As China enters the urban-rural renewal era, economic and social transformation has fundamentally changed the logic of urban-rural spatial renewal-shifting from traditional incremental expansion to connotative enhancement. However, the real estate market adjustment and local fiscal downturn have posed severe challenges to the conventional renewal model. To address spatial governance issues in this era, eight experts from academia, management and industry engaged in in‑depth discussions and reached the following consensus. (1) Renewal governance should shift from land finance and capital reliance to a new paradigm of value regeneration, pluralistic co-governance and fair sharing. (2) Government role transformation is key: empower grassroots and market players, optimize investment-financing systems, diversify funding channels, and leverage policies to stimulate market participation. In planning management, move beyond rigid standards, adopt flexible controls tailored to renewal contexts, and streamline approvals. (3) Renewal model should evolve from government-led and market-driven to multi-dimensional negotiation and co-governance, build fair spatial value-added distribution mechanisms, guarantee residents' full-process participation rights, and cultivate community self-organization capacity. (4) Rural renewal faces persistent challenges, including brain drain, funding shortages, and complex land ownership structures. Addressing these issues requires land system innovations, the introduction of distinctive industries, and the activation of endogenous dynamics. (5) To achieve urban-rural renewal linkage and overall value enhancement, macro‑level institutional restructuring and policy synergy are essential. Drawing on Baexpert interviews, we propose the "EPRSO" urban-rural spatial governance framework for the regeneration era, centered on reshaping multi-subject relationships. Through decentralization and empowerment, this framework ensures equitable distribution of spatial value added and fosters urban-rural value symbiosis, while necessitating cross‑sector collaboration to promote sustainable and shared prosperity.
The governance of super-large and mega cities is an important component of the modernization of China's national governance system and governance capacity. Based on core journal literature from the CNKI, this study comprehensively employs bibliometric analysis to divide the evolution of research on the governance of super-large and mega cities in China into three stages: preliminary exploration, in-depth expansion, and deepening transformation, thereby revealing the evolution of research trajectories across different periods. On this basis, this paper introduces the perspective of governance elements and constructs a comprehensive analytical framework consisting of "governance objectives—governance subjects—governance models—governance objects", so as to systematically analyze the core issues and limitations of current research. The findings show that the value orientation of research on governance objectives has shifted from growthism to humanism, while displaying increasingly systematic characteristics. In terms of governance subjects, a pluralistic collaborative governance pattern under the leadership of Party building has been established, with technological empowerment, institutional construction, and capacity building becoming the main research perspectives for addressing subject fragmentation and ambiguities in rights and responsibilities. Research on governance models has not only developed multiple types from the static classification perspectives of value objectives, subject structures, and governance tools, but also achieved multi-link innovation from the perspective of dynamic governance processes. Research on governance objects has formed a compound governance field covering life, production, living, and ecology. Looking ahead, future research should promote the systematic development of governance theory for super-large and mega cities with Chinese characteristics, with a focus on establishing an adaptive governance framework that responds to technological evolution and iterative shocks, expanding cross-scale governance analysis from the perspective of urban systems, and further deepening research on governance pathways under the People's City concept.
Urban regeneration has traditionally emphasized transformations of the built environment, while the social dimension has received less systematic attention. Conceptualizing regeneration as both physical (built-environment) renewal and socio-spatial restructuring, this study examines their spatial patterns and interrelationship within Beijing's Fifth Ring Road. The findings reveal that: (1) Material regeneration projects can be classified as production-oriented, residential, public, and comprehensive. Among these, production regeneration projects are the largest in scale, but residential projects are becoming the mainstream, and the spatial distribution of different regeneration types shows marked heterogeneity. (2) Using community-scale resident attribute data from Baidu Huiyan, we identify patterns of social spatial regeneration, and find that overall changes include an increase in the average age of residents, a relatively stable income level, and notable improvements in educational attainment, consumption capacity, and occupational status. Based on differences in changes to socioeconomic attributes, communities are clustered into eight types of social spatial regeneration areas, whose spatial differentiation shows a notable degree of correlation with material regeneration. (3) Quantitative analysis confirms that one year after urban regeneration, the scale of material regeneration is significantly correlated with social upgrading, indicating that material regeneration can drive changes in social structure. Among these types, production regeneration exerts the strongest explanatory power for social improvement, followed by residential and public regeneration. Different types of social areas also respond differently to material environmental regeneration. Recognizing the dual material and social dimensions of urban regeneration and strengthening research on the mechanisms by which material regeneration shapes socio-spatial restructuring, as well as the inherent links between community transformation and improvements in residents' lives, will support rigorous assessment of the comprehensive impacts of urban regeneration on the urban environment, economic growth, and social well-being. Such an approach can help refine locally adapted regeneration strategies and guide urban regeneration to become an important driver of socio-economic transformation, high-quality sustainable development, and equitable benefits for urban residents.
