Interior Architecture / KABK / The Hague Lucinda Zhang 03 / 2019
Introduction In China, people who live in urbanized cities, love to travel to ancient towns in their home country. After opening up (1978), China’s administration has made urbanization a priority, however, fortunately many ancient towns in rural China are not yet industrialized and are still supported by agriculture. Thus they have a fresh and natural environment, and the buildings remain traditional architectural style. As a result, many rural ancient towns in China has become destinations for those seeking to escape from the hectic city life. For more than ten years now China has intensely developed tourism in many ancient towns, including many minority inhabited towns like Lijiang (Naxi ethnic), Fenghuang (Miao ethnic). Because of the big urban-rural divide, tourism means a revival to these lagged towns. However, although the intention of tourism is to revive these old towns and promote its unique ethnic culture, the approach needs further discussion. Many issues have occurred in several ancient towns which had been through this pattern of tourism, in particular, over-commercialization and the dilution of ethnic culture. A typical example of a World Heritage town is Lijiang Old City in the Northern province of Yunnan. It was inscribed in the World Cultural Heritage site in 19971 and then stepped into a rapidly developing period, boomed with the entry of commercial spaces for tourism. Now, there has been a dramatic change in Lijiang Old City; it has become a fancy flourishing city from a backward old town within 20 years. Different from the good reputation at the beginning, the critical voices about Lijiang can often be seen on public media2 and been heard from tourists who visited there in recent years. Its reputation among tourists started continually declining since 20063. Subsequently, tourists began searching for other unexploited places in the vicinity to have a unique and authentic cultural experience. Needless to say, when these unexploited places are discovered and exposed to crowds of people, they probably will also become part of the ‘tourist’ mode’ flow. Close to Lijiang, Shaxi town is now considered as a “real ancient town” that worth to go by tourists. It is a Bai ethnic minority-inhabited town lies in a valley, and the tourism development there started in 2001 when it was included in the list of 100 most endangered site4. Just like Lijiang, a growing number of similar shops and hostels started to occur in the center village of it and the 1 UNESCO, Decision, Inscription: The old town of Lijiang (Paris: UNESCO, CONF 208 VIII.C, 1997). 2 Hongjiang Hu, “Between ‘Step forward’ and ‘Step back’, ‘over commercialized’ Lijiang Old Town is questioned, People’s Daily Online, September 20, 2010. 3 Xuanxian Zhao, “Study of the changes of the old town of Lijiang social space based on social network” (Master’s thesis, Yunnan University, 2015), 53. 4 Feiner, Jacques P., Huang Yinwu and Barbara Schultz, “Market Value”, World Monuments Fund Publication, (2004)
locals started moving out. By 2018, there are already more than 160 hotels and hostels in its 0.86 square kilometers core town area, visitors to Sideng (the center village of Shaxi valley) increasingly meet Chinese outsiders and not Bai locals5. As a traveler who is keen for an authentic experience and as a designer who does not agree with these generic hostels and shops which may drive Shaxi to the direction of Lijiang, I want to find out if Shaxi is mirroring Lijiang and how it can be a unique Shaxi in its future tourism development. Why the local residents of both Lijiang and Shaxi were leaving? Would Shaxi become the next Lijiang as people said? And what can I do as a designer for it? With these questions, my research started looking at the evolution of Lijiang old city as a lesson, followed with a comparative study on Shaxi town and Lijiang old city on similar issues. Started with a concern about the future of Shaxi town, this paper aims to research the evolution process of both Lijiang old city and Shaxi town to analyze the underlying issues. In the second and third chapter, I will take Lijiang as a study case, illustrating the evolution of it and analyzing the issues within it. I will focus on the issue of the loss of local residents and look at it in chronological order. In chapter four and five, I will turn the research scope to Shaxi town. At last, by reflecting on the research material, added to the field research I conducted in Shaxi, I would point out the marginalized position of the minority locals in the tourism development, exploring new ideas that give rise to a locally dominated tourism in Shaxi.
