Examining collaborative planning processes and outcomes in urban regeneration: A deliberative turn in China?

Abstract

Collaborative planning practices have recently emerged in China to deal with the complexity and conflicts of interest in urban regeneration. Building on the concept of authoritarian deliberation, this study develops a conceptual framework to examine the reasons for initiating collaborative planning, and its processes and outcomes. Through the case study of Guangzhou’s Enning Road micro-regeneration project, this research deepens understanding of collaborative planning in an authoritarian context. It reveals that deliberative methods were used by the local government to mitigate conflicts and improve governance performance in urban regeneration. While deliberations in an authoritarian context met many process criteria of collaborative planning, the collaborative processes had limited influence on planning outcomes. In addition, this study marks the increased level of participation in Chinese urban regeneration and discusses the limitation of deliberative practices in an authoritarian context. Lastly, this study reflects on the adoption of collaborative planning approaches as a state strategy to balance various interests and reinforce its dominance in market-driven urban regeneration, ultimately to achieve goals beyond economic benefits.

Introduction

Urban regeneration is expected to achieve multi-faceted objectives in contemporary cities (Roberts, 2000). At the same time, the diverse foci of urban regeneration also bring inherent complexity into the process, due to the involvement of various stakeholders with diverse interests (Mayer et al., 2005). Recently, urban regeneration has been prioritised in the Chinese urbanisation agenda, as land resources have become scarce in densely populated urban areas (Tang et al., 2019). However, urban regeneration in China has led to many social conflicts because of the increasingly complex problems and the limited room for public participation in planning processes (Chen and Qu, 2020; Ye et al., 2021). The instrumental and technocratic planning system is becoming incapable of dealing with the complexity of urban regeneration: competing interests among various actors, plural values, intricate property-rights systems and social inequalities.

Collaborative planning approaches have thus emerged to address conflicts among interest groups in urban regeneration (McCarthy, 2016). With an emphasis on conflict mediation and consensus-building, collaborative planning represents a participatory and deliberative approach to managing public matters through inclusive, sincere, truth-seeking, and interactive communications (Healey, 2020; Innes and Booher, 2018). Scholars observe a discursive turn in the Chinese planning system (Cao et al., 2021). First, the fast development of the internet and the widespread use of social media have facilitated a range of grassroots, internet-based participation in urban planning in China, which expands the channels for public participation and challenges the power imbalance in the traditional planning system (Cheng, 2013; Deng et al., 2015). Second, planning professionals have demonstrated various advantages of collaborative planning approaches, such as avoiding violent demolition (Liu and Xu, 2018) and mitigating conflicts in contested projects (Liu et al., 2022). However, Chinese collaborative planning practices are constrained by issues such as insufficient institutional support, citizens’ low motivation to participate, and limited impact of public participation (Li et al., 2020a). As Cao et al. (2021) have indicated, the instances of collaborative planning in China diverge from the ideal types in collaborative planning theory. Particularly notable is the government’s dominant role in Chinese collaborative partnerships (Wang and Huang, 2021). Nonetheless, there is little research on how the authoritarian context influences the processes and the subsequent outcomes of collaborative planning in China.

More broadly, collaborative planning theory is criticised for its insufficient attention to planning contexts (Huxley and Yiftachel, 2000; McGuirk, 2001). This criticism is particularly relevant in the Global South, where the different institutional contexts create a disjunct between the original theory and the collaborative planning practices (Watson, 2009). While collaborative planning is firmly grounded in democratic deliberation in Western contexts, Lin (2023) notes that Chinese collaborative practices are characterised by authoritarian deliberation. The concept of authoritarian deliberation refers to the rise of a deliberative turn in Chinese political system and governance, where authoritarianism is permeated with participatory and deliberative practices (He and Warren, 2011). This concept provides a vantage point for scholars to study collaborative planning in China, where the ruling elites tightly control collaborative processes and outcomes. Another critique is that collaborative planning theory overemphasises planning processes and fails to consider other influential factors beyond these processes (Fainstein, 2000). Scholars find that recently in China political interests may have outweighed economic benefits in urban redevelopment initiatives, which reflects the strong role of the central government in local urban planning (Wu et al., 2022). There is a need for a more nuanced understanding of the influence of political, economic, and social factors on the processes and outcomes of collaborative planning in China.

This research takes a case study of the Enning Road micro-regeneration project in Guangzhou to elaborate on why collaborative planning is deployed, and on its processes and outcomes. Micro-regeneration refers to a new urban regeneration method that involves small-scale building renovation in the regenerating area instead of property-led redevelopment with wholesale demolition. Responding to increasing social discontent surrounding the Enning Road project, the local government established a deliberation platform involving diverse actors to discuss the issues emerging from the micro-regeneration process. We examine the rationale behind using deliberative methods, the deliberation processes, and the subsequent outcomes in the micro-regeneration project. This study contributes to theoretical debates on collaborative planning and deliberative practices in an authoritarian context by developing a conceptual framework to examine their reasons, processes, and outcomes. This research also provides empirical evidence of collaborative planning in Chinese urban regeneration.

