Resource Allocation and Sustainable Development in Transitional China

Over the past four decades, China's rapid industrialization, urbanization, and global integration have reshaped resource use while intensifying environmental pressures. This book explores China's economic transformation and its implications for resource allocation and sustainable development. This volume is founded on the premise that key development challenges in China cannot be fully understood when examined in isolation. Issues such as land expansion, energy transition, household carbon emissions, and capital flows are interconnected through broader processes of structural change and resource reallocation. The book presents empirically grounded studies that address these issues from diverse perspectives and at multiple levels of analysis. The chapters examine land and spatial allocation, energy and environmental outcomes, and capital allocation and outward investment. By linking empirical findings to an analytical framework, the book seeks to provide a more coherent interpretation of how allocation mechanisms influence the trajectory of sustainable development. The book is intended for researchers and graduate students in economics, environmental studies, and China studies, as well as policymakers interested in structural transformation and sustainability in emerging economies.