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Building Civilization at Shenzhen Speed

By: Owen Hatherley

Once the poorer neighbor of Hong Kong, Shenzhen has been transformed into a showcase for the speed, power, and dynamism of Chinese development — and a study in extreme inequality.

(Andrew Holbrooke / Corbis / Getty Images)

Shenzhen, in southern China, is one of the world’s largest cities, and it didn’t exist in 1979. It is a border zone on top of another border zone, an enclave originally designed to take advantage of another enclave. It is now the center of the Chinese tech industry — the likes of Tencent and Huawei are headquartered […]

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Shenzhen, in southern China, is one of the world’s largest cities, and it didn’t exist in 1979. It is a border zone on top of another border zone, an enclave originally designed to take advantage of another enclave. It is now the center of the Chinese tech industry — the likes of Tencent and Huawei are headquartered […]

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Shenzhen, in southern China, is one of the world’s largest cities, and it didn’t exist in 1979. It is a border zone on top of another border zone, an enclave originally designed to take advantage of another enclave. It is now the center of the Chinese tech industry — the likes of Tencent and Huawei are headquartered […]

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Shenzhen, in southern China, is one of the world’s largest cities, and it didn’t exist in 1979. It is a border zone on top of another border zone, an enclave originally designed to take advantage of another enclave. It is now the center of the Chinese tech industry — the likes of Tencent and Huawei are headquartered […]

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