Since the 1970s, globalization, driven by economic efficiency and cost advantages, has integrated regional industries into a highly interconnected system. With the escalation of geopolitical decoupling, particularly in the context of China-U.S. tensions, this system is undergoing profound restructuring. To shed light on emerging trajectories of regional industrial development, it is necessary to synthesize recent scholarship on the impacts of external dynamics under the construction and reconstruction of global value chains and production networks. This study first clarified the connotation and practical manifestations of external dynamics. Furthermore, drawing on the theoretical foundations of evolutionary economic geography and global production network approaches, it identified the main analytical perspectives and conceptual frameworks for studying external dynamics. Accordingly, external dynamics were categorized into external coupling and external decoupling. These two perspectives provide a systematic framework for analyzing the key relationships between external dynamics and regional industrial development under the ongoing global (re)structuring processes. Existing studies suggest that external coupling enhances regional development, particularly by fostering economic growth. By contrast, the consequences of external decoupling remain less clear. On the one hand, decoupling may weaken mechanisms such as knowledge spillovers and innovation diffusion; on the other hand, it may stimulate regionalization and localization of industrial development. Future research could focus on the complex interactions between external dynamics, the domestic circulation, outward opening-up, and regional industrial development, thereby providing policy-relevant insights to support China's transition toward a higher level of institutional opening-up and economic transformation. By consolidating insights from recent studies, this study sought to advance dialogue at the intersection of external dynamics and regional industrial development.

Against the background of integrated urban-rural development and market-based allocation of factors, the flow of urban-rural factors has become a key pathway to breaking down the urban-rural dual structure. Its multi-scale transmission mechanism holds significant implications for promoting coordinated regional development. While current research has made progress in expanding the scope of factors and analyzing driving mechanisms, it still shows notable deficiencies in systematically integrating the multi-scale transmission mechanisms. This study adopted a multi-scale transmission perspective to systematically review existing research on urban-rural factor flows. Integrating scale restructuring theory, flow space theory, and spatial interface theory, it constructed an integrated analytical framework of "scale restructuring-flow-interface interaction". The study revealed that: (1) Existing research on urban-rural factor flows exhibits discontinuities across three dynamic transmission segments—national-regional strategy, regional-local interface, and local-community behavior—preventing the closure of the strategy-behavior-feedback transmission loop; (2) Examination of institutional and geographical interface barriers often treats them as static backgrounds, lacking dynamic and coupling analysis; (3) Top-down and bottom-up processes in scale transmission effect studies remain disjointed. Based on these findings, this article proposed a technical deepening pathway centered on flow-interface-transmission simulation. By integrating factor classification flow measurement, interface assessment, and cross-scale simulation, future research can achieve dynamic deduction from micro-level behaviors to macro-level patterns. This approach provides systematic theoretical tools and methodological support for resolving the scale dilemma in urban-rural factor flows and advancing integrated urban-rural development.

The uneven spatial and temporal distribution of water resources has become a significant bottleneck impeding sustainable regional development. This issue is exacerbated by the dual impacts of climate change and increased human activities, which intensify conflicts between water supply and demand. This article provides a comprehensive review of the historical development and current frontiers of methods for the optimal allocation of water resources, which are essential for effective integrated watershed management. The review systematically explored the topic through three primary dimensions: objective functions, constraints, and solution methods. The results indicate a substantial shift in objective functions — initially focused on purely economic outcomes, they have gradually incorporated a broader set of goals that include ecological, social, and economic objectives. This represents a transition towards a more holistic and sustainable framework for water resource management. Likewise, the development of constraints has evolved from conventional rigid constraints to more flexible "soft constraints" that reflect current institutional and policy landscapes. This evolution underscores an advanced understanding of the socio-political nuances influencing water distribution and utilization. In terms of solution methods, a significant diversification is evident. The field has progressed from relying solely on deterministic mathematical programming to adopting a variety of advanced techniques, such as intelligent optimization, fuzzy and stochastic optimization, and coupled simulation models. These innovations enable more robust modeling of the complexities and inherent uncertainties in water resource management systems. Despite notable achievements, challenges remain, including refining mechanisms for multi-objective coordination, enhancing the quantitative representation of soft constraints, and improving both the physical consistency and interpretability of models. The conclusion underscores the need for dedicated future research to address these critical issues, which are pivotal for advancing water resource optimization and achieving more effective and sustainable management outcomes.

