Shanghai Starts Related Plan To Clear Up Slums

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 43, 6 March 1937, Page 18

Shanghai Starts Related Plan To Clear Up Slums

.. . t- . -nJ . SHANGHAI.^ — In.undertaking an exhaustive investigation this. autumn . of the housing situatiou in Shangnai's International Settlement,- the xesponsibl'e authorities have apparently started & belated "effort to square housing standards with the economic life of ' the people.* : • ■ Preliminary investigations by persons within, and .without ■ the Shanghai Municipal Council employ .has reveaied slum . conditions prqbably worse than those of any ; other major city of 'the •w;orld. . Much of . the situation has been brought about by lack of adequate control by the Council of Buildings after construction; "temporary" -changes in the way- of knocking down walls and eliminating . staireases have. .turned houses into combination house-factories. "The housing standards of any community," a Council employee who will iake part in the housing investigation told The Christian Science Monitor, "are a reflection of general economic standards, and when an authority begins to concern itself with the housing of itB residents, even involuntarily to a degree as in the present case, it is beginning to concern - itself with the economie life of the people. • "The lack of concern in the past on the yart of Shanghai 's f'oreign-adminis-tered areas for this significant aspect of govefnmental responsibility has been a cause of wonder to many students of affairs, both xesident in Shanghai and visitors from elsewhere. "It may be argued that China as a nation is. coming belatedly into a recognition of the . significanc© of the economie life of the common people; but. this is little excuse for foreign administrators who have had it in their power to be concerned with these issues in their comparatively small area of responsibility for many years past, "If the appointment of a Housing Committee does in fact make a beginning in the Council ;s . concern for an understanding of the basie facts of tho life of the Chinese people who make up the bulk of the Settlement population, it will kave performed a serviee far in advance of tkose kopes originally keld by tke' protagonists of * better kousing, important as- tMs in itself is."