Integrating Resilience Thinking into Urban Planning: An Evaluation of Urban Policy and Practice in Chengdu, China

Abstract

Urban resilience has emerged as a crucial objective for achieving sustainable urban development. However, its practical integration into planning remains limited. This study evaluates the extent to which resilience thinking is integrated into Chengdu’s urban planning system by combining policy-theoretical analysis with empirical evidence. Drawing on a framework of nine resilience attributes, we conduct content analysis of Chengdu’s three types of statutory plan documents (Socioeconomic Development Plan, Urban and Rural Plan, and Land Use Plan) and a questionnaire survey of 70 expert planners. The results reveal that resilience is reflected implicitly in the plans through engineering-oriented attributes such as robustness, efficiency, and connectivity. In contrast, social and ecological attributes like inclusion, redundancy, and innovation are largely absent. Planners demonstrate moderate awareness of resilience, yet associate it predominantly with rapid response and infrastructure robustness rather than long-term adaptation or community capacity-building. These findings indicate the dominant top-down, growth-centric planning logic that constrains the adoption of broader socio-ecological resilience concepts. This paper concludes with policy recommendations for institutionalizing resilience in Chinese urban planning through legal mandates; multi-sectoral coordination; and participatory, adaptive planning frameworks.

1. Introduction

Cities are exposed and vulnerable to severe impacts from a growing range of challenges, shocks, and stresses, both natural and human-made [1,2]. From the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (2015–2030) to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (particularly SDG 11: “Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable”), resilience has become both a global policy priority and a conceptual framework for integrating sustainability, risk mitigation, and adaptive capacity into urban planning and governance [3,4,5]. Within this context, urban planning serves as a critical instrument for operationalizing resilience thinking by shaping the spatial, institutional, and infrastructural conditions that determine a city’s capacity to cope with disturbance, and the integration of disaster mitigation policies is significant for enhancing resilience [6,7,8]. Prior studies have highlighted that local plans with land use goals and policies aimed at reducing vulnerability have a significant positive effect on the local application of regulatory ordinances and infrastructure investments, thereby mitigating vulnerability and reducing property damage from hazards [9,10,11].

China’s rapid urbanization has led to remarkable achievements in economic growth and infrastructure development, but it has simultaneously heightened urban exposure and vulnerability to natural hazards such as earthquakes, floods, and geological disasters [12,13]. Consequently, balancing development and safety has therefore become a national imperative. In response, the Chinese central government has incorporated resilience principles into several strategic policies. For instance, the National New Urbanization Plan (2014–2020) introduced the vision of “people-oriented and sustainable urbanization”, while the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021–2025) further emphasized “coordinating development and security”, calling for the construction of “livable, resilient, and smart cities”. Together, these policies reflect a gradual transition from growth-centric planning to a more quality-oriented model that prioritizes ecological balance, social well-being, and disaster preparedness. Nonetheless, the legacy of top-down, growth-oriented planning raises questions about whether and how resilience thinking is actually being implemented on the ground. China’s statutory planning system traditionally prioritizes quantitative growth targets and engineering projects under a centralized framework [14,15]. It remains unclear to what extent resilience thinking is embedded in official plans or planning practice.

To address this gap, the present study examines Chengdu, a major Chinese megacity characterized by exposure to multiple hazards, notably the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake and recurrent floods and landslides. Chengdu’s urban profile, marked by its large population, rapid growth, significant exposure to hazards, and ongoing planning reforms, makes it an appropriate and illustrative case for exploring the operationalization of resilience thinking in China’s urban planning system. This study addresses the following research questions: (1) To what extent do Chengdu’s statutory plans incorporate core resilience attributes as outlined in resilience planning literature? (2) How do urban planners interpret and apply the concept of resilience in their day-to-day professional practice? (3) What gaps exist between the content of planning documents and planners’ conceptual understanding, and what do these reveal about institutional barriers to embedding resilience in practice?

This study contributes to the literature in three key ways. First, it bridges resilience thinking in planning (RTP) with plan quality evaluation through a structured, attribute-based framework. Second, unlike prior Chinese case studies that focus on high-level policies or specific sectors, this study offers a rare municipal-level, multi-plan, and multi-perspective analysis. Third, by combining textual and perceptual dimensions, it highlights both institutional continuity and conceptual divergence, providing insights into how legacy planning systems interact with emerging reforms such as the Territorial Spatial Planning (TSP) framework. Following a review of relevant literature and conceptual foundations, the paper presents the methodology, analysis results, and key findings. It concludes with policy recommendations for how Chinese cities, such as Chengdu, can better mainstream resilience into planning and development, offering insights for other rapidly urbanizing contexts.

2. Literature Review

2.1. The Evolution of Resilience Thinking

The concept of resilience originated in ecology and has evolved into a core paradigm for urban sustainability. Holling’s seminal work (1973) defined ecological resilience as a system’s ability to absorb disturbance without shifting to a qualitatively different state [16]. Later scholars extended this notion to encompass complex socio-ecological systems, emphasizing adaptive capacity and transformative potential [17,18]. In the domain of urban planning, resilience became a bridging concept between sustainability and risk management, linking short-term hazard mitigation with long-term adaptive governance [19,20].

