Entering the twentieth-first century, post-Mao China continues its considerable transformation. The central theme of this research lies in the examination of social networking through a case study of Shanghai Expo 2010. It is an analysis of the forms of networking in the formation of Shanghai as a global city. The overall question is: To what extent will China be able to enter the global network economy whilst maintaining its emphasis on hierarchical decision-making and central control? This concerns the role of the social in the preparation of Shanghai Expo 2010, with a particular focus on creative networks. The notion of creative networks, which was a starting point for this thesis, is theoretically understood as creative people who are specialists in rather privileged contexts involved with the new economy. The analysis of creative networks is framed in a dialectic relationship between agents (the researcher) and the structure within which they act. Ultimately, however, this thesis problematises the notion of creative networks as they are generally understood in Western urban cultures, providing a reflexive perspective with a focus on people and subjectivities, practices of networking, and socially embeddedness