Breaking Regional Imbalances for Sustainable Urban Development: Spatial Pattern Evolution of Human Capital and Urban Digitalization in Guangdong Province
Description
Taking 16 cities in Guangdong Province as the research objects, this study constructs a dual-dimensional evaluation system for higher vocational education and urban digitalization and combines the entropy method, the coupling coordination model, Dagum Gini decomposition, and spatial econometric methods to examine the coordinated development pattern from 2019 to 2023. The results show that: (1) the coordination level exhibits a stable core-periphery hierarchy, with Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Foshan leading while peripheral cities remain concentrated in low-to-middle coordination intervals; (2) regional disparity declines slightly overall, but inter-group differences remain the main source of imbalance, contributing more than 65% in most years; (3) annual spatial autocorrelation is positive but relatively weak, whereas the pooled panel Moran's I is significantly positive, indicating persistent yet uneven spatial dependence; and (4) the spatial Durbin model with two-way fixed effects outperforms competing specifications. Economic development shows a significant negative direct and spillover effect, suggesting polarization under concentrated growth, while informatization significantly improves local coordination. Government intervention has no significant direct local effect but generates positive neighboring spillovers. Based on these findings, the study proposes a capability-oriented governance path centered on spatial differentiation, digital empowerment, cross-regional collaboration, and medium-cycle policy coordination. Keywords: urban digitalization; sustainable human capital; spatial inequality; spatial econometrics; policy path
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This study adopts the authoritative index released by the Digital China Research Institute of H3C Group, China Urban Digitalization Development Index, as the comprehensive index of urban digitalization. Based on data from official departments such as the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and the National Bureau of Statistics, combined with multi-source public information (e.g., local government work reports, industry white papers), this index strictly follows the national standard Evaluation Index for New-Type Smart Cities (GB/T 33356-2022) and constructs a five-dimensional evaluation framework of “digital infrastructure, digital economy, digital society, digital government, and digital ecology.” Notably, the digital ecology dimension serves as a crucial proxy for evaluating a city's capacity for environmental resilience and its ability to utilize data-driven tools for sustainable resource management.
Institutions
- University of Saint JosephMacau, Macao