The city-life relationship constitutes the basic problem field of studies of urban meaning, while making life better is a core value field for critiquing and constructing such a meaning. Technically and tactically, Ch...The city-life relationship constitutes the basic problem field of studies of urban meaning, while making life better is a core value field for critiquing and constructing such a meaning. Technically and tactically, China's thirty years of reform and opening up practice have seen a string of successful models and experiences relating to "How should we develop cities?" Yet problems arising in the course of urbanization and the deteriorating quality of urban life require us to reflect upon and respond actively to the tricky question of meaning, a global issue: "Why develop cities?" In inquiring into urban meaning in the name of life, this study offers an academic approach and hope for the future through a critique of "devitalized" urban space and advocacy of a new form of urban civilization that will regulate and guide transformation in urban space under the principle of "the good life."展开更多
Rapidly urbanizing China is at a critical period in the construction of urban meaning and order. The city as an organic compound of space represents the organic integration in space of the elements of civilization, wh...Rapidly urbanizing China is at a critical period in the construction of urban meaning and order. The city as an organic compound of space represents the organic integration in space of the elements of civilization, while its meaning provides the ethical ties that link these elements to form an organic whole. A city without a locus of meaning will be buffeted by risks and confrontations. The realization of sustainable urban prosperity requires the integration of the city as an ordered community of meaning at the same time as its physical forms take shape. An important practical path to achieving this aim is restructuring city space in a rational "spatial-ethical ecology" based on integrity and interaction of physical, social and psychological urban space, by means of collective action knitted together by meaning and carried out by communities and organizations.展开更多
文摘The city-life relationship constitutes the basic problem field of studies of urban meaning, while making life better is a core value field for critiquing and constructing such a meaning. Technically and tactically, China's thirty years of reform and opening up practice have seen a string of successful models and experiences relating to "How should we develop cities?" Yet problems arising in the course of urbanization and the deteriorating quality of urban life require us to reflect upon and respond actively to the tricky question of meaning, a global issue: "Why develop cities?" In inquiring into urban meaning in the name of life, this study offers an academic approach and hope for the future through a critique of "devitalized" urban space and advocacy of a new form of urban civilization that will regulate and guide transformation in urban space under the principle of "the good life."
基金This study is part of 2007 key project sponsored by the National Social Science Foundation, "Paradigm Transformation of Development Ethics and the Historical Construction of ‘Harmonious World'" (07AZX005).
文摘Rapidly urbanizing China is at a critical period in the construction of urban meaning and order. The city as an organic compound of space represents the organic integration in space of the elements of civilization, while its meaning provides the ethical ties that link these elements to form an organic whole. A city without a locus of meaning will be buffeted by risks and confrontations. The realization of sustainable urban prosperity requires the integration of the city as an ordered community of meaning at the same time as its physical forms take shape. An important practical path to achieving this aim is restructuring city space in a rational "spatial-ethical ecology" based on integrity and interaction of physical, social and psychological urban space, by means of collective action knitted together by meaning and carried out by communities and organizations.