5 Edward Wong, “An ancient caravan town in China is Reborn� New York Times, March 28, 2016.
Contents 01 04
Introduction Subjects and Research Structure
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Chapter 1 General Survey of Tourism in Lijiang Old City and Shaxi Town - Lijiang Old City and Naxi Culture - Shaxi Town and The Tea-Horse Road
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Chapter 2 From “Naxi” to “Commercialized,” The Issues of “Lijiang Model” - Over-commercialization - The dilution of Naxi Culture - The loss of local residents
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Chapter 3 Cause Analysis: Why Naxi people were leaving? - Before tourism development: Government Policy - At the beginning phase: Heritage preservation policy and the inconvenient life - Early phase: Low competitiveness of locals in the tourism industry and a stable rental income - Later phase: A broken living environment
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Chapter 4 Next Lijiang? The Unspoiled Shaxi Town - The beginning of tourism in Shaxi - Again, Bai people were moving out - Speculation of the future
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Chapter 5 Cause Analysis of the Relocation of Local Bai Residents - At the beginning phase: In needs of improving the living condition - Early phase: Low competitiveness of locals in the tourism industry and the stretchy regulations
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Chapter 6
Reflection on Comparative Analysis - The marginalized position of locals in the tourism industry - Experience from other rural revitalization cases and the specialty of Lijiang old city and Shaxi town
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Chapter 7 The Advantage and opportunity of a locally dominated tourism industry in Shaxi - Excellent house building skill of Bai people - Special village pattern - The implementation of “One Household, One House” Policy
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Conclusion - The Dominant Position of Local Residents in Tourism was Sidelined by Foreign-Operated Tourism Industries - The Potential in a Production-based B&B Industry in Shaxi Town - Design for Tourists but Designing as Another “Local”
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Bibliography Entries
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05 Issues
over-commercialization Dilution of ethnic culture
Possible Similar Issues
Developing process of tourism
Reflection on similarities
Cpmparative study Filed reaserch in Shaxi
Design
S Shaxi SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX - SX
Key factor: the loss of residents Cause Analysis
Lijiang LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ - LJ L - LJ -
key factor: the loss of residents Cause Analysis
Subjects
Lijiang Old City in tourism from 1996 to this day. Shaxi Old town in tourism from 2001 to this day.
Research Structure
Chapter 1 General Survey of Tourism in Lijiang Old City and Shaxi Town Lijiang Old City and Naxi Culture
The tourism industry in Lijiang Old City6 (also called Dayan Old Town at that time) began in the 1990s, back then the tourism was centered on the natural landscape, and only a few backpackers would visit the old city. Early explorer described Lijiang as “The Forgotten Kingdom”7 and “The ancient Na-Khi kingdom of southwest Chin8.” After a big earthquake in 1996 which happened just one year before it was inscribed in the world heritage list, the local government started large-scale restoration work on the old city area. After that, with the integral historic townscape and the distinctive Naxi culture, this world heritage city soon became well-known both in China and abroad. The number of tourists started rising at a staggering rate, from 2.8 million in 1999 to 20.79 million in 2013. The tourism industry was booming with overflowed investment; On the other hand, Naxi residents have been moving out of the old city area since the exploitation started. Today, it has become a place packed with souvenir shops, hostels, foreign businessmen and tourists. “Overcommercialization,” “Tourist Trap” is often used in the press when talking about Lijiang Old City9.
Shaxi Town and The Tea-Horse Road
Shaxi town lies in a valley in between touristic Lijiang old city and Dali old city, compare to Lijiang, it is a small town (26 sq.km) that inhabited mostly by Bai ethnic group, (5889 registered residents by 2011). It consists of 14 administrative villages, and the center village - Sideng village is the one where tourism started from. The tourism industry there started around 2001, in the year Sideng area was included on the list of 100 most endangered site by World Monument Fund, for it has the only old market survived from the Tea and Horse Caravan Trail10, with an intact theater, guesthouse, temple complex, and gates11. 6 * Lijiang was not a city but a district by 2002, the state Council redesigned the administrative region of Lijiang district and established Lijiang City that administered one district (old town district) and four autonomous counties. This paper’s study case - The Lijiang Old City is a historical area (7.279 sq. km.) that separated from the old town district (1255.4 sq. km.) for tourism purpose (2005). 7 Peter Goullart, Forgotten Kingdom, Lijiang and Naxi people (London: readers union,1957). 8 Joseph.F.Rock, The ancient Na-Khi kingdom of southwest China (America: Harvard University Press, 1947). 9 Yuliang Chen, “There is neither adventure nor old city in Lijiang”, Wangyi News, October 5, 2018. 10 * The Tea Horse caravan trial is part of the Tea Horse Road network of caravan paths winding through the mountains of Sichuan, Yunnan and Tibet in Southwest China. 11 Feiner, Jacques P., Huang Yinwu and Barbara Schultz, “Market Value”,World Monuments Fund Publication,
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Because of its location and quaint atmosphere, it is often called “The most authentic ancient town” or “A real ancient town” by tourists in their travel logs12. Now, it is becoming another must-see place among the tourists who travel around Lijiang and Dali.
