中文摘要：

中国的城市具有鲜明的行政等级特征。按照行政级别和政府驻地，中国城市大体可分为直辖市、副省级市、一般省会城市、一般地级市、县级市、县城和一般建制镇七级。分析结果表明，城市规模大小及增长与其行政等级的高低密切相关，随着行政等级的提高，城市人口和用地规模均呈现指数递增的趋势。从人口和用地规模增长看，行政等级较高的城市增幅一般高于行政等级较低的城市。这种城市规模及增长的分异，受到政府资源配置行政中心偏向的重要影响，不同行政等级城市在权限设置、资源配置、制度安排等方面的差异，是造成这种城际分异的重要原因。在现有城镇体系下，行政中心偏向也是一种大城市偏向，二者起到了相互强化的作用，这种相互强化效应导致近年来行政等级较高的大城市过度膨胀和城市规模控制政策的失效。为促进大中小城市和小城镇协调发展，今后必须从根本上改变资源配置的行政中心偏向，弱化行政等级的影响，以综合承载力作为城市规模控制的依据，以扩权为重点促进经济强镇发展，推动城际发展机会平等和权益公平。

英文摘要：

China＇s cities are characterized with administrative ranks. Seven ranks can be categorized from top to bottom including municipality （province-level city ）, vice-province-level city desi , ordinary provincial capital, ordinary prefecture city ,county-level city ,county town and ordinary gnated town. The research demonstrates that the scale and growth rate of cities are closely related with their administrative ranks. City＇s population and land scale exponentially grows when its administrative rank is lifted. The population and land scale expansion of cities with relatively higher administrative rank is often faster than that with lower administrative rank. All these characteristics taking place in a time when administrative center is put as the priority in the governmental resource allocation, and the differences of administrative power, resource allocation, regime arrangement between cities makes diverse development paths for cities with different administrative ranks essentially. In current urban system,the administration-center bias is in fact a metropolis bias. The two biases reinforce each other leading to excessive expansion of mega cities and the failure to curb the expansion. In the future, the government should take measures to eliminate the administration-center bias in governmental resource allocation, lower the significance of city administrative rank and control the scale of cities according to the comprehensive carrying capacity. The county-level city and strong towns with big development potential should be given more administrative power to promote equal opportunity and fair right which beyond all doubt will help achieve the aim of harmonious development between different-scale cities.