Since Mr. Fei Xiaotong put forward the "big problem of small towns" in the 1980s, small towns have attracted much attention and attention. As the center of the rural economy, the transition area from rural to urban, and the intermediary between rural areas and large and medium-sized cities, small towns play the role of a "balance pole" in the coordinated development of urban and rural areas, leading the start of regional economic transformation and local reform. In the report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, it was pointed out that it is necessary to "comprehensively promote rural revitalization", "adhere to the priority development of agriculture and rural areas, adhere to the integrated development of urban and rural areas, and smooth the flow of urban and rural elements".
However, at present, the development of small towns on the mainland has problems such as a large population base, a wide range of areas, and an imbalance between the relationship between industry and agriculture and the dual system of urban and rural areas. Encouraging the development of small towns is of great strategic significance for resolving the food supply crisis, alleviating the tension between workers and peasants, and promoting the development of agricultural modernization. Promoting the high-quality development of small towns plays a key role in promoting rural revitalization and adapting to the new urbanization path with Chinese characteristics in the new era. Japan, South Korea and China have high similarities in terms of cultural background, geographical environment, population density and rural construction process, and their experience in small town and rural development has high reference value. The series of books "Research on East Asian Villages and Towns", written by Associate Professor Zhang Li of the Department of Urban Planning of Tongji University, and his team has carefully sorted out and analyzed the planning and management experience of small towns and villages in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, hoping that the proposed content can provide experience for mainland China.
With the author's authorization, this issue will continue to push part of the contents of the series of books "Construction and Planning of Small Towns in East Asia" and "Rural Construction and Planning in Taiwan - Building a New Rural Community" from April 23. Thank you to the author of the book, Mr. Zhang Li, and his team for their support!
Construction and Planning of Small Towns in East Asia
Zhang Li, Bai Yuxin / Author
Kyushu Publishing Co., Ltd., 2022
Stages of economic and social development of small towns in East Asia
1 Japan
Japan's economic and social development after the war can be divided into four stages.
The first phase was the post-war recovery period (1945-1959), during which a series of post-World War II recovery reforms were carried out, with the main task of increasing food production and laying the foundation for Japan's economic and social development. During this period, first, the reform of agricultural land was carried out, the equality of peasants was realized, and the production system of small-scale self-cultivated farmers was formed, which improved the lives of peasants and increased agricultural productivity; second, the dissolution of the chaebol reform (1946), which provided opportunities for the growth of new enterprises; Third, labor reform was carried out and the "Labor Union Law" was formulated. After the reform, Japan's grain production increased and farmers' incomes increased.
The second stage is the period of rapid growth (1960-1973), in which the average annual growth rate of the economy exceeds 10%, which is investment-led economic growth, and the industry is dominated by manufacturing. The development of large cities through industrial revival led to the formation of three major urban agglomerations, a pattern that continues to this day. The development of large cities has also brought about problems such as rising prices and environmental pollution. During this period, a large number of rural people have migrated into and settled in large cities, resulting in a sharp decline and over-thinning of rural areas. In 1961, Japan promulgated the Basic Law on Agriculture to protect the interests of farmers and pay attention to infrastructure construction, land use, and environmental improvement in towns and villages. In order to balance the widening regional development gap, Japan proposed the first comprehensive land development plan in 1962 and the "Revitalization of Excess Thinning Law" in 1970 to improve the problem of excessive development.
The third phase was a period of steady growth (1974-1991), during which the economy grew at an average annual rate of 4 per cent. The oil crisis of 1973 put an end to Japan's rapid economic growth, with soaring domestic prices, rampant speculation, and a slowdown in the Japanese government's financial austerity policy. During this period, Japan's industry was dominated by automobile and semiconductor manufacturing, and factories were scattered throughout the countryside, and there was an upsurge in the number of farmers working part-time. Part-time employment has stabilized the income of rural households, reduced the loss of rural labor, slowed down the flow of population, and stabilized the population of large cities. In 1985, the trade war between Japan and the United States broke out and the Plaza Accord was signed, forcing the dollar to depreciate and the yen to appreciate. Japanese residents continue to buy land, which leads to an increase in land prices. In addition, due to the high value of the yen's local currency, which affected product exports, a large number of factories were relocated to the United States, China, and other places, and the part-time employment of farmers was affected, and a large number of laborers flowed into large cities again, and Japan experienced re-urbanization. In 1991, there were even "extreme villages", in which rural Japan was facing extinction due to population decline and aging. During this period, the Japanese government carried out the second and third comprehensive land development plans to improve the level of local infrastructure, especially in remote villages far from big cities, and pay attention to the improvement and improvement of the living environment.
