Theorising small city as ordinary city: Rethinking development and urbanism from China’s south-west frontier

A recurrent critical argument in urban studies holds that theories about relationships between cities and globalisation need to account for a broader diversity of urban experiences and contexts. Scholarship needs to move beyond the narrow focus on a limited number of prototypical cities exerting high degrees of command and control in the global system through networks of specific corporations and sectors, and account for the diverse, inventive ways of being urban. This article contributes to the agendas of ordinary city and comparative urbanism by applying this epistemology to analyses of the recent urban development and urban strategies in Ruili, Yunnan, a small border city at China’s south-west frontier. It argues that, although not qualified as a global or world city, Ruili is a hub of busy connections and flows, drawing opportunities from a vast territorial frame and navigating multiple layers of social, economic, cultural and institutional embeddedness. Engaging with scale thinking to operationalise theoretical ideas in the ordinary city treatise, this study pays specific attention to two scenarios in the recent urbanisation of Ruili: (1) cross-border trade and the blueprint of local industrial upgrading; and (2) the rapid expansion of the jadeite and red timber economy.