Exploring the triggering mechanism of the policy agenda for the regeneration of old and dilapidated communities (ODCs) in the context of urban renewal is of significant practical importance for advancing high-quality urban development and modernizing urban governance. Guided by the Multiple Streams Framework (MSF), this study employs a two-way fixed effects model on multi-source, heterogeneous panel data from Beijing (2019-2024) to systematically analyze the spatiotemporal patterns and driving mechanisms of ODC policy agenda setting, thereby addressing limitations in quantitative identification and external validity in existing research. The findings show that: (1) As of 2024, 30.17% of Beijing's ODCs have been included in the regeneration agenda, with 71.98% concentrated in the urban areas, particularly within the Fifth Ring Road. (2) The problem, policy, and political streams significantly shape the policy agenda for the regeneration of ODCs. In the problem stream, key drivers include older building age, lower spatial quality, low-rise/multi-story structures, and absence of underground parking.In the policy stream, higher district-level fiscal expenditure and greater government attention, along with younger top officials, significantly advance policy agenda, whereas a district head's transition in the same year exerts a suppressive effect. In the political stream, neighborhoods with stronger resident demands, property rights involving Danwei housing, and market-oriented property management are more likely to enter the agenda. (3) Demographic characteristics—specifically aging rate, education level, and income level—significantly moderate the effects of the multiple streams, with notable heterogeneity between urban and suburban areas. We propose building a sustainable urban renewal model through pathways such as strengthening an integrated "people- and place-focused" city check-ups, encouraging multi-stakeholder collaborative self-regeneration, cultivating grassroots "policy entrepreneurs", and implementing differentiated urban-suburban governance strategies.
Under the influence of urban renewal, the original sociospatial structure of residents has been disrupted and reconfigured, forming heterogeneous communities composed of diverse groups. While these groups live in close physical proximity, systemic differences in their social networks and access to spatial resources often result in a complex phenomenon where physical proximity coexists with social alienation. This study aims to break away from the static paradigm of traditional research on sociospatial differentiation. Based on a progressive perspective of "spatial co-occurrence-behavioral coordination-relational embedding", it constructs a three-tiered measurement model of "Exposure-Interaction-Association" to understand the dynamic developmental process of social differentiation—from spatial sharing to behavioral coordination and ultimately to the establishment of social relationships. To rigorously study the micro-level features of sociospatial segregation, data on the daily activities and social trajectories of three groups (commercial homeowners, tenants, and resettled residents) were gathered using five urban renewal areas in Xi'an as empirical instances. The results show that: (1) At the exposure level, intergroup sharing of activity spaces is generally low, with strong functional preference-driven segregation. (2) At the interaction level, heterogeneous groups show temporal-spatial misalignment in activity trajectories, resulting in physical proximity but behavioral estrangement. (3) At the association level, strong internal connections coexist with weak external exchanges, forming typical nested social islands. Regarding differentiation characteristics, this study advocates shifting community governance from resource provision to group intervention, proposing a three-tiered governance pathway: (1) Break the pattern of preferential occupation of functional spaces by different groups through spatial preference guidance and optimization strategies. (2) Resolve the dilemma of parallel activity trajectories among groups through spatiotemporal behavioral coordination and triggering strategies. (3) Activate social interactions among diverse groups through social network cultivation strategies to break the solidification of social circles. The goal of this study is to advance residential integration toward social integration by offering theoretical underpinnings and practical advice.