Lijiang Shaxi
Tea Horse Road Image 2 / The location of Lijiang and Shaxi and the Tea Horse Road (Source: Illustrated by the author)
12 http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_49cdda9d0102v1dw.html; https://travel.ifeng.com/ a/20180517/44994372_0.shtml; http://www.sohu.com/a/191711656_488482
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Chapter 2 From “Naxi” to “Commercialized,” The Issues of “Lijiang Model” 13 “Once, the image of Lijiang is ‘The ancient kingdom of Naxi people,’ there were a wooden mansion, Locke House, white Sands murals and other historical monuments, there were Naxi ancient music, Dongba song, Dongba dance, and other cultural heritage, there are copper, pottery and other national handicrafts. Now, it is a paradise full of bourgeois sentiments, where people drink and rave, experience the same culture as the city, but declare themselves in a foreign land.”14
Over-commercialized
By 2002, the production of the tourism industry has counted more than fifty percent of the total GDP of Lijiang City; the tourism industry had become the pillar industry of the national economy. However, massive exploitation brought Lijiang great economic growth and also over-commercialization. Though commercialization in itself is not an issue but a method of commerce15, over-commercialization is beyond the necessity of the development of a town and thus become an issue. From 2000 to 2004, the number of tourist shops in Lijiang Old City had increased rapidly, by 2004 there were 359 shops within Sifang street area16, and the intensity of shops had reached 42 every hundred meters17. In 2013, the proportion of touristic feature shop among the total 1606 shops was up to 93.77%. Almost all the places along the streets and lanes in Sifang street area were converted to shops. According to a statistic from 2 leading booking website in China (qunar.com and xiecheng.com), there are more than 2400 hotels and hostels in the old city area now. The effect of over-commercialization has embodied in many aspects, such as the destruction of ecological balance, noise pollution, and heavy traffic. Besides, it has also caused the decline on its reputation, in the interviews I had with people who once been to Lijiang, they all said they would not go to Lijiang a second time because of the commercialized atmosphere. An Italian female tourist said: “It is just shopping, and the stuff they sell is not even related to any 13 * “Lijiang Model” is a part of a workshop on culture heritage management and tourism organized by UNESCO Bangkok, (http://www.unescobkk.org/culture/wh/culture-heritage-managementand-tourism-models-for-co-operation-among-stakeholders/lijiang-models-for-cooperation-amongstakeholders/) It was later used as a term by Lijiang government for describing its achievement on heritage protection and development. 14 Cheng, “Neither adventure nor old city”. 15 * Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercialization 16 The center Sifang street square and the 9 extended streets in Lijiang Old City. 17 Yu Huang, Tianxin Zhang and Gaoshu Shancun（Japan）, “Study on Tourism Commerce population and Spatial distribution in Old Town of Lijiang”, Chinese Landscape Architecture, Vol.5, (April 2005).
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sense of real Naxi culture, it is a good shopping mall for me though.”
The Dilution of Naxi Culture While the material heritage was well preserved, the non-material part of this cultural heritage city, Naxi Dongba culture and the Naxi ethnical way of living have experienced a variety of changes. For the Naxi ethnic group, Dongba culture is the core content of their culture, which was derived from the Dongba religion. However, as an ethnic minority group with a population much less than Han ethnicity, and inhabited in a peripheral region of the mainland; the culture system was very fragile when confronting an influx of money and the incoming modalities within a short time. These changes of Naxi culture are multiplex and have embodied in different aspects. Depending on previous researches, I will state it from two perspectives: the dilution of the integrity of Naxi culture and the negative effects of it from public understanding. When the tourism industry started to carry on rapidly in Lijiang Old City, Dongba culture has been taken as an attraction for developing characteristic rural tourism.18 Specific manifestations are the overflowing “Dongba-featured” shops which sell decorative items that are used in certain customs, and the staged dongba dancing performance. Folklore researcher Jiehong Yan thinks that the massive commodification of dongba culture has distorted and fragmented the integrity and the authenticity of it19. For instance, in the funeral rites of Naxi people, Dongba dancing, music, scriptures, paper, clothes, wood painting and so on were organically integrated into a sacrificial activity, but the tourism market only extracted two or three elements and then promoted them to the public. This process has deconstructed the integrity of dongba culture. Even more, there are foreigners in the tourism market who impersonate Naxi locals to sell “Dongba products.” From the standpoint of cultural preservation, these changes have beyond doubt damaged the ecology of dongba culture and degraded the culture diversity at large. From the perspective of public perception, tourists would aggravate this cultural impact through consuming and spreading the content of it. To a great extent, tourists’ understanding of Naxi culture is affected by this distortion and fragmentation of cultural authenticity. Therefore, in this internet age, the social influences of tourists’ comments on travel destinations are considerable. The information posted by tourists about a place on travel blogs, magazines, social media would construct the anticipated image of the destination in advance20. In this sense, the distortion of Naxi culture was being deepened through the public perception at the cognitive level.
