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5 The designation of model city clusters first appeared in The State Administration of Environmental Protection in China, China Urban Environmental Management (12 June 2005), p. 34.

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9 Mol and Carter, “China's environmental governance in transition.”

10 Sinkule and Ortolano, Implementing Environmental Policy in China. See also Yanqi Tong, “Bureaucracy meets the environment.”

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13 Figures on cities which attained model city status are correct to April 2009.

14 Changshu's case seemed similar to that of Taicang (both gaining NMCEP status in 2001) but we had better access to the latter, so we chose Taicang as a “late adopter,” along with Wujiang.

15 Our request to hold interviews with EPB officials in Wujiang was turned down since they were in the midst of MEP re-examination of their model city status. Information about Wujiang was obtained from interviews with officials from Suzhou and the provincial EPBs and, where possible, cross-checked with secondary sources.

16 Other programmes include National Garden City (Guojia yuanlin chengshi) under the Ministry of Construction, National Sanitary City (Guojia weisheng chengshi) under the Ministry of Health, and most recently, National Ecological City (Guojia shengtai chengshi) under the MEP.

17 SEPA, “Chuangjian guojia huanbao mufan chengshi jiancheng chuangmu” (“Creating National Model Cities for Environmental Protection, also known as Creating Models”), http://www.zhb.gov.cn/cont/mhcity/mcjs/200512/t20051229_72932.htm.

18 SEPA, “Guojia huanbao mofan chengshi” (“National Model Cities for Environmental Protection”), http://www.zhb.gov.cn/cont/mhcity/mcjs/200512/t20051229_72888.htm.

19 Li Lei (Chief of Division of Urban Environmental Management, Department of Pollution Control at SEPA, Shiyi wu chengkao he chuangmo zhibiao xiuding jieshao (An Introduction to the Revised Eleventh Five-Year Plan's Assessment Criteria for QESCUEC and Establishment of NMCEP), September 2006, pp. 37–38. For information compilation requirements for applying for the NMCEP award, see Yinhui, Zhao, Chuangjian guojia huanjing baohu mofan chengshi ziliao zhengbian yaoqiu (Information Compilation Requirements for Creating NMCEP), September 2006Google Scholar.

20 SEPA, China Urban Environmental Management; see also SEPA, “2004 nian guojia huanjingbaohu mofan chengshi fucha jieguo” (“Result of 2004 NMCEP Review Exercise”), 27 March 2005, http://www.sepa.gov.cn/cont/mhcity/mfcsxx/200503/t20050327_65797.htm.

21 SEPA, “Guanyu dui Shantou shi guojia huanjing baohu mofan chengshi fucha suo faxian wenti xianqi zhenggai tongzhi” (“A notice to Shantou about the deadline for improvements of the problems revealed in the review exercise of NMCEP”), 31 December 2004,http://www.sepa.gov.cn/info/gw/huanhan/200412/t20041231_65163.htm.).

22 Li Lei, An Introduction.

23 Yongxin, Zhao, “Chixu fazhan de chenggong shijian, chuang jian guojia huanbao mofan cheng shu ping” (“Successful practices of sustainable development: analysing the NMCEP”), People's Daily, 24 December 2001Google Scholar.

24 Zhonggong Zhangjiagang shiwei xuanchuanbu (Publicity Office of Zhangjiagang Party Committee), Zhangjiagang zhi lu (The Road of Zhangjiagang) (Beijing: Xinhua chubanshe, 1995), pp. 49–51Google Scholar.

25 Zweig, David, “Institutional constraints, path dependence and entrepreneurship: comparing Nantong and Zhangjiagang, 1984–96,” in Chung, Jae Ho (ed.), Cities in China: Recipes for Economic Development in the Reform Era (London & New York: Routledge, 1999), pp. 220 and 245Google Scholar.

26 “Shouge huanbao mofan chengshi de shengtai fazhan jing” (“Way of ecological development of the first NMCEP”), 19 April 2009, http://www.suzhou.gov.cn/newssz/sznews/2009/4/19/sznews-17-16-52-3578.shtml.