The lack of a shared identity among residents often prevents neighborhood redevelopment initiatives from achieving their intended social integration goals. In Medellín, Colombia, implemented a series of informal settlement redevelopment practices known as "Social Urbanism", which transformed the city from the "world's most dangerous" to the most innovative". Distinct from traditional neighborhood redevelopment practices that primarily aim to provide physical and social capital for the community, the social urbanism practice presents a redevelopment model centering on the construction of shared identity. This paper adopts Social Identity Theory as the analytical perspective, and identifies three key aspects of the model: First, cultural ties are employed to connect fragmented communities, encourage collaboration among stakeholders, and create a new shared identity; Second, artistic initiatives are organized to create distinctive communities, emphasize positive community traits, and minimize social differences between residents of different neighborhoods; Third, landmark construction transforms informal neighborhoods into Medellín's new centers and attractions, emphasizing the positive value of this new identity. Social Urbanism practice provides important insights, demonstrating that culture-centered neighborhood micro-redevelopment can effectively foster a sense of identity and a spirit of sharing among residents from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds. Driven by a shared social identity, citizens' sustained investment in informal neighborhoods and active interaction with local residents have fostered a sustainable mechanism for social integration. The Social Urbanism practice offers valuable case implications and methodological references for China's neighborhood redevelopment practices to foster stronger community identity and cohesion.
Uncovering the mechanism of residents' policy support intention is beneficial for promoting urban regeneration and achieving high-quality development. Existing research predominantly focuses on the pre-relocation phase, with insufficient attention to policy support intentions and their underlying mechanisms during the post-relocation phase. This study identifies two types of policy support intentions, i.e., policy advocacy intention and generalized policy support intention, and develops measurement scales with good reliability and validity as tools. Based on survey data collected from 488 respondents across 16 new-type urbanization pilot areas, this study adopts social exchange theory and the norm of reciprocity as theoretical framework and employs structural equation modeling to examine the framework. The results indicate that: (1) Perceived value significantly and positively influences residents' policy support intentions through policy satisfaction and government trust. (2) Compared to generalized support intention, policy advocacy intention is more strongly associated with antecedents. The norm of reciprocity may not be the primary driving force behind generalized policy support intention, which is instead shaped by multiple factors such as motivational orientations, perceived efficacy, and environmental conditions. (3) Older, low-income residents participating in livelihood projects are driven by greater reciprocity motives, and consequently, perceived value more strongly affects subsequent variables. These groups are more sensitive to compensation value and livelihood value. Based on these findings, this study proposes recommendations including: (1) reforming the long-term work system of relocation to enhance the continuity and stability of policy implementation in urban regeneration; (2) stimulating the intrinsic motivation of public participation by identifying residents' needs through systematic social surveys and fostering positive relocation experiences; and (3) meeting vulnerable groups' needs consistently to ensure spatial justice, with particular emphasis on fair compensation for peasants and residents in development-oriented projects; livelihood support for older and low-income residents; and maintenance of social ties among older residents.
The scientific evaluation of the effects of urban village redevelopment is an important reference for steadily advancing urban renewal and achieving high-quality urban development. Based on 571 resident survey responses in Guangzhou, this study employs propensity score matching (PSM) to identify and evaluate the impact of urban village redevelopment on residents' satisfaction with the living environment. Furthermore, utilizing data on urban village redevelopment in Guangzhou from 2005 to 2022, the staggered difference-in-differences (DID) model and structural equation modeling (SEM) are applied to explore the mechanisms through which redevelopment influences residents' satisfaction. The main findings are as follows: (1) Urban village redevelopment has significantly enhanced local residents' satisfaction with the living environment. However, the effectiveness of the redevelopment varies notably depending on the redevelopment model and scale, with larger urban villages and developer-led models achieving higher resident satisfaction than smaller ones or government/village collective-led approaches. (2) Redevelopment enhances objective physical environment of residential areas while simultaneously boosting satisfaction through strengthened environmental perception among residents. More concretely, the accessibility of bus stops and subway stations improved by 6.7%, medical facilities increased by 44.9%, and the number of waste collection points and public toilets has doubled after redevelopment. Such improvements provide essential guarantees for daily life, strengthen residents' living convenience, and sense of security, and in turn enhance satisfaction with the living environment. Additionally, the overall village green space increased by 18.5%, which enhanced residents' living comfort and ultimately boosting their happiness and satisfaction. (3) Despite these positive outcomes, urban village redevelopment still shows room for improvement, particularly in the optimization of convenient service facilities that are of direct concern to residents. Therefore, urban village redevelopment should be actively and steadily promoted as a public welfare project. However, it is essential to adopt context-specific measures, adhere to a people-oriented approach, respond to the reasonable demands of stakeholders, and prioritize the improvement and spatial optimization of convenient service facilities.
