Top-level Design Research Articles

The Evolution Model of and Factors Influencing Digital Villages: Evidence from Guangxi, China

(1) Background: Digitalization is the key to sustainable village development, posing a new challenge for village planning, construction, and governance in all countries. The construction of digital villages is currently in the stage of experimentation and exploration; China is the largest developing country and a pioneer in the digitization of villages. (2) Methods: Based on a combination of the Boston Consulting Group Matrix and GeoDetector, we conducted an empirical study on 70 counties in Guangxi, aiming to analyze the construction level, evolution model, and driving mechanism of digital villages and to provide a basis for decisions on government investment and social participation. (3) Results: First, Conspicuous disequilibrium in rural digitalization has manifested in Guangxi, and counties at different levels (leader, follower, and straggler) show significant clustering and correlation effects in their geographical distribution. Second, digital village construction in Guangxi has evolves in diversified modes (divided into four types: star, gazelle, cow, and dog), with hot and cold areas forming a center–periphery structure. Third, rural digitalization has a very complex driving mechanism, with high heterogeneity in the direct influencing factors, significant synergistic enhancement of factors, and nonlinear enhancement dominating the interaction’s relationship. (4) Conclusions: According to the results of analysis, we suggest highlighting the government-driven mechanism and regional linkage in the construction of digital villages, formulating differentiated management policies and development plans based on the combination of top-level design and grassroots innovation, establishing joint meetings or development associations and service alliances, and stimulating the enthusiasm of the whole of society, especially farmers and enterprises, in order to achieve rapid and sustainable rural digitalization.

The Impact Factors and Management Policy of Digital Village Development: A Case Study of Gansu Province, China

(1) Background: Along with the maturity of smart cities, digital villages and smart villages are receiving more attention than ever before as the key to promote sustainable rural development. The Chinese government has made great efforts in promoting the digital development of villages in recent years, as evidenced by policies intensively introduced by the central and local governments, making China a typical representative country in the world. (2) Methods: This paper evaluates the performance and geographic pattern of rural digital development by the Geographic Information System (GIS) in Gansu, a less developed province in western China, and analyzes the driving mechanism of rural digital development using GeoDetector, providing a basis for spatial zoning and differentiated policy design for the construction, planning and management of digital villages based on the GE matrix. (3) Results: First, the development of digital villages shows a prominent geographical imbalance, with 79 counties divided into leader, follower and straggler levels. Second, digital villages show unsynchronized development in different dimensions, with the village facilities digitalization index in the lead and the village economy digitalization index lagging behind. Thirdly, the development of digital villages is characterized by significant spatial correlation and spillover effects, with cold and hot counties distributed in clusters, forming a “center-periphery” structure. Fourth, the factors show significant influence differentiation. They are classified into all-purpose, multifunctional and single-functional factors by their scope of action, and into key, important and auxiliary factors by their intensity of action. Fifth, the interaction and driving mechanism between different factors is quite complex, dominated by nonlinear enhancement and bifactor enhancement, and the synergistic effect of factor pairs helps increase the influence by 1–4 times. (4) Conclusions: It is suggested that the government develop differentiated policies for zoning planning and management based on the level of digital development of villages in combination with the factor influence and its driving mechanism and promote regional linkage and common development and governance through top-level design.

Does Soil Pollution Prevention and Control Promote Corporate Sustainable Development? A Quasi-Natural Experiment of “10-Point Soil Plan” in China

The Action Plan for Soil Pollution Prevention and Control (“10-point Soil Plan”) provides the top-level design for soil environmental protection in China and motivates heavy polluters to participate in soil pollution prevention and control. Using a sample of Chinese-listed firms with key soil pollution regulation from 2013 to 2020, this study utilized the Difference-in-Differences method to analyze the effect and mechanism of the “10-point Soil Plan” on corporate sustainable development. The “10-point Soil Plan” significantly promoted corporate sustainability via debt vacating and cash defense effects. However, this policy failed to achieve innovation compensation. Further, the promotion of corporate sustainability via the “10-point Soil Plan” is more significant in state-owned and large enterprises and depends on the intensity of local environmental regulations. This study provides a valuable reference for government and corporates to actively implement soil pollution prevention and control measures, which complements the systematic study of soil environmental planning and helps China integrate soil environmental planning with water and air environmental planning to build a comprehensive pollution prevention system.

