China’s ministries of housing and urban-rural development (MHURD), culture and finance joined hands recently with the State Administration of Cultural Heritage (SACH) to promulgate the Guidelines on Practically Strengthening the Protection of Traditional Chinese Villages. Worth more than 10 billion yuan ($1.6 billion), the project aims to conserve the culture of 1,561 villages listed in the Directory of Traditional Chinese Villages (hereafter referred to as “the Directory”) over a period of three years.

Villages and towns are home to the majority of China’s population. Many people have found the bustling pace of urbanization has left an indelible mark on their hometowns. Lack of protection, blind construction, demolition of old houses in favor of new ones, excessive business development and other unsustainable measures have led to the startling disappearance of traditional villages. Urbanization has also resulted in the regrettable loss of time-honored architecture and intangible cultural heritage.

Disappearing hometowns

Qingcheng Township in Yuzhong County, Gansu Province, is an ancient residential complex with more than 1,000 years of history that dates back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907AD). It is home to the Gao Ancestral Hall, Qingcheng Ancient Academy, Cheng Huang Temple and Luo’s Courtyard. There are also 45 preserved quadrangle dwellings built in the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties scattered in the core area. Despite these relics withstanding the test of time, a large number of historic buildings has been damaged to varying degrees or lost altogether.

Qingcheng is only one of China’s many disappearing villages. Traditional villages are vanishing quickly amid the rapid pace of urbanization in recent years.

A field survey conducted by the Research Center for the Culture of Traditional Chinese Villages at Hunan University found that traditional villages in the Yangtze River and Huanghe River basins of great historical, ethnic, cultural, architectural and artistic value numbered 9,707 in 2004. This number nearly halved to 5,709 in 2010, down by an annual average of 7.3 percent. The daily attrition rate of villages was 1.6.

According to statistics released by the MHURD, industrialization and urbanization over recent decades have resulted in the widespread disappearance of traditional villages. The current number accounts for only 1.95 percent of the country’s total administrative villages. It is estimated that there are fewer than 5,000 traditional villages of important historical or cultural value left in China.

Ancient buildings, unique folk customs and intangible cultural heritage have been pushed to extinction in the wake of disappearing traditional villages.

Wang Zhengrong, director of the Cultural Affairs Bureau of Dali, Yunnan Province, said that intangible cultural heritage is concerned with traditional culture of the Chinese nation. Different from tangible cultural heritage, the disappearance of intangible cultural heritage is irreversible.

“Accordingly, the cultural pattern of traditional villages throughout various generations is undergoing drastic changes, and the inherent structure of traditional culture is also at risk of falling apart,” said Hu Binbin, director of the Research Center for the Culture of Traditional Chinese Villages.

As urbanization speeds up, it is worrying that traditional villages and cultural icons with rural characteristics will vanish from memory. Historically and culturally valuable outposts of rural China are increasingly vulnerable.

“Each ancient village is a giant volume. We cannot stand to see them disappearing in the tide of urbanization before we open and read them carefully,” said Feng Jicai, a writer and chairman of the Chinese Folk Literature and Art Society.

Toll of extensive urbanization

Featuring a drum tower, granary, ancient well and old road, Baojing Stockaded Village is the largest Dong village in the northern part of Qiandongnan Prefecture, Guizhou Province. It also stands out as one of the few well-preserved stockaded villages of the Dong ethnic group in China. Sadly, it was ravaged by a massive fire in March 2014 that destroyed the centuries-old village overnight.

“Wooden houses are damp-proof, but highly vulnerable to fire. As young people, the main guardians responsible for protecting traditional villages, have moved to work in cities, traditional houses have been left unpreserved and traditional culture has faded away,” said Gu Huaxian, deputy director of the Housing Bureau of Qiandongnan Prefecture.

In the wake of young men flocking to cities, rural areas have been left with only women, children and elderly villagers. This dramatic demographic shift has ruptured the inheritance of rural culture in many villages nationwide.

