CPN Urban Economy and Job Creation Roundtable

"Made in Cities"

June 17, Renmin University, Beijing

As part of CPN China Week June 15-20, 2009

Chairs (overseas): Mr. Michael Woo, Los Angeles Planning Commissioner, adjunct professor,  School of Policy, Planning, and Development, University of South California

Chairs (China): Prof. YE Yumin, Head, Department of Urban Planning and Management, Renmin University

Themes

Talk to any mayor of one of the mega-cities around the world, and they all state the same top priority---more jobs. They want more paid-employment, self-employment, skilled jobs, professional jobs, and secure jobs with decent benefits, more skilled and permanent than many jobs in the informal sector. Cities don’t have the same policies at hand to create jobs that countries have, but big cities have potential policy advantages that countries don’t have---they know their cities better, and they know its potential better, and they know that this potential hasn’t yet been reached. They can also study each other to learn more about how to generate jobs. Can planners help them? Planners can play a major role in promoting urban job expansion but only if they come out of the closet of the classroom, where planning departments the world over rarely teach anything about jobs. The economics, politics, law, science and technology of job creation have to be re-inserted into the field of planning, and the planners who have already re-inserted this into their work have to be heeded. Otherwise, planners will continue doing what they do well---transportation, the environment, GIS, landscape architecture, urban design---anything but promoting the number one priority of big cities throughout the world. If they stay in the closet, planning as a profession will fade into obscurity. Countries fight over jobs. Cities should do better, and build them top-down and bottom-up.

Questions:

• Are there “role models” of cities that have done especially well in job formation? What are the advantages of these role models in this area? Do the advantages lie in good universities, or is this an exaggerated institution?
• Can the equivalent of “industrial policies” at the level of cities and provinces be used to create jobs (American states almost all use industrial policies to attract investors). How can these industrial policies meet international standards of government intervention? Are there enough loopholes to let industrial policies do their thing?
• Self-employment means entrepreneurship. Can entrepreneurship be created or is it natural? What can planners do in this regard? Can entrepreneurs be attracted from other places to come to cities? Can big cities invest in R&D the way countries do? What do planners have to know to make this happen?
• Planners tend to worship grass-roots, ground-up policies. Can planners successfully insert job creation somewhere between the national and city governmental levels? How can the two cooperate?

Speakers/Discussant:

• John M. Courtney, Urban Planning Advisor China, Former Senior Urban Planner, the World Bank
• Karen R. Polenske, Professor of Regional Political Economy and Planning, MIT, Former President, International Input-Output Association (bio)
• Daxi Li, Chairman, Chinese Association for Science and Business, Director of Board, United Orient Bank (bio)
• JIANG Changyun, Fellow, Research Institute of Industrial and Technological Economy, National Development and Reform Commission
• LIU Shuang, Professor, School of Society and Demography, Renmin University
• Takashi Onishi, President of City Planning Institute of Japan; Professor of Tokyo University
• Werner Rothengatter, Head of the Institute of Economic Policy Research, University of Karlsruhe, Former President of the World Conference on Transport Research Society, Former Head of the Transport Division, German Institute for Economic Research (bio)
• WANG Qingyun, Institute of Land Development and Regional Economy, National Development and Reform Commission
• Michael Woo, Los Angeles Planning Commissioner, adjunct professor,  School of Policy, Planning, and Development, University of South California (bio)
• Prof. YE Yumin, Head, Department of Urban Planning and Management, Renmin University
• ZHANG Keyun, Professor, Director of Regional Economics and Urban Management Research Center
• ZHANG Xiangmu, Department of Industrialization, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology

CPN Urban Economy Roundtable Program
Time: June 17 AM; Venue: Room 1, Yifu Conference Center, Renmin (People's) University

Congress Logistics:
The CPN Urban Economy Roundtable will be held as part of the CPN China Week 2009: Urbanization Summit,, the 6th year continuation of CPN’s effort to fuse western knowledge on urban development with China’s unprecedented experience. CPN China Week 2009 will be held in Beijing/Chongqing on June 15-20, including seven conferences:

• CPN Urban Housing Conference
• CPN Urban Transportation Conference
• CPN Urban Revitalization Roundtable
• CPN Urban Planning and Public Policy Roundtable
• CPN Urban Economy Roundtable
• CPN-ACSP Urban Planning Education Roundtable
• CPN-NRDC Urban Energy and Environment Roundtable
• CPN Urban Information System Roundtable

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• CPN 2006: http://chinaplanningnetwork.org/english/CPN3rdAnnual.htm 
• CPN 2007: http://www.chinaurbantransport.com/english/fur_ppt.htm
• CPN 2008:  http://chinaplanningnetwork.org/english/cpn2008/ 
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About CPN
China Planning Network (CPN) was established in 2004 and has since advanced from simply an academic interest group to become an independent voice that affects the education, research, practice and policies in China’s urban development. CPN has moved forward on its mission to systematically introduce western knowledge and experiences to China and more importantly CPN has started pursuing its vision of cultivating China's own discourse on urban development. As MIT President Susan Hockfield wrote in 2006: "Through the efforts of the China Planning Network, MIT and the Department of Urban Studies and Planning, continue to lead the world to bring the advanced knowledge on urban planning and development to bear on China's urbanization challenges."  

Please contact Jinhua Zhao at jinhua@mit.edu Tel: +1-857-350-0079 or Ming Guo at guoming@mit.edu Tel: +86-(0)10-84418776 for more information.

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