Urban Modernization

This book posits that, beyond China’s reform and opening-up policy and various factors of timing, geographical advantages, and popular will, the institutional innovations introduced in Shenzhen—including allowing inputs to receive reasonable returns, leveraging the market's role, cultivating modern industrial chain (clusters), promoting high-quality economic development, emphasizing contractual obligations and the rule of law, and establishing a limited yet effective governance framework—constitute the unique drivers of Shenzhen's modernization. The city's new designation as a Pilot Demonstration Zone has charted a course for its future development by defining new goals and consolidating its institutional advantages.