18 Jinping Lin, Hong Zhou and Yunhong He, “A Study on The Inheritance and Passing on of The Naxi Dongba Ethnic Tradition and Development of Rural Tourism,” Human Geography 20, no.5 (October 2005). 19 Jiehong Yang, “The Staged Culture in Multiple Interactions and The Distortion of Folklore, Taking Dongba Culture of Liang as an Example,” Folklore Studies 108, no.2 (2013). 20 John Urry, Consuming Places (New York: Routledge, 1995), 132-33.
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The loss of local residents To be correct, the loss of local residents is a manifestation rather than an issue, but looking at the evolution process of Lijiang, the continuous loss of Naxi residents is a crucial factor of over-commercialization and the dilution of ethnic culture. For one, it gave the place to commercial, because the local Na people moved out to the surrounding area, the original residential spaces were mostly converted into commercial spaces, in particular, hostels and shops. These hostels and shops were distributed centered on Sifang street area and scattered over the whole old city in a high-intensity. In relation to the cultural impact, since the original social network that used be structured within a neighborhood frame was broken, the interactive activities between the locals were not happening frequently as before21, which led to a lack of cohesive force in the ethnic community. Besides, some places that used to host folk amusement activities have lost its user and being transformed into commercial spaces.
Image 3 / Lijiang Old Ciy in 1988 (Source: Internet)
Image 4 / Lijiang Old City in 2015 (Source: Internet)
21　Xuanxian Zhao, “The Changes of The Old Town of Lijiang Social Space.â€?
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Chapter 3 Cause Analysis: Why Naxi people were leaving In chapter one, I refined the issues of “Lijiang model” and pointed out the core factor that gave rise to the issues. In this chapter, I will expound the underlying reasons for the leaving residents. As I was told by some foreign hostel operators in Lijiang, they did it for getting the rental income. However, after the studies of many related research documents I can find online by previous researchers, I summarize them in chronological order as follows:
Before tourism development: Government policy Before the tourism development, the population density of Lijiang Old City was quite big with 15279 Naxi residents (by 1986), so in order to decrease the density for better organization, the local government encouraged those poor residents to move to Beipomen residential area with exempt from house foundation charge22. At the beginning phase: Heritage preservation policy and the inconvenient life After being inscribed in the World Culture Heritage list, the local government noticed the value of old houses and established the Authority of Lijiang Old City Protection. They conducted a series of supervision policy regards to the restoration and reconstruction of old buildings. Therefore, the local residents were constrained to remodel and extend their own houses, which made many inconvenient situations for their life. For instance, because of the growing families, some locals therefore needed to extend their houses, but their requirements were not always satisfied due to the strict control of construction work. As a result, overcrowded housing became a problem, and those Naxi residents then chose to move out. From 1987 to 1999, 49.77% of relocated Naxi residents said they moved because of the overcrowded housing problem23. Besides, the living conditions and infrastructures were still weak at that time, most areas of the old city did not even have running water and street lamps. So, some Naxi locals who were relatively rich also started moving out spontaneously.
22 Yudan Ye, “A Study of ‘The Loss of Original Residents’ at the Angle of Disembeding Community” (Master’s thesis, Zhejiang University, 2012). 23 Ying Cao, “Why Lijiang locals are running out of the old city?” Guangzhou Daily Newspaper, October 15, 2002.