Resilience thinking reframes cities as complex adaptive systems composed of interacting social, ecological, and technical subsystems [21,22]. This perspective encourages planners to move beyond deterministic “control” models toward flexible, learning-oriented frameworks for managing urban change [23]. Key principles such as diversity, redundancy, modularity, and feedback loops are highlighted as characteristics that enhance an urban system’s capacity to reorganize after shocks [24,25].

In the context of urban planning practice, the concept of resilience was first operationalized in the late 1990s to foster “places with resilience” at the local level [26]. At present, there is a broad consensus that urban planning plays a critical role in advancing urban resilience [27,28]. For instance, Porter and Davoudi (2012) argue that resilience thinking enriches the planning discipline in threefold: (1) by introducing novel concepts and methodologies that challenge planning’s traditional preoccupation with order, predictability, and static outcomes; (2) by highlighting the limitations of blueprint-style strategies in managing complex, nonlinear, and dynamic urban systems; and (3) by offering new avenues to address deeply rooted and evolving socio-ecological challenges [29]. Scholars such as Holling and Gunderson (2002) recognized that the systemic orientation of resilience is fundamental to sustainability [30]. In an increasingly uncertain and unpredictable world, the resilience lens enables a holistic understanding of social-ecological systems, emphasizing the significance of multi-stakeholder interactions across spatial and temporal scales in shaping system dynamics [30,31]. As such, adopting resilience thinking necessitates a transformation in policy-making, planning practices, and governance approaches. Moreover, resilience serves as a shared conceptual framework across sectors and disciplines, fostering interdisciplinary collaboration in urban development [32].

2.2. The Key Attributes of Urban Resilience

Scholars have proposed a range of attributes that resilient urban systems should exhibit, reflecting diverse disciplinary lenses and normative goals. For instance, Godschalk (2003) emphasizes strength, diversity, redundancy, and adaptability as key traits of resilient cities from an engineering planning perspective [33]. Ahern (2011), drawing on ecological resilience, highlights modularity, multifunctionality, and connectivity [19]. Meanwhile, Da Silva and Morera (2014) emphasize governance and social inclusion attributes such as integration, inclusiveness, and resourcefulness, reflecting a socio-ecological systems orientation [34]. These frameworks differ in emphasis but converge on the importance of both structural performance and adaptive capacity across spatial, institutional, and social domains. Rather than adopting a single framework, this study synthesizes commonly cited attributes across leading models to derive a coherent and applicable set of nine attributes: robustness, efficiency, redundancy, diversity, adaptation, connectivity, inclusion, integration, and innovation [4,35,36,37]. These were chosen for their frequency in the literature, complementarity across disciplines, and operational suitability for evaluating statutory planning documents in the Chinese context.

Table 1. The main attributes of urban resilience.

Attributes	Description	Reference
Robustness	Ability to resist attacks or other external forces. The robust design anticipates potential system failures, ensuring that failures are predictable, secure, and not disproportionate to the cause.	[33,38,39,40]
Efficiency	The positive relationship between the functioning of a static urban system in relation to the operation of a dynamic system.	[33,41]
Diversity	The system has several functionally different components to protect it against various threats. The more diversity the system possesses, the better its ability to adapt to a wide range of diverse circumstances.	[33,42]
Redundancy	The existence of several functionally similar components ensures that the system does not fail when one of the components fails.	[33,38,39,40,41,42]
Connectivity	Connected system components for support and mutual interaction.	[33]
Adaptation	Ability to learn from experience and be flexible in the face of change.	[33,39,40,41,42]
Innovation	Ability to quickly find different ways to achieve goals or meet their needs during a shock, or when a system is under stress.	[39,40,41,42]
Inclusion	Development of broad consultation and community involvement, particularly among the most vulnerable groups, in the development of processes and plans. An inclusive approach contributed to a joint vision to build the city’s resilience.	[33,39]
Integration	Integration and alignment between urban systems promote stronger decision-making and ensure that all users/components mutually support each other for a common outcome.	[33,39]

provides definitions and references for the nine selected attributes, which are used in Section 4 to guide our qualitative content analysis of planning documents. This approach enables a structured and theory-informed assessment of how resilience is conceptualized and embedded in local planning practice. To strengthen the analytical coherence, these attributes are grouped according to three foundational perspectives of resilience theory: engineering, ecological, and socio-ecological resilience. For example, robustness and efficiency are typically emphasized in engineering-based approaches, while redundancy, diversity, and adaptation align more closely with ecological resilience. Inclusion, integration, and innovation are central to socio-ecological resilience, which foregrounds governance, equity, and system learning.

2.3. Evaluating Urban Resilience in Planning

Evaluating resilience within urban planning requires both textual and institutional analysis. Early work on socio-ecological systems distinguished resilience as a metaphor, a dynamic property, and a measurable quantity—laying the foundation for its integration into planning theory and assessment. More recent contributions have developed frameworks that connect resilience thinking to the planning cycle itself [43,44]. For instance, Pinho et al. (2013) proposed the concept of “Resilience Thinking in Planning” (RTP), integrating resilience principles into both the formulation and implementation of spatial plans [45].

Several studies have applied content analysis methods to examine the presence of resilience attributes in local plans. Lambrou and Loukaitou-Sideris (2022) reviewed 38 city resilience plans in the U.S. and found that most adopted an engineering-oriented view, with limited attention to transformative or equity-based dimensions [46]. In China, Xu and Shao (2020) used qualitative frameworks to assess post-disaster reconstruction plans for evidence of adaptive governance and ecological learning [47]. These approaches often assess how explicitly resilience-related language and strategies appear in planning documents.

