Search

Rural China is experiencing rapid socioeconomic transformations, including suburbanisation and rural gentrification. In this paper, we argue that to understand these processes, we have to take into account the changes in rural land rights. Based on an analysis of a pilot case for China's rural collective commercial construction land (RCCCL) reform policy at the edge of Chengdu City, we demonstrate how state-led rural land reform paves the way for stealthy land dispossession and rural gentrification. Our argument in this paper is threefold. First, given the entrenched collective land use rights of rural villagers in China, state-led land commodification, is a necessary condition for rural gentrification in China. Secondly, the prospect of capital accumulation through rural gentrification motivates entrepreneurial public and private actors to promote such reforms in ways that dispossess rural peasants and peasant collectives of their land (use) rights. Thirdly, the particularities of dispossession through state-led land reform result in particular experiences of displacement and displacement pressure on the side of affected rural communities. Our findings contribute to the decentring of rural gentrification theory, in that they underline the necessity to include the particular histories of land commodification and dispossession in our understanding of rural gentrification in contexts where rural land is partly or wholly shielded from market influences. In the case of China, dynamics of rural gentrification are blurring the rural-urban boundary on three dimensions: political economy (land use governance), material infrastructure (landscape and residential architecture), and socio-cultural practices (rural livelihoods and identity). • Rural land regimes structure peri-urban development in China. • Land commodification is a precondition for rural gentrification in China. • Original villagers are dispossessed and displaced. • Rural gentrification blurs the rural-urban boundary in terms of land use (rights), landscape and social relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper contributes to the literature on rural gentrification by incorporating empirical evidence from amenity-poor rural areas in the developing world. While current literature on rural gentrification has largely focused on the gentrification process in amenity-rich rural areas, the present study examines rural gentrification process in a historically polluted county in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China. The gentrification process features a holistic transformation of farmland into an artificial landscape, thereby segregating gentrifiers from both polluted rural space and unwelcoming urban space. The paper attributes the rise of holistic gentrification to state-initiated farmland concentration, and to the gentrifier developers' practices of redefining rurality as immersive resort experiences. The paper concludes that the holistic gentrification was conducive to job losses in both the recreation and agricultural sectors, consequently reducing peasant households to a state of passivity and dependency, while collective actions against gentrifier developers were ineffective owing to highly skewed power dynamics. • Holistic gentrification transforms large-scale farmland into scenic rural resorts in amenity-poor rural areas in China. • Holistic gentrification is caused by national peasant relocation programs. • Gentrifier developers redefine rurality as immersive resort experience. • Holistic gentrification is conducive to local job losses in recreation and agricultural sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]