Achieving coordinated development of both ecological protection and livelihood improvement is a critical issue that must be addressed in implementing ecological and land-use regulations, particularly for the suburban villages in the ecological protection areas where the tension between protection and development is pronounced. In China, the government compensation mechanism remains imperfect at the meso- and micro-scales, while the emerging market-based compensation mechanism is also underdeveloped. Moreover, existing studies on the value system of ecological space and on the impacts of ecological protection and land-use regulations are insufficient. Consequently, how to renew suburban villages to achieve coordinated ecological protection and livelihood improvement remains largely underexplored. This study explores the theoretical mechanisms through which the ecological protection and land-use regulations influence the renewal and transformation of the villages, with an empirical investigation conducted in Wuhan city. It addresses how to promote a win-win outcome of villagers' livelihood improvement and ecological protection as social public goods. The theoretical mechanism is constructed as follows: Implementing tiered and category-based ecological protection and land-use regulations in protected areas generates land rent differentials across locations and functions, leading to an imbalanced allocation of land development rights among landowners, including villagers as a collective. It is thus essential to construct appropriate mechanisms of adjusting the allocation of land development rights, which include enhancing the flexibility of the ecological protection and land-use regulations to promote the overall transformation of villages through the renewal of their production, living and ecological areas. The ecological protection and land-use regulations in Wuhan have transformed from the flexible guidance of planning to a state of rigid constraints. During this period of transformation, there have been many explorations into diverse village regeneration models. Property-oriented in-situ redevelopment and protection-focused approaches, both of which neglect village development, represent two extremes in the trade-off between villagers' livelihood improvement and the ecological protection. The ecological protection model involving villagers' complete urbanization through relocation performs relatively well, but this model requires tremendous investment of both the government and market investors, which makes it difficult to adapt to the reality of fiscal austerity in current China. The in-situ micro-regeneration approach, designed to facilitate villagers' urban integration, offers great practical value. The core of this model lies in how the government flexibly adjusts the land-use regulations, construction land quotas, and the layout of production-living-ecological areas, and fulfills its obligations of service and insurance provisions to the villages to promote the in-situ urban integration of villagers. This requires local government to establish flexible adjustment mechanisms within the overarching system of ecological protection and implement consensus-based plan-making and implementation mechanism in localized regeneration efforts.
Although there is widespread consensus on the role of land rent gap in urban renewal, their function as a conditional variable in the choice of redevelopment modes remains empirically untested. The redevelopment of collective-owned industrial land in Chinese megacities requires careful consideration of both economic and transaction costs in order to bridge the land rent gap. We establish a framework of "land rent gap scale-rent gap realization cost" to address this issue by investigating 52 typical village-level industrial park redevelopment cases in Guangzhou. Using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis and partial least squares discriminant analysis, we examine the configuration pathways and influencing factors underlying redevelopment modes. Research findings indicate a spatially differentiated redevelopment mode, moving outward from "center" to "periphery" and "suburban" areas with a predominant approach shifting from "non-acquisition" to "land acquisition". The main redevelopment leading actors have shifted from operation institutions in central areas to a variety of decentralized actors in the outer regions, eventually moving towards local governments and state-owned enterprises in the outer suburbs. Additionally, the industrial land has changed from collective ownership to state ownership, coinciding with a land use change from non-industrial to industrial use. Multiple variables-such as land location, development regulation, property rights reconfiguration, and profit negotiationsinteract to produce four primary redevelopment configuration pathways: light asset operation, village-enterprise collaboration, village-led redevelopment, and government land acquisition. The spatial heterogeneity of these modes is shaped by land location disparities, the collective economic development level, and local government's control measures. Effective redevelopment governance should adhere to the fundamental principles of land location differentiation and leverage rent gap adjustments to reduce costs and enhance efficiency. This study extends rent gap theory to the context of collective land redevelopment and clarifies the feedback mechanism linking renewal modes, land rent dynamics, and development regulation in urban renewal.
