New Type Of Urbanization Research Articles

The Impact of Rapid Urbanization on the Efficiency of Industrial Green Water Use in Urban Agglomerations around Poyang Lake

The construction of urban agglomerations around Poyang Lake is an important starting point of the strategy for the improvement of central China, but the spatial agglomeration of industry and population brings great pressure to the ecological environment. It is of great practical value to explore the impact of rapid urbanization on the water use efficiency of important ecological functional areas. Considering the undesired output of industrial production, this paper adopts the SE-SBM model to measure industrial green water use efficiency, comprehensively considers different aspects of urbanization of the urban agglomeration around Poyang Lake, empirically tests its inhibiting or boosting effect on industrial green water use and explores its spatial spillover effect with the help of a spatial metrology model. The results show that (1) the industrial green water use efficiency of urban agglomerations shows an overall upward trend, and the efficiency value of central cities is significantly higher than that of non-central cities and continues to show a state of diffusion; (2) social urbanization, environmental urbanization, and balanced urbanization can significantly improve industrial green water use efficiency, while industrial urbanization or industrialization inhibits the improvement in water use efficiency; (3) considering the spatial spillover factor, there are significant positive local effects between population urbanization and balanced urbanization, and significant positive spatial spillover effects between industrial urbanization and environmental urbanization; (4) the original model can pass the significance test by replacing the output-oriented water use efficiency with the input-oriented or non-oriented water use efficiency; the study area is extended to Jiangxi Province, and the impact of urbanization on industrial water use efficiency is basically consistent. We should adhere to the new type of urbanization that improves well-being and is friendly to the environment, rationally plan the industrial spatial pattern of urban agglomerations, adhere to the ecological and environmental threshold on undertaking industrial transfer, and promote the flow and sharing of green production factors.

Conflict or Coordination? A Coupling Study of China’s Population–Urbanization–Ecological Environment

Whether the new type of urbanization implemented in China in the past decade has been effective in regulating urbanization and balancing human development and environmental protection remains to be verified. Therefore, this study develops a framework for assessing population-urbanization–ecological environment interactions by combining the coupling coordination degree model and the decoupling index. Firstly, the proposed framework establishes an indicator system of population, economy, society, space, environmental pressure, ecological governance, ecological status, and ecological services based on two sets of national census data; secondly, this study combines the coupling coordination degree model and decoupling index to comprehensively understand the coupling coordination relationship and the decoupling relationship of the population–urbanization–ecological environment across time and space. Overall, this study contributes to a deepened understanding of coupled population–urbanization–ecological environment interactions and provides a scientific basis for effective guidance on urban–rural management and the balance between human development and environmental protection.

Interaction between urbanization and carbon emission in Guizhou Province

Investigating interplay between urbanization and carbon emissions is crucial for reaching carbon peak objective. This study employs a VAR model to examine correlation between the urbanization rate and carbon emissions specifically within Guizhou Province, VAR model has obvious advantages in studying the dynamic relationship between them. The findings indicate that: (1) In Guizhou Province, there is a nuanced interplay between the urbanization rate and carbon emissions, with the magnitude and direction of their influence varying across different time intervals. (2) Carbon emissions in Guizhou Province exhibit a notable self-propelling effect, while concurrently, the urbanization rate demonstrates an inertia effect, which also contributes to its own advancement. (3) The influence of the urbanization rate on carbon emissions in Guizhou Province experiences gradual rise before plateauing, suggesting that the high-quality advancement of new urbanization in the region facilitates the achievement of carbon reduction objectives. Finally, policy recommendations are put forward: (1) Conscientiously implement the central ecological environment zoning control policies, such as: Guizhou Province Ecological environment zoning control Plan and Guizhou Province Urban and Rural Construction Carbon peak Implementation Plan and other policies. (2) Pay attention to the quality of Guizhou’s urbanization process. Solve the relationship between urbanization and carbon emissions, and realize the coordination and unification of urbanization and the carrying capacity of resources and environment. (3) Develop a new type of urbanization rich in Guizhou’s mountainous characteristics and promote the construction of low-carbon cities. Give full play to the regional characteristics of Guizhou’s mountainous areas, build a new type of urbanization with Guizhou’s mountainous characteristics, promote the construction of low-carbon cities in the process of urbanization development, and strengthen the coordinated development of ecological environment construction and urbanization.

