china's real estate development

Here's a post dedicated to some of my professional interests.  For those who don't know, my specialty, or at least interest, is in land use law, especially in the international context.  I am intrigued by the the connection between land and real estate development, and overall economic development. Two semesters ago, I traveled to China for our school's International and Comparative Law clinic and witnessed some the massive buildings and skyscrapers on mainland China and wondered exactly how sustainable the development was (my pictures of Beijing below).  As part of my school's advanced writing requirements, I authored a paper on china's land use laws as applied to [to the lack of] rural and agricultural growth.

Developers in the city, however, are digging their own graves.  On one hand, the size of these buildings are beyond impressive, but on the other hand, the real estate may be little more than a facade of economic growth.  I regularly check a law blog on land use law, and most recently, they've been posting about ghost cities in China.  One of their most recent posts linked to a DATELINE video documenting the faux developments.  As one of the analysts explains, the Central government is stuck on this idea of preserving economic growth that it mandates regional governments to meet specific GDP numbers.  The easiest way to do that for the local governments is to simply build despite empty storefronts.  This is a classic bubble and could perhaps have far-reaching implications for social stability in a country that is building too fast.