Counting urban population in Chinese censuses 1953-2000: Changing definitions, problems and solutions

The level of urbanisation in many developing countries such as China has remained at less than 50%, despite rapid urban population growth since the 1950s. Obtaining accurate information on urban population is essential for monitoring and studying the ongoing urbanisation process that is restructuring the societies of less urbanised countries. The difficulties in counting China's urban population have arisen from the accelerated urbanisation in China under a model of dual-track urbanisation since the early 1980s. Institutional settings for urbanisation have also been altered with the revision of criteria for city and town designation. These developments make it increasingly difficult to count urban population in China, causing frequent changes in the definition of urban population in five censuses from 1953 to 2000. Two approaches have been adopted to estimate urban population data series for inter-census periods. This paper proposes a third approach based on the concept of dual-track urbanisation, counting and estimating urban non-agricultural and agricultural populations separately. After thorough examination and comparison of the definition of urban population and data quality from five censuses, this paper obtains a set of more consistent urban population data after a series of adjustments. A new series of urban population data is estimated for 1982-2001. The results provide reliable urbanisation data for further study on urban transition and development in China. Copyright (c) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.