This paper is organised as follows. The second section provides the theoretical background of the research. First, collaborative planning theory and its criticisms are discussed. Second, the notion of authoritarian deliberation is introduced, followed by a conceptual framework. The third section presents the research methodology. The fourth section elaborates on the Enning Road micro-regeneration project with the conceptual framework. In the fifth section, the paper concludes by highlighting the wider theoretical debates on collaborative planning and deliberative practices in an authoritarian context and the state’s strategy in the new era of urban regeneration in China.

Theoretical framework

Collaborative planning theory and its criticisms

Collaborative planning theory largely adopts Habermasian communicative rationality in which planning is seen as a process of interactive collective reasoning or a locale for authentic dialogue (Healey, 2020; Innes and Booher, 2018). As a participatory and dialogical endeavour, collaborative planning explores the potential of deliberative democracy in the planning field. It aims to make planning processes inclusive and thorough before planning issues are settled and seeks ways to reduce the influence of systematically biased power relations on planning (Sager, 2017). Certain conditions should be met, including legitimate representation of participants, sincere and accurate use of language, inclusive dialogue, equal access to information, equal opportunities to speak and be heard and reflexive processes that promote mutual understanding (Healey, 2020; Innes and Booher, 2018).

However, this communication-centred approach is subject to two major criticisms. First, scholars argue that collaborative planning theory overlooks the wider political, economic and social contexts in which planning practices are embedded (Huxley and Yiftachel, 2000; Tewdwr-Jones and Allmendinger, 1998). In particular, institutional and political legacies have predetermined the deliberation boundaries, shaped the existing interactions and capacities, and forged a series of interest alignments, making it nearly impossible to achieve ideal-type communication in real planning practices (Brand and Gaffikin, 2007; McGuirk, 2001). This critique becomes significant in the Global South, where the theory’s underlying assumptions of deliberative democracy do not hold (Watson, 2008). The second critique is that the theory attaches inadequate importance to planning outcomes. Achievable planning outcomes are subject to factors such as formal rules, political priorities, allocated state resources and local economies, which cannot be transformed through collaborative processes (Fainstein, 2010; Huxley and Yiftachel, 2000). And there is a risk of failing to translate the processes into the desired outcomes, particularly when the consensual solutions are not legally binding for the participants (Tewdwr-Jones and Allmendinger, 1998). While the collaborative planning literature and most of its criticisms are predominantly discussed in Western contexts, a detailed investigation into the processes and outcomes of collaborative planning in China can shed light on the limitations of collaborative planning in the Global South.

Authoritarian deliberation

The emergence of collaborative planning practices in China has been accompanied by a deliberative turn in China (Lin, 2023). The concept of authoritarian deliberation was coined by He and Warren (2011) to describe the use of deliberative mechanisms by authoritarian rulers to inform public decisions. Here, deliberation is defined as a mode of communication that generates a persuasive influence on decision-making. Unlike deliberation in democratic countries, authoritarian deliberation implies that the state’s monopoly in decision-making is unchallenged (He and Thøgersen, 2010). However, there is a need to expand the public participation groups and to empower public voices to a certain degree to address popular resistance and to respond to growing social demands at local level (He and Wagenaar, 2018). Authoritarian deliberation differs from other forms of communication in authoritarian contexts in its distinct process and outcome criteria (Jiang, 2010). First, the authorities must create – or, at the very least, allow – the existence of a public space where issues are debated, arguments are sustained by sufficient evidence or proper justifications, and different opinions and responses are shared and considered. Second, the final decision should, at a minimum, reflect the suggestions stemming from the deliberative processes. In China, deliberative mechanisms are often used by local governments to pursue conflict mitigation and improve governance performance (Tang, 2015). Deliberative practices usually have different motivations and work in different ways; some may achieve significant citizen empowerment, whereas others are more tightly controlled and intervened in by the government (Fishkin et al., 2010).

Conceptual framework

Building upon the concept of authoritarian deliberation and collaborative planning literature, we develop a conceptual framework to examine the reasons, processes, and outcomes of collaborative planning in an authoritarian context.

Why deliberate?