Study on Typical Flight Ground Transit Scenario

In the process of aircraft design, it is necessary to study the flight ground transit scenario. In this paper, to research a typical flight ground transit scenario, a domestic airport is selected, and the typical values of taxi distance, service transit time, and arrival flight time are assessed, analyzed, and given after the influence of passenger flow, runway, terrain, and temperature. This typical transit scenario can be used for the relevant calculations of flight transit capacity in the top-level design of the aircraft.

Comparative Analysis of Chinese Proficiency Grading Vocabulary Between HSK2.0 and HSK3.0

As the top-level design of international Chinese education at the HSK3.0 stage, Chinese Proficiency Grading Standards for International Chinese Language Education are improved in many aspects compared with International Curriculum for Chinese Language Education (Revised Edition) at the HSK2.0 stage. The requirements for vocabulary part of these two files are quite different in terms of total vocabulary quantity, difficulty, marking method and content. After comparative analysis, it is found that the new standard is more inclusive, practical and innovative in vocabulary part.

Resolving the “Matteo Ricci Puzzle”: Top-Level Design of the Grand Canal of China Based on the Ternary Leadership Theory

Resolving the “Matteo Ricci Puzzle”: Top-Level Design of the Grand Canal of China Based on the Ternary Leadership Theory

The change and continuity in China’s S&T policy: an institutional grammar (IG) approach

ABSTRACT This article identifies and demonstrates the change and continuity in China’s science and technology (S&T) policy over 30 years. Firstly, we analyse and compare the two top-level S&T policies in 1985 and 2015 by applying institutional grammar (IG) in Chinese. To situate the policy analysis in the dynamic history, this paper then reviews the development of S&T-related policies from the late 1970s until now. By analysing the policy content and history, we find that policy-making with strong pragmatism continually sets S&T as the role of the engine of economic development. Meanwhile, the paradigm of how China governs S&T changed from decentralization and direct order to top-level design and indirect guide. In terms of the S&T policy framework, China grows into a holistic innovation policy (HIP) concentrating on demand-side and environment-side and soliciting more public sectors, from the linear model. These changes between the two eras do not happen suddenly but proceed gradually. During these, a significant shift that views innovation as a culture of comprehensive reforming forms HIP with Chinese characteristics.

The initiation, exploration, and development of hospital-based health technology assessment in China: 2005 ‒ 2022.

A hospital-based health technology assessment (HB-HTA) can provide the evidence needed to inform clinical decisions at the administrative level. With the implementation of a new round of medical and health care system reforms in China, such as the abolition of medical mark-ups, adoption of modern hospital management systems, reform of diagnosis related groups (DRGs) payment, and performance evaluations for public hospitals, medical institutions increasingly need HB-HTA. The development of HB-HTA in China can be divided into three phases: An initiation phase (2005-2014), a preliminary exploratory phase (2015-2017), and a rapid development phase (2018-present). HB-HTA has been used to manage medical consumables, medical devices, and medicines, but there are still problems and challenges in terms of concept recognition, the mode of development, and limited professionals and data. To promote and use HB-HTA in developing countries, we have identifies the development paths and recommendations for implementation based on a case study in China, which can be summarized as follows: enhancing the top-level design of HB-HTA, formulating HB-HTA guidelines, further promoting the main ideas of HB-HTA, concentrating on the training of evaluation personnel, establishing an HB-HTA network and paying attention to the flexibility of HB-HTA in the application process, and multi- stakeholder participation.

Chinese Path to Sports Modernization: Fitness-for-All (Chinese) and a Development Model for Developing Countries

This policy review overviews the Chinese path to sports modernization within the theoretical framework of the Chinese path to modernization, which is centered on the principle of Fitness-for-All. Over a century of endeavors, the modernization of sports in China has created a new and comprehensive sports civilization in a developing country with a large population and inadequate sports resources. The essence of the Chinese path to sports modernization can be summarized as a people-centered process of sports modernization led by the Communist Party of China that relies on a top-level design with universal participation and seeks to develop a diverse global sports governance. The development of Chinese sports will not only make a transformative contribution to China’s commitment to its second Century Goal, but it will also provide a renaissance for the ancient Chinese philosophy of health first into a people-centered modernization theory, and contribute a Chinese blueprint for the pursuit of the advancement of cross-cultural, diverse world sports civilizations and sustainable development goals.

