Manchurian children were gradually abandoned by the society as they turned from leaders to foot-draggers. The growth pattern of Beijing culture also entered a new period because of this.
Large military camps under the 1949-1980 rationing system
Until 1949, Beijing entered a rare period of prosperity in any field. This period of the city was the freest Beijing had seen in more than 800 years. Hutongs were remodeled and large mansions were either remodeled or cut up. Slums took shape around Longshugou. This traditional military-run city began to take on the basic shape of a modern city.
After 1949, however, Beijing became the center of a Stalinist-Leninist socialist system. This system had the character of a general war, turning society into a logistical support for the storehouse of power. The control of power was characterized by several features, starting with the unprecedented penetration of its tentacles into all corners of society until it reached the level of the family. Then it reorganizes society according to the needs of the central government, turning it completely into a military barracks. Finally, the distribution of resources is then delineated by integrated rationing.
Beijing and all cities in the country have the same approach to control and to organize urban residents into production sequences using units as aggregates. Street blocks are used to fill in the gaps between units and to serve as nests for urban dwellers.
Although the communalization of land was only enshrined in the Constitution, written ownership ceased to matter shortly after the founding of the country in 1949. The new resettlement of citizens was completed by the end of the first five-year plan in 1957. By that time, 90 percent of the country’s urban residents had been incorporated into units.
However, there has been a lack of investment in the management of the nest in Peking City. A great deal of money is spent on public facilities and public buildings, on manifesting the greatness of power. And the development and production of residential housing has lagged behind as much as light industrial development. There is clearly a common logic behind it, both that life gives way to production. This result also contributes to the poor quality, low per capita area and poor public health conditions of nests in the city. Except for the courtyards occupied by upper-class officials. Most of Beijing’s residential neighborhoods have been cut into smaller pieces to compensate for the expansion of the city and the lack of public housing development. The siheyuan became a large miscellaneous courtyard.
Even so, the cities remained the upper class under the national rationing system, a difference that is evident from the effects of the three-year famine. The urbanites were supplied with food and could not starve.
Units assume a central function in this rationed social system. Large units develop public facilities related to daily life, movie theaters, bathhouses. The rationing of daily foodstuffs and the rationing of ingredients for important festivals were all taken care of by the unit. This custom has survived into the 21st century.
Civil society before 1949 was based on community neighborhoods. And after 1949, this tradition was partially broken up. It was more or less the opposite of the rural dismantling of clans and the establishment of potlatches. Cities broke up and reorganized the traditional neighborhood communities, with units assuming clan-like functions. The unit is not only responsible for the life, death, marriage, funeral, education and entertainment of the workers, but also establishes a closer community of interest, culture and interpersonal relationship among the workers. As a result, the so-called “children of compounds” and “children of factories and mines” were created.
Street blocks play a supporting role in this pattern, controlling the movement of people outside the unit. Employees of a unit often live in the same neighborhood, making it easier to manage. The hierarchy of districts in Beijing is also clear, with military compounds and ministries concentrated along Fuchengmen to Chaoyangmen and along Chang’an Street. This is the highest-ranking area of the city. The Chaoyang District contains the Embassy District, which local Beijing residents are generally not allowed to enter.
In this pattern, the scale and scope of population movement is controlled. An individual who wants to do business in a place where the length of the distance does not allow for a same-day commute needs to have official authorization to move in.
Because of the existence of the proposed common body during this period, stable interpersonal relationships and daily ethics were able to flourish. However, this common body image gradually declined and disintegrated after the social transformation in the 1980s. Just as the children of the Eight Banners had to cope with the new urban order. Today, the younger generation born after 70s and before 85 retains memories of a more egalitarian childhood, with a stronger atmosphere of urban community, and tends to embellish nostalgic thoughts.
Although, in those days, the vast majority of homes did not have private toilets. The human diet was poor and backward, and everyone loved Cream of Wheat.
During this period, the displacement of the citizens and the power hierarchy had already taken place, with power occupying the central areas and the citizens being pushed to the periphery of the city, such as in the expansion of Chang’an Street and Tiananmen Square, where the citizens were relocated and resettled in Jinsong and other places.
The growth of capital and power cooperation after 1980
After the 1980s, Beijing went into transition. The new commercial and capital atmosphere rippled through the Haidian District, Chaoyang District and the East and West Cities. It is interesting to note that around the 1990s, the West and East Cities of Beijing maintained their civic and commercial prosperity. For example, one of the largest disco clubs of the time, JJ’s, was located in Xinjiekou, and in the late 1990s, the market for audio-visual equipment, which signaled the highest standards of family life and public entertainment, was concentrated there; JJ’s declined rapidly in the early 21st century. Outside of the traditional Western food centers, seafood cuisine has become a new favorite of the upper class. One of the most popular seafood restaurants is Lichang Seafood World, located in Guiguo Temple, less than one kilometer south of Xinjiekou.
Similarly, the Longfusi area in the Dongcheng District saw a boom in the 1990s and led to the trade of small commodities in the neighborhood.
KFC and McDonald’s entered Beijing at Qianmen and Wangfujing, respectively. Both were the commercial centers of Beijing 49 years ago, and equally the centers of the rationing era. The Beijing Department Store is both in Wangfujing.