SACH director Li Xiaojie noted that demographic changes, lax environmental protection and poor economic adjustment have made matters worse amid social and economic development.

On one hand, inadequate historical and cultural research, weak protective measures and misguided conservation efforts have fueled the simplification and assimilation of ancient villages.

　　On the other hand, erroneous tendencies such as dismantling old houses to build new ones, demolishing authentic buildings to construct fake ones, damaging spatial patterns, excessive business development and massive emigration have compounded other problems.

Lack of protection and excessive development driven by urbanization are hindering the conservation of traditional villages. But compared to demolishing old houses to construct new ones, blind construction and massive emigration are eroding culture more elusively and seriously.

Yi Peng, research fellow at the China Center for Urban Development under the National Development and Reform Commission, warned extensive urbanization poses a severe threat to rural culture.

“During the process of urbanization, some places realize urban expansion simply by building houses, repairing roads, developing industries and carrying out projects. This is so-called extensive urbanization, which is very likely to cause cities to become indistinguishable,” he said.

“Although economic performance seems satisfactory, cities are losing their unique character and feeling of ‘home’ due to inadequate management of urban development,” Yi added.

Saving our hometown

Visiting Zhengding County, Hebei Province, it is easy to be amazed by its mottled walls and plain buildings. Within the county, which spans about 12 kilometers in circumference, there are nine important cultural relic sites under state protection. Locals live in harmony with their ancient town.

Zhengding has never stopped its cultural conservation work. It has never been subjected to high-profile reconstruction, thus avoiding irreparable destruction to its original yet vulnerable self. Furthermore, it has also never relocated its people to transform the county in the name of urbanization. Instead, its cultural legacy inspires its ongoing protection.

“Importance must be attached to the relationship between urbanization and cultural inheritance,” noted Wang Kezhong, a professor from the School of Economics at Fudan University.

Li also stressed the necessity of regarding cultural inheritance as a “soft power” and “propeller” for urbanization.

In 2012, the MHURD, ministries of culture and finance, and the SACH jointly investigated and identified traditional Chinese villages in an effort to protect symbolic and representative villages. To this end, a protection database has been earmarked for villages listed in the Directory.

Recently, the four departments also enforced a ban on unapproved construction, indiscriminate imitation and groundless reconstruction to further protect traditional villages.

Besides legal and policy measures, it is equally important to arouse the public and enlist their support for the conservation of traditional villages.

In March 2014, the Forum on the Protection of Ancient Villages and Development of China convened in Shanghai. During the meeting, the Convention for the Protection of Chinese Scenic Villages was signed to fully tap, reasonably assess and extensively disseminate the historical and future value of resource significance in traditional villages. The agreement also aims to mobilize society as a whole to protect threatened villages’ heritage.

Meantime, highlighting uniqueness in urbanization is also a top priority. There are 123 national-level historical and cultural cities, but few of them, including Pingyao, Shanxi Province, and Lijiang, Yunnan Province, have world cultural heritage listing with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). It is the unique cultural characteristics that make Pingyao and Lijiang popular destinations for tourists from home and abroad.

Chen Shaofeng, vice-dean of the Institute for Cultural Industries under Peking University, claimed that “industrialization emphasizes standardization and uniformity, but the charm and value of culture lies in diversity, richness and uniqueness.”

“Only by protecting and carrying forward cultural uniqueness can we attract tourists and avoid building indistinguishable cities. Urbanization characterized by tall buildings and the eradication of culture is by no means healthy,” he said.

Feng also urged the government to make a difference to the conservation of traditional villages, suggesting it should incorporate it as a key goal in urbanization. Establishing legal, supervisory and enforcement systems, speeding up the formulation of scientific protection standards, and setting up accountability and punitive mechanisms to prevent ineffective conservation efforts are also steps the government should take, he added.

The Chinese link: http://theory.people.com.cn/n/2014/0515/c40531-25019736.html

Translated by Chen Mirong

　　Revised by Tom Fearon