Innovation of mechanism and regional policy are important means for adjusting and controlling the direction, goal, speed, and path of regional development. This article explored the effect of mechanism innovation and regional policy on coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. The relationship between fairness and efficiency, and human and nature should be placed in an important position. According to the main tasks of the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region in the near and medium terms, we put forward five key tasks of mechanism innovation and the policy support required: mitigate the non-capital function of Beijing orderly, optimize the industrial structure and spatial layout, build an integrated modern transportation network, promote equal basic public services, and strengthen environment protection. From a long-term and global perspective, we elaborated the key mechanism innovation and macro regional policies, including coordinated development of regional industry, integrative development of regional factor market, regional collaborative innovation, regional public service sharing, and regional horizontal ecological compensation. These policies could provide decision-making references for promoting the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region.
Promoting coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration is not only a major national strategy, but also a long-term complex process. It is necessary to apply scientific theories and respect the laws of nature to realize the strategic target of common prosperity, share a clean environment, share the burden of risk of development, and build a world-class metropolis for the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration. This article examines the scientific foundation and patterns of coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration. Synergy theory, game theory, dissipative structure theory, and catastrophe theory are the theoretical basis of coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration. Synergy theory is the core theory for the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration. The coordinated development process of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration is a non-linear spiral progress of game, coordination, mutation, game, resynchronization, and mutation. Each game-coordination-mutation process promotes the coordinated development of the urban agglomeration to a higher level of coordination, and the progress fluctuates. This process includes eight stages: assistance phase, cooperation phase, harmonization phase, synergy phase, coordination phase, resonance phase, integration phase, and cohesion phase. Further analysis shows that the real connotation of coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration is to realize the coordination of planning, transportation, industrial development, urban and rural development, market, science and technology, finance, information, ecology, and the environment, as well as the construction of a collaborative development community. The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration will achieve advanced collaboration from low-level collaborative phase through regional coordination on planning, construction of traffic network, industrial development, joint development of urban and rural areas, market consolidation, science and technology cooperation, equal development of financial services, information sharing, ecological restoration, and pollution control. This study may provide a scientific foundation and theoretical basis for the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration.
The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is an important population agglomeration area and economic growth pole in China. Research on the coordinated development between population and economy under the backgroud of coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is of great significance for promoting sustainable development of regional economy. Based on the population and GDP of Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei, this study applied elasticity, geographic concentration index, inconsistency index, and gravity center methods to analyze the coordinated development between population and economy in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. The results are as follows: (1) The degree of coordination between population growth and economic growth was generally high in the whole region, but differs among the cities. (2) Population and economic activities are concentrated in the southern and central parts of the region while the north was sparsely populated with few economic activities. The economic concentration index values were higher than the population concentration index values in Beijing and Tianjin. The population concentration index values were higher than the economic concentration index values in most cities of Hebei. The population gravity center and economic gravity center both moved towards the northeast of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, with the economic gravity center displaying a stronger movement momentum. Moreover, the population gravity center of each city in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region deviates from the economic gravity center to different extents. This article also puts forward some policy recommendations for promoting the coordinated development between population and economy.
As a most influential measure to achieve regional sustainable development and transformation strategies, coordinated regulation and control policies are drawing increasing attentions from scientists and policymakers. It is important to understand the mechanisms of policy performance and systematically estimate the effects before making regional development decisions. However, a number of problems have arisen during the formulation and implementation of current policies, such as lack of specific targeted policy orientation, unclear policy maneuverability, uncertain policy interaction mechanisms, and vague policy impacts, which all hindered the effective implementation of policy objectives. The crux of the problem lies in the lack of policy parameters that can bridge the gap between directive policy objectives and specific management practices, and between specific policy measures and system responses. Thus, this study proposes a framework of policy parameterization, which includes four steps: refining policy indicators, quantifying policy parameters, identifying regulatory regions, and modeling. Taking the regional population regulation and control of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region as an example, this study implemented the policy parameterization framework in the system dynamic (SD) model of population regulation and control of the study area. The results show that: (1) The policy parameterization method has well represented the policy functional process by integrating with the SD model. (2) The trend of population regulation changes in the case study area indicates that population migration control policy had limited effect on the population dynamics. Only by improving the regional population carrying capacity, system sustainability can be achieved. (3) The parameterization method is able to specify policy implementation practices by providing specific indicators and their regulation intervals, and further providing a basis for scenario analysis and strategy optimization. Thus it can be a useful tool for directing regional regulatory policy making.