The transfer of homesteads is the key way to activate idle homesteads in rural areas, and the vigorous development of rural industries is an important means to promote the transfer of homesteads. From the perspective of rural industrial development, there are not many empirical studies on the impact of farmers’ willingness on homestead transfer, and there is also a lack of combing its mechanism of action. Based on the data of China land economic survey (CLES) in 2022, this study uses econometric methods to deeply analyze the mechanism and effect of rural industrial development on farmers’ willingness on homestead transfer. The findings indicate that: (1) Rural industrial development significantly enhances farmers’ willingness to transfer their homesteads, a result that remains valid after endogeneity and robustness tests. (2) The development of rural industries promotes farmers’ willingness to transfer homesteads by attracting the inflow of foreign labor forces, increasing farmers’ disposable income, and promoting the diversification of homestead use functions. (3) There are obvious individual, family, and village heterogeneities in farmers’ willingness to transfer homesteads. The positive impact of rural industrial development on farmers’ willingness to transfer homesteads is more significant among highly educated farmers, in villages that attach importance to industrial development, and in villages close to the county seat. The government should continue to strengthen policy support for rural industrial development and design differentiated financial, fiscal, credit, and land-use measures tailored to the needs of diverse industrial operators, so as to enhance policy targeting and efficacy and foster the prosperity of rural industries. In parallel, it should improve the benefit-sharing mechanism between rural industrial development and farmers, thereby boosting farmers’ wage, property, and agricultural operating income. It is necessary to establish a close interest-connection mode so that farmers can share the economic dividend brought by the development of rural industries, thereby improving farmers’ enthusiasm to participate in the transfer of homesteads and realizing the benign interaction between the development of rural industries and farmers’ willingness to transfer homesteads. It is also essential to improve the rural homestead transfer trading platform by establishing an online information release system and offline transaction service centers. Such measures would help alleviate farmers’ concerns about homestead transfer, bolster their sense of security, and ultimately encourage both their willingness and actual participation in the process.
Tourism-driven brownfield regeneration has become a crucial strategy for old industrial areas seeking to restore their reputation and achieve sustainable transition. Although prior research confirms that green regeneration enhances regional image, the specific dimensions and underlying mechanisms remain underexplored. This study introduces destination image theory to address this gap. Using the WISCO Blast Furnace No.1 Industrial Heritage Park as a case study, it investigates the impact of tourism-driven brownfield greening regeneration on regional image and its underlying mechanisms. The research employs a mixed-method approach, combining online user-generated content (UGC) data with offline questionnaire surveys. Statistical analyses, including the Mann-Whitney U test and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), are applied. The findings reveal the following: (1) In terms of cognitive image, tourism, historical-cultural, and environmental dimensions exhibit significant improvement, while economic image improves only to a limited extent. (2) Affective image displays a trend of transitioning from negative to positive. (3) Cognitive image is directly influenced by individuals' age and income, and indirectly by geographic distance from the brownfield through the mediating role of familiarity. (4) Historical-cultural image and environmental image—both subdimensions of cognitive image—significantly and positively shape affective image. Theoretically, this research extends destination image theory by establishing familiarity as a mediator and historical-cultural image as a key driver, revealing the micro-foundations of regional image reconfiguration. Methodologically, the comparative use of online and offline data captures subtle perceptual differences, offering a novel direction for future inquiry.
In the New Era, China's heritage sites are facing new challenges in the process of deep integration of culture and tourism and urban regeneration. The culture- and tourism-led heritage site conservation and regeneration, with tourism-induced social stratification and spatial restructuring, affects the transformation and reconstruction of its socio-spatial fabric and surrounding areas. This article selects Shuhe ancient town, a world cultural heritage site, as a typical case and conducts an in-depth analysis of the socio-spatial effects of culture- and tourism-led heritage site conservation and regeneration through qualitative methods. The findings reveal that: (1) The culture- and tourism-led heritage site conservation and regeneration link the transformation of land functions and spatial landscapes in heritage sites to trans-local tourism demands, while also overlaying multiple social governance objectives and system of capital accumulation in heritage site development. Within this context, the interactive practices around heritage values and spatial rights, involving government leadership, market operations, and local responses, constitute the socio-spatial process of conservation and regeneration. In this process, individuals' developmental aspirations, and cultural awareness reveal the agency of local communities. (2) Under the zoned heritage conservation and institutional constraints led by local governments, conservation and regeneration accelerate the multi-scalar tension of tourism flows' impact on land and housing investment, as well as community sense of place. Different social actors and forces converge, clash, and negotiate within heritage sites, shaping a diverse and uneven social spatial landscape. This paper emphasizes the production of social space resulting from the interaction and negotiation between tourist flows and local forces during the urban regeneration process. By adopting a process-oriented, relational, and contextual perspective, this research expands the theoretical frontiers of China's increasingly intertwined cultural and tourism development and urban regeneration, thereby providing a scientific foundation for achieving high-quality development of heritage sites in the New Era—one that harmoniously balances the sound conservation and utilization of cultural and tourism resources with the enhancement of social welfare.