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Early phase: Low competitiveness of locals in the tourism industry and a stable rental income In the early phase of tourism development, there were many foreign businessmen came to Lijiang rented the locals’ house for running a business. Although the rental income was not much at that time, it is enough for Naxi locals to move out and obtain a better living condition outside. Certainly, there were also opportunities for the Naxi locals to take part in the tourism market and making a profit in this way, but very few locals had chosen to do so. In a research from 2004, only 39.4% operators of shops and hostels said they are “local residents of Lijiang” (this may also contain some outsiders who have lived in Lijiang for many years)24, most of the local Naxi people chose to move with a stable rental income. The reasons, as stated by many previous researchers in their field research, is that the locals were no match for those outsiders at running hostels or selling products. Comes from more than 22 provinces all over China, the foreign businessmen in Lijiang were often well-funded and experienced about the design trend of hostel and hotel which tourists might be attracted. So, if the locals chose to stay and participate in the market on themselves, they would confront big commercial risks. Meanwhile, along with the increasing number of commercial spaces, the ordinary life in the old city was getting more and more inconvenient; life services spaces like barbershop， penny breakfast store and the tailor’s shop were converted into hostels or shops. Thus, given the risk of doing business with tourists and the vested interest of improved life quality, it is rather rational for Naxi locals chose to move out from an economic standpoint. Later phase: A broken living environment When the tourism industry became massively exploited, the living environment was damaged through noise pollution, heavy traffic, price upswing and so on. The locals started moving out spontaneously to escape the damaged environment. For instance, a big number of bars in Sifang area creates too many noises at night and this often interrupted the local residents who sleep early.
24 Yu Huang, Tianxin Zhang and Gaoshu Shancun（Japan）, “Commerce population”.
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Image 6 / The region of Lijiang Old City and the evolution of the dominating inhabitants in it (Source : Illustrated by the author)
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Chapter 4 Next Lijiang? The Unspoiled Shaxi Town The beginning of tourism in Shaxi In 2001, the first B&B (Gudao homestay) was opened in Sideng village. Later with the Shaxi rehabilitation project25, several historical buildings were restored by a Swiss-led international restoration team in 2003-2006 as foundational work of that project. Also, the infrastructure in Sideng village was improved through preserving construction. Soon after that, like Lijiang, again with the fame and gradual improvement of infrastructure in Sideng village, tourism started to grow in Shaxi. The number of visitors has increased from 1500 in the year 2001 to 19000 in the year 200426, and by 2004 there were 4 B&B in Sideng village. However, it is worth noting that in this early period of tourism, accommodation service and restaurants were still operated autonomously by local Bai residents. Again, Bai people were moving out With the notability of Shaxi continuously improved, the tourist amount was increasing year after year. Meanwhile, the number of foreign businessmen who came to Shaxi to open hostels had also increased a lot. Local residents in Sideng village started to rent out their house to foreign businessmen and move to a new house. “The evolution of this village is beginning to mirror what happened in Lijiang,”27 a foreign journalist wrote so. However, different from the Naxi people in Lijiang who moved to a modern residential building, Bai people built their new house themselves. As illustrated on the map (image 5), there was a notable increase of newly built residential houses at the northern edge of Sideng village from 2014 to 2017, with which together is the increasement of the newly opened hotels and hostels in the central area. By 2018, there are 116 hotels and hostels in Shaxi, most of them operated by outsiders and 105 of them are in Sideng village. Speculation of the future It is not difficult to predict that if this pattern of tourism continues to develop in Shaxi, it may occur a similar situation as Lijiang in its later phase. Negative effects would come along in this speculative future: From the perspective of tourist’s perception, tourists will be constrained in the core zone which fulfilled with outsiders and shops and not getting the whole picture of local life and local culture; From the perspective of the overall development of Shaxi town, commercial spaces will be centralized on Sideng village and thus cause a rise 25 Feiner, J. Huang, Y.and Schmid, W.A., “The Shaxi Rehiblitation Project,” Departement Bau, Umwelt und Geomatik, ETH Zürich (2004). 26 Zhiyuan Sun, “A Study on the special evolution of Shaxi Village and town under the impact of tourism” (Master’s thesis, Kunming University of Science and Technology), 2018. 27 Edward Wong, “Reborn”.
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in prices in Sideng village which leads to unbalanced development and overcommercialization issue of Sideng village.
