Abstract: Development of modern service industry reflects a city's comprehensive competitive strength in a late-stage industrialization or post-industrialization society. Since the middle of 20th century, in the developed international cities such as New York, London, Tokyo, and Chicago, etc., low-end manufacturing industry has been transferred to the developing countries and service industry has evolved as a dominant economic activity, which dramatically promotes the ranking of those cities around the globe. Currently, the vast majority of researches on the spatial development of modern service industry mainly focus on the general principles. However, differences exist in the developmental processes between China and western countries, and therefore it is necessary to further investigate the spatial organization and mechanisms of the distribution of modern service industry, based on the actuality of metropolitan development in China. This paper first reviews related researches abroad and at home and summarizes the mechanisms of the spatial organization of modern service industry, including self-organizing innovation network, driving forces from the market and institutions, interventions of human and social factors, etc. It then conducts an empirical analysis, qualitatively and quantitatively, on the characteristics of the spatial organization of modern service industry of Nanjing city, and verifies the mechanisms mentioned above in order to provide references and examples for the improvement of the theories and methodologies of the planning of related industries. At last, the paper indicates that the road map combining“top-down”with“bottom-up”for the development of modern service industry as well as the research on dynamic mechanisms are the directions of future studies.

Key words: flattening, metropolis, modern service industry, Nanjing, spatial organization