PESTEL Analysis of Marine Tourism in Zhuhai Under the Background of Construction of Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area

Marine tourism has become the key direction of tourism development in China and even in the world. Under the policy background of China's top-level design and the accelerated construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Zhuhai's marine tourism faces a new historical opportunity. In this thesis, Zhuhai is selected as the research area, and the PESTEL model is applied to analyze the current situation of marine tourism development in Zhuhai from the perspective of the macro environment with the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area as the background, and relevant optimization suggestions are put forward according to the problems arising in the development process.

Promote or inhibit? The effect of the whole chain development of intellectual property on manufacturing firm performance.

With the promotion of intellectual property strategy, the whole chain development of intellectual property environment faced by manufacturing firms has been improved, but the effect of the whole chain development of intellectual property on firm performance still needs to be studied. The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of the whole chain development of intellectual property on different types of manufacturing firm performance. A panel regression model is constructed based on listed manufacturing firms from 2010 to 2020, and this is tested empirically. The results of the study show that the whole chain development of intellectual property has a promotion effect on manufacturing firm performance, among which the promotion effect of intellectual property services is the strongest, followed by intellectual property utilization and intellectual property creation, and the promotion effect of intellectual property management has a significant lag, while the relationship between intellectual property protection and manufacturing firms performance is significantly negative. The promotion effect of the whole chain development of intellectual property on different types of manufacturing firm performance is heterogeneous, and the promotion effect of the whole chain development of intellectual property on the performance of small-scale, non-state-owned, medium-high-technology manufacturing firms is stronger than that of large-scale, state-owned, low-technology manufacturing firms. This study not only extends the research direction of intellectual property, but also adds to the literature on firm performance. In addition, the findings of this paper help government authorities to further optimize the strategic layout of the whole chain development of intellectual property, promote manufacturing firms to solve internal management problems, and achieve a positive interaction between the top-level design of the intellectual property and the bottom-level logic of manufacturing firms.

Green Investment, Technological Progress, and Green Industrial Development: Implications for Sustainable Development

Environmental reformation of old-fashioned sectors and the establishment of new pro-ecological businesses via green investment are the main driving forces behind the revolution in the Chinese industrial sector. Green investment aids in the growth of environmentally friendly industries. Hence, the primary objective of the analysis is to investigate the impact of green investment and technological progress on green industrial development. The results of the unit root tests encourage us to apply the ARDL model. The short and long-run estimates attached to R&D expenditures are positively significant, confirming that increasing R&D expenditures help improve the industrial structure. Similarly, the short and long-run estimates attached to green finance investment are positively significant, signifying that green investment benefits the industrial structure. Empirical findings show that technology significantly aggravates industrial structure development in only the long run. Thus, for green industrial development in China, there is a need to increase green investment and technological development up to top-level design.

Can vertical environmental regulation become a sharp weapon in China's green development process? The moderating role of pollution dividend.

Optimizing the vertical environmental regulation (VER) effect of the central government and reducing the negative execution motivation of local governments have become the priority points to accelerate the green development of China. Based on the spatial Durbin model, this paper not only examines the influence of VER on green development efficiency (GDE), but also discusses the moderating effect of politically and economically motivated pollution dividend (PPD and EPD) on the relationship between them. The research results are as follows: (1) VER has a U-shaped effect on local GDE, the green governance effect of which began to appear when VER was higher than 1.561. VER has an inverted N-shaped effect on adjacent GDE. When the VER intensity lies in (0.138, 3.012), it has a positive spatial spillover effect. (2) PPD weakens the local green governance effect of VER, while EPD positively moderates it. Both of them have no significant moderating effect on it in neighboring areas. (3) Cross-regional cooperative governance moderates the short-term weakness and pollution transfer of VER, and generally facilitates the positive moderating effect of PPD and EPD. In China's two major economic belts, VER, PPD and EPD also have different performances. This study proves the important influence of local inter-governmental competition and promotion tournament on the central environmental regulation for the first time, which is of great significance for optimizing the top-level design of the central government and implementing the governance responsibility of local governments.

