Cross-border governance: The merger of Guangzhou and Foshan

Abstract

Two metropolises in Guangdong Province, Guangzhou and Foshan, are now the most integrated urban areas in the Pearl River Delta. In the process of the merging of them, the interaction and cooperation between their local governments, which can be called cross-border governance, was in reality the key problem. The integration process of infrastructure conducted by the two local governments is actually a process of economic development and of the collaboration of local authorities across borders. Based on the history of spatial and structural changes of the areas, this chapter analyzes the cross-border governance during the spatial merging process, taking comparable international examples into account and learning from them while finding workable solutions for this special Chinese case.