Production and reconstruction mechanism of consumption spaces in urban fringe areas under capital intervention: Evidence from Guangming town in Shenzhen

As the rapid urban expansion and the rise of consumer society, urban fringe areas have become an essential place for urban capital to intervene and achieve spatial regeneration, and it has triggered the consumerization and transformation of space. Taking Guangming Town in the urban fringe area of Shenzhen as an example, this paper reveals the process and dynamics of spatial consumerization transformation under the influence of capital intervention. It examines the intricate mechanisms of capital operation underlie the production of space, and endeavors to explore a novel model of rural spatial regeneration in China's urban fringe areas. This paper found that the production of space in Guangming Town under the capital intervention includes the material production and social relations production. With the reconstruction of spatial form and relationships, new local products, spatial configuration, social services and organizational relations are generated, forming a consumption space with heterogeneous landscape, market institutionalized management, commercialization and symbolization. The realization of the production of consumption space in urban fringe areas is based on the joint action of core elements such as land, capital and government, which provide the material foundation, operational power and coordination organization for space consumption. These promote capital to complete the triple cycle of “acquiring land - creating space scarcity - realizing space consumption”, and then realizing space reproduction and capital appreciation. In the Chinese context, the spatial transformation and production of urban fringe areas should not be regarded as a local practice of Western counter-urbanization or rural gentrification theory. Rather, it as a new spatial regeneration mode that harmonizes urban and rural production, lifestyles and development trajectories. This paper offers valuable practical insights and analytical perspectives for promoting integrated urban-rural development and fostering a new type of urbanization, thereby broadening the regional framework of rural development.

Migrants Subjective Well-being in Big Cities of China: Based on Self-rating Social Status and Social Integration

Promoting subject well-being of migrants could give full play to the advantages of talent's resource. Social position and social inclusion of migrants could be the key to pursue a people-centered, new type of urbanization and bring about rural migrants settling in cities. There is a lack of studies focusing on social comparison and social inclusion of migrants with the point of geographical features. Using the data collected from China Migrants Dynamic Survey in 2014, the relations among object socioeconomic status and self-rating social status as well as subject well-being of migrants in one municipal district and seven prefecture-level cities of China was examined by adopting multilevel linear regression model, which includes both mediating variables and moderating variables. Several conclusions are drawn as follows: 1) Migrants subjective well-being is affected by their objective socioeconomic status. Whilst migrants comparing themselves with local relatives and colleagues, as we call it self-rating social status, plays a part in mediating relations between object socioeconomic status and subject well-being, especially when the object socioeconomic status refers to migrants household monthly income, certain types of occupations (including civil servants, clerks and the self-rated) and homeowners in the host city. 2) When compared their socioeconomic status with locals in the host cities, including economic status and respect for themselves, the deeper the migrants are merging into cities and social networks, the weaker the relationship between self-rating social status and subjective well-being will be. In other words, social inclusion among migrants do negatively regulates the relations above. 3) However, there is no evidence that the higher the acceptance degree of local residents in host cities to migrants, the deeper the impact of the respect for migrants on subjective well-being will be. Obviously, the acceptance degree of local residents could not significantly moderate the relations between respect for migrants and their subject well-being. Based on the above research conclusions, this paper suggests that for building a harmonious society and improving the quality of urbanization, equal treatment of migrants and locals should be identified and dealt with. Furthermore, Therefore, we must speed up migrants to blend into the society in the cities.

Research on the Coupled and Coordinated Development and Optimization Path of Low Carbon Economy and New Urbanization

Currently, China has entered a stage of high-quality development, and urbanization is an important issue in China's modernization process. Urbanization faces many challenges such as food security, resource and energy shortages, and environmental pollution. To solve this problem, we must take a new path of sustainable development towards urbanization. The new type of urbanization adheres to the principle of people-oriented, taking the path of green, circular, and low-carbon. It can unleash huge domestic demand potential and is an important driving force for the healthy and high-quality development of China's economy and society. A low-carbon economy emphasizes increasing energy output, reducing energy consumption and pollution, thereby reducing emissions and improving economic benefits. Low carbon economy is not only a new economic form and development model in the era of ecological civilization, but also the best economic form and development model for the construction of new urbanization.