Institutional analysis complements textual methods by uncovering the governance structures, coordination mechanisms, and implementation pathways that enable or constrain resilience. Zaidi and Pelling (2015), for example, assessed disaster risk reduction (DRR) strategies in London, revealing the role of social learning and self-organization in operationalizing resilience [48]. In contexts like China, where planning is hierarchical and fragmented, such institutional factors are critical for understanding how resilience is mainstreamed—or sidelined—in practice. To measure the alignment of plans with resilience goals, plan quality evaluation (PQE) has emerged as a widely used tool for assessing plan quality. Berke and Godschalk (2009) and Berke et al. (2015) developed a “resilience scorecard” to evaluate the internal consistency, hazard sensitivity, and inter-plan coordination of local land use plans in the U.S [9,49]. Yang (2019) applied this method in Shenzhen, finding that stronger interlinkages among statutory plans significantly enhanced their contribution to disaster resilience [50].

The existing literature provides valuable insights into resilience theory, governance, and planning practices. Yet significant critical gaps persist. Empirical evidence on how resilience thinking is translated into planning practice is limited, especially in China. Most studies focus on theoretical frameworks or quantitative indices [51,52,53], rather than examining how resilience concepts are applied in actual planning documents and the perceptions of planners. This study addresses these gaps by integrating document analysis and survey methods to evaluate the presence and interpretation of resilience in Chengdu’s urban planning. By bridging theoretical concepts and empirical evidence, it provides a more nuanced understanding of the barriers and opportunities for mainstreaming resilience in China’s ongoing spatial planning reform. The findings contribute to international debates on how resilience can be institutionalized in planning systems with strong state control, offering lessons for other rapidly urbanizing regions facing multi-hazard risks.

3. Materials and Methods

A mixed-methods approach, which combines quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis, is employed in this study: (1) Document analysis: first, we conducted a directed content analysis of Chengdu’s key statutory planning documents: the most recent Chengdu Comprehensive Socioeconomic Development Plan, the Chengdu Urban and Rural Plan, and the Chengdu Urban Land Use Plan. (2) Planners survey: second, we carried out a questionnaire survey of urban planners in Chengdu to probe professional awareness of resilience concepts. The sample (n = 70) was drawn from the Chengdu municipal planning departments and their affiliated institutions.

3.1. Overview of Selected Planning Documents

To evaluate resilience thinking in local planning, the following relevant documents and materials have been mainly selected in this study (

Table 2. Major selected local plans in Chengdu.

Type of Plan	Content	Document
Socio-Economic Development Planning (SEDP)	A guiding plan of economic and social development (also called the five-year plan), including development, industry, transportation, education, urban space and function, infrastructure, society, environment, culture, reform, well-being, etc.	Chengdu City National Socio-economic Development Planning (2011–2015) Chengdu City National Socio-economic Development Planning (2016–2020)
	Legal basis: Constitution of China (1982, 2018 update)
Urban and Rural Planning (URP)	Includes urban system planning, city planning, town planning, township planning, and village planning. City or town planning provides master planning and detailed planning. (Here, focus on city master planning)	Chengdu City Comprehensive Planning (2011–2020) Chengdu City Comprehensive Planning (2016–2035)
	Legal basis: Urban and Rural Planning Law (2008, 2019 update)
Land Use Planning (LUP)	The land use is regulated, and the land is divided into agricultural land, construction land, and unused land. Strictly restrict the conversion of agricultural land to construction land, control the total amount of construction land, and implement special protection for cultivated land.	Chengdu City Land Use Master Planning (2006–2020, 2014 update)
	Legal basis: Land Administration Law (1986, 2019 update)

). Despite China’s ongoing reforms in national territorial spatial planning, there are currently three predominant forms of statutory planning that cover the whole territory of the city, serving as superior planning at the local level. The Socio-Economic Development Planning (SEDP) is an integrated socio-economic planning framework for productivity development and layout, implemented by various levels of development and reform commissions. Urban and Rural Planning (URP) is an integrated spatial planning approach that aims to rationalize the allocation of spatial resources and enhance the built environment at various levels within urban and rural planning departments. Additionally, Land Use Planning (LUP) is a specific spatial planning approach for arranging the exploitation, management, and preservation of land resources by the relevant land and resource departments. Thus, this study focuses on the question of whether the local planning documents have resilience thinking or not (See major resilience-related planning strategies in Appendix A).

To systematically assess the presence of resilience thinking in Chengdu’s statutory planning documents, we employed a directed qualitative content analysis of the SEDP, URP, and LUP. This approach is particularly suitable for evaluating texts against an existing conceptual framework. We first developed a coding scheme grounded in nine core resilience attributes widely cited in the urban resilience literature. For each attribute, we generated a structured list of representative keywords and synonymous phrases based on academic sources and prior planning studies. Using this keyword set, we conducted a systematic textual analysis of each planning document to identify provisions that explicitly or implicitly aligned with the defined attributes. Each identified provision or strategic objective was manually coded to its corresponding attribute category. The process followed a consistent coding protocol to ensure analytic reliability. In addition to qualitative interpretation, we recorded the frequency of coded instances per attribute across the documents, allowing us to assess the relative emphasis placed on each resilience dimension.

