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Policy Mobility in Green Urbanism: A Comparative Case Study of Suzhou and Tianjin

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Abstract

China has initiated many eco-city projects to fulfill its economic, social and environmental expectations. This paper examines the underlying driving forces of policy mobility in the context of global turn to neo-liberalism, arguing that the urge for capital accumulation and production is what renders China an eager learner to absorb policy models of other countries. The punctuated equilibrium model is used to explain China’s turn in environmental policy, which converges with the neo-liberal urge and boosts the eco-city projects in China. The hybrid force calls for both economic growth and sustainable development, and further facilitates a new round of policy mobility focusing on green urbanism. Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP) and Sino-Singapore Tianjin Eco-city (SSEC) are both cases to reveal this new trend of policy transfer.

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Acknowledgements

This study was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 71834005, 71673232). The work described in this paper was also substantively supported by the grants from the Research Grant Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative region, China (Project No: CityU 11271716 and CityU 21209715).

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Correspondence to Yang Fu .

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Fu, Y., Zhang, X. (2019). Policy Mobility in Green Urbanism: A Comparative Case Study of Suzhou and Tianjin. In: Zhang, X. (eds) Remaking Sustainable Urbanism. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-3350-7_7

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