6. Conclusion: Social Inclusion, Citizenship, and Beyond

This chapter gives an analytical conclusion and provides some reflective thinking on the policies of urban village redevelopment in Xi’an. It argues that in dealing with China’s rapid urbanisation, different understandings on the meaning of urban citizenship are at play. From the perspective of local authorities, urban citizenship remains at a narrow definition that implies membership identity with associated benefits. The populace’s understanding, however, broadly expands the notion of citizenship from a passive and static status on membership identity to the active process of realising that identity. The discrepancy between different understandings of citizenship is a major potential for triggering conflicts in urban redevelopment projects. In dealing with conflicts, the chapter suggests that cultivating a participatory environment and assisting a mature development of neighbourhood self-governance would contribute to a stable and harmonious urbanisation process in the future.