PROGRESS IN GEOGRAPHY ›› 2021, Vol. 40 ›› Issue (1): 3-14.doi: 10.18306/dlkxjz.2021.01.001

• Rural-Urban Integration Development in the New Era • Previous Articles     Next Articles

The role of rural settlements in rural revitalization: Perspective of economic geography

LI Xiaojian1,2(), HU Xueyao1, SHI Yanwen2, YANG Huimin2   

  1. 1. College of Environment and Planning/Key Research Institute of Yellow River Civilization and Sustainable Development, Henan University, Kaifeng 475004, Henan, China
    2. Collaborative Innovation Center of Urban-Rural Coordinated Development/Academician Laboratory for Urban and Rural Spatial Data Mining, Henan University of Economics and Law, Zhengzhou 450046, China
  • Received:2020-06-22 Revised:2020-11-11 Online:2021-01-28 Published:2021-03-28
  • Supported by:
    National Natural Science Foundation of China(41971223);National Natural Science Foundation of China(41701197);Key Project of Institute for Yellow River Civilization and Sustainable Development(2020M18);Youth Fund Project of Humanities and Social Sciences of the Ministry of Education(17YJC790125)

Abstract:

This article started with an analysis of the background of rural decline, and the content and logic of the national strategy of rural revitalization from the perspective of human-land relationship. We proposed that rural recession is the result of the adjustment of human-land relationship lagging behind the process of social and economic development. The ultimate purpose of rural revitalization is to adjust the relationship between human and land to adapt to the change of the value of production factors in the new stage of social and economic development. Then, the review of the literature on rural revitalization found that the existing research has paid more attention to the implementation of its strategic content, but not enough attention to rural settlements that have been the important carrier of rural population. There is a close relationship between rural settlement and rural revitalization. Rural settlements are the focus of human social and economic activities in rural areas, and are the core and starting point of rural human-land relationship adjustment. But in the existing literature on rural settlements, emphasis is placed on development cases and neglecting mechanisms, especially the mechanism of change of rural settlements, which is closely associated with rural revitalization. Therefore, bearing in mind the key role of rural settlements in rural revitalization, this article finally put forward five focus areas of future research: the theory of rural settlement evolution, changing trend of spatial structure in rural settlements, specialization transformation of rural settlements, optimization of rural settlements, and landscape of rural settlements.

Key words: rural settlement, rural revitalization, human-land relationship, factors of production