This seminar focuses on the question of 'development' in the context of contemporary China, with particular attention to the development logics guiding change in urban and rural landscapes from the 1950s to the present. We will examine the institutions, initiatives, and narratives that have reshaped built and natural environments. We will also examine the structures of (im)mobilities and community in relation to the urban and rural — as sites and governing categories. Finally, we will explore the question of the 'global' in China's development, both in the earlier socialist periods and in the present, a period marked by rapidly expanding forms of direct engagement with development elsewhere.