There are normative, strategic, and functional reasons for governments to use deliberative mechanisms in China (He and Warren, 2011). First, the Chinese conception of deliberation originated from the Confucian philosophy in the imperial era, which saw deliberation as a moral requirement for ruling elites (He, 2014). It emphasised that rulers should lead the country through moral persuasion, not coercion. Second, the government uses deliberations as a strategic approach to channel citizens’ political demands into government-controlled venues (He and Warren, 2011). This also explains why most Chinese deliberative practices are implemented at local levels and focus on certain topics, thereby acting as a form of moderate democracy to avoid radical and substantial political reform (He, 2006). Third, rulers use deliberative mechanisms as a crucial policy instrument to pursue social stability and improve governance performance when facing increasing resistance to autocratic decision-making and poor results from policy implementation (Tang and Dryzek, 2014). State-dominated capitalism and the unequal distribution of wealth have led to persisting social unrest, which also raises serious political challenges (Zhang et al., 2021). He and Warren (2011) summarise five functions of authoritarian deliberation: co-opting dissent and maintaining social order; acquiring information; creating business opportunities; supervising local officials; and deflecting the responsibility of leaders.

How to deliberate?

Drawing on previous evaluative frameworks (Agger and Löfgren, 2008; Tong and He, 2018), we examine deliberations in collaborative planning from five aspects. First, we examine the identity of participants in deliberation, as well as the selection criteria for participants and who selects them. Second, we investigate the agenda-setting stage, focussing on who has the power to initiate deliberations and propose and select topics for deliberations. The third aspect centres on the reasoning processes in deliberation, assessed according to the process criteria from collaborative planning literature: whether each participant has equal and adequate access to information, the right to express opinions, and the capacity to contest the assertions of others while showing reciprocal respect. The fourth aspect pertains to the authenticity of deliberation, assessed by whether the deliberation topics address real-life substantial issues. In urban planning, the deliberation topics include planning zones, preliminary design, housing renovation, public facilities, compensation, noise nuisance and so on. They are selective in terms of various contexts and different planning stages. Fifth, we examine the immediate results of the deliberation and its effects on planning outcomes.

In addition, the stages of a planning process during which deliberations take place have significant implications for the influence of deliberations. Innes and Booher (2018) distinguish five stages of a collaborative process: assessment/planning; organisational; educational; negotiation/resolution; and implementation. Deliberations at each stage are bounded to addressing the tasks and challenges of that stage, resulting in varied impacts on the planning outcomes. For example, deliberation at assessment stage can help to identify common problems and stakeholders, whereas during implementation stage deliberation can be used to develop maintenance strategies and respond to emerging conflicts (Lin and Benneker, 2022).

What are the outcomes?

The instrumental role of authoritarian deliberation in conflict mitigation requires decision-makers to take immediate and concrete actions, while giving less consideration to relevant policies and the planning system (Tang, 2014). Therefore, one explicit outcome of such deliberations is that responsible organisations take immediate action to address the pressing issues at hand, whereas the revision of policies and systems may only occur much later. In addition, collaborative planning theorists suggest that the assessment of outcomes of collaborative processes should include not only tangible, easily recognisable ones but also intangible outcomes such as social, intellectual, and political capital (Healey, 2003; Innes and Booher, 1999). Social capital refers to new or stronger personal and professional relationships and trust that are sufficient to enable genuine communication and joint problem-solving. Intellectual capital encompasses shared problem definitions, mutual understanding, and agreements on scientific information, forming a knowledge base for coordinating actions. Political capital refers to actors’ capacity to mobilise and act collaboratively with various interest groups and thus influence public action and/or break a deadlock.

Furthermore, we argue that an examination of planning outcomes should expound on planning outcomes that are not influenced by the planning processes. In China, where the government exercises significant control over the market, political considerations may be prioritised over economic gains in planning activities (Wu et al., 2022). Wu (2018) proposes the term ‘state entrepreneurialism’ to highlight the political rationale behind the emergence of state entrepreneurial behaviour in urban transformation. This concept denotes the state’s engagement in market activities and its entrepreneurial role in the economy, differentiating Chinese urban transformation from a neoliberal growth machine. Thus, planning outcomes in China are subject to various political, economic and social considerations.

Methodology

We employ a single case study approach focussing on the Enning Road micro-regeneration project in Guangzhou, which was selected due to its pioneering and exemplary role in recent Chinese urban regeneration. It is the first pilot project to trial the micro-regeneration method and to adopt deliberative mechanisms in urban regeneration in China. The project was endorsed by President Xi during his visit in October 2018, since when it has become a nationwide demonstration case of urban regeneration. This study draws upon the information from newspaper articles, academic journals, and official documents. In addition, the first author conducted 26 semi-structured interviews with individuals from local governments, universities, planning agencies, the real estate company, the civil society organisation, and residents during fieldwork in Guangzhou from May to July 2022. The first author also observed the deliberation processes in a meeting held by the Enning Road co-creation committee in June 2022. Lastly, onsite observation was conducted to examine the project outcomes, such as the area’s appearance after micro-regeneration, the commercial and tourist activities, and the living conditions of the remaining residents.