The fourth stage is the period of low growth (1992 to the present), during which the economic growth rate is less than 2%. In 1992, the bubble economy collapsed, housing prices and stock prices plummeted, and a large number of non-performing loans appeared. Ageing is an exacerbated problem in rural areas, with people over the age of 65 often making up more than half of the population in villages. In 2008, the global financial crisis broke out, a large number of Japanese banks and securities companies collapsed, economic globalization continued to push a large number of factories overseas, and the domestic economy continued to slump. The Japanese government has successively promulgated the fourth, fifth, and sixth comprehensive land development plans to curb the polarization of Tokyo, promote the formation of a multi-level decentralized development pattern, and revitalize local development, that is, from "quantity" development to "quality" improvement stage. After basically overcoming the "Lehman Brothers crisis" (in 2008, Lehman Brothers, the fourth largest investment bank in the United States, announced that it filed for bankruptcy protection after the failure of the negotiation of the acquisition, triggering a global financial tsunami), Japan's economic growth rate was only 1%~2%, and at the same time, the total population was declining, and the rate of decline was accelerating. Technological innovation has stagnated since the 1990s, and the phenomenon of de-urbanization has gradually emerged, and the coexistence of aging and over-alienation has become a major problem in Japan's machi-rural areas. Japan's economic and social development has entered a period of stability, and the challenges facing Japan are becoming increasingly severe.
2 South Korea
South Korea's socio-economic development can be broadly divided into five stages.
The period of turmoil and recovery (1945-1960). The Korean government was established in 1948, and the period from 1950 to 1956 was divided into a three-year war period and a three-year post-war recovery period. In 1954, the rural land ownership reform of "paid expropriation" and "paid distribution" was implemented, that is, the government purchased land and distributed it to farmers to improve agricultural production efficiency. The recovery of agriculture at this stage laid the foundation for subsequent economic development.
Rapid growth period (1961-1978). During this period, South Korea implemented six five-year economic plans, which led to rapid economic growth (Table 1). This stage can be divided into two periods: (1) the period of the formation of the export-oriented economy in the 1960s. In 1961, the first five-year economic plan was implemented to revitalize exports, introduce foreign capital and technology; In 1967, the Second Five-Year Plan was introduced, and the focus of economic development began to shift to heavy industry. (2) During the period of heavy industrialization in the 1970s, South Korea implemented the Third and Fourth Five-Year Plans to promote the construction of a self-reliant economy and solve the problem of uneven development. In 1970, South Korea launched the "New Village Movement", which greatly changed agricultural production and the appearance of rural areas, and gradually filled the gap between urban and rural development. In 1972, the first land development plan was implemented. In 1973, then-President Park Chung-hee issued a "Declaration on Heavy Chemical Industrialization". Throughout the 1970s, South Korea's economy maintained rapid growth, the industrial structure underwent major adjustments, and from 1972 to 1978, the annual growth rate of South Korea's GDP was as high as 10.8%, and South Korea officially became one of the "Asian Tigers". Table 1 The Seven Five-Year Plans for Economic Development of the Republic of Korea (1962-1996)
Period of economic adjustment (1979-1992). With the assassination of President Park Chung-hee in 1979, South Korea's economy fell into a trough and needed to be further adjusted. In 1982, the Korean government put forward the policy of "stability, efficiency, and balance", focusing on economic and social development, giving full play to market mechanisms, improving the order of competition, focusing on research and development, and promoting exports, and achieved a trade surplus in 1986. In 1986, the Sixth Five-Year Plan was implemented, the market order was further adjusted, and the economy gradually tended to develop steadily.
Reform and transition period (1993-2002). In 1992, the Republic of Korea implemented its Seventh Five-Year Plan. After President Kim Yong-sam came to power in 1993, he implemented the New Economic Plan, which set off a vigorous reform of the political system, further promoted the reform of government functions, industrial structure, and financial institutions, attached importance to the information industry, and increased the added value of technology. In 1995, South Korea became one of the founding members of the World Trade Organization (WTO), and in 1996, it joined the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). After the "baptism" of the financial crisis in 1998, South Korea carried out various adjustments and reforms. In that year, President Kim Dae-jung took office and continued to promote the reform of Kim Yong-sam's administrative structure, reducing the number of civil servants, reducing the number of government agencies, improving the atmosphere of public opinion, resuming the dialogue between the North and the South, dealing with bad financial institutions, and promoting the privatization of state-owned enterprises. The 10-year reforms of Kim Yong-sam and Kim Dae-jung established a new economic system in South Korea. From 1997 to 2002, the Republic of Korea basically completed the upgrading of its industrial structure, and gradually transformed from a factor-input-based developing economy to an innovation-driven mature economy.