Prior to the 1990s, much of the prosperity of Beijing’s inner city was centered along the trolleybus line. This line was also an urban area of Beijing that was both relatively mature in terms of development before ’49, retaining the skeleton of the city, as well as a gathering place for the city’s old upper class and middle class. The new class of Beijing in the planned era prioritized the occupation of its physical space for use after driving out and eliminating the old upper class.
From the 1990s onwards, however, Beijing entered a new phase of expansion, and the prosperity of the old city was doomed to decline. the late 1980s saw the launch of China’s first commercial-residential district, Fangzhuang. High-rise plus park-like residential neighborhoods emerged, and a decade later, similar projects spread rapidly throughout Beijing and the country, changing the face of the city as it was at the time of the Flat-Street segment.
With the development of the Haidian and Chaoyang districts by policy, the city of Beijing was enriched with science and technology and foreign capital initiated and followed by state enterprises and individual commercial enterprises. New civic life grew with it.
At the same time, the control of power over the city is not lost, but the new order of hierarchy of the city is planned in the form of enclaves. The rings of the second and third ring until the sixth ring delineate the skeleton of the city.
Along Chang’an Street and the Second Ring Road, it constitutes the distribution belt of state organs and national economic and financial enterprises. The East Third Ring Road has become the distribution zone for foreign capitalism and embassy districts. This trend of construction was accompanied by the dismantling of traditional units and the demolition of some street blocks. However, some neighborhoods were still preserved. For example, in the vicinity of the Yonganli Embassy District, the old-style low-rise boarding houses remain.
After 2000, the Shichahai and Di’anmen areas were transformed into tourism development, spreading year by year to Nanluoguxiang, Guoguo Temple and Yonghegong area. Today, the Xinjiekou area is being demolished and transformed into a new site for inner-city redevelopment.
If you search by cafes on the electronic map, you will find an interesting phenomenon that it is difficult to find cafes in the center of the old city of East and West City, except for the tourist area. This is especially true of the old ministries’ neighborhoods along the West Side of the city to the West 3rd Ring Road and West 4th Ring Road. Urban space and land ownership in this area are constrained by national ministries and regional policies, making it even more difficult to develop commercial projects that meet the needs of the public. In addition to the concentration of old-school bureaucrats, the growth of a new civic culture is lagging behind.
Similarly, the distribution of supermarkets can also be seen. The distribution of supermarkets for the shopping needs of different classes naturally corresponds to the areas where the classes live. There is a clear difference between the distribution of the best top supermarkets and the distribution of the most common supermarkets in Beijing.
In addition, the urban infrastructure in the old town is relatively aged, with dense and obsolete power lines visible in the hutongs and on the streets.
However, perhaps for reasons of institutional control, the best medical and basic education institutions still exist in the upper-class distribution zones of the planned economy. In today’s world, homes around basic education institutions form school districts. Their housing prices are high, while their quality and living standards are much worse relative to newer neighborhoods with weaker education. This cannot but be ironic.
In short, the inner-city area of Beijing has so far created a kind of concave zone that lags behind the new commercial neighborhoods. This zone is lagging behind in every aspect except public resources, and yet prices are high.
The new round of development is marked by the strip between the fourth and sixth ring roads. It is almost always occupied by upgraded Fangzhuang neighborhoods and villa areas for the newly rich. Far from the centers of power, this area was built from scratch and is less affected by the legacy of the planned economy era. The vast majority of Beijing’s emerging middle and wealthy classes are concentrated in this zone. It is also the least urban in the true sense of the word that resembles rationed Beijing. One could even say that these zones and Beijing are two cities.
Particularly noteworthy is the rise of Yizhuang. This area concentrates nearly half of Beijing’s economic output. Around this economic scale, new urban neighborhoods have formed. The city streets and infrastructure are completely different from those in the center of Beijing, making it a city within a city. The coexistence of Decathlon and Sam’s Club marks the special character of Yizhuang.
In short, this article wants to try to clarify the general texture of Beijing’s urban development. Beijing has had different development plans at different times, but the basic function of the city is still to serve the new socialist class and to serve the power, and the absurdities that occurred during APEC are difficult to understand from the citizens’ point of view, but they are natural and reasonable from the managers’ point of view, because the owners of the city are not you and me, and there is no difference between Beijing and Pyongyang. Because you and I are not the masters of this city, there is no difference between Beijing and Pyongyang in this respect. To be able to obtain a Beijing hukou and be resettled in Beijing is in itself a privileged status in this country. The ability to obtain privileges is naturally filtered by power. Power is also used as an incentive and constraint on society. What can be said about this?
In addition, Beijing at different times had different driving forces and actors, and there was no such thing as a whole; it was more like a spliced together monster that suddenly grew out of nowhere as the political winds shifted. One could even say that Beijing is a plural concept. Sanlitun, Dongsi, Ganjiakou, Tongzhou, Qingnian Lu and Yizhuang cannot be understood in a single urban unit.
Beijing is always changing, and the only thing that remains the same is the understanding of the power holders of Beijing. This understanding permeates all corners of the city’s streets and alleys along with the various isolation zones and fences. The implication is that the citizens are treated as people diversion rather than owners of urban space. These fences and zones are walls, the control of power over urban space, and naturally over the physical space we live in, which you can call BEIJING WALL.
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