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At the begining
2006-2009 Newly built local residential houses
2010-2013 Newly built local residential houses
Early phase
2013-2017 New built local residential houses and newly opend hostels (red dots)
Image 9 / The change of village pattern of Sideng village under tourism (Source : Illustrated by the author)
Tourists Tourists
Outsiders(Han nationality) Outsiders(Han nationality)
Local Bai People Local Bai People
Image 10 / The predictable future of Sideng village (Source : Illustrated by the author)
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Chapter 5 Cause Analysis of The Relocation of Local Bai Residents At the beginning phase: In needs of improving the living condition Although Shaxi was flourishing back to Tea-horse trading period when the caravans continued arrives in this valley along with its clear jingling of horse bells, but after the era of caravan fell into a decline, this small town was just a small farming town that behind the times28. Before the tourism started to develop there, many of the villagers were still having a low living standard life, facing living issues like over-crowded housing and scarce infrastructure. Therefore, when tourism started in Shaxi, the reason of some locals rented out their houses was mainly because they were in needs of improving their living qualities, in particular, to having their own Bai-style house instead of sharing one with two other families. The traditional Bai-style house is a yard-type architecture which is usually built on a family base and owns a beautiful Baistyle house is considered as a criterion of a good life for Bai people29. During my staying there, a local female Aofeng villager told me that the people who lived in Sideng village were actually the poorer ones, thus they cannot afford moving out and building their new house. “Before, the people live in Sideng village were the poorest ones, but who knows, it has tourism industry now, those dilapidated houses became so valuable all of a sudden, and they can get money just by renting out their house.” She said to me. Early phase: Low competitiveness of locals in the tourism industry the stretchy regulations With the development of tourism, many Sideng villagers had noticed the opportunity and started to run a small B&B business in their house. As I mentioned earlier, in this beginning phase, the tourism business was still operated autonomously by local residents. However, with the increasing travel demand and the increasing amount of investment that comes in, the disadvantage of locally-owned B&Bs started to occur when compared to those hostels and hotels runs by foreign businessmen. So, the locals started to choose rent out their old house and built a new one elsewhere. Local Bai Mr.Li is now running a restaurant in Beizonggu street, Sideng village. He lives in a new house in the surrounding village. When I ask why they didn’t open a B&B in their old house, his daughter said:” We don’t know how to make a good-looking hotel for them, it’s more convenient for us to rent the old house to outsiders and with the rental income we can live a better life in a new house”
28 Yinwu Huang, Reading time in Shaxi (Yunnan: Yunnan Nationalities Publishing House, 2009). 29 Huizhong Bin, Bai Chinese traditional Architectural Craftsmanship (Shanghai: Tongji University Press, 2011)
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Apart from the lack of design knowledge and business operations, this relocation behavior of Mr.Li and many other villagers also reflect another factor of it, which is the sketchy regulation of construction at that time. Many landlords of the hostels in Sideng village now actually own two buildings which is not allowed according to the law of the People’s Republic of China on Land Administration 30.
Image 10 / The previous old house of Bai locals (Source : Internet)
30 Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, Law of People’s Republic of China on Land Administration, Article 62, Chapter 5 (2nd amendment, 2004).
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Chapter 6 Reflection on Comparative Analysis The marginalized position of locals in the tourism industry Through above research on the evolution of both Lijiang old city and Shaxi town under tourism development, I found that the loss or relocation of local minority residents is a vital factor regards to the issues that have occurred in Lijiang and might occur again in the future Shaxi. By analyzing the reason of locals moving out through different periods of the tourism development of both towns, I found that although it has multiple reasons in terms of money, policy, and capacity in the tourism market, it has certain similarities. At first, due to the backward situation of both Lijiang and Shaxi before, it is a solid need for the residents to improve living conditions in the beginning phase. Secondly, what brought influential change which leads to over-commercialization is in the rapid developing period, in which many residential houses started turned into hostels, hotels, and shops by outsiders. Therefore, although tourism has brought Lijiang and Shaxi economic growth, the local residents were and are not holding a dominating position in the tourism industry, especially in the hostel industry. They were marginalized through the developing process geographically and also economically (image 11). Geographically, as the original houses were converted into complete commercial spaces with foreign inhabitants, the living space of locals were continually squeezed to the surrounding area; On the economic side, foreigneroperated hostels or shops are not bringing sustainable income for the village community but only short-term benefit for individual families, in other words, a large piece of the tourism revenue is not flowing to the village but other cities in the end. Experience from other rural revitalization cases and the specialty of Lijiang old city and Shaxi town As noted before, tourism means a redevelopment for these lagged villages and towns in China, while how to revive villages is rather a global issue, as rural areas are under the impact of global urbanization process. Many other countries have been practicing on it with different methods：In Korea, the government launched “New Countryside” movement in the 1970s and had primarily achieved modernization in many villages31. In Japan, also in the 1970s, because of a population falling in the countryside, it started a revitalization movement called “Making villages,” which greatly improved the living conditions and the economy
31 Binxiong Gao and Guosheng Cheng, “A sober reflection on Korean ‘New countryside movement’,” JiangHan Forum, vol.7, 2009.
