Scenes Making: The Development of Three Urban Communities in Beijing from Cultural Dynamics

The past researches of urban development rarely involve specific local cultural characteristics, for example, amenities, activities, organizations, norms, values, etc... The researchers mainly focus on land, capital and labor when they explain the dynamics of urban development, while they often overlook the roles of culture and arts. With the advent of the post-industrial society, the tradition of this kind of research has changed gradually. The paper selected three different communities in Beijing to explain the driving forces of urban regeneration from cultural scenes, including Zhongguancun community characterized by the culture of innovation and entrepreneurship, the 798 Art District and Nanluoguxiang community characterized by traditional culture. The cultural scene or local cultural characteristics include the following dimensions: facilities consumer oriented, diversity population, characteristic activities, these factors combined to form the scene, and the values and the way of life in the scene. It’s believed that the local cultural features are very important during the process of the gathering of senior human capital, especially for the IT talents and arts crowd. These will bring regional prosperity, including jobs increasing, new industries and social development.