Driven by the deep integration of digital technology and the acceleration of regional integration, the smart urban agglomeration (SUA) has emerged as a new paradigm of regional coordinated development and modern governance in the era of digital intelligence. Consequently, it has become a frontier topic in geography, urban planning, and public administration. Based on the perspective of regional synergy, this article systematically reviewed the development context of related research on smart urban agglomerations in China and internationally since 2010. It analyzed its conceptual content and spatial characteristics from the geographical dimension, and summarized research hotspots and development trends. Studies indicate that smart urban agglomeration represents a modern form of regional spatial organization aimed at fostering coordinated regional development, human-centered principles, and sustainable growth. It operates through digital platforms, prioritizes talent, technology, and institutional frameworks as its core elements, relying on cross-regional collaboration networks and regional innovation systems to optimize resource allocation. Defining characteristics include spatial organization that transcends administrative boundaries, highly concentrated digital technological capabilities, and a multi-tiered collaborative governance structure. The current research mainly focuses on four areas: evaluation system construction, regional cooperation system, innovation system evolution, and digital technology empowerment. However, there are still obvious deficiencies in the construction of the theoretical system, the analysis of spatial mechanisms, and the coordination of human-environment relationship. Future research should strengthen investigations into the spatial evolution mechanism, evaluation system, collaborative governance mechanism, and the impact on regional development patterns of smart urban agglomerations, thereby enriching the geographical connotation of urban agglomeration theory in the digital intelligence era.

This study used the CiteSpace software and bibliometric analysis to systematically review the Chinese and international literature on rural inclusive finance from 2005 to 2024, tracing the development stages and the evolution of key themes in this field. Based on this, the article summarized the progress in the research of inclusive finance and rural development, with the aim of unravelling the mechanisms and effects through which inclusive finance influences rural development. Inclusive finance originated from achieving the goal of eliminating financial exclusion. Against the backdrop of global climate change and the new development of globalization, promoting inclusive growth has emerged as a new and critical objective of inclusive finance. As the connotation of inclusive growth continues to broaden, research topics related to inclusive finance and rural development have shifted from an early emphasis on rural poverty alleviation to cutting-edge areas such as rural economic resilience, sustainable livelihoods, and green development. Correspondingly, the exploration of underlying mechanisms has expanded from focusing solely on alleviating credit constraints to encompassing the multifaceted functions of comprehensive financial services. At the same time, digital technologies have significantly improved the spatial accessibility and population coverage of inclusive finance, positioning digital inclusive finance as a central focus of current research. This article systematically synthesized the core issues of inclusive finance in promoting rural inclusive growth and identified directions for further research, aiming to provide valuable insights to advance both the theories and practice in the field of inclusive finance.

With the development of traditional gentrification theory, its research framework has expanded from a single humanistic, social, or economic dimension to a comprehensive consideration of natural ecological spaces and ecosystem services. Against this backdrop, an increasing number of scholars have paid attention to urban issues such as population displacement, environmental protests, and social group displacement caused by urban environmental improvement, climate governance, and resilience strategy implementation, and have linked them to gentrification. Meanwhile, China's urban development is shifting to a new stage dominated by existing urban space renewal and a people-oriented approach. The central government urban work conferences have also listed the construction of green, low-carbon, and resilient cities as a key task. This indicates that environmental improvement gentrification and climate governance gentrification are becoming new research directions in the field of gentrification. Therefore, this article reviewed the overall progress of Western scholars in the research of environmental improvement (environmental, ecological, green) and climate governance (climate, resilience, low-carbon) gentrification, and systematically examined the connotations of the concepts, identification methods, effects of influencing factors, and formation mechanisms of related gentrification. Finally, taking into consideration the current situation of research in China, the prospects of research on environmental improvement and climate governance gentrification in China were prospected.

