Shiqiao Li, the School of Architecture’s Weedon Professor of Asian Architecture, has offered up new perspectives on the issues faced by contemporary Chinese cities in his new book Understanding the Chinese City. Li, who also serves as the program director for the Architecture School’s acclaimed summer program in China, argues that, despite revolutions in the past century, the Chinese traditions of city making have not disappeared. He suggests that they have simply found new ways of manifesting themselves materially. What this means for the future, he says, is that decisive development to come in Chinese cities must rely on working creatively with China’s cultural traditions rather than marginalizing or exoticizing them.