An empirical approach for enhancing farmers' concentrated residence strategies: A case study in Jiangsu Province, China

The concentrated living of farmers is an important engine for rural revitalization and a new type of urbanization, thus is of great significance for the construction of a resource-saving society. Due to rapid economic development in China, some farmers have successfully urbanized through rural–urban migration, but still more than 500 million farmers, have not migrated yet. Concentrated residence has long been recognized as the best strategy to help Chinese farmers to achieve local urbanization, and has been paid much attention in the local, regional, national and global scientific community. Although robust models and policies are still lagging behind because of insufficient datasets and models. In this study, empirical model has been used in which concentrated residence cases of farmers in Yancheng City, Jiangsu Province of China taken as a case study, and strength (S), weakness (W), opportunities (O) and threats (T) as the criterion layer to identify 16 influencing factors as the index layer. For this study, data was collected during 2021 & 2022 by questioner-based survey from 6 different settlements, and AHP analytic hierarchy model integrated with SWOT was used to built farmers' concentrated residence strategies. The positioning coordinates of this study show the following weightage like S (0.480, 0), W (-0.098, 0), O (0, 0.306), and T (0, −0.116) which clearly mentions that S and O as positive influences, W and T as negative influences, and locates the respective total weights. Therefore, empirical results indicate that SO (growth-oriented) strategy should be emphasized to build robust strategies for concentrated residence of farmers. The findings of this study can provide a benign model for centralized residence for local governments, village collectives, and farmers withdrawing from homestead, and help to promote the sustainable development of society.

Effect of the characteristic town policy on sewage treatment in mountainous areas: Evidence from Chongqing

The report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China highlighted the necessity of advancing a new type of urbanization with people at the core. Characteristic towns as an essential link between new urbanization and rural revitalization attach great importance to creating a beautiful environment. Sewage treatment is an indispensable foundation for a town's high-quality economic and social development; however, it may be hard to achieve through urban construction. Therefore, using data from 584 organic towns in Chongqing, a typical mountainous city in western China, this study empirically analyzes the effect of the characteristic town policy in China on mountainous sewage treatment and its mechanisms from 2014 to 2020. The results indicate that (1) the characteristic town policy helps enhance sewage treatment in small towns, which remains valid after a series of robustness tests. (2) Investment and human resource effects are mediators for the characteristic town policy to boost sewage treatment in small towns. Further analyses reveal that the boosting effect of the characteristic town policy on small-town sewage treatment is more significant for small towns with higher economic development levels suffering ecological and environmental pressures. These findings provide a basis for a broad recognition of the effect of the characteristic town policy and its impact. They also theoretically enrich the awareness of the Chinese government's urbanization policy concerning the economy and society.

Study on Urbanization in Liaoning Province

In recent years, there are some problems in the urbanization of Liaoning Province, such as slow economic growth, serious brain drains, unbalanced regional development and so on. If there is no scientific research guidance, the development of new urbanization in Liaoning Province will only be like a headless fly, and ultimately affect the healthy economic and social development of Liaoning Province. In order to solve these problems properly, the comprehensive level of the new type of urbanization in Liaoning Province should be studied. In the paper, a comprehensive evaluation index system is constructed, 13 specific evaluation indexes are selected. Principal component analysis is used to analyze the factors influencing the process of new urbanization. The evaluation index and statistical method can be used as a reference for the study on the comprehensive level of new urbanization in the future prediction.

Dynamics between Population Growth and Construction Land Expansion: Evidence from the Yangtze River Economic Belt of China

Population growth and construction land expansion’s link to sustainable development has gained attention. This study investigated the urban–rural divergence in the population–construction land relationship in China’s Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB) from 2000 to 2020 using census and land-use data. This study utilized an integrated urban–rural framework to discuss reasons for the disparity. The findings suggested the following: (1) A spatial mismatch formed between population distribution and construction land allocation in the YREB from 2000 to 2020. The mismatch gap in rural areas was larger than in urban areas. (2) The urban areas maintained double growth rates in the population and construction land, while rural areas experienced constant population loss accompanied by construction land expansion. (3) An expansive negative decoupling relationship dominated the urban population–land system, while a strong negative decoupling relationship dominated the rural population–land system. (4) Institutional factors, such as land financialization and urban–rural dualism, were major triggers for the mismatch between population and construction land. Policy responses such as a new type of urbanization and rural revitalization strategies can shape the population–land relationship’s evolution. Our comparative analysis of urban and rural areas highlights the population–land relationship’s complexity, promoting sustainable land-use planning in urban–rural spaces.