3.2. Introduction to the Planner Survey

In this section, we present a targeted questionnaire survey of urban planners in Chengdu, China, focusing on experienced practitioners directly involved in the city’s planning projects. The survey respondents were expert planners from Chengdu’s core planning departments and affiliated planning institutions, serving as key informants for our study. This expert survey, conducted between April and October 2024, comprised three parts. Part I (Q1–Q3) inquired about each respondent’s role and involvement in planning projects, confirming that all participants were qualified planners actively engaged in planning work. Part II (Q4–Q21) consisted of closed-ended questions on a 7-point Likert scale, designed to assess how nine resilience attributes (identified in our framework) are reflected in planning practice during both plan formulation and implementation. Part III (Q22–Q25) included open-ended questions that invited the planners to discuss their awareness of the resilience concept and their views on adopting resilience as an approach in planning.

A total of 70 expert planners participated in the survey. While a sample size of 70 may appear small for a megacity like Chengdu, it is appropriate for an expert survey aimed at gathering informed professional perspectives rather than broad public opinion. In this key-informant approach, depth of insight is prioritized over sheer number of respondents, which strengthens the credibility of the results. The participants were drawn from Chengdu’s core planning agencies and affiliated institutions, representing the city’s major planning sectors: specifically, 20 were involved in Socio-Economic Development Planning (SEDP), 30 in Urban–Rural Planning (URP), and 20 in Land Use Planning (LUP). By focusing on this expert sample, the survey ensures that the findings reflect the insights of planners with direct, practical experience in Chengdu’s planning system (see Appendix B and Appendix C for the questionnaire and respondent details).

4. Results and Discussion

4.1. Resilience Attributes in Chengdu’s Planning Documents

4.1.1. Resilience-Related Strategies in the SEDP

The SEDP is pivotal as it provides the statutory foundation for formulating and adjusting both the URP and LUP. As a comprehensive roadmap for short-, medium-, and long-term socio-economic development, the SEDP outlines macro-level goals, policies, and strategies. It encompasses all facets of urban and rural development, including industry, transportation, governance, infrastructure, social welfare, and environmental management.

Our content analysis reveals that the SEDP places strong emphasis on the resilience attribute of efficiency. Numerous policy items in the plan emphasize improving the efficiency of urban systems, particularly in terms of emergency responsiveness and recovery capacity. At least six policy measures were identified that directly address efficiency. In addition, robustness, adaptation, diversity, and connectivity are also mentioned to varying degrees. For instance, it includes strategies for seismic retrofitting of infrastructure (robustness), social programs for vulnerable groups (a form of social adaptation), promoting a diversified industrial base (economic diversity), and developing transport and communication networks (connectivity). In contrast, other key resilience attributes such as redundancy, inclusion, integration, and innovation receive minimal or no explicit attention in the SEDP (Appendix A,

Table A1. Major resilience-related strategies in the SEDP.

Aspect	Items	Resilience-Related Strategies	Attributes
Urban development	Implement innovation-driven development strategies to enhance urban innovation and creativity (p. 11).	Innovation-driven development	Innovation
Urban governance	Further, eliminate the differences in the status of urban and rural residents and reform the household registration system (p. 16).	Urban-rural linkage	Social connectivity, inclusion
	Promote the downward shift in management focus and highlight the roles of districts (cities), counties, and communities in urban management (p. 17).	Administrative empowerment	Efficiency, adaptation
Regional development	Improve regional coordination mechanisms and diversified development (p. 30)	Industry diversity and regional coordination	Diversity, integration
Urban spatial structure	Promote the transformation of urban spatial structure from a single center to a multi-level networked urban spatial structure (p. 55)	Polycentric urban structure	Diversity, redundancy
Ecology	Strengthen environmental protection and construct a Park City (p. 11).	Ecological planning and design	Diversity, adaptation
Rural construction	Construct rural information infrastructure, and promote network coverage of administrative villages (p. 19).	ICT Infrastructure	Efficiency, connectivity
	Construct rural infrastructure, such as fire protection, meteorological disaster monitoring, and early warning systems, to improve disaster resistance (p. 20).	Disaster resistance and early warning	Robustness, efficiency
Transport	Realize a reasonable connection among the road network system (p. 22); Speed up the construction of the urban rail transit network system (p. 73)	Physical network system	Connectivity efficiency
Infrastructure	Improve risk assessment and emergency response, and increase infrastructure construction, such as storage and disaster backup (p. 24)	ICT Infrastructure	Robustness, redundancy
	Construct river embankments and urban drainage facilities to prevent and control floods, and improve the emergency response system for disasters (p. 26)	Disaster prevention and resistance	Robustness, adaptation
	Construct a multi-level infrastructure network system (such as public services, municipal utilities, water, energy, etc.) (p. 77)	Public facilities and services for response capacity	Robustness, connectivity
Society	Increase the coverage of social insurance (p. 72); Build a more equitable and sustainable social insurance system covering all urban and rural residents (p. 106)	Social insurance system	Adaptation, inclusion
	Protect the rights and interests of women, children, older people, and people with disabilities (p. 108)	Focus on vulnerable groups	Inclusion
	Improve social governance capabilities, and establish a social governance system featuring government responsibility, social coordination, and public participation (p. 15)	Social co-governance capacity	Inclusion, integration
Public safety	Establish disaster prevention and mitigation systems covering disasters, accidents, and public health, and further improve various emergency plans (p. 78)	Disaster prevention and mitigation	Efficiency, adaptation
	Establish risk assessment and emergency response systems, and improve the early warning and emergency response to natural disasters, accidents, public health, environmental risks, social security, and other emergency ability (p. 128)	risk assessment and emergency response capacity	Efficiency, adaptation

).