The discourse analysis method was used to elucidate the practice of micro-regeneration in Guangzhou and the actions of key actors in planning activities. This method assumes that politics is an arena where different interest groups seek to construct a particular narrative or version of events to shape political agendas (Jacobs, 2006). The data collected from the online documents and the notes on the 26 semi-structured interviews were analysed following the three-dimensional framework of critical discourse analysis (Fairclough, 1992). The first step analysed the text, so entailed examining how the concept of ‘micro-regeneration’ was articulated in both spoken and written vocabulary. This step revealed the attitudes, values and interpretations of the message senders that might lead to different ways of doing and different results. The second step concentrated on discursive practices, which encompass two dimensions: the discursive conditions (i.e. the framing of texts or statements, and the identities of message senders and receivers) and the manifestation of discourse (i.e. the forms or styles in which messages were conveyed). This step yielded insights into social relationships and the embedded norms and culture of communicative events. The third step was to analyse the social practices of micro-regeneration, as the discourse of micro-regeneration was embedded in the broader economic and political contexts. Specifically, we considered the political, economic, and social conditions under which the project was implemented, as well as the ideological and political effects of the discourse.

Deliberations on micro-regeneration in Guangzhou

Background of the Enning Road micro-regeneration project

The Enning Road area is in the Liwan District of Guangzhou, an area renowned for its traditional architecture and the preservation of the lifestyle of native residents. The area has undergone lengthy and contentious redevelopment processes since 2006, and there have been several major changes in its redevelopment plans. The local government initially intended to expropriate and demolish most of the old buildings in the area. The demolition of housing started in 2008, and by 2012, approximately 70% of the original residents had agreed to the compensation scheme and had been relocated. However, the demolition was not completed due to conflicts related to relocation, compensation and heritage preservation, which triggered widespread public concerns. Consequently, the redevelopment of the Enning Road area stagnated for several years.

In 2015, the Guangzhou municipal government introduced a new urban regeneration method called micro-regeneration in its first municipal urban renewal policy. The Enning Road area was selected as the pilot project to experiment with this method in 2016. Due to funding shortages, the Liwan District government outsourced the project to the real estate company Vanke Group under a BOT (build–operate–transfer) contract. The developer was required to rebuild or renovate the government-owned houses in the area following the government’s guidelines. In return, the developer was granted the management rights to these renovated buildings for a certain period, to recoup its investment. The project was implemented in two phases, with the developer holding management rights for the buildings in the first phase for 15 years and in the second phase for 20 years. At the end of the management period, the developer should transfer the management rights back to the district government.

The first phase of the project was implemented in an approximately 8000 m² plot called Yongqingfang in February 2016. It entailed renovating the vacant public buildings and communal spaces in the plot, while the resident-occupied dwellings remained untouched. In October 2016, the plot was transformed into an area with mixed commercial and residential use. The Yongqingfang project was criticised for the architectural style of the renovated buildings, the destruction of resident-occupied houses, and the lack of transparency and citizen participation (news article reported in He and Mo, 2016).

The project’s second phase began two years later in September 2018 and covered the remaining 90,000 m² of the Enning Road area. In response to social concerns and criticism regarding the project, the local government established the Enning Road co-creation committee at the beginning of this phase. The committee held regular meetings with representatives from various interest groups to discuss issues related to the project. More details of the co-creation committee are given in the following section.

Why the Enning Road co-creation committee was established

Although the micro-regeneration method provided a solution for continuing the redevelopment of the area, the project still faced inevitable and persistent conflicts. First, the micro-regeneration method meant that some original residents remained in the area. However, due to the high housing density, residents experienced significant disturbance and inconvenience from the nearby building renovation. The disturbance to residents’ lives was further exacerbated by the commercial and tourist activities after the developer converted the area into a popular tourist attraction. Moreover, the second phase of the project experienced greater complexity than the first. It covered a significantly larger area, with over 400 households affected by the project compared to the 20 households in the first phase. In addition, the project faced substantial social pressure due to the strong criticism of its first phase. Consequently, the commencement of the second phase was delayed by two years (interview with a real estate employee, May 2022). The establishment of the Enning Road co-creation committee offered a solution for proceeding with the project in a such complex situation.

