Urban growth and sustainable development in China

Fang Wang, China Youth University for Political Science

Using the data of the fifth population census of China in 2000 and the data published by Urban Statistical Yearbook of China, this paper analyzes the growth status of large cities, medium cities and small cities in China, researches the adverse impacts of containing the development of large cities on urbanization in China at the moment, and puts forward the strategy for China’s urbanization in the future. The study argues that it is an inevitable trend for large cities of China to grow and expand under the circumstances of rapid development of urbanization. The urban development policy of Chinese government, that is “controlling sizes of large cities”, should be revised in order that all of cities of different population sizes can develop healthily, and environmental damage and resources’ waste in urbanization of China can be reduced as far as possible.