“Promoting” or “inhibiting”: the nonlinear impact of rural digitization on the rural enterprises’ resilience

Abstract

ABSTRACT Considerable research has focused on the question of how to better utilize the rural digitization to enhance rural enterprises’ resilience. However, there has not been a unified conclusion reached on the influence of rural digitization on rural enterprises’ resilience. To reconcile the existing inconclusive evidence, this paper aims to investigate the nonlinear impact of rural digitization on rural enterprises’ resilience. We also hypothesize the mediating role of rural labour outflow in the relationship and explore the moderating role of rural social organization. Following a mixed research method, we employ the U-test method and 205 listed Chinese rural enterprises as the research objects to test the hypotheses. We then use a qualitative case study to offer unique insights for explaining the underlying mechanisms behind the quantitative results. The findings show that rural digitization and rural enterprises’ resilience have a U-shaped relationship, and labour outflow plays a nonlinear mediating role in it. Moreover, rural labour outflow and rural enterprises’ resilience show an inverted U-shaped relationship, which regulated by rural social organization. Together, the mixed methods research offers nuanced and scientific advice for enhancing rural enterprises’ resilience.