The impact of green urbanization on carbon emissions: The case of new urbanization in China

Urbanization in developing countries has brought economic growth and industrial development, but at the same time, it has also brought environmental problems, especially increased carbon emissions. Recently, China has promoted a new type of urbanization with the common goal of economic growth and green development, which provides a reference for the sustainable development of urbanization in developing countries. The study focuses on microscopic impact of this new urbanization on carbon emissions, which has received little attention previously. This study takes China as an example, constructs a quasi-natural experiment based on the first batch of new urbanization pilot areas in China, selects panel data of 164 prefecture-level cities from 2010–2019, applies the double difference method (DID) to identify the emission reduction effects of pilot policy on carbon emission (carbon emission intensity and per capita carbon emission), the mechanism of action model is constructed for further analysis, and various robustness tests are conducted. The results show that the new urbanization pilot policy can effectively diminish carbon emissions, and the sensitivity of pilot policy to per capita carbon emissions is greater than the intensity of carbon emissions, and the emission reduction effect of pilot policy of new urbanization tends to be enhanced with the implementation of pilot policy. With the improvement of infrastructure, the upgrading of advanced industrial structure, and the strengthening of environmental regulation, the inhibitory effect of new urbanization construction on carbon emissions tends to be enhanced. Various robustness tests show that green urbanization can effectively lessen carbon emissions, and under the constraint of economic growth rate target, if the government still gives priority to economic development, it is not conducive to the development of green urbanization. Therefore, the green urbanization process needs to be accelerated, infrastructure construction is linked, strict and appropriate environmental controls are adopted, the industrial layout is customized and the advanced industrial structure is promoted.

The mechanism and effects of national smart city pilots in China on environmental pollution: empirical evidence based on a DID model.

The policy of the national smart city (NSC) pilots, a new type of urbanization for future development, has been implemented in China in batches. This paper investigates the mechanism and effects of the NSC pilots on the environment. Using the prefecture-level panel data during 2004-2018 period, our multi-period difference-in-differences (DID) estimation shows that the NSC pilots causally mitigate SO2 (wastewater) pollution by 13.76% (14.36%), which is supported by a series of robustness tests. The mediating effect model indicates that green total factor productivity (GTFP) plays a partial mediating role in mitigating both SO2 and wastewater emissions, while technological innovation plays a partial mediating role in mitigating wastewater emissions. After introducing the two mediating channels into the multi-period DID model, the reduction effect for SO2 and wastewater emissions drops to 11.04% (1-e- 0.117) and 12.1% (1-e- 0.129), respectively. Comparatively, the NSC pilots contribute to the improvement of GTFP and GTFP takes the major mediating role in reducing SO2 and wastewater pollution. The heterogeneous effects of the NSC pilots show that the mitigation effect is more pronounced in cities with strong fiscal support, cities with abundant human capital, and cities with high R&D expenditure. Based on these novel findings, this study provides some policy implications for achieving better mitigation effects.

Impact of the COVID-2019 Pandemic on a New Type of Urbanization in China: an Analysis of the Transformation of the Lives of Large Cities Residents (the Саse of Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou)

The study is aimed at identifying the features of the impact of the COVID-2019 pandemic on urbanization in China. The objects of the study were the cities of Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou, which is determined by their representativeness and the possibility of disseminating the results of the study to other large urban agglomerations in China. The methodology is based on an integrated methodological approach that combines elements of descriptive statistical and sociological research. To assess the relationship between the spread of the pandemic in the Chinese metropolitan areas of Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou, correlation and regression analysis was used. The study of the impact of the pandemic on the quality of life of the urban population was carried out through a survey using a structured questionnaire. The data obtained were processed and analyzed using the SPSS 26.0 software tools, which made it possible to identify the degree of connection between urbanization and various aspects of the life of urban people, including their employment, well-being, access to health services, and the transformation of life values. It was found that there is a strong link between the level of urbanization and the pandemic, therefore, with the development of urbanization, the number of cases of infection (if other conditions remain unchanged) increases, and vice versa. As a result of a survey of urban residents, an assessment of the frequencies and correlations of responses, it was revealed that the impact of the pandemic on the daily life of urban people was most pronounced on the level of well-being of informally employed people, increasing the availability of health care, and only then on the values of citizens. These results should be taken into account in the formation of directions for improving the quality of urbanization.