4.1.2. Resilience-Related Strategies in the URP

The URP prioritizes spatial and infrastructural strategies, exhibiting several implicit links to resilience thinking. The plan’s spatial vision shifts from a radial or finger-type development model to a more networked and polycentric urban structure. Compared with monocentric and hierarchical systems, polycentric networks inherently support greater diversity and redundancy, thereby enhancing urban resilience. Secondly, the transportation section of the URP aims to establish a multi-level, interconnected mobility system and to improve road density and transport efficiency—key elements of the connectivity and efficiency attributes. Ecological resilience is also considered through the creation of environmental security zones, biodiversity corridors, and green buffer networks, thereby promoting ecological connectivity, diversity, and adaptive capacity.

Additional URP components focus on public facilities, emergency preparedness, and post-disaster recovery, which contribute to strengthening the robustness of the urban system. Notably, the updated URP version (released around 2018) explicitly references the term “urban resilience,” particularly in the context of enhancing public safety. This indicates growing awareness of resilience within official planning language. However, the interpretation of resilience remains predominantly narrow and engineering-focused, emphasizing structural stability and physical connectivity. Attributes such as inclusion (community engagement) and innovation (adaptive governance mechanisms) are largely absent. Hence, while the URP shows progress in incorporating resilience considerations, especially in physical domains, it still reflects a conventional approach grounded in structural and infrastructural resilience (Appendix A,

Table A2. Major resilience-related strategies in the URP.

Aspect	Items	Resilience-Related Strategies	Attributes
Spatial structure	Relying on a radial/finger transport system to form a network and polycentric city system and spatial structure (p. 3) (p. 8)	network and polycentric structure	Diversity, redundancy
Transport system	Build a multi-level, networked transportation system (p. 12); Improve road density and traffic efficiency (p. 13)	Network transport system	Efficiency, connectivity
Environment	Build an ecological security spatial pattern, an ecological corridor and a biodiversity protection network (p. 6) (p. 8)	Urban and landscape ecological planning	Diversity, connectivity, adaptation
Public service facilities	Form a system of public service facilities covering urban and rural areas at five levels: central urban areas, new cities, key towns, general towns, and new rural communities (p. 15)	Infrastructure network system	Robustness connectivity
Public safety	Establish the comprehensive disaster prevention and mitigation system, and improve disaster adaptation capabilities (plan for earthquake, geology, flood, fire, dangerous item(p. 20). Improve urban resilience (p. 13).	disaster prevention and mitigation plan	Robustness adaptation
	The construction land of towns and villages should avoid natural disaster-prone areas, and special protective measures must be taken if they cannot be avoided (p. 20)	Recognize disaster-prone areas	Robustness
Post-disaster reconstruction	Strengthen the construction of refuge sites and passages, and improve the seismic standards of public facilities (p. 22)	Spatial planning and building standards	Robustness

).

4.1.3. Resilience-Related Strategies in the LUP

The LUP governs land development, utilization, and conservation, with a core objective of protecting cultivated land. Its master plan seeks to optimize land use based on urban functionality and spatial coherence. Given the well-documented adverse effects of land cover change, from natural to human-made environments, on ecosystem services and disaster resilience, the LUP’s environmental components are noteworthy.

The 2014 revision of Chengdu’s Land Use Master Plan (2006–2020) serves as the regulatory foundation for annual land use planning and delineates key areas for farmland protection. These measures aim to curb urban sprawl, enhance land use efficiency, and ensure food security. However, aside from resource efficiency and ecological preservation, the LUP exhibits limited integration of broader resilience principles. It is the least reflective of resilience attributes among the three planning documents. Features such as redundancy (e.g., alternative land use provisions), inclusion (public participation in land decision-making), and innovation in land governance are virtually absent. The LUP remains a technical instrument, primarily focused on meeting upper-level mandates related to land quota control and resource protection (Appendix A,

Table A3. Major resilience-related strategies in the URP.

Aspect	Items	Resilience-Related Strategies	Attributes
Ecology Food security	Strengthen the protection of arable land and ecological land; Improve land use efficiency and prevent urban sprawl (p. 20)	Land control and management	Efficiency diversity

).

In summary, the analysis suggests that across Chengdu’s statutory plans, the discourse of resilience has not yet been systematically mainstreamed into the planning agenda. While the notion of “resilience” is not explicitly expressed in the reviewed planning documents, some attributes of resilience, such as efficiency, adaptation, and robustness, are evident to varying degrees. On the one hand, SEDP tends to focus on efficiency and social adaptation through socio-economic development. On the other hand, URP attaches great importance to robustness through structural resistance and physical connectivity through infrastructure and transport systems. However, LUP is the least reflected resilient attribute in statutory planning. Crucially, key resilience attributes—especially those related to social capital and governance, such as integration, inclusion, and innovation—are lacking or remain underdeveloped in all three plans. This pattern reveals the dominance of a top-down, engineering-oriented planning paradigm in the local context. These findings suggest that current planning practices have yet to internalize the broader socio-ecological dimensions of resilience. This gap points to a need for complementing the top-down approach with bottom-up insights and more flexible, inclusive planning actions to enhance urban resilience.