27 Qin reportedly led more than ten official visits to Singapore during his tenure as Party Secretary.

28 The city had a slogan at the time which literally means “everyone has to be investment friendly; every citizen should be a model of the Zhangjiagang spirit,” The Road of Zhangjiagang, p. 19.

29 For details, see ibid., pp. 18–20; and Zhangjiagang shi gailan bianzuan weiyuanhui (Editorial Board of Zhanjiagang Review) Zhangjiagang shi gailan (Zhanjiagang Review) (Nanjing: Jiangsu renmin chubanshe, 1996), pp. 98–100Google Scholar. Methods implemented in Zhangjiagang in these early campaigns included requiring a person caught littering or spitting in public to wear a red jacket and stand in place, until the next miscreant had been apprehended. Local media were instructed to report the names of persons and companies who had violated environmental requirements.

30 Zhangjiagang nianjian 1996 (Zhangjiagang Almanac 1996) (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 1996), p. 136

31 Zhangjiagang Almanac 1997, pp. 2 and 149–50.

32 See Heilmann, “Policy experimentation in China's economic rise”; Heilmann, “From local experiments to national policy.”

33 Marton, Andrew M., China's Spatial Economic Development: Restless Landscapes in the Lower Yanzi Delta (London & New York: Routledge, 2000)Google Scholar.

34 Weixin, Liu, Zhongguo Kunshan de jueqi yu kechixu fazhan (The Rise of Kunshan of China and Sustainable Development) (Beijing: Kexue chubanshe, 1995)Google Scholar.

35 “Quanguo huanbao mofan chengshi Kunshan shi shichang fangtang lu” (“Interview with the Mayor of Kunshan, the National Model City of Environmental Protection”), television interview script, China Education Television, 1999.

36 Lake Tai, the source of tap water for Wuxi, is regularly polluted by blue-green algae, the growth of which is evidently exacerbated by agricultural and industrial pollutants from the Lake Tai basin. In the summer of 2007, the algae expanded on the lake to such an extent that the tap-water supply for Wuxi was cut for three days, alarming citizens and generating national publicity as the worst environmental disaster of that year.

37 The new criteria included compulsory targets for energy efficiency and pollution control, and safety assurance of drinking water as a result of the Lake Tai incident in 2007. For details, see Ministry of Environmental Protection, “Shengtai xian, shengtai shi, shengtai sheng jianshe zhibiao (xiuding gao)” (“Guideline for ecological county, ecological city, and ecological province construction, revised”), 15 January 2008, http://www.mep.gov.cn/natu/stxhq/ghyzb/200801/t20080115_116249.htm.

38 Committee on Environmental Protection of the Jiangsu Province, Jiangsu sheng chuangjian guojia huanjing baohu mofan chengshi shiwu shishi jihua (Implementation Plan of the Jiangsu Provincial Government in Creating NMCEPs in the Tenth-Five Year Planning), 12 August 2002, p. 5. http://zwgk.zjg.gov.cn/uploadfiles/2005-10/2005108105219642.doc. It was also reported in 2001 that the provincial government had aimed to make Suzhou, together with its five county-level cities, the first NMCEP district of the nation. This objective, however, was not realized until 2003 when Wujiang was awarded the honour. See “You dian dao mian zhengt jin, chengshi quyu yipian hong, Jiangsu chuangmo you sheng wen” (“From a point to a cluster, city districts in Jiangsu province are gearing toward further NMCEP creation”), China Environmental News, 17 March 2001, http://www.envir.gov.cn/info/2001/3/317821.htm.

39 “Jiangsu queli chuangmo 4333 mubiao, huanbao mofancheng yaozuo zhen dianfan” (“Jiangsu affirms its ‘4333’ chuangmo objectives, model cities have to be true role models”), 6 May 2008, http://www.sepa.gov.cn/cont/mhcity/cjmfcs/cmdt/200805/t20080506_122163.htm.

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