https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2410-351X
![Sample our Urban Studies journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/110826/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Urban-Studies.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
This article examines the urbanization of Tibet. We argue that urbanization is a new technique of colonial governance for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and is characterized by what Yen Le Espiritu calls ‘differential inclusion’: a form of forcible incorporation resulting in particular spaces and populations being ‘deemed integral to the nation … only or precisely because of their designated subordinate standing’. We explore how urbanization achieves the differential inclusion of Tibet and Tibetans through three distinct processes: segregation (the separation of Tibetan and Han Chinese spaces), congregation (the creation of Tibetan-dominated towns) and negation (urbanization as an administrative process that undermines Tibetan political autonomy). We argue that these three processes form an integrated strategy of colonial governance aimed at achieving differential inclusion. We conclude by arguing that our case study of the urbanization of Tibet offers a model for thinking about the role urbanization plays in enforcing differential inclusion as a means of colonial governance elsewhere in the PRC, and beyond.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors are grateful to the reviewers and editors for help with this article; any errors remain the authors’ own.
DISCLOSURE STATEMENT
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1 Particularly, the National New-Type Urbanization Plan (2014–20) and Rural Poverty Alleviation and Development Program (2011–20). As Wilmsen (Citation2Citation0Citation1Citation8) points out, the aim of these policies is to drive the national shift from an investment- and export-led economy to a consumer-led economy.
2 A distinction is made in the Chinese language between urbanization through the expansion of ‘cities’ (chengshihua) and expansion in the number and size of smaller ‘towns’ (chengzhenhua).
3 The first author carried out ethnographic observations and semi-structured interviews in Rong bo in north-east Tibet (113 interviews, conducted in 2016–17); Guza in eastern Tibet (observation and informal conversation, 2016–17); and in Chengdu (six focus group interviews, each with between two and five participants, 2018). All interviews were conducted with Tibetans who speak minoritized languages: Manegacha, nDrapa and Gochang.
4 The first author lived in Xining, capital of Qinghai, for eight years (2005–13), working with Tibetan communities there, and not only lived through a period of rapid urbanization but also during this time had many informal conversations with Tibetan interlocutors about urbanization, both in Xining and elsewhere in Tibet. The second author lived in Nanjing, Shanghai and Beijing for nearly a decade during the 1990s and 2000s, and has travelled extensively throughout the ethnic periphery. The third author has spent more than three years living and working in Tibetan parts of Yunnan province.
5 Of the more than 200 million migrant workers in China today, between 20 and 25 million are ethnic minorities. State policies aim to increase this population by 1.81% annually (State Council, Citation2016).
6 The five ‘minzu’ universities in the PRC where Tibetans study are Qinghai Nationalities University (Zi ling); Northwest Nationalities University (Lanzhou); Southwest Nationalities University (Chengdu); Yunnan Nationalities University (Kunming); and Minzu University of China (Beijing). This list excludes vocational tertiary institutes: Gansu Nationalities Normal University (in Gtsos), Sichuan Nationalities Normal University (in Guza) or Tibetan Medical University (Lhasa). Lhasa is also home to the only university in Tibet, Tibet University, which, despite having a student body dominated by Tibetans and other ‘minority’ students, is not designated as a ‘minzu’ university.
8 This event was reported on Chinese social media platform WeChat, and was also shared on Twitter (https://twitter.com/lhaphur/status/1115394924709593089?s=19 and https://twitter.com/lhaphur/status/1115762734937800704?s=19).
9 As Mumford (Citation2012, p. 1) describes, reduccion comes ‘from the Spanish verb reducer, meaning to subdue, persuade, or reorder’.
10 Now officially known as Shangri-La (Hillman, Citation2003).
11 Zhu et al. (Citation2013, p. 43) define in situ urbanization as ‘a phenomenon where rural settlements and their populations transform themselves into urban or quasi-urban settlements without much geographical relocation of the residents’.
12 In this sense, the violence of urbanization here is not a case of ‘urbicide’ (Goonewardena & Kipfer, Citation2006) – the destruction of a city – but it is coherent with other forms as architectural violence described by Bevan (Citation2007). What we see is destruction by the city rather than destruction of the city.
13 Han migration to these places has failed for several reasons, including the collapse of state-led agricultural projects that did not take into account the plateau environment (Rohlf, Citation2016), as well as the economic conditions of Tibetan regions relative to the Han heartlands.
14 Although English-language sources do not describe the protestors’ background (https://savetibet.org/tibetans-in-rebkong-gather-to-protest-police-brutality/), Tibetan sources clearly state that protestors were from the Ngandehua-speaking community of Seng ge gshong (https://www.voatibetan.com/a/protest-in-rebkong-/1485909.html). For a video of the protests, including the chants, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPTT6D6oMVU&feature=youtu.be.
15 In the Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Yunnan province, the number of annual visitors grew from 43,000 in 1997 to over 3 million in 2007 following a successful tourism marketing campaign centred on ‘Shangri-la’ (Hillman, Citation2010, p. 274). Today tourism is one of the largest industries in China’s Tibetan areas.
16 An important exception to the pattern outlined in this section are the cities of Golmud and Delinghka, and others, in northern and western Qinghai. These towns are essentially Han settler towns inside Tibet. They are characterized by the demographic dominance of non-Tibetan populations – Han, Hui and other ethnic groups – as well as large military garrisons. Tibetans living in these cities are, despite being within Tibetan territory, inhabiting non-Tibetan sites. These cities are characterized by ‘audaciously expansive’ (Edmonds, Citation2010, p. 66) forms: broad streets in regular grids that radiate from a political centre, a pattern common in modern Chinese urban planning (Abramson, Citation2008). Most of these cities operate primarily as bases for resource extraction and logistical hubs for the processing and transport of natural resources.
17 This figure was calculated by the authors using 2010 census data; it does not include the two autonomous counties of Muli and Dpa’ ris.