Globalizing Shanghai: the ‘Global Intelligence Corps’ and the building of Pudong

Abstract This article is situated in the current debate over the influence of globalization processes on the restructuring of cities. Shanghai, China's largest city, has been experiencing unprecedented foreign direct investment (FDI) in the first half of the 1990s, and urban restructuring processes are being worked out at blistering speeds. However, these developments, which are propelled by the shifting nature of the world economy and economic growth in the Asia Pacific region, are not the only impacts altering the nature of the urban planning process, and the urban landscape. Globalization processes have a myriad of non-material dimensions, and these dimensions play a significant role in underlying the processes associated with the building of the global city. To help redress this conceptual imbalance, the article is used to outline the role and diverse impacts (both tangible and intangible) of elite non-Chinese design professionals — the ‘Global Intelligence Corps’ — in the planning of Shanghai's new financial district — Lujiazui Central Finance District, Pudong. An examination of this urban planning process helps shed some light on the human dynamics behind globalization processes, and the twisting (often contradictory) goals which facilitate the formation of links across space.

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