清代之前广州长期作为重要的外贸港口,港市、对外贸易、多元文化及“蕃坊”等对城市社会空间结构的影响很大;清初广州确立“一口通商”,对外贸易更趋繁荣,西关及滨江地带成为巨贾侨商集聚之地,而城内的满族与汉族在社会地位、居住等方面呈现较大的分异。从城市总体层面来看。清代广州呈现“西商-东官”的社会空间格局,西关平原及“南关”滨江地带“因港而商,因商而富”,城墙之内的老城区则一直作为官衙区及官僚贵族居住区,“因衙而尊,因官而贵”,这成为广州社会空间结构演进的历史主线。就清末的广州西关而言,已分化为纺织机房区、新兴高级住宅区及洋商区等社会区类型。具备殖民性河港贸易城市的社会空间特征。自然条件对城市空间扩展的限制,“一口通商”的港市繁荣。以及遵循封建礼制的城建思想等成为影响清代广州社会空间结构的主要机制。
Guangzhou had been one of the most important foreign trade harbors before the Qing Dynasty. Port market, foreign trade, cultural diversity and the "Fan Fang (the authorized residential cluster for foreigners)" etc. had exerted a significant impact on the urban socio-spatial structure. In the earlier Qing Dynasty, Guangzhou was designated as the only foreign trade harbor, which promoted the flourish of transnational trade. The "Xi Guan (the outside of the west gate of Guangzhou)" and the southern area close to the Pearl River attracted the local rich and foreign traders for living, while the inner city was mainly occupied by the Man nationality and the Han nationality, and the former with higher social status was more privileged in residential choice etc. In general, Guangzhou had a "dual-core" socio-spatial structure, that is, the rich in the western part and the bureaucracy in the eastern part. The "Xi Guan" and "Nan Guan (close to the Pearl River)" were better-off due to their closeness to the Pearl River and the transnational trade. Meanwhile, the old inner city had been the feudal official area and the residence for the bureaucracy and the aristocrat. This is the evolutional path of socio-spatial differentiation of Guangzhou. For the "Xi Guan" in the later Qing Dynasty, it could be sorted into the weaving factories for the workers, the newly-built residences for the local rich and the transnational trade district for the foreign traders, which had some characteristics of the colonial trade harbor city. By and large, the natural conditions had affected the urban sprawl; the designation of the only foreign trade harbor made Xi Guan become the merchant and tradesmen district, the inner city was the upper scholar-officials district. All of these could contribute to the formation of urban socio-spatial structure of Guangzhou in the Qing Dynasty.