Originated from Marx's theory of social reproduction, Western reproductive geographies are dedicated to exploring the power relations and spatiotemporal constitution of social reproduction activities within capitalist societies. By reviewing the main theoretical viewpoints and evolutionary trajectory of Western reproductive geographies, this article aimed to integrate these intellectual strands with China's contemporary reproductive geography realities. It sought to envision a research agenda for reproductive geographies with Chinese characteristics and to extract key implications for China's high-quality population development. Beginning with the "Wages for Housework" movement's critique of the production-reproduction dichotomy in the 1970s, Western reproductive geographies have undergone a spatial and scalar turn, an affective and relational turn, and a cyborg and more-than-human turn of social reproduction research. This intellectual evolution guides Chinese geography to explore the localized characteristics of the reproductive labor process, the spatial-temporal transformations arising from changes in reproductive labor relations, the spatial-temporal reshaping resulting from the performativity of reproductive labor practices, and the interactive relationship between reproductive labor and the socioecological environment. To achieve high-quality population development in China, insights from reproductive geographies suggest the need to ensure spatial equity in accessing reproductive resources to optimize population distribution; build fertility-friendly social relations to stabilize the population; uphold social care and support for reproductive laborers to enhance social well-being; and improve the ecological environment and technological standards of reproductive activities to adapt to demographic structural transitions.

Urban renewal has become a frontier topic in urban development and transformation. The rent gap theory, by revealing the phenomenon of capital flowing back into inner-city areas, has become one of the classic theories explaining the internal mechanism of urban renewal. This study explored the evolving characteristics of the rent gap concept through an in-depth review and systematic summary of typical literature and reviewed the development trends of urban renewal both in China and internationally. On this basis, it further elaborated on the progress of applying the rent gap theory in urban renewal. The introduction of the rent gap concept reveals the intrinsic mechanism and driving force behind capital investment in the urban built environment. Over time, the connotation of the rent gap has been continuously enriched and expanded, exhibiting features such as inclusivity, humanism, global-oriented, diversity, and innovation. This also reflects the gradual transformation of urban renewal towards aspects like business revitalization, ecological restoration, scene creation, cultural heritage, and innovation-driven development, highlighting key characteristics such as gradual orderliness, multi-stakeholder governance, and policy orientation. The development of rent gap theory showed four significant evolutionary characteristics: the increasingly comprehensive development of the theory's connotation; the shift from spatial incremental rent to including non-spatial incremental rent; the diversification of rent gap measurement models; and the shift in focus from capital logic to fairness in benefit distribution. Urban renewal in China and internationally presents development models oriented towards real estate, culture, and technological innovation. The integration of rent gap theory with urban renewal practices is deepening, and this study attempted to propose innovative ideas from the perspective of the rent gap theory to address the conflicts in China's frontier urban renewal. The aim was to provide a theoretical reference for China's urban development and transformation, contributing to the high-quality development and the construction of Chinese-style modernization.