Against the backdrop of modern people-oriented urban construction, culture-tourism integration drives urban regeneration. Qiaoxiang cities (overseas Chinese hometowns), as special units linking overseas Chinese to their homeland, have unique cultural-tourism resources and complex social structures, making their regeneration nationally significant. How Qiaoxiang cities achieve scale jumping and regeneration through culture-tourism integration has become a key research topic. Taking Kaiping city in Guangdong province as a case study and utilizing local chronicles, policy documents, and in-depth interviews, this study adopts a scale-theory perspective to explore how Qiaoxiang cities achieve scale jumping and urban regeneration between national policies and transnational networks under culture-tourism integration. Findings reveal that: (1) Kaiping's development exhibits a path-dependent yet breakthrough scale circulation. Driven by cultural tourism, it experienced three scale jumps: World heritage inscription-driven promotion, diaspora network-facilitated global dissemination, and national strategy-guided functional transformation, forming a nested progressive pathway. (2) It demonstrates a multi-scalar linkage mechanism across local to global scales, where two-way interactions through policy support, capital flows, and social identity help the city break boundaries and achieve a cross-hierarchical rise from a marginal position. (3) Government leadership, capital support, and community participation are the core driving forces. The overnment provides institutional platforms, capital drives spatial reproduction through cultural projects, and overseas Chinese mobilize transnational resources via emotional and network ties, jointly shaping the regeneration path. This study reveals how Qiaoxiang cities seek differentiated development within global-local scalar relationships, providing empirical experience and a case reference for numerous Chinese Qiaoxiang seeking breakthroughs in urban regeneration pathways and model transformation under the new paradigm.
Enhancing the governance efficacy of cultural space in traditional villages constitutes a crucial issue bridging cultural revitalization with the activation and intergenerational transmission of cultural heritage in rural areas. While existing studies have predominantly emphasized the conceptual promotion of pluralistic co-governance, they have largely overlooked systematic exploration of the practical paths and operational mechanisms through which external forces can effectively intervene to catalyze endogenous development. To address this gap, this study integrates action research theory to construct a comprehensive five-stage cyclical regeneration framework encompassing preparing, problem defining, planning, taking action, and evaluation. Through an in-depth, longitudinal case study conducted over two years in L village, situated in the Lower Weihe River Basin, this research meticulously examines the dynamic formation processes and underlying mechanisms of pluralistic co-governance in rural cultural spaces. The findings reveal that: (1) Distinct stakeholders—including village community members, the academic research team, and local government agencies—played differentiated yet complementary roles, serving respectively as the core of endogenous agency, knowledge translation intermediaries, and institutional empowerment platforms. (2) As a pivotal social force, the research team employed a suite of action research methodologies, particularly participatory workshops and collaborative mapping, to establish an iterative knowledge translation pathway, progressing systematically from collective memory excavation, through shared value refinement, to spatial consensus building. (3) The effective operation of the pluralistic co-governance mechanism fundamentally relies on the synergistic interaction of three critical elements: the construction of a composite organizational core to coordinate collective action, the strategic alignment of formal institutions with context-specific informal norms, and a bidirectional knowledge translation model. This research contributes both theoretical insights and practical recommendations for advancing rural cultural heritage conservation and regeneration, while also providing transferable knowledge for constructing culturally-grounded, endogenous, and sustainable governance models for rural cultural spaces across diverse contexts.