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of its rural area32. In Germany, with a series of laws and regulations, kleingarden has become a successful case for promoting rural tourism33 in Europe. From the general result, these examples have all made great achievement in terms of narrowing the urban-rural gap, stimulating rural economic growth and reactivating local life culture, and the local residents are in the dominating position of the tourism part now. However, it is necessary and important to notice the difference between the above examples and the situation of rural ancient towns in China. On the whole, tourism in these villages in Korea or Japan is more like a derivative within a well-developed and organized system instead of a source of its development, the living condition local residents and rural industry development were under consideration in the first place, which made a good foundation for the coherency of the village community to grow. For instance, the villages in Japan had already realized industrialized agriculture and had a complete infrastructure system before the “make village” movement, and the later developing process was also strategically controlled by the government. However, in the case of Lijiang old city and Shaxi town, the impact of tourism goes through its development from the first phase, therefore, to a large extent they are shaped by capital and are easily covered by commercialization.
32 Lei Cheng and Wenqiao Qiu, “The interpretation of ‘Making villages movement’ in Japan,” Contemporary Asia-Pacific, vol.6, 2006. 33 Fan Cheng and Gequn Feng, “The Historical Evolution of German Schrebergarten and Its Contemporary Significance,” International Urban Planning, no.2, vol.23, 2008.
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(Imformation from a conversation with a foreighner business man) Improving Life facilities Child Education
Improving Life facilities Child Education
local goverment Local People
Local People Improving the village environment
(80000)
B&B runs by foriengers (320000)
B&B runs by Locals (240000)
(240000)
(320000)
Stock Outside cities
Image 11 / Comparation of the Money flows (Source : Illustrated by the author)
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Chapter 7 The Advantage and Opportunity of Locally Dominated Tourism Industry in Shaxi During my field research in Shaxi, although I found many hostels and shops are managed by foreign businessmen, and Siding village is gradually getting spoiled, I also found the uniqueness of Shaxi that give chances to a locally dominated tourism, more practically, a local dominated B&B or retail tourism business in its future development. Excellent House Building Skill of Bai People As I mentioned before, the reason why local bai people were moving out of their house in Sideng village in the beginning phase is that they like to have their own Bai-style house, but another significant reason is that they know quite well how to build one. In fact, Bai ethnic carpenters and wood carvers are famous across the country for their extraordinary skill and some young Bai people would still choose carpenter as their future career. Furthermore, doing traditional housing construction work is a sideline business in an ordinary local family’s production. “I found that almost every Bai people is more or less good at a craft!” I once said to a local villager admiringly. “Well, you know, we cannot make a living without a craft.” She replied sarcastically. For them, the craftsmanship is maybe only a matter of livelihood, but in my point of view, the aesthetics in their work process are full of potential in products developing terms, which may give birth to a production that has a real-rootedness of local compares to these generic souvenirs in tourist shops. Special Village Pattern Different from Lijiang Old City which located in a city, Shaxi town lies in a valley, appears as a patch of several semi-independent villages. This special village pattern holds a big potential in diversifying tourism activities, especially when Sideng village is now defining how big Shaxi is and what can you do in Shaxi in its tourism map. During my time in Shaxi, I often heard some tourists were saying: “Shaxi is too small, I think one day is quite enough for it.” However, in the light of my 20 days staying there, there are many more authentic things outside Sideng village which only need a reason to go. The Implementation of “One Household, One House” Policy In 2013-2017, the sketchy construction policy was one of the reasons that caused excessive housing transfer that led to the expansion of foreign-operated hostels, however, due to the “hollow house”34 issue that happening 34 * The “hollow house” means a phenomenon that many rural residential houses are now empty, because the residents live in the city while keeping building houses in their hometown.
