Chinese Exceptionalism in Architecture and Urban Design: A Book Review

This essay reviews three books on contemporary Chinese urbanism. The first book, Designing Reform, understands the exceptionalism of Chinese reform through architectural evidence. The second book, The Shenzhen Experiment, further argues for the exceptionalism and non-replicability of Shenzhen reform. The third book, The City After Chinese New Towns, similarly highlights the unprecedentedness of Chinese new towns. These three recent publications collectively aim to demystify contemporary Chinese urbanism, and have done so with a sensibility towards space, geography, materiality, and infrastructure. These authors and editors are mainly architectural researchers leveraging disciplinary contributions to the discussion of post-socialist China. In turn, they have also contributed to the field of architecture and urban design with rich case studies in China. This review essay aims to understand (i) their geographical and spatial perspectives, (ii) their architectural design perspectives, and (iii) how they address social justice issues. It seeks to formulate contemporary Chinese urbanization as an object of inquiry, to “exceptionalize” Chinese phenomena, and to argue for the pedagogical contribution of Chinese case studies to architecture and urban design.