Uncoordinated urbanization and economic growth—The moderating role of natural resources

Abstract Malthusian population theory states that, when population growth exceeds the growth of the means of production, socioeconomic development will be hindered. This paper analyzes this issue from the perspective of uncoordinated urbanization. We used the data available for 262 cities at the prefecture level and above in China, for the years 2000, 2005, 2010, and 2015. We empirically investigated the relationship between uncoordinated urbanization and urban economic growth. We also examined how this relationship is affected by natural resource constraints. The research results show that there are temporal and spatial differences in the distribution of uncoordinated urbanization in China. From a temporal perspective, from 2000 to 2015, 45.61% of China’s 262 cities show under‐urbanization, while 36.45% of cities show over‐urbanization. However, the number of cities with over‐urbanization is growing. From a spatial perspective, the number of cities in the northeastern region with over‐urbanization is declining. Conversely, the number of cities with over‐urbanization in Beijing in the central and southeastern coastal areas is increasing. Empirical research shows that uncoordinated urbanization and urban economic growth have an inverted U‐shaped relationship. Abundant natural resources can make the inverted U‐shaped curve of uncoordinated urbanization and economic growth flatter. The “resource curse” seems to occur only under high levels of uncoordinated urbanization (over‐urbanization). For some cities where there is under‐urbanization, abundant natural resources are conducive to urban economic growth.