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in many rural areas in China, the national government has started to fully implement the strategy of rural revitalization. One of the strategies is to carry out the confirmation work of homestead properties, which means to confirm the connection between the use right of a house-base land and its householder via registration35. This confirmation work has been carried out first in the pilot area from 2015 to 201836 and is going to be fully implemented in all the rural area of China since 2018. It is called “One Household, One House” policy by rural residents in short. On the one hand, this change is maybe not a good news for fast economic growth as it would constrain excessive housing transfer; while on the other hand, it also creates opportunities for young Bai locals to take part in the tourism market through a new form of constructing their houses, given the fact that Bai locals in Shaxi still build up their own houses when a new family is about to set up.
35 CPC and the State Council of the PRC, Suggestions on the Implementation of Rural Revitalization, Article 2, Chapter 9 (January, 2018) 36 General office of the PRC and General office of the State Council, Suggestions on the rural land expropriation, collective management of construction and the reform of house-base regulation on pilot area (January, 2015).
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Image 12 / Bai locals were building their house (Source : Photographed by the author)
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Shaping Village
Changle Village
Sideng Village Hualong Village
Aofeng Village Beilong Village
Dengta Village
Xinan Village
Image 13 / The spacial pattern of Shaxi town (Source : Illustrated by the author)
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Conclusion The dominant position of local residents in tourism was sidelined by foreign-operated tourism industries Throughout the research of tourism development in Lijiang and Shaxi, I have shown the negative effects of it on town development and also tourist experiences, and in Chapter 6 I have pointed out the marginalized position of the local residents in the development and how it connects to the issues. It is clear that the massive injection of foreign-operated tourism industries was marginalizing the status of locals, which is reflected in the village pattern and the money flow. In view of development, in Chapter 4 I have suggested an inevitable future of Shaxi town if this status goes on. Thus, there is an urgency to explore forms of locally-owned tourism services that are competitive to foreign-operated ones. The potential of a production-based B&B industry in Shaxi town In my extensive field research, I have not only investigated the issue of the relocation of local residents, but also looked at the local’s life through close attach to a local family. As mentioned in Chapter 7, I have spotted the advantages and potential in the local livelihood that could give rise for them to take part in the tourism industry in their ways. To be more explicit, given the situation that the Bai-style traditional house is in continual constructing and refining, addition to the advantage in which the “One household, one house” would start limiting the house transfer. I think Bai villagers are having a big opportunity in involving a B&B business in their house if there are a proper spatial arrangement and an appealing design with a unique local sense. Moreover, the production of joint products could derive from the process of house building through innovations of the crafts, which could activate the local industries in turn. Design for tourists but designing as another “local.” Started with worry about another coming generic travel experience as a tourist, my role in this research is multiple and in changing state. Through document studies of Lijiang old city, I shifted my perspective from the tourists to the locals, seeing the close connection between the change of travel experience and the change of local’s life. In the research of Shaxi town, I dived into the life of local Bai people with a dual role, trying to understand the given circumstances like a local, and in the same time looking for potentials of change as a designer. Thus, for the design of B&B, I see myself design for tourists but designing as another “local,” with a deep understanding of what the locals do, I would start my design by acting differently from a local.
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Lin Jinping, Zhou Hong and He Yunhong. “A Study on The Inheritance and Passing on of The Naxi Dongba Ethnic Tradition and Development of Rural Tourism.” Human Geography 20, no.5 (October 2005). Peter Goullart. Forgotten Kingdom, Lijiang and Naxi people (London: readers union,1957). Sun Zhiyuan. “A Study on the Special Evolution of Shaxi Village and Town under the Impact of Tourism.” Master’s thesis, Kunming University of Science and Technology, 2018. Standing Committee of the National People's Congress. Law of People’s Republic of China on Land Administration. 2nd amendment, 2004. UNESCO, Decision. Inscription: The old town of Lijiang. Paris: UNESCO, CONF 208 VIII.C, 1997. Yang Jiehong. “The Staged Culture in Multiple Interactions and The Distortion of Folklore, Taking Dongba Culture of Liang As an Example.” Folklore Studies 108, no.2 (2013). Ye Yudan. “A Study of ‘The Loss of Original Residents’ at the Angle of Disembeding Community.” Master’s thesis, Zhejiang University, 2012. Zhao Xuanxian. “Study of the changes of the old town of Lijiang social space based on social network.” Master’s thesis, Yunnan University, 2015.
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