Period of stable development (2003 to present). After a long period of reform, South Korea's economic growth has slowed, and the focus of economic development has shifted to the information technology industry. In 2003, the Roh Moo-hyun government proposed two major policy directions: "a second founding of science and technology" and the establishment of a "technology-centered society", and in 2009, South Korea's broadband penetration rate and Internet population percentage have jumped to the top of the world. In 2011, South Korea's R&D expenditure accounted for 4.03% of GDP. In 2013, the Park Geun-hye administration proposed the third phase of the Basic Plan for Science and Technology (2013-2017). In 2018, the Moon Jae-in administration released the fourth Basic Plan for Science and Technology (2018-2022).
3 China, Taiwan
The economic and social development of Taiwan, China, can be divided into the following four stages.
Economic recovery period (1945-1960). After World War II, Taiwan's productivity was low, various materials were in short supply, the contradiction between man and land was prominent, and the social economy was in chaos. In order to rapidly increase productivity and restore the agricultural economy, the Taiwan authorities proposed the first land reform in 1949, that is, in 1949, the "357 rent reduction" was implemented [stipulating that the rent paid by tenant farmers to landlords should be capped at 37.5% of the annual harvest, and those whose existing land rent is higher than 37.5% must be reduced to this standard, and those below this standard must not be raised], and in 1951, the "public land is delegated" [stipulating that the ownership of public cultivated land will be transferred to peasants (current cultivators, hired farmers, tenant farmers, and semi-self-cultivated farmers who lease public land). ≈In 1953, the implementation of "the cultivator has his land" [stipulating that the landlord can retain the private leased cultivated land of 3A medium paddy field or 6A dry field, and the rest of the cultivated land under the rent exceeding the standard is expropriated by the government and transferred to the farmers who are currently cultivating. The price is calculated at 2.5 times the annual harvest yield of the expropriated land, and the compensation paid by the treasury to the landlord is distributed in the form of 70% of land bonds in kind and 30% of public utility stocks, which will be repaid in 10 years], and in 1948, the "China Rural Rejuvenation Joint Committee" (hereinafter referred to as the Agricultural Rehabilitation Committee) was established to implement and implement agricultural policies and train and educate farmers for agricultural production. All in all, at this stage, the Taiwan authorities have closely focused on agriculture from top to bottom in order to resume its production as soon as possible. When the economy improved slightly, the Taiwan authorities dominated labor-intensive light industry, and the focus of the economy began to shift from agriculture to industrial production, and gradually shifted to external exports, but agriculture still dominated economic development. In 1953, the Taiwan region began to implement the "Four-Year Economic Construction Plan", the first phase (1953-1956) proposed to strengthen agricultural and industrial construction, and the second phase (1957-1960) proposed to strengthen the development of industry and mining, expand export trade, and establish basic economic and social rules and systems. In the initial stage of the economy, a large number of rural laborers were transferred, and economic construction was on the right track (Table 2). Table 2 The nine-phase four-year economic construction plan for Taiwan, China
Economic take-off period (1961-1972). During this period, Taiwan's economic focus has shifted to industrial production, encouraging the expansion of trade markets and driving the economy through trade. The third, fourth, and fifth four-year economic construction plans were implemented at this stage: the third four-year plan led to rapid industrial growth, and even uneven development; The fourth and fifth phases of the economic plan began to expand industrial exports, improve the industrial structure, and promote the development of agricultural modernization. In 1963, the output value of the secondary industry exceeded the primary output for the first time, marking the initial industrialization of Taiwan. In 1972, the output value of the secondary industry approached the tertiary industry, and Taiwan's economy developed rapidly under the drive of industrialization. However, the policy of "supporting workers through farming" implemented over the past 20 years or so has led to increasingly serious agricultural problems in Taiwan, and the situation in rural areas is not optimistic. Therefore, the Taiwan authorities took measures to promote rural development and carried out the construction of rural communities in 1968, but due to insufficient motivation, the results were small.
Economic adjustment period (1973-1987). In 1973, when the first world energy crisis appeared, Taiwan launched the sixth phase of the economic construction plan, implementing 10 construction projects. In 1976, in response to the economic recession, the seventh phase of the economic construction plan was launched, and 12 major infrastructure construction projects were implemented to further expand domestic demand. In 1982, in the face of a series of problems such as the appreciation of the Taiwan dollar, soaring land prices, and environmental pressure, Taiwan successively implemented the eighth and ninth phases of the economic construction plan, focusing on the development of high-tech industries, and the development of heavy industries towards technology-intensive industries. At this time, with the rapid development of industry, the increasingly bad environment, the outflow of a large number of rural laborers, and the widening economic gap between urban and rural areas, the Taiwan authorities implemented the second agricultural land reform in 1982, mainly to promote land circulation, abolish the restriction of non-annexable land, and promote the mechanization and standardization of agricultural production; It has strengthened public investment and put forward a series of rural construction plans, focusing on the construction of a basic production environment in rural areas and improving the rural welfare system.