Study on Quality Citizenship of Agricultural Transferred Population in Ethnic Areas

The citizenship of the agricultural transfer population is an important part of promoting the new type of urbanization with people as the core, and it is of great significance to promote the comprehensive development of people and the comprehensive social progress in ethnic areas. The improvement of the overall quality of the agricultural transfer population is a prerequisite for the citizenship of the agricultural transfer population. This paper proposes some specific strategies to solve the citizenship of the quality of the agricultural transfer population in ethnic areas in light of the difficulties faced by the agricultural transfer population in integrating into the life of citizens and the actual situation in ethnic areas, with a view to promoting the high-quality development of cities.

The Influence of the Urban-Rural Income Disparity on the Industrial Structure—Taking the Yangtze River Delta Region as an Example

In this paper, the effect of the mediation effect is mainly used to test and analyze the regression model, and most scholars have studied the impact of the modernization of the industrial structure on the income gap. However, this paper is from another perspective, based on the social background of high-quality development, the main study is the impact mechanism of urban and rural income gap on the industrial structure, taking the Yangtze River Delta as the main research object, and specifically selecting 22 central cities in the Yangtze River Delta region, which is also one of the highlights of this study. The regression model is constructed by using the intermediary effect, and the four intermediary variables of fiscal expenditure (M1), fixed asset investment (M2), number of patent applications (M3), and total import and export (M4) are selected, which represent the role of the government, fixed asset investment, scientific and technological level and opening-up level, and study and analyze the inherent influence mechanism between each variable. Before doing specific research, I consulted the papers and literature of many other outstanding scholars, among which Cheng Yuhong and Cheng Chi’s “The Influence Mechanism of industrial structure of urban and rural income gap” [1] has great reference value for this paper. According to the research results, under the background of high-quality development in the Yangtze River Delta region, the expansion of the income gap between urban and rural areas will inhibit the upgrading of the industrial structure, so it is necessary to focus on building a new type of urbanization, accelerating the construction of an urban innovation system, optimizing the rural employment structure to narrow the income gap between urban and rural areas, and providing impetus for the continuous upgrading of the industrial structure.

Spatiotemporal Difference Characteristics and Influencing Factors of Tourism Urbanization in China's Major Tourist Cities.

Tourism is crucial for promoting industrial development and is an important driver of China’s new type of urbanization. A tourism urbanization index system was constructed in three dimensions: the tourism industry, urbanization, and the ecological environment. The spatial–temporal differentiation characteristics and influencing factors of tourism urbanization in 35 major tourist cities in China from 2009 to 2018 were analyzed using the state space method, standard deviation ellipse, and spatial autocorrelation analysis. The results show the following. (1) Over time, the tourism industry index displays an upward trend, the urbanization index exhibits a more obvious upward trend, and the ecological environment index fluctuates strongly. Under the influence of all three factors, the tourism urbanization index shows a fluctuating rising trend. (2) Regarding the spatial distribution pattern, the development center of tourism urbanization shifts to the southeast, and the distribution direction is northeast-southwest. There is a significant agglomeration in global spatial autocorrelation. The local spatial correlation pattern is dominated by correlation characteristics and supplemented by different characteristics. (3) In terms of influencing factors, policy and regional development strategy, tourism resource endowment, economic development level, and traffic conditions are listed in descending order of influencing degree. Finally, we put forward some suggestions.