4.2. Evaluation of Resilience Thinking in Planners

4.2.1. Resilience Attributes in Planners

To systematically assess how local planners in Chengdu incorporate resilience thinking into their practices, we analyzed survey results for nine resilience attributes. A 7-point Likert scale was used to evaluate both the perceived consideration of each attribute in plan formulation and its effectiveness in implementation. To aid interpretation, attributes with mean scores above five were classified as strongly emphasized, scores between four and five as moderately emphasized, and scores below four as weakly emphasized. Figure 1, Figure 2, Figure 3, Figure 4, Figure 5, Figure 6, Figure 7, Figure 8 and Figure 9 present the distribution of responses, while Figure 10 and

Table 3. Resilience attributes as they appear in planning practices: a framework for evaluation.

Attributes	Illustration of Different Resilience Perspectives
	Engineering Resilience	Ecological Resilience	Socio-Ecological Resilience
Robustness	++	+	+
Efficiency	++	+	+
Diversity	−	+	+
Redundancy	−	+	+
Connectivity	−	physical: + social: −	physical: + social: +
Adaptation	−	−	+
Innovation	−	−	+
Inclusion	−	−	++
Integration	−	−	++

Note: The + and − signs indicate the degree of emphasis on the resilience attribute from different perspectives. The ecological resilience perspective emphasizes physical connectivity over social connectivity, as it overlooks the nature of the human-based socio-ecological system and the complexity of interactions among stakeholders.

summarize cross-attribute and cross-plan comparisons.

(1)

Robustness

Robustness received strong emphasis from planners, with an average score of 5.04 (Figure 1). Nearly all respondents agreed that structural resistance to hazards is a top priority in planning and development. URP planners scored slightly higher, aligning with their responsibility for spatial structure and infrastructure, where robust measures (e.g., seismic design, zoning for hazard avoidance) are often incorporated. Overall, robustness emerges as a top-priority attribute in the mindset of Chengdu’s planners, reflecting an emphasis on “hard” resilience measures such as physical safety and engineering standards. This finding is consistent with the engineering resilience perspective prevalent in China’s planning practice.

(2)

Efficiency

Efficiency had the highest overall score among all attributes, averaging 5.54 for formulation and 4.80 for implementation (Figure 2), indicating a strong preference for efficiency but some dissatisfaction with the actual planning’s effect on improving efficiency. However, among the three types of planning, LUP has the lowest consideration of efficiency, and LUP as a land regulation method is perceived as having limited effectiveness in promoting the efficiency of the city’s response capacity to disasters. In contrast, SEDP and URP planners reported a strong focus on efficiency—SEDP through emergency management policies and URP through the design of transportation and infrastructure networks that facilitate quick mobilization.

(3)

Diversity

Diversity was one of the lowest-scoring attributes (average: 3.81, Figure 3). Planners indicated that functional diversity and mixed land use are rarely emphasized in current planning practices. The dominance of rigid functional zoning and blueprint-style plans, influenced by imported Western models, discourages spatial heterogeneity. Interestingly, SEDP planners showed slightly more attention to diversity, possibly reflecting concern for economic diversification. Some noted that real-world urban development sometimes achieves unplanned diversity through market forces or informal processes.

(4)

Redundancy

Redundancy was another attribute that received low emphasis. The mean scores were 3.56 for considering redundancy in plan formulation and 3.44 for implementation effectiveness (Figure 4), indicating that redundancy is not adequately accounted for in various plans. Planners noted that redundancy is often misunderstood as inefficiency or waste under China’s performance-oriented governance. The priority to “optimize” resource allocation discourages overprovisioning. Recently, however, some planners have begun to recognize the drawbacks of this approach. Several respondents “regretfully acknowledged” that the lack of redundancy (e.g., insufficient alternative routes, lack of backup power or water systems) leaves the city vulnerable. They suggested that more attention should be paid to designing infrastructure with extra buffers. For instance, ensuring multiple road connections between key areas or maintaining reserve land for emergency uses could improve resilience.

(5)

Connectivity

The average rating for considering connectivity (both physical and social) in planning was 4.79 (Figure 5), indicating moderate emphasis. SEDP and URP show a greater emphasis on connectivity, with the former focusing more on social connectivity, which is the connection of non-physical elements such as the economy and society, while the latter pays attention to physical linkage through, for instance, transportation systems and infrastructure. Overall, connectivity is one of the better-incorporated resilience attributes among Chengdu’s planners. They recognize that well-connected systems can better withstand and recover from disruptions by providing alternative pathways and facilitating the flow of resources.

(6)

Adaptation

Although all investigated planners reported an average of 4.56 on a 7-level Likert scale evaluation (Figure 6), which indicates a moderate awareness of adaptation, a complex and disparate picture emerges among the three plans. First, the SEDP reported a relatively high consideration for adaptation, higher than the overall average. This likely reflects that socio-economic planning inherently deals with change (economic transitions, demographic shifts) and must be adaptive. SEDP documents often include language about improving the city’s capacity to adapt to economic restructuring or climate change, indicating some forward-looking flexibility. LUP, in contrast, showed an exceptionally low level of concern for adaptation in their work. Many URP respondents essentially follow fixed master plan targets and regulations, leaving little room for adaptive approaches. They noted that China’s traditional land use planning is a top-down process with infrequent updates (every 5–10 years), which is inherently non-adaptive. In summary, adaptation is moderately recognized but unevenly applied.

