Heritage Tourism And Cities In China

China has surged into the 21st century as one of the most rapidly modernizing countries in the world. Its burgeoning cities reflect this extraordinary growth with a dazzling array of new architectural forms and designs. In its transformation, the 5000-year old heritage of its built civilization, embedded in its villages, towns and cities, has often been replaced. The Chinese Government, aware of the value of this heritage, has in recent years taken concrete steps to conserve and preserve not just national icons such as the Forbidden Palace in Beijing, the Great Wall of China and the Grey Goose Pagoda in Xian but also the more general historic fabric of its urban development over the centuries. The challenges are great, particularly as population growth and rural-urban drift have combined to place enormous pressure on city resources. The chapters in this book explore these challenges as well as analysing other institutional, cultural, social and economic issues related to urban heritage conservation and utilization, with a focus on the role of tourism in reinforcing conservation values by finding new uses for old buildings and districts. This book covers new areas of heritage tourism research in Chinese cities. The chapters were originally published in a special issue of the Journal of Heritage Tourism.

China has witnessed a dramatic development of tourism in urban context in the past thirty years, especially with its success in hosting the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008 and the Shanghai World Exposition in 2010. Urban areas as tourism destination are receiving increasingly more popularity than traditional destinations such as national parks, natural reserves, and historical relics. Deriving largely from a special issue on "Urban Tourism Development and City Destination Marketing" (Journal of China Tourism Research), Urban Tourism in China presents the readers with a collection of nine independent research reports examining issues such as consumer behaviour in urban destinations, the social impact of tourism, destination image, leisure, regional collaboration, and heritage tourism in ancient towns. The investigations covered urban areas of different scales and diversified nature from major metropolises such as Beijing, and Guangzhou, to ancient towns like Lijiang and Pingyao. Readers who have interests of tourism research, business development, and in-depth understanding of urban life in China may find the book informative and interesting. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of China Tourism Research.

​This volume explores China’s cultural heritage ideology and policies from three interrelated perspectives: the State and World Heritage tourism; cultural heritage tourism at undesignated sites, and the cultural politics of museums and collections. Something of a cultural heritage designation craze is happening in China. This is new within even the last five to ten years. Officials at many levels now see heritage preservation as a means for commoditizing their regions. They are devoting new resources and attention to national and international heritage designations. Thus, addressing cultural heritage politics in a nation dedicated to designation is an important project, particularly in the context of a rapidly growing economy. This volume is also important because it addresses a very wide range of cultural heritage, providing an excellent sample of case studies: historic vernacular urban environments, ethnic tourism, scenic tourism, pilgrimage as tourism, tourism and economic development, museums, border heritage, underwater remains, and the actual governance and management of the sites. This volume is an outstanding introduction to cultural heritage issues in China while contributing to Chinese studies for those with greater knowledge of the area.

This volume unravels the politics surrounding behind China’s hegemonic project of heritage tourism development in Lijiang. It provides a compelling study of the dialectical relationships between global and domestic capital, the state, tourists and locals as they collude, collaborate and contest one another to ready Lijiang for tourist consumption. Using rich material from insightful interviews and quantitative data, the authors show how complex tourism development can be even as it strives to do good for the community. Su and Teo investigate the practices of contestation and negotiation of identity within Lijiang; analyze the negotiations that transform material and vernacular landscapes; and suggests strategies that will enable sustained tourism interest in this location. Linking Gramsci’s theory on hegemony to the cultural politics of space, this book has two major strengths: it establishes a theoretical framework to conceptualize power relations in tourism space and provides critical insights into the rapidly shifting socio-political landscape of contemporary China. Comparisons with other Chinese heritage sites are also provided. By addressing the power struggles inevitable in the process of tourism development, The Politics of Heritage Tourism in China provides an innovative understanding of China’s dynamic politics in a period of transition. As such, it will address the needs of students and academic scholars working in the fields of China studies, tourism, cultural studies, urban studies, sociology, geography, political science and heritage studies.

Chinese Heritage Sites and their Audiences provides a Chinese perspective on tourists’ relationship to heritage. Contributing to ongoing debates within heritage and tourism studies, the book offers insights into how and why visitors engage with such sites. Drawing on interviews with domestic tourists, local residents and heritage officials at the World Heritage sites of West Lake, Xidi and Hongcun, Zhang argues that tourists have agency: when they visit heritage sites, they are doing cultural, social and emotional work, whilst also negotiating cultural meanings. Providing an examination of the complex interactions between locals and tourists, the author then considers how tourists navigate and interpret heritage sites. Finally, Zhang examines whether the government or locally controlled tourism enterprises are more effective in facilitating meaningful cultural interaction between tourists and locals. Overall, the book demonstrates the interrelation between tourism and heritage, and the tensions that are created when the ways in which sites are used differ from the expectations of UNESCO and national or regional site managers. Chinese Heritage Sites and their Audiences pays particular attention to ongoing debates about heritage performances, the importance of emotions and the agency of tourists, and will thus appeal to academics and students engaged in the study of heritage, tourism, landscape architecture and anthropology.

Heritage Politics in China: The Power of the Past studies the impact of heritage policies and discourses on the Chinese state and Chinese society. It sheds light on the way Chinese heritage policies have transformed the narratives and cultural practices of the past to serve the interests of the present. As well as reinforcing a collective social identity, heritage in China has served as an instrument of governance and regulation at home and a tool to generate soft power abroad. Drawing on a critical analysis of heritage policies and laws, empirical case studies and interviews with policymakers, practitioners, and local communities, the authors off er a comprehensive perspective on the role that cultural heritage plays in Chinese politics and policy. They argue that heritage-making appropriates international, national, and local values, thereby transforming it into a public good suitable for commercial exploitation. By framing heritage as a site of cooperation, contestation, and negotiation, this book contributes to our understanding of the complex nature of heritage in the rapidly shifting landscape of contemporary China. Heritage Politics in China: The Power of the Past is essential reading for academics, researchers and students in the fi elds of heritage studies, cultural studies, Asian studies, anthropology, tourism and politics.

​This monograph analyzes current cultural resource management, archeological heritage management, and exhibitionary practices and policies in the People’s Republic of China. Academic researchers, preservationists, and other interested parties face a range of challenges for the preservation of the material past as rapid economic and social changes continue in China. On the one hand, state-supported development policies often threaten and in some cases lead to the destruction of archeological and cultural sites. Yet state cultural policies also encourage the cultivation of precisely such sites as tourism development resources. This monograph aims to bring the concepts of world heritage sites, national tourism policies, ethnic tourism, and museum display together for a general cultural heritage audience. It focuses on a central issue: the tensions between a wide range of interest groups: cultural anthropologists and archeologists, tourism officials, heritage proponents, economic development proponents, a new class of private rich with the means to buy artifacts, and a fragmented regulatory system. Behind all of them lies the political role of heritage in China, also addressed in this monograph.

This innovative study presents a thematic examination of the development of cultural heritage management (CHM) in an Asian context, offering valuable insights into Asian culture and society.