Total Investment in Fixed Assets and the Later Stage of Urbanization: A Case Study of Shanghai

After more than 40 years’ opening-up and reform, China’s urbanization has entered a new type of urbanization. In order to reveal the rule of different infrastructure investments and urbanization relationships, this paper uses Shanghai as a case by applying econometric methods to study the detailed relationship between different indicators from 1990 to 2019. Firstly, we quantify that each variable has a long-term co-integration relationship with urbanization by co-integration test. And we found that the real estate is a main driving force of urbanization while the construction project investment plays an important role in promoting the urbanization rate in the studied period. Secondly, according to the Granger test, our study illustrates that each variable has a bilateral Granger relationship with urbanization while the urbanization rate has more Granger causality impact on the studied variables. Thirdly, based on impulse response test and variance decomposition analysis, we found that urbanization rate with other variables accounts for the majority of the percentage of impacts while the total investment in fixed assets and its three categories contribute a small amount to the urbanization rate. Finally, we propose policy suggestions to strengthen healthy urbanization development in Shanghai.

Ecological effects of new-type urbanization in China

The development of urbanization in China has changed from a traditional form of urbanization that focuses on the rate of growth to a new type of urbanization that stresses improvements in quality. To evaluate this new type of urbanization, this paper constructs a system that looks at the four dimensions of economy, population, society, and environment, and then, using provincial-level panel data, employs a dynamic spatial panel model to empirically test the ecological effects of the new type urbanization. The study finds that the new-type urbanization in China increased gradually from 2003 to 2017, focused on improvements to the ecological environment, and displayed obvious inter-provincial differences. Moreover, China's new-type urbanization has not only effectively reduced pollution emissions and improved energy efficiency but has also been significant in terms of its ecological effect. Moreover, economic urbanization, population urbanization, social urbanization and environmental urbanization exhibit the obvious ecological effects of “pollution reduction and efficiency improvement.” In the process of this new type of urbanization, both the government's “severe constraints” on pollution emissions and the active introduction of foreign capital are further important avenues that lead to achieving “pollution reduction and efficiency improvements.”

Cities without slums? China's land regime and dual-track urbanization

China's urbanization has avoided the expansion of slums despite the influx of rural migrants. What might explain this phenomenon? We argue that Chinese urbanization is driven by two tracks rooted in the country's land ownership: 1) a state-led track relying on land financing and expropriation, facilitated capital accumulation, infrastructure construction, and the provision of public goods; 2) an informal track based on collective land ownership and self-governance resulted in informal “urban villages” that provide affordable housing and services to migrants. China's urbanization underscores the credibility thesis, which posits that institutional form follows from function, as the urban villages – as informal settlements – fulfil a credible function in driving urbanization by accommodating the migrant population. However, Chinese urbanization is challenged by issues of sustainability and inclusiveness, and its current credibility might not last. In this context, local policy innovations may highlight possibilities to integrate the tracks and achieve a new type of urbanization by “formalization of the informal.” Put differently, the inclusion of that what is done into law, which should be critically distinguished from privatization through titling. At this point, one could consider the Credibility Scales and Intervention (CSI) Checklist, a “toolbox” of policy interventions predicated upon the credibility thesis.

How feasible is regional integration for reconciling land use conflicts across the urban–rural interface? Evidence from Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei metropolitan region in China

Competition among different uses for land is becoming acute under the process of urbanization, and conflicts related to this competition are becoming more frequent and more complex. This article presents a methodology for confronting this issue. By applying an integrated framework, we explore the implicit role of the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei Regional Integration (BRI) policy in land use conflicts by focusing on the urban-rural interface, and try to address the research question: “How feasible is BRI for reconciling land use conflicts across the urban-rural interface?” An original structure of the analysis is developed based on the identification of three types of conflicts, namely, conflicts over land use structure, conflicts over land conversion and conflicts over landscape pattern. According to the interactions and relationships among these conflicts, we define broad categories of land use conflict areas. Indeed, these conflicts are all related to the unplanned use of agricultural land reserves, which competes with other more immediate uses, and the over-exploitation of land resources caused by unsustainable urban practices. This policy is clearly a critical objective for optimizing the land use structure. It, however, fails to reconcile the conflicts over land conversion and landscape pattern, especially for considerable agricultural land conversion to non-agricultural uses, and low-density development pattern with mixed residential and industrial land uses. Hence, alternative strategies involving public participation, spatial equity, rural revitalization, land-use system reform, and new type of urbanization, can be identified as viable solutions for land use conflict management, which may be complementary to regional integration. The findings of our paper may also contribute to the policy debate on BRI concerning land use planning and regional sustainability.