As a unique geomorphic configuration of small watersheds on the Loess Plateau, the land use pattern change in the slope-gully system profoundly affects the process of human-environment interactions. As a critical area of human-environment interactions on the Loess Plateau, the loess hilly-gully region has undergone substantial and obvious changes in its landuse patterns. Based on a literature review and inductive summary, this study first established the theoretical understanding of the slope-gully system. Then, it systematically summarized the spatiotemporal change, resource-environmental effects, and optimization pathways of land use patterns across diverse landforms in the loess hilly-gully region since 1980. Finally, we proposed the future direction for the in-depth study of land use patterns in the slope-gully system. The results show that: 1) Due to significant spatial heterogeneity of both natural and socioeconomic factors across different sections of the slope-gully system, land use patterns exhibit clear horizontal and vertical differentiation. 2) Currentstudies primarily focus on natural aspects such as soil erosion, water-sediment processes, and vegetation dynamics, while limited attention has been paid to socioeconomic effects, including farmers' livelihoods and non-agricultural employment opportunities. 3) The optimization paths of land use patterns in the slope-gully system can be categorized as problem-oriented, resource-utilization-based, and systematic design paths. However,the optimization paths mostly concentrate on local engineering or single planting structure adjustment, lacking integrated design frameworks and comprehensive socioeconomic evaluations. Moving forward, it is essential to develop a theoretical framework for land use pattern research in the slope-gully system grounded in the coupling theory of human-environment systems. Advanced technologies, such as high-resolution remote sensing and 3D real-world mapping, should be used to accurately quantify vertical land use pattern changes and to carry out the diagnosis of problems and optimization of layout design of multi-scale land use patterns of the slope-gully system. Last, future study can engage with cutting-edge international studies on land-use patterns in slope-gully systems, especially extending from regional analyses to global perspectives. This study provides theoretical insights and technical pathways to deepen the understanding of land use pattern changes in the slope-gully system, contributing to the optimized allocation and sustainable management of land resources in the loess hilly-gully areas.

Visceral geography, proposed by Jessica Hayes-Conroy and Allison Hayes-Conroy in 2010, is a theoretical paradigm that emphasizes how internal bodily sensations participate in spatial practices at non-rational and non-verbal levels. This article interprets visceral geography as the socially construted visceral bodily experience, in order to distinguish it from biologically innate bodily responses. Although Western scholars have extensively explored this framework across topics such as food, emotion, gender, and race, existing research often suffers from weak theoretical integration and fragmented analytical frameworks. In response, this article systematically reviewed the theoretical development of visceral geography, clarified its central proposition of "bio-social dual encoding", and proposed an analytical framework consisting of embodiment, relationality, and transformative potential to deepen understanding of this paradigm. It further identified three major research themes: the visceral politics of food, racialized spatial politics, and embodied politics of place, demonstrating how bodily experience actively engages with spatial power relations. Finally, the article offered a theoretical reflection from the perspective of the Chinese context and engaged in a dialogue between Chinese and Western scholarships, highlighting the potential applications of visceral geography in research in China. By introducing visceral geography into the Chinese geographical discourse, this study explored how bodily experience is embedded in spatial political practice and thus contributes to expanding the theoretical horizon of body geography.

Gully erosion is a typical geomorphic evolution process on the Loess Plateau as well as in other loess regions of the world. However, the analysis of erosion process has been hindered due to the limitations of existing research methodologies. In this article, we reviewed and compared three research methods for gully erosion on the Loess Plateau, both in China and internationally, based on their characteristics in terms of spatiotemporal resolution. Among the gully erosion research methods, geomorphological analysis, which is based on the principles of geology and geomorphology, can explain the relative age of the gully erosion process in the region during the geologic period, but cannot determine the absolute age of gully erosion. The dating and documentary research methods, which are based on the multi-dating technology and historical documentary analysis, can accurately reflect the evolution process of gully erosion around the dating site by using absolute chronological dating. However, these methods are applied on a small spatial scale and are unable to analyze the temporal continuity of gully erosion. Model simulation methods include empirical statistical models, physical process models, and complex system models, which rebuild the historical erosion process at high spatiotemporal resolution based on multi-source data and interdisciplinary technologies. However, there are few research achievements based on these methods. The three types of methods each has its own strengths and focuses on different aspects of gully erosion, showing the characteristics of critique-integration-transcendence. In general, the results of the existing research methods are more microscopic than macroscopic in spatial scale, more static than dynamic at the temporal level, and more independent than coupled technically. With the development of data acquisition, interdisciplinary exchange, AI technology, and multimodal large language models, their data processing and coupling analysis capabilities will be greatly enhanced, which can overcome the spatial scale limitations, improve the accuracy of time series analyses, and increase the coupling of analyses and methods, ultimately providing a future solution to the shortcomings of existing gully erosion research methods.

