Allocation of Land Factors in China Looking Forward to 2035: Planning and Market

Abstract

Land factors are natural resources with fundamental and strategic significance in the achievement of China’s 2035 modernization goals. Dilemmas caused by market-oriented or planning-oriented allocation of land factors urgently call for new theoretical guidance and mode. After conducting a systematic review of the literature, this paper built a new framework from the perspective of production–living–ecological spaces to facilitate a better understanding of China’s land factors allocation looking forward to 2035. Inductive and deductive methods were both used to interpret the applications of planning and market in land factors allocation. Our results show that: (1) The allocation of land factors for production space is truth-oriented and needs the guidance of market efficiency. The essential feature of “production” as the driving force in production space requires that the allocation of land factors in production space must “respect rules, give play to the agglomeration effect, and rationally carry out regional economic layout”. (2) For the allocation of land factors for living space, it is necessary to pursue a kindness-oriented approach and establish a reasonable housing supply system based on people. Among them, the ordinary commercial housing and improving housing should rely on market forces to achieve multi-subject supply, while affordable housing should be ensured through government intervention in a multi-channel way. (3) For the allocation of land factors in ecological space, aesthetic-oriented planning should follow the rule of territorial differentiation and realize the transformation of ecological function into ecological value through market mechanisms. Top-down planning and bottom-up market represents the logic of overall and individual rationality, respectively. The effective allocation of land factors requires the utilization of both planning and market forces. However, the intersection needs be guided by boundary selection theory. This research indicates that “middle-around” theory could be a possible theoretical solution for future study.