Economic revitalization and city branding practices in the old industrial base in northeast China

Abstract

The old northeastern industrial base, including Liaoning province, Jilin province and Heilongjiang province, used to be the most developed areas in China back in 1980s. Now they are going through a tough time in recent years. GDP growth rate of the northeast kept declining and below national average in the past ten years. Liaoning, the biggest economy entity in the northeast, even negative growth in 2015. Two facts should be blamed for, including single industrial structure and rigid governmental and economic system. Main industries in the northeast are resource-based heavy industry and manufacturing, which almost account for half of its GDP. This single economic structure can hardly maintain economic growth when its secondary industry is stagnating and even recession. And that is the situation in the northeast. Another problem is the lack of innovation caused by rigid governmental and economic system. Governmental institution still dominates the allocation of market resources. Specifically, state-owned enterprises are the main force in the market, and private economy is weak. While, state-owned enterprises cannot count on to initiate innovation...