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Features: July 29, 2002
East Meets West in Shanghai
Alan Balfour's new book World
Cities: Shanghai,
(Wiley, 2002) is more than a study of the architecture of
one of Asia's most influential cities. Balfour's book examines
the history, culture, and politics of Shanghai that led
to unprecedented growth in the last decade of the 20th century.
Shanghai, a city of commercialism and consumerism,
is a place where any Westerner would feel at home, says
Balfour, dean of the School of Architecture. Yet underneath
this facade of coffee houses and fast food restaurants lies
the regimented order of Communism that controlled a physical
and economic transformation unparalleled in urban history.
The onset of Shanghai's transformation stemmed
from the late 1970s decree by Deng Xiaoping to turn China
into a modern nation by the year 2000. Now Shanghai is a
city of power and influence that rivals the capital Beijing;
it is a city that benefits from "crass consumerism."
Yet Balfour warns against categorizing the
city as a "naive representation of Western reality."
There is confusion in the culture from the incredible changes
that have occurred over the last decade, but one must remember
that Shanghai has emerged "out of the 3,000-year history
of urban culture in China."
This strong history and intense desire to
succeed will make Shanghai into one of the world's most
populous cities, and one of its wealthiest, Balfour believes.
"Even if the city is unable to escape the seduction
of the West, the result will not be failure. Throughout
its history, this has been a city of wily pragmatism,"
he says.
Shanghai is Balfour's third "World
Cities" book, following New York (2001) and Berlin
(1995).
For more information go to Press
Release
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