The idea of establishing a co-creation committee was initially constructed by several planning professors from local universities with planning officials. Having witnessed the redevelopment process since its inception in 2006, they recognised the need for a conflict resolution platform (interview with an official, May 2022). Despite the notable improvement of the physical environment during the project’s first phase, local officials knew the living conditions of some residents had not improved, and their lives were disturbed by the regeneration project. A local official explained that despite the lack of administrative and financial support, they felt the imperative to mend the relationship between the government and citizens:

In the beginning, we did not even have a fixed meeting room. But I thought we still needed to do it, because we made some mistakes in the first phase; many residents felt hurt, and some problems remained unsolved. There were no ways to coordinate and solve these problems. In the second phase, we wanted to mend the relationships with residents and to know how we could improve. (Interview, May 2022)

The committee also offered a means for the local government to maintain social order, given that the tension between residents and the developer in the project had posed a threat to social stability. Because of the nuisance caused by the first phase of the project, residents filed a joint petition against the project to higher-level governments in 2017 (He and Mo, 2017). This civic petition was seen as a challenge to the local authority, as it revealed the failure of local-level officials to resolve the issues (Wong and Peng, 2015). Thus, the local government was incentivised to silence the petitioners. In addition, confrontations between the developer and residents occurred periodically during the project implementation period (interviews with several residents, May–July 2022). Many residents held a strong grudge against the developer because of its illegal conduct and the disturbance brought by the project. Moreover, the prior lengthy and contentious redevelopment processes had severely strained the relationship between residents and the local government. Therefore, it was crucial for the local government to maintain good relationships with residents to prevent social unrest in the area. The committee meetings provided a space for communication and deliberation where each party could explain and clarify the issues arising from the project. At a minimum, the meetings served as a pressure outlet for residents to express their grievances and anger. In this way, the government ascertained public opinion and could address conflicting issues before they escalated beyond control.

Lastly, the committee meetings provided local governments with information to improve governance performance. By attending committee meetings, government officials stayed informed about the project’s progress and residents’ concerns. For example, residents were able to voice their complaints about the misconduct of the developer, such as housing damage and late-night construction, and during committee meetings they provided evidence in the form of videos and photos (meeting observation, June 2022). It helped to alert the government to the problem and put pressure on both the government and the developer to take corrective action. The information generated from these committee meetings enabled local government to effectively and timely supervise the market-driven project and thus improve governance performance in urban regeneration.

Deliberations in the co-creation committee meetings

This section examines the deliberations that took place in the co-creation committee meetings from four aspects: the participants; agenda setting; deliberation topics; and deliberation processes.

Participants

The committee consists of 25 formal members from a wide range of groups; they are 12 resident representatives, two officials from Liwan District Urban Renewal Center (representatives of government-owned houses), three planning professors, one official from the Duobao Street Office (the lowest level of government), one developer representative, one business owner representative, one community planner, two media representatives and two members from the district Communist Party organisations. There are also several online WeChat groups with members from diverse backgrounds. Most of the formal members were nominated by the local government, whereas some residents signed up by themselves to become formal members. An official stated that there were no eligibility requirements because the committee was intended to be as inclusive as possible (interview, May 2022). The public could also participate in committee meetings without being formal members. However, the inclusiveness of the committee has not been without problems. First, the diverse composition of the committee was not always represented, as not all members attended every committee meeting. A member remarked that some formal members only showed up for the first committee meeting (meeting observation, June 2022). Second, although the government claimed that there were no entry requirements, approval from local officials was needed for individuals who wanted to join the committee or WeChat groups. A resident said that a journalist was removed from a WeChat group because the group administrator deemed the journalist irrelevant to the project (interview, June 2022). A local official also expressed concerns regarding the resident representatives in the committee:

Only residents who were highly dissatisfied with the project actively participated in the meetings. But these residents mainly talked about their losses and personal demands and showed less interest in the area’s planning. This often made it difficult to continue the discussion, because we wanted to focus more on the public interests of the area. (Interview, May 2022)

Agenda setting and deliberation topics

Committee meetings were convened by the Duobao Street Office. For the first two years, the committee held regular monthly meetings, but from 2020 meetings were held only when notified by the street office. The committee mandated that the meeting dates should be announced, and topics should be collected three days in advance (interview with a professor, May 2022). People who were concerned about Enning Road could report problems to the street office and the committee members, or directly express their concerns in WeChat groups. One day before the meeting, the street office would disseminate the meeting agenda. The co-creation committee, as defined by the local government, aimed to negotiate project planning, supervise business behaviour, and address daily conflicts. In practice, deliberation topics revolved around planning issues, such as the functions of renovated buildings, locations of public facilities and standards for self-renovations. They also addressed pragmatic issues that emerged during project implementation and operation, including noise nuisance, housing damage and the maintenance of communal areas. Some residents used online WeChat groups to express their concerns about the project. The topics of noise control and housing damage assessment, which were mentioned frequently in WeChat groups, became the focus of deliberation in the June 2022 meeting, while certain problems were promptly addressed by the street office or the developer and did not become subjects of deliberation. However, because the meeting agenda was eventually announced by the street office, there was a risk that officials might omit some sensitive or controversial topics from public deliberations. For example, during the interviews with some residents, a recurring theme was their strong desire to move out of the area and their disagreement with the compensation methods offered by the government. However, in the meeting that the first author observed in June 2022, the topics included the noise problem caused by late-night construction, policies of resident self-renovation, the next working plan of Enning Road, and the adjustment of committee members, while issues related to relocation and compensation were not discussed.

