“城市区域”主义下的中国区域治理模式重构——珠三角城际铁路的实证

The restructuring of regional governance under the city regionalism of China: A case study of the Pearl River Delta intercity railway

中国的区域治理模式长期以来呈现出阶段性演化的特征。特别是近些年,传统省-市分层设权的权力组织关系被动态的、反复连续性的博弈所取代。本研究借助政治经济学与人文地理学关于"国家空间再中心化"及组织社会学者的"行政发包制"理论,立足区域基础设施项目,即"珠三角城际铁路网"展开实证,系统分析其规划、建设及运营过程。并聚焦其中的事权与财权动态演变过程,解析省政府的角色定位和省市关系的演变等两大关键问题,揭示中国城市区域治理重构的内在逻辑。研究发现:一方面,省政府的角色定位由"分包商"和"协调者"逐渐转变为协调与发展并重的新角色定位;同时,省市关系由结构化的"行政发包"转化为多轮协商的动态博弈连续体。

Regional governance in China has shown the periodic feature,notably under the city regionalism in recent years.Examining the formation of regional governance in China is conducive to probing the China’s city-regionalization as well as the features of institutional architecture oriented integrated development.The dynamic and continuing game process in terms of power configuration has replaced the traditional multi-level governmental system.Based upon a case study of Pearl River Delta intercity railway,this article examines the dynamic evolution of power and financial right relation in the planning,construction,and operation process systemically.The Pearl River Delta intercity railway is a large-scale infrastructure project in which multiple governments are fully involved and actively sought for their interests.Thereby,the primary objective of this article is to explore the dynamics of regional governance restructuring in China through interrogating the role of provincial government and the evolution of provincial-local relation.There are two important findings reported by this article.First,the role of provincial government has been transformed from subcontractor and coordinator to"subcontractor plus contractor"and"coordinator plus developer".This indicates that the provincial government has operated towards both gatekeeper and competitor.The financial authority is essential to determining this role transformation.Second,the structural administrative subcontract of provincial-local relation has transformed to serval opposed and cooperation waves of continuum.This continuum has been driven by different types of interests and the provincial-local relation constitutes to the stability and structural coherence of regional governance in China.This finding rectifies existing understanding around the regional governance mechanism,that is top-down and bottom-up mechanisms.As such,the regional governance has generally manifested as the hybrid model in which different governmental agencies co-shaped.The changing regional governance in the Pearl River Delta intercity railway also implies that the regional governance is sensitive to the concrete socioeconomic environment and varied case by case.In this vein,we contribute to the understanding of recentralization of state space as well as the restructuring of provincial-local relation beyond administrative subcontractor.It concludes that China’s cityregionalization is orchestrated by different levels of government and the actual effect and modality of regional governance are determined by inter-scalar politics oriented economic growth.