In the context of new mobility, spatial governance in rural tourism destinations faces complex challenges. Traditional governance models rely on administrative dominance and localized management, while the emergence of new mobility breaks the boundaries of physical space, promoting the cross-boundary integration of flow elements such as capital, people, information, and technology, thus forming dynamic social structures and power networks. This change makes traditional governance models ineffective in addressing the spatial governance needs of rural tourism destinations in the new mobility context, necessitating the exploration of adaptive governance strategies. Therefore, this study introduced the concept of "spatial good governance", and based on a clear understanding of the theoretical connotation of spatial good governance in rural tourism destinations under the context of new mobility, it constructed a multidimensional framework for spatial good governance around five key dimensions: goals, objects, subjects, scales, and methods. Based on this, the study further proposed directions for future research, emphasizing the importance of goal setting, object identification, subject coordination, scale transformation, and method transition. By transcending the binary opposition of mobility and locality, this study enriched the theoretical perspective on spatial governance in rural tourism destinations and provided some insights for the practical exploration of diverse governance models in rural tourism.

Globalization, climate change, population mobility, and technological transformation have brought multiple challenges to the transformation and upgrading of rural systems. Exploring the path and mechanism of the comprehensive revitalization of rural areas from the perspective of resilience has become the key to global sustainable development. International research has established the basic framework of rural resilience from the perspective of subject + space + system, which has become an enlightenment for researchers in China to explore the process of rural resilience from the perspectives of sociology, geography and management, and provides scientific references for finding adaptive transformation paths for rural areas in different regions of China. On this basis, this study deeply analyzed the relationship between the new quality productivity system and rural resilience, and used this framework to explore the paradigms that should be followed in future research on rural resilience in China. This research clarifies the path to enhance rural resilience and also provides a scientific basis for global rural development policies.

Global climate change has exerted significant impacts on the arid regions of Central Asia, reshaping their hydrological cycle and highlighting the increasing vulnerability of regional water resource systems. This study systematically reviewed multi-source observational data and model simulation results from existing research, and, from the three dimensions of climate change, glacier and snow cover variations, and water resource changes, revealed the spatiotemporal differentiation patterns of water resources in Central Asia. The constraints of data-related and methodological uncertainties on water resource evaluation were also discussed. 1) Climate change: Since 1901, Central Asia has exhibited a pronounced warm-wet trend, characterized by a persistent temperature increase and growing precipitation. Annual precipitation increased by 0.66-1.93 mm per decade, showing marked spatial heterogeneity. During 1960-2011, the annual mean temperature rose at a rate of 0.3-0.4 ℃ per decade. From 1901 to 2013, the frequency of extreme high‑temperature events increased by about 30% compared with other regions at similar latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere. Multi-model projections indicate a regional warming of 2-6  ℃ by the end of the 21st century, with precipitation trends ranging from -3.34  mm per decade to +4.63  mm per decade, and showing seasonal differentiation characterized by winter wetting and summer drying. 2) Cryosphere response: Glaciers in the Tianshan Mountains have been retreating at rates of 0.53%-3.01% per year in area, with mass loss showing a southwest-to-northeast increasing gradient. Snow cover across Central Asia exhibits spatiotemporal variability, with an overall significant decrease in extent and duration. 3) Water resource changes: In glacier-rich basins, runoff has shown a short-term increasing trend, but in some cases, glacier-fed runoff has already reached a turning point toward decline. Long-term projections suggest that by 2100, total runoff in the Tianshan Mountains could decrease by up to 36%. Human activities, superimposed on climatic forcing, further exacerbate water resource stress. Although advances have been made in data integration, distributed hydrological modeling, and downscaling techniques, inadequate high-altitude observations, inconsistencies in data resolution, limited representation of nonlinear processes in models, and insufficient understanding of cryosphere-hydrology coupling mechanisms continue to hinder systematic understanding and accurate prediction. Therefore, strengthening the construction of transboundary hydrometeorological monitoring networks and developing multi-scale data assimilation systems will be essential for enhancing the monitoring and regulation of water resources, advance water resource assessment under climate change scenarios, and support sustainable water resource management, thereby improving the capacity of Central Asia to cope with climate change and ensure water security.