Deliberation processes

In the absence of regulatory guidelines, the committee discussed and formulated its own rules for deliberation during the first few meetings (interview with a professor, May 2022). A photo showed that during a meeting, the committee wrote a set of deliberation rules on a whiteboard. These rules concerned the meeting frequency, time limits for speeches, attendance requirements, agenda setting and topic collection, the structure for deliberating a topic, and the required response from the government. To ensure sufficient access to information, the project planning was publicised on noticeboards and official websites. The real estate employee and planners said that they tried to use plain language and intuitive pictures to introduce the project planning, to ensure that every participant could understand and provide input (interviews with a real estate employee and planners, May 2022). However, several residents still struggled to comprehend the published planning information (interviews, May–July 2022).

There was a relatively high degree of freedom in the deliberation processes (meeting observation, June 2022). Most of the formal members attended the meeting, and the open meeting room allowed many residents to stand aside and participate. However, several resident representatives and the committee members from the district Communist Party organisations were absent. The meeting was chaired by an official from the Urban Renewal Center and proceeded based on the pre-announced agenda. During the meeting, participants were encouraged to express their opinions with supporting reasoning or evidence. For example, because many residents disagreed with the strict regulations on resident self-renovation, participants – including professors, planning officials and residents – deliberated on reasonable standards of self-renovation, such as height limits, area sizes and styles of building appearance. Critical questions from residents and media representatives were allowed and responded to by the developer and government departments. The meeting extended beyond the anticipated two hours to four since the moderator did not strictly control speech time. Particularly when confronted with challenging topics, discussions often exceeded the expected duration and had to be terminated because no resolution could be reached after prolonged deliberations. In this respect, the committee meeting provided an open space for opinion expression and discussion. Despite these efforts, it was difficult to achieve an equal opportunity for everyone to express opinions and be heard in the meeting. The individuals who spoke the most were a journalist, who raised many residents’ complaints regarding construction noise and housing damage, and the developer representatives, who either provided justification of these issues or responded with corrective measures to address these complaints. Meanwhile, others either remained silent or spoke only when questioned. An inactive resident expressed that she did not have much knowledge to provide meaningful suggestions (interview, July 2022). In addition, the freedom of expression led utterance in the meeting to easily become outbursts, with residents expressing resentment and grievances. Several bitter quarrels ensued during the discussions because residents felt frustrated that the same problems kept happening or remained unsolved for a long time. Many of the interviewed professionals mentioned that they found it difficult to reach consensus in committee meetings, as the meeting often became a venue for venting emotions. For example, a professor commented:

The discussion became unproductive when residents treated us as enemies. In meetings, residents were eager to solve some thorny issues that had not been resolved for decades. We hoped to first find some small common things that we can do together to build trust. However, because of the problems accumulated in the area over the years, residents deeply distrusted the government and the developer, no matter what we did. (Interview, May 2022)

The outcomes of committee meetings and the current conditions of the Enning Road area

Since the co-creation committee was established, the local government and the developer have taken actions to address the conflicts in the project. The committee meetings enabled participants to identify the organisations responsible for the problems and urge them to take corrective measures (meeting observation, June 2022). For example, the committee discussed solutions to control the noise from commercial activities which the developer, as the area’s manager, is accountable for. The developer subsequently set up a patrol group to monitor and control the noise level in the area. Regarding the residents’ housing damage, the developer and the government agreed to hire third-party professional companies for damage assessment and to compensate for any damage caused by the project construction. In addition, the developer promised to enhance communication and information disclosure before undertaking future construction. The residents’ major complaints were channelled into the deliberation platform, preventing them from escalating to mass incidents. Nonetheless, compensation issues for residents seeking to relocate were suspended. The government argued that the compensation is too high to afford with the district government’s budget. Furthermore, it is important to retain the original residents in the area to preserve the authenticity and vibrant character of the old Guangzhou city centre, aligning with the ongoing discourse on the preservation of city’s cultural identity through the micro-regeneration method.

Moreover, the committee meetings generated new social, knowledge, and political capital (meeting observation, June 2022). First, they fostered closer connections within the local community, allowing participants to exchange contact information and form new acquaintances. Second, during committee meetings, participants communicated professional and local knowledge, which helped each party make more informed decisions. Third, the committee increased the community’s capacity to mobilise and influence actions, as the residents and local media formed an influential coalition. This allowed the residents to make their voices heard by the wider public, putting pressure on the local government and the developer to behave properly. In the future, the committee will continue to serve as a deliberation platform to discuss issues during the project operation period. In addition, it was required that similar deliberation mechanisms should be provided in other cultural heritage regeneration projects in Guangzhou (interviews with a planner, June 2022).

