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Digitally Driven Urban Governance: Framework and Evaluation in China

Author

Listed:
  • Wei Li

    (School of Management, Fudan University, Shanghai 200437, China
    School of Economics and Management, Jining University, Jining 272100, China)

  • Jun Zhang

    (Graduate School of Education, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China)

  • Xiaojie Guo

    (College of Foreign Languages, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei 230002, China)

  • Yang Zhou

    (School of Economics and Management, Jining University, Jining 272100, China)

  • Fan Yang

    (College of Foreign Languages, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei 230002, China)

  • Ruilin Li

    (Graduate School of Education, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China)

Abstract

With the rapid development of digital technology, the role of digitalisation in urban governance continues to emerge. Building a theoretical analysis framework and evaluation system of digitally driven urban governance has important theoretical and practical significance for stimulating the efficiency of digital technology tools and improving the energy level of urban digital governance. This paper aims to explore the mechanism of urban governance enabled by digital technology, innovatively change the previous thinking mode that only attaches importance to facility construction and e-government platforms, adopt ecological thinking, and comprehensively consider the role of “soft elements” such as strategic support, industrial support, the security environment, talent support, and the market environment. Then, the extreme value variance method and the coefficient of variation method are used to calculate the overall capacity and secondary index scores of each city, and the standard deviation of secondary index scores is used to represent the sub-environmental balance of the cross-sectional data of China’s provinces. In order to further explore which indicators restrict the improvement of China’s urban digital governance capacity, this study also constructs an obstacle degree model. The results show the following: (1) The overall capability of China’s digitally driven urban governance is low, with a total score of 27.25, indicating that China’s digitally driven urban governance is in its infancy. (2) There is a significant development imbalance among Chinese provinces, with Beijing ranking first with a score of 81.16, and Tibet, Qinghai, Xinjiang, Heilongjiang, and Ningxia scoring less than 13.30 points, ranking as the bottom 5 among the 31 provinces. (3) The shortcomings of talent support, industrial support, and the security environment restrict the improvement of the entire digital ecological governance ability.

Suggested Citation

  • Wei Li & Jun Zhang & Xiaojie Guo & Yang Zhou & Fan Yang & Ruilin Li, 2024. "Digitally Driven Urban Governance: Framework and Evaluation in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(22), pages 1-22, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:22:p:9673-:d:1515321
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    3. Ioannis Zervas & Emmanouil Stiakakis, 2024. "Economic Sustainable Development through Digital Skills Acquisition: The Role of Human Resource Leadership," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(17), pages 1-25, September.
    4. Roberto Pasqualino & Melissa Demartini & Faezeh Bagheri, 2021. "Digital Transformation and Sustainable Oriented Innovation: A System Transition Model for Socio-Economic Scenario Analysis," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-34, October.
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