The Rural Turning Point: China in a Global Perspective
14th International Conference on Agriculture and Rural Development in China (ICARDC XIV)
Yinchuan, China, 21-23 October 2018
Hosted by Ningxia University
Co-organized by:
Academy of New Rural Development
School of Economics and Management
School of Resources and Environment
Over the past decades, China has undergone a marked development, unprecedented urbanisation and industrialisation, as well as a profound transformation of the rural landscape. Simultaneously, this significant growth has had its toll: a widening rural-urban income gap, increasing distributional conflict over resources, widespread pollution and related health issues, financial bubbles and bad loans, and ecological degradation. Moreover, in recent years, China’s domestic growth has clearly slowed down. In this context, many wonder whether Chinese development may have reached a critical turning point: in socio-economic, political, environmental and cultural terms.
In light of the above, ICARDC XIV and Ningxia University, jointly organized this year’s conference theme – The Rural Turning Point: China in a Global Perspective. Chinese academics and international scholars, development practitioners and those from diverse policy arenas participated to contribute thoughts, papers and panels around the theme above. The wider objectives of the conference involved not only a critical reflection on and rethinking of China’s developmental status-quo, but also, on a historical and contemporary basis to compare it with developed and other developing regions of the world. More in particular, participants were encouraged to consider similarities and differences with regard to the Chinese urban-rural divide or integration, the lessons that China could learn from such a comparison, and what contributions the Chinese experiences could make, theoretically, methodologically and empirically, to our understanding and knowledge of processes of development and change.
Some photo impressions