(7)

Innovation

The attribute of innovation encompasses vision and direction-setting frameworks, as well as sustainable development. It also includes the creation of new socio-ecological systems and an emphasis on learning, experimentation, locally developed rules, and embracing change. However, planners almost unanimously acknowledged that they rarely consider fostering innovation as a planning objective. The average score was 3.47 (Figure 7), reflecting a low degree of focus. In general, respondents felt that while innovation is vigorously pursued in the economic sphere (for example, promoting innovation in industry and technology for economic growth), it is not a significant part of urban planning practice. When it comes to planning the built environment or social development, planners admitted that they seldom set goals like “enhance the city’s creativity or learning capacity” in their plans. Despite this, a couple of planners noted a paradox: there is a high degree of innovation in vision statements and economic plans, but much less in concrete urban planning actions. This suggests a gap between rhetoric and practice.

(8)

Inclusion

Regarding inclusion, the survey examined planners’ perceptions of community engagement, particularly in relation to vulnerable groups. Inclusion is a vital attribute of urban resilience, contributing to social cohesion and long-term development. By contrast, the survey indicates that inclusion is not yet a well-incorporated practice in Chengdu’s planning. Planners rated the consideration of public consultation and community involvement at 3.83 during plan formulation, and even lower (3.24) in terms of how effectively plans improve inclusiveness in practice (Figure 8). Notably, URP planners reported a higher score in formulation but remained critical of actual outcomes, suggesting a mismatch between intentions and practice. Respondents widely agreed on the importance of enhancing public participation and community engagement. However, the lack of institutional mechanisms for consultation makes it challenging to incorporate residents’ perspectives—especially those of marginalized groups—into final planning outcomes.

(9)

Integration

Integration refers to the coordination of different urban systems, administrative departments, geographic areas, and stakeholders during the planning process. This critical resilience attribute received limited attention, with a mean score of 3.64 (Figure 9). Planners involved in URP and LUP gave remarkably low scores, consistent with the fragmented institutional structure, where departments operate independently and often result in conflicting plans. Survey responses confirmed this fragmentation, with many planners citing overlaps and contradictions between URP and LUP, as well as the absence of effective mechanisms for harmonization. SEDP planners, whose responsibilities inherently span multiple sectors, reported slightly higher integration efforts, such as aligning spatial strategies with economic development; however, they still noted insufficient cross-sectoral coordination.

An interesting development referenced by some respondents is China’s recent introduction of a new Territorial Spatial Planning (TSP) system, which is intended to merge and replace the previous URP and LUP. This reform aims to promote the integration of various plans under one unified framework. Planners in Chengdu are aware of TSP and a few noted that it is supposed to solve coordination problems by having “one integrated spatial plan” for the city. As of the survey, TSP was newly in effect, and it remains to be seen how well it improves integration in practice.

To sum up, although some resilience attributes are evident to varying degrees in the thinking of local planners, there are significant differences among the attributes and those pursued by different plans (Figure 10). Robustness and efficiency emerged as the most emphasized attributes, indicating a dominant engineering resilience perspective that focuses on structural strength, stability, and rapid recovery capabilities. Connectivity and adaptation were moderately acknowledged, whereas innovation, redundancy, and integration received minimal attention, revealing a significant gap in addressing broader socio-ecological resilience dimensions. Differences across planning types are also notable. SEDP planners prioritize efficiency and adaptation, highlighting economic resilience and policy flexibility. URP planners emphasize robustness and physical connectivity, aligning with traditional infrastructure-centered resilience. In contrast, LUP planners scored lowest on nearly all attributes, reflecting institutional constraints and limited scope for integrating resilience considerations, particularly social or governance-related aspects such as inclusion or innovation.

Drawing on Shao (2017) [37], we adopted a three-tiered framework linking resilience attributes to engineering, ecological, and socio-ecological perspectives (Table 3). Engineering resilience is characterized by robustness and efficiency; ecological resilience adds diversity, redundancy, and physical connectivity; while socio-ecological resilience encompasses the full spectrum, particularly emphasizing integration and inclusion. Our findings suggest that most Chengdu planners remain grounded in an engineering mindset, with limited engagement in more adaptive and participatory approaches to resilience.

4.2.2. Resilience Awareness in Planners

In Part 3 of the questionnaire, the term “resilience” was directly presented to respondents to explore how they understand and evaluate it in the context of planning. Participants were first asked about their familiarity with the concept. Most SEDP planners reported “some understanding,” while URP planners predominantly selected “well understood.” In contrast, LUP planners showed limited awareness, with many selecting “merely heard of it” or “never heard before.” Despite these variations, overall familiarity with resilience was moderate, with an average score of 4.43 on a 7-point Likert scale (Figure 11), and URP respondents demonstrated the highest awareness. When the questions turned to the consideration of resilience in planning and the effectiveness of implementation, most planners were less optimistic. The results show that planners currently give less concern to resilience when preparing their plans and do not believe that current plans are resilience-minded. This finding calls for further research on the integration of resilience with planning and how to assess resilience, exploring different planning tools and instruments to promote urban resilience and address the current deficiency in planning for resilience in China.

