National governments long have wrestled with issues of how to deal with differences among regions in the formulation and implementation of economic development policies. While the general goal of promoting equality in development among various regions often is promoted in order to improve the wellbeing of all residents of a nation, differences in the human and natural resources and in the geographic situations among regions argue for differential development policies to be developed and implemented. The conflicts between these different approaches to regional development have been apparent in the People's Republic of China in recent decades. Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, development policies favored regional equity in hopes that poorer inland provinces would "catch up" with wealthier eastern coastal provinces. Regional policies under Deng Xiaoping have emphasized regional specialization and division of labor, however, with export-oriented industrialization and trade in the east generating more rapid development than agricultural and energy- related activities in central provinces and animal husbandry and mineral-related activities to the west. This project will investigate the dynamics and implications of the shift in regional development policies through construction and analysis of a database containing demographic and socio-economic data for all counties in China in 1982 and 1990. Special attention will be given in the analyses to assessing the extent of spatial polarization in China, to measuring the degree of spatial inequality among different regions and changes in levels of inequality, and to identifying factors that explain those variations. This project will contribute to new understandings in a number of ways. The demographic and socio-economic database will provide unprecedented opportunities to explore differences in economic development and related factors across different parts of China over time. The analyses will provide new insights into the spatial implications of different regional development policies, especially the degree to which differential policies foster unequal levels of development. Not only will these insights be useful for those interested in the dynamics and implications of current Chinese economic policies, they also will enhance more general understandings of the spatial implications of development policies and practices in other locales.