Existing resilience research that treats urban and rural areas as separate analytical units has become increasingly inadequate for addressing cross-regional and systemic risks under the context of global change. This paper argues that the long-standing theoretical and methodological divide between urban resilience and rural resilience limits our understanding of regional vulnerability and constrains coordinated risk governance. From a coupled systems perspective, the study examines the driving mechanisms of urban and rural resilience integration along three interrelated dimensions: risk interdependence driven by intensified urban-rural interactions, mismatches in resilience elements induced by spatial restructuring, and scale misalignment resulting from fragmented governance systems. Building on this analysis, the paper proposes an integrated analytical framework for urban-rural resilience that emphasizes system coupling and scale matching. Rather than conceptualizing cities and rural areas as isolated entities, this framework portrays them as a dynamically evolving, interdependent human-environment system, wherein ecological processes, socio-economic functions, and governance structures are closely intertwined. The framework highlights how risks, resources, and adaptive capacities circulate and interact across urban-rural networks, thereby shaping regional resilience outcomes. Furthermore, the paper identifies four core research agendas for advancing urban-rural resilience studies. First, it calls for the development of a coupled system cognition framework that explicitly captures key feedbacks and nonlinear dynamics between urban and rural subsystems. Second, it emphasizes the need to construct multi-dimensional and synergistic resilience assessment systems that overcome the fragmentation of existing urban- and rural-specific indicators while remaining sensitive to spatial heterogeneity. Third, it stresses the importance of exploring the spatial mechanisms of resilience under urban-rural integration, with particular attention to the roles of ecological networks, infrastructure connectivity, and functional complementarity across space. Fourth, it advocates for innovation in collaborative resilience governance mechanisms that transcend administrative boundaries and promote cross-scale and cross-sector coordination. By reframing resilience as a property of integrated urban-rural systems rather than isolated spatial units, this study provides a conceptual foundation for rethinking regional resilience theory and practice. It aims to contribute to a more holistic understanding of human-environment interactions and to offer scientific support for resilience-oriented governance and sustainable development strategies in the context of urban-rural integration.
The Chinese path to modernization emphasizes common prosperity, with the integrated development of urban and rural areas at the county level serving as a crucial avenue for its realization. To address the prevailing "overall tendency" and "temporal blind spots" in research on promotion pathways, this study analyzed panel data from 43 counties in Fujian province, collected between 2014 and 2023. Employing a dynamic QCA model, the research examined the configuration pathways through which the integrated urban and rural development at the county level fosters common prosperity from a spatiotemporal perspective. The findings indicate that: (1) Achieving high-level common prosperity necessitates the coordinated functioning of multiple subsystems of integrated urban-rural development at the county level, as no single condition can independently attain high-level common prosperity. (2) There are four configurational paths to achieving high-level common prosperity: H1, which is dual-core driven by factor embedding and environmental co-governance; H2, dual-core driven by spatial integration and environmental co-governance; H3, multi-stakeholder collaborative-driven; and H4, dual-core driven by functional complementarity and environmental co-governance. Among these, configuration H1 demonstrates the widest applicability, whereas configuration H3 is applicable to the fewest county-level cases. Ecological co-governance plays a foundational role, and both factor embedding and spatial integration point to the importance of constructing an urban-rural "space of flows", with the two exhibiting certain substitution effects. The effectiveness of all configurations hinges on the "government-market" collaborative interaction model that aligns with local contexts. (3) Significant temporal and spatial effects are evident across configurations. Temporally, structural changes in core conditions were observed in the configurations of case counties such as Ninghua, Datian, and Zhao'an during the period from 2022 to 2023. From 2014 to 2023, the overall configuration consistency exhibited an upward trend; however, the explanatory power of H1 and H4 configurations declined during 2016 to 2018, and collective configuration growth stagnated from 2019 to 2020. Spatially, the configurations displayed distribution characteristics specific to Southern Fujian (H2), Western Fujian (H3), and West-Central-Northern Fujian (H4), reflecting how developmental stages and regional conditions influence driving strategies.
In the process of rapid urbanization, traditional settlements in China are undergoing demographic shifts and built-environment transformations. Conflicts between people and land, coupled with social integration challenges, compromise residents' social health, while rural heritage preservation and healthy living environments face dual threats. This paper elucidates the connotation of traditional settlements from the social health perspective, and identifies the built environment factors that influence social health, including housing environment, neighborhood and public activity spaces, infrastructure and public service facilities, and traditional space and cultural environment. It specifies direct, mediated, and moderated pathways of built-environment influence on social health. It further constructs a multidimensional theoretical model of built-environment effects on social health at both individual and community levels, analyzes the correlation structure to reveal underlying mechanisms, and provides guidance for health-oriented interventions in proactive preservation planning of traditional settlements through social health impact assessment. The study enriches the theoretical framework for cultural heritage preservation in traditional settlements from the perspective of social health, informs the planning practice, and advances the national agendas of Healthy China and cultural rejuvenation.