The Construction of “China- Central Asia- West Asia Economic Corridor” In the Post- Covid Era: Challenges, Prospects and Responses

The COVID-19 outbreak since 2020 has had a profound impact on the world. The international cooperation environment in the Belt and Road Initiative is facing new changes and new tasks. China-Central Asia-West Asia Economic Corridor is the most sophisticated one with the largest number of countries and the highest geopolitical complexity among the six economic corridors under the Best and Road initiative. The epidemic has brought more new challenges to the China-Central Asia-West Asia Economic Corridor. Based on the current status of the economic corridor after the epidemic, this paper analyzes the practical problems and challenges that the economic corridor will face from the perspective of the global situation and regional cooperation. From a global perspective, China-Central Asia-West Asia Economic Corridor needs to face the challenges of the "Cold War mentality" caused by the COVID-19 and the trend of anti-globalization. From a regional perspective, the regime, sovereignty and security problems of countries of the route are more serious, the economic structure is irrational, and the level of technological innovation is insufficient. It is suggested that China should work with countries along the route to optimize the economic structure, build the Digital Silk Road, build a community of shared future for mankind, determine the top-level design, formulate specific routes, and promote the construction of economic corridors. This article has guiding significance for the direction of continuing to promote the construction of the Belt and Road Initiative in response to the difficulties of China's construction of economic corridors in the post-COVID era.

Understanding the Influencing Factors of Enterprise Transformation and Upgrading Capability: A Case Study of the National Innovation Demonstration Zones, China

Being at the forefront of China’s regional innovation and development, enterprises in the National Innovation Demonstration Zones must take the lead in completing high-quality transformation and upgrading. In this study, we use data from 1770 manufacturing companies from China’s 21 National Innovation Demonstration Zones. Based on the multi-factor influence model, we quantitatively study a series of factors that affect enterprise transformation and upgrading capability in terms of innovation-driven input, economically beneficial output, regional high-quality development, and the enterprise’s basic environment. The research results show a good trend in enterprise transformation and upgrading capability, and 45% of the enterprises have higher capabilities than the average of these zones. There are significant differences in these capabilities across the different National Innovation Demonstration Zones. Economically beneficial output has a relatively large impact on enterprise transformation and upgrading capability, while innovation-driven input, regional high-quality development, and the enterprise’s basic environment all have a relatively small impact. We suggest that the National Innovation Demonstration Zones and relevant departments should provide policy guarantees for enterprise transformation and upgrading in terms of regional systems, industrial chain layout, and soft environment optimization, so as to fully enable policy benefits from top-level design.

Digital finance, environmental regulation, and green development efficiency of China

In the context of the increasingly prominent contradiction between economic development and ecological environment, how to promote green development has become the core of sustainable economic development. Digital finance is an innovative financial model with a high degree of integration of finance and digital technology and provides a new opportunity for achieving green development. Based on identifying the mechanisms of digital finance and environmental regulation on green development efficiency, this research uses the directional distance function and Malmquist-Luenberger index to measure the green development efficiency of 30 provinces in China from 2011 to 2020 and then employs a dynamic panel GMM model to empirically analyze the relationships among digital finance, environmental regulation, and green development efficiency. The results of the study show the following. 1) Digital finance contributes to the efficiency improvement of green development. 2) Environmental regulation has not yet crossed the Porter’s inflection point and still has a dampening effect on green development efficiency. 3) The synergy between digital finance and environmental regulation has a positive impact on green development. 4) Digital finance alleviates the financing constraints arising from environmental regulation and to some extent weakens the negative effect of environmental regulation on the efficiency of green development. In view of this, the government should give full play to the active role of digital finance in eco-environmental governance, optimize the top-level design of environmental regulation, and promote industrial structure upgrading and optimal allocation of financial resources.

Design of Knowledge Model and Training Mode of Business Foreign Language Composite Talents Based on the Background of Digital Economy under the Current Pattern of "Dual Circulation"

Based on the requirements of "dual-circulation" new pattern development, the type attribute of China's vocational education and the background of vigorously developing the new situation of vocational education, this paper comprehensively applies the theories of Multiple Intelligence and compound talents training, and innovatively constructs a compound talents training mode of "three standards, four pairs and five dimensions" through compound talents knowledge model according to the idea of "systematic planning, top-level design, coordinated advancement and key breakthrough".

Policy Experimentation under Pressure in Contemporary China

AbstractMany studies put forward the argument that local policy experimentation, a key feature of China's policy process in the Hu Jintao era, has been paralysed by Xi Jinping's (re)centralization of political power – otherwise known as “top-level design.” This narrative suggests that local policymakers have become increasingly risk-averse owing to the anti-corruption campaign and are therefore unwilling to experiment. This article, however, argues that local governments are still expected to innovate with new policy solutions and now will be punished if they do not. By introducing the analytical framework of “experimentation under pressure” and drawing on an analysis of over 3,000 local government regulations and fieldwork data related to foreign investment attraction policies in two localities, Foshan and Ganzhou, the authors highlight new features developing within current experimental policy cycles. Local cadres now have no choice but to experiment as the political risk of shirking the direct command to experiment may be higher than the inherent risk of experimentation itself.