The core of collaborative development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is problem-oriented, aiming at breaking the administrative boundaries and optimizing the allocation of resources on a larger regional scale, thus realizing the overall regional development goals. As a consequence, it is crucial to carry out spatial development regionalization and implement targeted local governance according to the needs of modernizing regional spatial governance system and from the perspective of improving the spatial planning system. On the basis of regional development differentiation, this study conducted cluster analysis based on spatial and attribute constraints to divide the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region into four subregions, that is, the central core function development region, eastern coastal key development region, southern gateway function development region, and northern and western ecological conservation region. This study further used districts and counties as the basic unit of analysis and constructed a classification index system at the micro spatial scale, considering the status quo of development intensity, urban construction land increment forecast, and ecological protection responsibility. The status quo of development intensity is composed of population density, construction density, input density, and output density. Ecological protection responsibility mainly incorporates restricted construction area and limited construction area. Urban construction land increment forecast is determined by elements including natural, socioeconomic, transportation, planning factors, and so on. With the aid of a three-dimensional coordinate classification method, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region can be divided into five typological divisions at the district and county levels, namely, urban optimized development area, urban key development area, modern agriculture development area, limited and moderate development area, strict ecological reserve area. Corresponding to the above analysis, this article puts forward policy recommendations on spatial governance: (1) Emphasizing the fundamental role of the market in resource allocation and improved regional development; (2) Mediating the contradiction between development and protection, building up a mechanism of sharing benefits and the burden of risks.
The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration is one of the most competitive support platforms of China in the international economic system. It is also one of the most challenging areas with regard to water security in China and worldwide. Mainly based on data from 2000-2014, we analyzed the spatiotemporal characteristics of water resources exploitation in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration using quantitative and qualitative methods, including Theil index, coefficient of variation, curve analysis, and spatial classification analysis. The results show that: (1) The average annual water resources of nearly all cities decreased evidently. The decrease in the north and west were greater than that in the south and east. (2) Water resources are scarce and unevenly distributed in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration. The spatial imbalances of water resources first decreased and then increased during the study period. Water scarcities in the central and southern parts of the region were more serious than that in the north. (3) Total water utilizations of nearly all cities showed zero or slow negative growth. The proportion of industrial and agricultural water uses in total water utilization decreased in most cities. However, the spatial imbalances of all types of water use remain relatively stable. (4) Water use efficiencies in all cities increased rapidly. Their spatial differences first increased and then decreased. Based on the above spatiotemporal characteristics, it is recommended that the size of cities and the scale of industrial operations in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration should be planned according to water resources carrying capacity, and corresponding urbanization and industrial development policies should be implemented. Water and ecological compensation policies should be improved. Water resource management red line policies should be carried out.
Venture capital is an effective driving force in the collaborative innovation of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei urban agglomeration. Based on the Zero2 IPO database, this study analyzed the spatiotemporal distribution of urban venture capital using social network theory and examined the mechanism of this distribution using a gravity model and panel data regression. The results show that, first, the gross venture capital of this urban agglomeration showed a four-year-period fluctuation. Second, the distribution is becoming less uneven due to the spin-off effects of Beijing, Tianjin, and Tangshan, where venture capital has concentrated in the past years. Third, venture capital flows between different cities are gradually forming a network with strong connection between core and peripheral cities, as well as weak connection between peripheral cities. The distribution of venture capital has become more even between different stages of entrepreneurship. With regard to the influencing factors of this distribution, information infrastructure and economic development have played significant positive roles, while innovation activities are not keeping in pace with venture capital flows partially due to the underdevelopment of financial instruments and service sectors.
Collaborative innovation is one of the core issues of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei integration and coordinated development. This study constructed a collaborative innovation index of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region for narrowing the gap of innovative level and promoting innovation cooperation among different regions and actors. From 2010 to 2014, while the overall innovation ability of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region has improved significantly, notable differences within the region remain and innovative collaboration among different regions and actors is still at a low level. In terms of the differences within the region, Beijing is far ahead in the fields of innovation investment, output, and environment. Tianjin is making rapid progress in innovation investment and high-tech industry development. Hebei has shown rapid growth in high-tech industry investment but slow progress in innovation output and environment. In terms of regional innovative collaboration among key actors, the role of enterprises is lagging far behind the developed regions. Although universities and research institutions have abundant research results, many of them remain unapplied. Lastly, in terms of the ability for cross-region innovative cooperation, Beijing has shown a "jumpy" diffusion pattern with much stronger influence and collaboration with faraway regions than its immediate neighboring areas of Tianjin and Hebei. The article concludes with recommendations on how to further clear the orientation and function division of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, create a better collaborative innovation market environment, make an industry-university-research institute system, and deepen the reform of the science and technology innovation system.