Economic transition period (1988 to present). During this period, Taiwan's economy began to move towards internationalization, liberalization, and institutionalization, actively developing strategic industries, encouraging scientific and technological production, and transforming its industry into a high-tech industry dominated by science and technology. In 1991, the "Regulations on Promoting Industrial Upgrading" was implemented, and a six-year construction plan was launched. In 1993, it promoted industrial upgrading and promoted Taiwan to become an Asia-Pacific operation center. In the early 1990s, the gap between urban and rural areas in Taiwan was further widened, and in order to cope with the rural problems, the Taiwan authorities vigorously promoted the development of leisure agriculture and new agriculture, highlighted the "bottom-up" construction mechanism, attached importance to the value of the village itself and the role of villagers, and implemented the "overall community construction plan" and "rural regeneration plan" and a series of plans derived from this concept, such as the community planner system and the new hometown plan, and so on, and the rural development has made a qualitative leap. 4 Summary4.1 Similar economic and social development processes
Since the 1950s, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan have all experienced similar socio-economic developments. In terms of development stage, the post-war period has gone through a period of recovery, a period of rapid growth, a period of adjustment, and a period of slow development or recession, and the relationship between urban and rural areas has undergone a process of unbalanced development to continuous balanced development.
In terms of industrial structure, during the period of economic recovery, production gradually resumed from agriculture, and then turned to heavy industry and entered a period of rapid economic growth. At first, it was generally dominated by labor-intensive industries and focused on export trade; In the later period of rapid growth, it underwent the transformation of industrial structure, turned to high-tech industries, and paid attention to the modernization of agriculture.
In the evolution of urban-rural relations, although agricultural development was used as a breakthrough in the economic recovery period, after entering the period of rapid economic development, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, China, have all seen uneven development of urban and rural areas, especially Japan and South Korea, where there is a phenomenon of unipolarization or multipolarization, the population is concentrated in large cities, and a series of problems such as rising land prices and environmental pollution have emerged, rural development has lagged behind significantly, and the loss of rural population has accelerated. In the later stage of rapid economic growth and the period of transformation and adjustment, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan have taken a series of measures to solve the problem of unbalanced urban and rural development.
At present, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan have all entered a period of stable economic and social development, showing the characteristics of high population density and high urbanization rate. In terms of economic conditions, GDP per capita has exceeded $25,000 (Figure 1).
Fig. 1 Economic and social development processes in Japan, South Korea, and China (including mainland China and Taiwan)4.2 Although the number and scale of differentiated small towns have similar economic and social development processes, the development of small towns in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan has strong differences (for the concept of small towns and administrative divisions, see serial 01 for details). In terms of the number of small towns, Korea has the largest number of eup-myeon in terms of total volume, and the number of small-scale eup-eups far exceeds that of relatively large ones. In Japan, although the total number of towns and villages is also large, the difference in the size of towns and villages is relatively small, and in contrast to South Korea, the relatively large towns have more total number than the relatively small villages. Taiwan, on the other hand, has the smallest number of townships and has far more small-scale townships than large-scale townships. It can be seen that the distribution of small towns in South Korea is the most dense and widespread, and Taiwan is the least in Japan (Table 3). Table 3 Number and size of small towns in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, China
In terms of administrative division adjustment, unlike Japan and Taiwan, China, which merge administrative divisions to meet the needs of urbanization and administrative management, South Korea adopts the form of making administrative divisions smaller to increase the number of central cities in order to achieve balanced development, which is also the reason why South Korea has the largest number of euphem. In terms of the size of the population of small towns, the difference in size between towns and villages in Japan is the smallest, followed by the towns in Taiwan, China, and the largest difference between eup-myeon in Korea (the average population size of eup is 25,000, and the number of noodles is less than 5,000). In terms of average population size, the towns in Taiwan have the largest population, while the population of Japanese towns is mostly less than 20,000, while the average population size of Eup in Korea is less than 10,000, mainly due to the disparity in the number and size of Eup (large number and small scale). Similar to the population size, the Eup-myeon district in South Korea is also smaller, followed by the towns in Taiwan, China, and the largest in remote areas of Japan, but the smallest in urban areas. In terms of population density, there is a large difference between the population density of urban areas and remote areas in Japan, with the highest population density in urban areas among the three countries and regions, followed by townships in Taiwan, China, and Eup-myeon, South Korea, but higher than those in remote areas of Japan (i.e., over-sparse areas) (Figure 4). Fig.4 Comparison of the jurisdictional size, population size and population density of small towns in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, China
Series of articles
01 Introduction to Small Towns in East Asia: Conceptual Analysis and Administrative Division
Edit | Gu Chunxue
Typography | Xu Dudu
—— to be continued ——本文为本订阅号原创