The input-output table serves as a core tool for quantifying the interconnections within an economy's sectors and the material flows between regions, playing a crucial role in studying regional economic ties and the various resulting relationships. Based on a systematic review of the basic structure, development history, and related concepts of the input-output table, this article summarized its functions in various fields, the shortcomings of the existing compilation methods, and its future development trends. The input-output table has played significant roles in economic analysis, industrial configuration optimization, policy evaluation optimization, regional economic connection and resource flow analysis, regional sustainable development and environmental governance, among others. Currently, the compilation of the input-output table overly relies on scarce historical trade data, which has caused problems such as insufficient accuracy, and low timeliness. In highly regionally heterogeneous countries such as China, the common simplistic homogeneity assumption can lead to failures. The future directions of the input-output table development include: First, compiling regional input-output models under future scenarios to predict future regional economic ties, which can provide basic data for predicting future trends of regional economic ties, resource flows, and environmental issues, identifying potential risks and opportunities, and thus providing a strong basis for scientific and reasonable decision-making. Second, establishing spatial input-output models, combining production and demand spatial distribution patterns, transportation and price factors and so on, to analyze regional trade ties, thereby breaking the excessive reliance on trade data. Third, data collaboration optimization, integrating enterprise-level transaction data and AI technology, dynamically computing industrial sector-correcting technical coefficients, and reducing uncertainties. In addition, combining real-time data with predictive models to establish a high frequency response-detailed analysis-multidimensional governance mixed model framework to adapt to dynamic and diversified application needs. This research can provide a reference for further research on input-output models.

Tourism destination is a core concept in tourism research and tourism practice, but the analysis of the trends, key directions, and theoretical bases of tourism destination research is not clear enough. In this case, neither researchers nor professionals have reached a consensus on the definition of a tourist destination. Although a few studies have conducted in-depth analysis of the keyword co-occurrence network and evolution of tourism destination research, there is a lack of coding, classification, and reflection of the research content. In addition, the exploration of the conceptual nature of tourism destination as a unit of analysis needs to be further developed to provide a fuller cognitive picture for the theorization of tourism destination. Therefore, this study used systematic literature review and bibliometric research methods to examine and reflect on the Chinese literature from 1998 to 2024. The results show that: 1) The research on tourism destinations can be divided into four stages, the abundance and depth of the research topics are deepening, and the co-occurrence map also shows a concentrated trend in the time series, among which tourism image, destination residents, and rural tourism are the topics with high attention. 2) The meta-themes of tourism destination research include 23 categories, which can be divided mainly into five levels: tourism destination image, marketing and brand; tourist perception, attitude, and behavior; rural tourism host and guest perception and culture; tourism destination patterns, processes, and mechanisms; and heritage tourism destination governance and residents' livelihood. 3) The research on tourism destinations is mainly carried out under the paradigm of tourism management and tourism geography, and the related theories of life cycle, glocalization, and social construction are insufficient to understand the complexity of tourism destinations, while the emphasis of social-material theory on networks, heterogeneous actors, and relationship effects provides another possibility for understanding the integrity and dynamics of tourism destination reproduction. This study aimed to clarify the genealogy of tourism destination research and deepen the theoretical exploration of the conceptualization of tourism destination.