Respondents who reported having at least heard the term (61 out of 70, all investigated planners) were then provided with a list of 16 relevant words closely associated with the main interpretations of resilience in the literature. They were asked to select five terms they considered most appropriate and to rank them in order of importance. Each selection was assigned a weighted score from 5 (most important) to 1 (fifth-ranked); unselected terms received a score of 0. The final score for each term was calculated as the average weighted score across respondents, as shown in Equation (1):

$$Weighted score= {\displaystyle \frac{\sum (Frequency at which an option is choosen \times weighted score)}{Numbers of respondnts (n=61)}}$$

(1)

As illustrated in Figure 12, “adaptability” received the highest score, indicating that many planners equate resilience with the ability to adapt, partly due to linguistic and conceptual overlaps in the Chinese context. Planners also closely associated resilience with “efficiency,” “resistance,” and “robustness,” reflecting a predominantly engineering-based interpretation focused on stability and rapid recovery through strong infrastructure and system optimization. “Emergency management capability” also ranked high, suggesting that resilience is frequently perceived as synonymous with preparedness and response, a view consistent with Chinese administrative practice. Conversely, terms aligned with socio-ecological resilience—such as “redundancy,” “innovation capacity,” “reflective learning,” “social inclusiveness,” and “public participation”—were rarely selected. This supports prior findings indicating that broader, equity-oriented, and adaptive dimensions of resilience are largely absent in local planning mindsets.

In summary, the collective mental model of resilience among Chengdu’s planners is skewed toward an engineering and emergency-management paradigm. Resilience is viewed as the ability to withstand disturbances, respond efficiently, and recover quickly, mainly through robust infrastructure and effective emergency response. This finding is important because how planners conceptualize resilience will influence how they implement it. The current bias may lead to plans that focus on strengthening infrastructure and response mechanisms, which are necessary but not sufficient for holistic resilience. Emphasizing that true urban resilience requires integrating physical, social, and institutional strategies could gradually shift this mindset.

Additionally, while this study focuses on three traditional statutory plans—SEDP, URP, and LUP—most of which were formulated between 2011 and 2020, their analytical value remains highly relevant in the context of China’s ongoing Territorial Spatial Planning (TSP) reform. First, these three plans served as foundational components of China’s pre-reform planning system, directly shaping the spatial and strategic development trajectory of cities like Chengdu. Understanding their resilience orientation provides essential baseline insights into the institutional legacies and sectoral priorities that the emerging TSP system inherits. Second, although the TSP reform aims to integrate multiple planning layers into a unified framework, it is primarily built upon the principles, contents, and administrative logic of existing plans. Many of the policy goals, spatial strategies, and land use controls from URP and LUP, as well as the macro-strategic guidance from SEDP, have been incorporated—often with limited structural transformation—into local TSP pilots and approved plans. Thus, analyzing these legacy documents helps illuminate both the strengths and gaps that TSP must address to internalize resilience thinking. Therefore, assessing the resilience attributes of these three core plans provides practical insights for enhancing the transformative potential of future TSP instruments.

5. Conclusions

This study examined the integration of resilience thinking into Chengdu’s urban planning system through content analysis of statutory documents and a survey of practicing planners. The findings reveal that while the concept of resilience is increasingly referenced in policy rhetoric, its implementation in planning practice remains limited and uneven. Chengdu’s planning framework, like that of many Chinese cities, continues to prioritize engineering resilience, focusing on physical infrastructure and disaster prevention. In contrast, the social, institutional, and adaptive dimensions of resilience remain underdeveloped.

From the document analysis, it is evident that Chengdu’s local plans emphasize robustness, connectivity, and efficiency, aligning with China’s long-standing emphasis on infrastructure-based safety and growth-oriented modernization. In contrast, redundancy, inclusion, and diversity are either absent or weakly expressed. The questionnaire survey of planners reinforces this pattern. Planners primarily associate resilience with disaster management, system robustness, and rapid recovery, reflecting a technocratic and reactive mindset. Few respondents linked resilience to social equity, community participation, or long-term transformation. This “hazard-response” framing aligns with international observations that resilience discourses can become depoliticized when translated into practice [18,54]. It also underscores a fundamental challenge in the Chinese context: even as national policies promote sustainability and resilience, local planning institutions often remain structurally ill-equipped to pursue adaptive governance or inclusive decision-making [55]. Theoretically, this study contributes to the debate on translating resilience theory into planning practice. The case of Chengdu demonstrates that the engineering–adaptive dichotomy remains unresolved in China’s urban governance. Engineering resilience, emphasizing control and efficiency, aligns with China’s centralized administrative culture and performance-based governance [56]. Thus, this study underscores that embedding resilience in Chinese cities requires not only planning techniques but also governance innovation.

However, several limitations should be noted. First, the analysis focuses solely on Chengdu, which, while illustrative due to its hazard exposure and planning reforms, may not fully represent the diversity of urban contexts across China. Second, the planning documents analyzed were published before the full implementation of the new TSP system. Although the findings remain relevant, future studies should investigate how resilience thinking develops within the unified TSP framework. Third, while the survey covered a broad range of planners, it relied on self-reported awareness and interpretations, which may not fully capture actual implementation dynamics.

In conclusion, Chengdu’s case suggests that embedding global resilience principles into China’s planning system will require both conceptual and institutional shifts. While statutory plans now recognize the importance of resilience, this study demonstrates that without stronger attention to inclusion, diversity, and integration, resilience will remain only partially realized. Future research could track the implementation of these planning reforms and examine interventions that overcome the current constraints of the planning culture. Such work is essential for transitioning from a narrow, technical resilience agenda to a more holistic, systemic resilience model in China and other developing countries.