Ethics and governance of trustworthy medical artificial intelligence

BackgroundThe growing application of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare has brought technological breakthroughs to traditional diagnosis and treatment, but it is accompanied by many risks and challenges. These adverse effects are also seen as ethical issues and affect trustworthiness in medical AI and need to be managed through identification, prognosis and monitoring.MethodsWe adopted a multidisciplinary approach and summarized five subjects that influence the trustworthiness of medical AI: data quality, algorithmic bias, opacity, safety and security, and responsibility attribution, and discussed these factors from the perspectives of technology, law, and healthcare stakeholders and institutions. The ethical framework of ethical values-ethical principles-ethical norms is used to propose corresponding ethical governance countermeasures for trustworthy medical AI from the ethical, legal, and regulatory aspects.ResultsMedical data are primarily unstructured, lacking uniform and standardized annotation, and data quality will directly affect the quality of medical AI algorithm models. Algorithmic bias can affect AI clinical predictions and exacerbate health disparities. The opacity of algorithms affects patients’ and doctors’ trust in medical AI, and algorithmic errors or security vulnerabilities can pose significant risks and harm to patients. The involvement of medical AI in clinical practices may threaten doctors ‘and patients’ autonomy and dignity. When accidents occur with medical AI, the responsibility attribution is not clear. All these factors affect people’s trust in medical AI.ConclusionsIn order to make medical AI trustworthy, at the ethical level, the ethical value orientation of promoting human health should first and foremost be considered as the top-level design. At the legal level, current medical AI does not have moral status and humans remain the duty bearers. At the regulatory level, strengthening data quality management, improving algorithm transparency and traceability to reduce algorithm bias, and regulating and reviewing the whole process of the AI industry to control risks are proposed. It is also necessary to encourage multiple parties to discuss and assess AI risks and social impacts, and to strengthen international cooperation and communication.

HODG:high-order discontinuous Galerkin methods for solving compressible Euler and Navier-Stokes equations - an open-source component-based development framework

In this work, we present HODG, an open-source component-based development framework based on high order Discontinuous Galerkin (DG) methods for solving compressible Euler and Navier-Stokes equations. This framework is written in pure C++11, and proposes “component” as the basic function unit, which is the key to the Interface-Oriented Programming principle and Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) technology. Built on the top-level design of components, HODG is a flexible yet pragmatic development framework that works right out of the box and is easy to use for starters and developers.The current release of HODG supports structured, unstructured, hybrid, and second-order meshes available. It is capable of solving Euler and Navier-Stokes (N-S) equations in two dimensions and three dimensions. In this development framework, spatial accuracy is easy to be extended to higher orders, and DG-P0, DG-P1, DG-P2 (up to third order) are implemented in the current version. Moreover, implicit temporal discretization and explicit discretization are available. Especially for viscous fluxes, the direct Discontinuous Galerkin (DDG) formulation and Bassi and Rebay II (BR2) scheme are implemented. In the case of strong discontinuities or shock waves, artificial viscosity is applied to capture shock waves. Various benchmark numerical examples are provided to demonstrate the full capabilities of HODG. The software is freely available under an MIT license. Program summaryProgram Title: HODG v2.0.0CPC Library link to program files:https://doi.org/10.17632/835732yz8s.1Code Ocean capsule:https://codeocean.com/capsule/4788938Licensing provisions: MITProgramming language: C++11Nature of problem: Compressible Euler and Navier–Stokes equations of fluid dynamics; potential for any advection–diffusion type problem.Solution method: DG-P0, DG-P1, DG-P2 spatial discretization, combining with DDG and BR2 schemes for viscous fluxes, explicit and implicit time schemes, and supporting structured, unstructured, hybrid, and high-order meshes.unusual features: developed based on modern C++11 features; propose the “component” as basic function unit, which follows the practice of Interface-Oriented Programming principle; Special component named “action” is used, and is the key to AOP technology in this framework; Implicitly implements the Dependency Injection (DI) technology; Flexible yet pragmatic, and works right out of the box.