Rural transformation is an important way to achieve sustainable development of rural areas. The establishment of rural transformation path and policy in line with major function-oriented zoning is an important measure to promote the integration of urban and rural development and achieve rural revitalization. Taking Hunan Province, an agricultural region in central China, as an example and based on major function oriented zoning, this study constructed an evaluation index system of rural transformation degree around the core elements including population, land, and industry. We calculated the rural transformation degree of each county during 2006-2011 and 2011-2016, and analyzed the spatial differences and driving mechanisms of rural transformation development in various major function oriented zoning. The results show that the characteristics of rural transformation in different major function oriented zones varied because of factors such as natural condition, location, economic foundation, and policy environment. Rural transformation in prioritized development zones was mainly driven by cities and towns. The role of urban influences, market drivers, and farmers' decision-making power was outstanding. The degree of rural transformation was high and the speed was fast. Rural transformation in main agricultural zones was mainly driven by modern agriculture. Resource support, policy impetus, and cultural embeddedness played a leading role. The degree of rural transformation was relatively high, and the speed was relatively fast. Rural transformation in key ecological function zones was mainly driven by the government. Due to the constraints of topography, economic basis, and resources and the environment, the degree of rural transformation was relatively low, and the speed was relatively slow. The rural transformation degree of all major function orientedzones during 2011 to 2016 was improved compared with that during 2006 to 2011. The major function oriented zoning scheme of Hunan Province reflects the difference of rural development to some extent, but the guiding role of major function-oriented zoning policy in the process of rural transformation development needs to be strengthened.

In the new century, the countryside of China is experiencing a new and vigorous process of transformation and reconstruction and the spatial differentiation of rurality in rural areas can be seen as the concrete manifestation of the process of rural transformation and reconstruction in local areas. Also in this period, rural development has become more pluralistic and more externally dependent and the driving factors are more pluralistic as well. Therefore, a more comprehensive and systematic spatial interface perspective was applied to explore the spatial differentiation of rurality in village areas, which provides a new perspective for the study of rural development in the new era. In this study, we used the rurality index to analyze the spatial differentiation of rurality at the village scale in Gongyi City, Henan Province, China. Next, we quantitatively determined the location of spatial interfaces in Gongyi using the moving split-window technique. Finally, we used a geographical detector technique to assess the mechanisms that influenced the spatial differentiation of rurality at the village scale in Gongyi. Our results show the following: (1) The spatial interface of Gongyi can be divided into natural and human categories. The most important natural interfaces include terrain and natural resources, and the human interfaces include agricultural production, residential, administrative division, and traffic. (2) The distribution of rurality at the village scale in Gongyi showed strong positive spatial autocorrelation. The number of the strong rurality and extremely strong rurality villages was relatively small. The strong rurality and extremely strong rurality villages were mainly distributed in the southern and northwestern regions of Gongyi City. Intermediate rurality villages were mainly distributed in the southwestern, southeastern, and eastern regions of Gongyi City. The weak rurality and extremely weak rurality villages were mainly distributed around the urban region and the two port towns in the west and east of the city. On the whole, spatial agglomeration was evident and it was strong in the periphery and weak in the middle area. (3) Under the influence of the multiple effects of the spatial interfaces, the elements in the county space of Gongyi were reorganized to promote the formation of rurality spatial differentiation. The traffic, administrative division, and residential interfaces strongly affected rurality spatial differentiation, while the natural interfaces played a less important role.

The Report of the 19th CPC Congress puts forward the strategy of rural vitalization. The role of human geographers is to participate in various rural vitalization practices and to think of it from the perspective of space and region. David Harvey, a representative of the Marxist geography, pointed out that the phenomenon of time-space compression had aggravated the crisis of capital accumulation. To eliminate the crisis needs the revolution in production modes and production relations. This study used the data of rural investment projects of enterprises in Guangzhou City from 2015 to 2017 published on the Guangdong Provincial Government’s official website, to find out what projects tried to eliminate regional development gaps and resisted the pure pursuit of capital profits. This will provide a basis for the government to target its support. The research method was empirical analysis of the statistical data. The conclusions of this study are as follows. First, the spatial distribution of investment projects indicates that the majority of the investments in the rural vitalization of Guangzhou City from 2015 to 2017 followed the “pure” market principle—the investment projects are mainly in the suburbs close to the central city, and the large-scale investment projects are also concentrated there. This distribution is the result of time-space compression. Second, a small number of the rural investment projects for rural vitalization in Guangzhou City from 2015 to 2017 are not purely pursuing profits. These investment projects are mainly on improving the environmental quality of rural areas, rather than on production. These may be regarded as spatial restoration projects, not for strengthening capital circulation. These investment projects can better reflect people's understanding of the nature of a happy life and have positive meanings.

The change of farming household behaviors is an important driving force for quantitative change or from quantitative to qualitative change of rural production space system. The operation of rural production space system is the external manifestation of farming household behaviors. Examining farming household behaviors can provide some insights for the interpretation of the operational mechanism of rural production space system. Based on a theoretical framework of farming household behavior transformation and the operational response of rural production space system, this study constructed the index system and established a fuzzy comprehensive evaluation model from the perspective of farming household behavior transformation, and took Henghe Village of Jiangjin District in Chongqing Municipality as an example to interpret the operational mechanism of rural production space system. The main conclusions are as follows: the behaviors of various farming households effected differently on the operation of rural production space system, among which large agricultural producers showed greater impact than joint agricultural cooperatives, which in turn had greater impact than the traditional households. The impacts of different farming household behaviors on rural production space system operation were different, among which the behaviors of large agricultural producers mainly affected the utilization efficiency of rural production space system; the behaviors of joint agricultural cooperatives clearly improved the economic benefits of rural production space system; and the contribution of traditional household behaviors to the improvement of rural production space system was minimal. This study put forward some suggestions from the perspective of economic, social, and spatial restructuring including developing a variety of moderately large-scale operations, fostering new agricultural management entities and professional farmers, and guiding the input behavior of technology and capital of farming households in order to realize the coordination and balanced development of rural production space system.