Land-taking for technopoles in Shanghai and Taipei

Researcher: Li Qi

My dissertation studies the technopoles-driven urbanism in Shanghai and Taipei. Conducting multi-sited fieldwork in villages on the development site of Zhangjiang Science City (Shanghai), Beitou Shilin Technology Parks(Taipei), and the Shezidao Eco-Project (Taipei), this research aims to explore the entangled process of land development under technopoles expansionism. I propose that the deployment of technopoles should be read as place-making projects that consistently intertwine with the changing social, economic, political, and environmental conditions in and beyond the place.

The objectives of this research include four main aspects: (1) the role, rationale, and challenge of setting up technopoles in Shanghai and Taipei, (2) multiple rural-urban transition routes and the socio-political dynamics within the molding of technopoles space, (3) the adaption and variation of land development technologies, and (4) the contradictory ideas of public interest revealed by the concrete operation of land shifts.