Author: Fan Yang
Source: Made in China Journal
Link: https://search.informit.org/doi/abs/10.3316/informit.T2025103000004901863070988
Abstract
This essay brings an interdisciplinary cultural studies approach to the study of Shenzhen as a ‘core engine’ city in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area (GBA). Through archival research, ethnographic fieldwork, and textual analysis, I examine the tensions and contradictions that have informed and emerged from the recent formation of the low-altitude economy, which aims to transform the airspace below 3,000 metres into a digitised and value-generative economic resource.
By probing the central role played by drones in this discursive and imaginary formation, I explore how technological agents carve out future scenarios for Shenzhen, the GBA, and the nation. Conceptualising Shenzhen as a media-infrastructure complex, I argue, is helpful in illuminating the multidimensional reconfiguration of Shenzhen as a ‘City in the Sky’ through vertical, aerial, digital, and more-than-human means.