However, many planning outcomes in the Enning Road area were not influenced by the committee, for various reasons. The committee was established at the implementation stage, after the local government and developer had made the major decisions, for example, on planning layouts and types of business, or, more fundamentally, on using the micro-regeneration method. Moreover, while the BOT contract granted significant power to the developer, the committee’s influence lacks legal backing. For example, although residents and planning professionals expressed concern about the project neglecting local culture and residents’ well-being, the developer stuck to the original business plan introducing pubs and restaurants. In fact, the local government had prescribed that the renovated houses should be used as offices or hostels, with minimal impact on residents. However, the area was ultimately transformed into a commercial and tourist hub. As explained by a real estate employee:

The Enning Road area is not the right place for offices because the area is not close enough to public transport; also, there are not enough parking spaces. No boss wanted to rent our offices. The rental price of offices was very low. But we depend entirely on the rent to recover our investment because we don’t have property rights to these renovated buildings. We have invested more than a billion in the project, and that is not even counting our loan interest. How can we recoup the investment in 20 years from renting offices? We’ll lose money in that way. (Interview, May 2022)

Furthermore, the committee had limited influence on local regulations and policies, which, in turn, constrained the achievement of other planning outcomes. For example, many residents wish to renovate their houses by themselves. However, they still face difficulty in obtaining construction permits because the area is still included in the municipal demolition zone in which new construction activities are tightly restricted. While the local government permitted the developer to experiment with the micro-regeneration method for government-owned buildings, no provision was made to allow residents themselves to renovate their homes. In addition, stricter requirements for housing renovation were imposed in the Enning Road area after the municipal government designated the area a municipal historical preservation zone in 2014. According to an official, improving the committee’s influence on present policies requires support from higher-level governments: ‘otherwise, local officials will just continue saying that they will write down the committee’s inputs and consider the feasibility, but everything should be done according to current regulations’ (interview, May 2022). This suggests that although the committee was able to tackle daily conflicts within the project, modifying local policies requires authorisation from higher-level government.

Nowadays, the Enning Road area has become a popular tourist destination in Guangzhou. At its peak, the area attracted an average of 7500 visitors per day and hosted eight public activities per month (LvJieMedia, 2022). A few residents continue living in the area, while some houses are surrounded by renovated buildings that have been repurposed for commercial use. Despite the desire to relocate, the high housing prices in Guangzhou have made it difficult for the local government and residents to reach a mutually acceptable agreement. The current conditions of the Enning Road area will remain until the developer’s management rights expire.

Concluding discussion

Urban regeneration in a densely developed area with historical features, high funding demand, multiple actors and plural values brings a challenge of how to regenerate such place in a both economically viable and socially acceptable way. Due to the deficiencies of the top-down planning approaches, collaborative planning practices have emerged in Chinese urban regeneration. We developed and applied a conceptual framework to examine the reasons, processes, and outcomes of collaborative planning in China. Our case study reveals that the complexity of micro-regeneration prompted the local government to launch a deliberation platform for discussing conflicting issues in the project. Deliberative mechanisms proved effective to mitigate conflicts, maintain social order, and improve governance performance. While the government-led deliberations were organised with relatively inclusive and free processes, their influence on planning outcomes was limited. The collaborative processes failed to change major planning decisions made by the government and the developer. This research contributes to the understanding of collaborative planning in an authoritarian context and elucidates the evolution of participatory planning practices in urban regeneration in contemporary China.

First, this study links the processes of collaborative planning with outcomes and showcases the features of collaborative planning in China. While planning theorists claim that improved institutional design and sophisticated process management skills can shield collaborative planning processes from the wider contexts and bring transformative changes (Healey, 2020; Innes and Booher, 2018), the Chinese political context determines that collaborative planning practices in China are characterised by authoritarian deliberation. In addition, Chinese collaborative practices are coupled with ‘authoritarian empowerment’ (Qin and He, 2022), granting citizens the right to participate and deliberate with some influence on planning outcomes, while preventing them from full political empowerment. In the Enning Road case, even with a relatively inclusive and open environment for deliberation, the co-creation committee could only address disputes in project implementation and operation stages, while critical topics of urban regeneration were excluded from deliberation and major planning decisions remained unchanged. Consequently, collaborative planning in an authoritarian context scarcely challenges the existing hegemonic power relations in the local planning system. Nonetheless, different designs of deliberation and the use of deliberative mechanisms at different stages of a planning process may produce different outcomes. Deliberations at the project implementation stage are limited to monitoring and assuring compliance with already established planning decisions and responding to changing conditions (Innes and Booher, 2018).