Urbanization in China has resulted in an increased consumption of resources, energy, and materials and led to negative environmental effects. Urban agglomeration plays pivotal roles in the China's new urbanization. These factors have motivated the widely discussed topic of urban agglomeration's eco-efficiency. This research developed an index system of eco-efficiency and evaluated the eco-efficiency of counties in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration using the modified Topsis model for the spatial pattern of consumption of resources, economic benefit, and environmental pollution outputs. We also quantified eco-efficiency by the undesirable-output SBM model in 2006, 2010, and 2014 using environmental pollution as an undesirable output. Spatial autocorrelation index and local Moran's I index were used to analyze the spatial correlation pattern of eco-efficiency at the county level in the study area. The results show that there exist significant spatiotemporal differences of consumption of resources, economic benefit, and environmental pollution outputs. The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei area had high values of inputs and outputs in the research period. Eco-efficiency of counties in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration was relatively low. Mean values of eco-efficiency were 0.324, 0.305, and 0.347 in 2006, 2010, and 2014. It decreased first and then increased. The reasons for the spatial differences of eco-efficiency are location and natural backgrounds, and low economic benefit and high environmental impact are the main factors that restrict the improvement of eco-efficiency. The global Moran's I index values were 0.2539, 0.3007, and 0.3088, indicating that the impact factors of eco-efficiency were not only related to the economic development level of each county unit, but also associated with the eco-efficiency of adjacent counties. The positive agglomeration effect has been increasingly obvious since 2006, and the gap of eco-efficiency of neighboring counties has reduced.
Using primary data from a questionnaire survey of Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (BDA), this study examined the characteristics of residential space of development zone and its formation mechanism. The study found that both the income and education levels of residents of development zones are higher compared to the general population. Immigration has been the most important source of population increase. The types of housing in development zone are diversified, and government policies and size of housing are important factors that caused the development of residential differentiation. Differences in income and social stratus have resulted in spatial segregation of residents of higher and lower incomes. As new suburban communities, in development zones the awareness of rights of resident is strongly while the community connection is week among the residents of these communities. Distance of commuting is the most important factor that affects the residential location choice in development zones. Living environment and quality of education resources are also important factors. In order to analyze the characteristics of residential space of development zones, a theoretical framework of formation mechanism is put forward that considers multiple stakeholders including residents, real estate developer, local government, enterprises, parent city, and surrounding districts. At present, most economic-technological development areas are facing the transformation from areas of industrial function to urbanized functional area. These areas are industrial agglomerations or residential towns, even isolated cities, which creates a complex situation. As a result, the residential space and its formation mechanism are very complex. This is significant for understanding and developing the theories of urban residential space.
This article presents an analysis on international journals in the broad discipline of human geography indexed by the US Institute for Scientific Information (ISI), including 115736 articles from 156 Social Science Citation Index (SSCI) journals published during 2000-2013. It examines the performance, trends, characteristics, and challenges of Chinese human geography in the process of internationalization by an in-depth analysis of knowledge production in terms of the number of papers, citations, and top institutions and scholars in current human geography literature. The results show that: First, contemporary human geography is comprised of orthodox geographies (for example, economic geography, urban geography, cultural geography, and political geography), environmental studies, urban studies, development and planning, and economics, which are interconnected. There is an evident shift of western human geography towards social and cultural dimensions. Second, it is an indisputable fact that China has emerged as an important contributor for international literature in human geography in recent years with respect to not only the amount of paper production, but also highly influential publications and leading institutions and scholars. Nevertheless, at present China is not in the position to challenge the Anglo-American hegemony in the global pattern of human geography. Third, Chinese human geography is highly characterized by developmentalism and empiricism, being excluded from the mainstream fields of human geographical strands and epistemologies. Lastly, there exist huge gaps in the areas of cultural and social geography, innovation-based studies, social networks, and regional governance between Chinese and international studies, which requires a timely research agenda to promote reform of current institutions of China's educational and research systems, and to make fruitful dialogues with external scholarship.
This study divided the migrant population in Shenzhen into three groups based on the sixth census data: inter-city migrants, inter-provincial migrants, and intra-provincial migrants. By calculating location quotient, the proportions of migrants in urban sub-districts were compared within the city. Spatial autocorrelation was used to identify spatial agglomeration, and then a differentiation index was used to characterize the degree of differentiation of migrant population. The ordinary least squares (OLS) model, spatial lag model, and spatial error model were used to analyze and explain the influencing factors of the residential spatial differentiation of migrants, taking the proportion of migrant population as the dependent variable and housing and employment factors as the independent variables. The results show that: (1) The location entropy of the migrant population showed a clear circular structure, with inter-city migrants in Nanshan and Futian Districts in the southwest corner at the center, and inter-provincial and intra-provincial migrants outside. (2) Spatial agglomeration has occurred in the residential distribution of migrant population. Inter-city migrants are distributed around the city administrative center; inter-provincial migrants are concentrated around the commercial center; and intra-provincial migrants are concentrated in sub-districts in Guanwai where industrial parks are concentrated in. (3) The highest degree of residential differentiation was found between the intra-provincial migrants and the population with the hukou (population registration) of Shenzhen. (4) Residential spatial distribution of intra-provincial migrants was significantly affected by housing factors, while inter-provincial migrants was significantly affected by employment factors, and inter-city migrants are affected by both housing and employment factors, but less significantly. The regional characteristics of housing and employment led to the settlement of migrants of all types to specific locations of the city, and thus formed the overall pattern of residential spatial differentiation.