Second, this study marks the adoption of deliberative methods by local authorities in response to the complexities of urban regeneration in China, while in previous planning practices, local communities only had modest forms of participation (Fan, 2014; Xu and Lin, 2019). The surge of social conflicts with disruptive forms of collective resistance has necessitated the adoption of deliberative mechanisms across various fields (He, 2018). The prolonged controversies surrounding the Enning Road redevelopment received extensive media coverage, criticisms, and public attention, along with numerous daily disputes throughout the project implementation and operation phases, rendering the regeneration project a thorny issue for the local government. The use of deliberative methods enabled multiple actors to communicate and negotiate solutions in a timely manner, resulting in the avoidance of civic petitions to higher-level governments and reduced social conflicts. From this perspective, the deliberative mechanisms enhanced resident participation in urban regeneration, transforming residents from passive receivers to more active participants (Arnstein, 1969). However, it should be noted that there is a lack of regime-level democracy, while partial citizen empowerment at the local level is needed to mitigate social conflicts. First, local deliberative practices primarily involve non-political conversations among different interest groups (He, 2018). In the Enning Road case, contestations between the district government and residents were seldom discussed through the deliberation platform. Instead, the district government, as the major property owner in the area, acted as an impartial third party coordinating and mediating the conflicts between the developer and residents. Additionally, the adoption of deliberation is a strategic and pragmatic move by the local government to justify the official agenda and achieve multiple objectives (Wang et al., 2022). It also builds up the government’s moral ground as it provides an open space for public deliberation in a conflictual regeneration project. The Enning Road co-creation committee was established at a late implementation stage and engaged just a small percentage of the original residents, as 70% of the original residents had already received compensation and been relocated in previous redevelopment processes. In other urban regeneration projects, such as Pantang Village (Ye et al., 2024) and Shenjing Village (Li et al., 2020b), a larger portion of residents participated in deliberations during the initial stage. These projects also involved the local government as the primary investor, focussing on improving public space and village revitalisation. While deliberation may thrive in less contested arenas such as village autonomy and community governance, the room for deliberation is much smaller in highly controversial planning practices such as the Enning Road case where competing interests among various stakeholders are difficult to reconcile. Whether deliberation is feasible and substantial depends on the specific context of the case and the level of contestation involved. Lastly, while the intention behind introducing deliberative methods in China differs from deliberative democracy in the West, these deliberative experiments yield process products, such as the development of deliberative capacities and desire for higher-level participation of experienced citizens, and new social, knowledge and political capital (He, 2018; Innes and Booher, 1999). However, the development of deliberative citizenship might be restricted in Chinese urban regeneration, as rational communication becomes challenging when actors defend competing interests with agonistic features. Whether the deliberative turn at local-level governance paves the way for deliberation-led democratisation in China remains an open question.

Third, this research reflects the use of collaborative planning approaches as a state strategy to balance various interests and reinforce its dominance in urban regeneration in China. While the prioritisation of economic competitiveness in pro-growth planning led to similar planning outcomes and social problems in both liberal Western counties and China, the Chinese government’s goals extend beyond prioritising the market. Recently, in China, the government has experimented with new urban regeneration methods to dodge the conflicts associated with demolition, displacement, and heritage preservation (Teo, 2022; Wang et al., 2022). These methods emphasise not only the generation of land revenue but also political considerations such as city beautification and harmony society, which demonstrates how the Chinese model of state entrepreneurship goes beyond economic interests. Notably, in market-driven regeneration, when citizens’ interests are at risk, local officials are motivated not only by instrumental views but also by normative forces to employ deliberative methods, as they closely work with residents to understand their conditions and struggles. This reflects the influence of Chinese political culture, which emphasises the moral responsibilities of ruling elites to govern for the common good, demonstrate virtue, and attend to community well-being (He and Warren, 2011). Adding to the narrative that the state uses market instruments in planning activities to maintain state power (Wu, 2018), deliberative instruments are increasingly used by local governments to supervise market activities and prevent market-driven projects from triggering social unrest, and to ultimately strengthen the regime power and legitimacy in the new era of urban regeneration in China.

The empirical research is limited to a single case study on an urban regeneration project where the developer played an important role and the area’s original functions have largely been changed. Considering these limitations, we make two future research recommendations. First, researchers are encouraged to compare the deliberative practices in urban regeneration with different regeneration methods where deliberations were initiated at different stages. Second, scholars have identified authoritarian deliberation in countries such as Vietnam, Singapore and France (He and Wagenaar, 2018). Future research can also test the validity of the conceptual framework in these countries to enhance the understanding of deliberative practices and their contextual dependencies.