Perceived Benefits, Technological Affordances, and Community Identity: An Integrated Model for Resident Participation in Sustainable Community Governance

Against the backdrop of intertwined individualization, urbanization, and digitalization, the demographic heterogeneity within urban communities continues to increase. How to foster resident participation has become a crucial issue for achieving sustainable urban development. Using empirical data from the city of Harbin and employing stepwise multiple regression analysis, this study examines the mechanisms through which perceived benefits, technological empowerment, and community identity influence resident participation. The findings indicate the following: First, perceived benefits and technological empowerment not only directly promote resident participation but also exert a significant indirect influence by enhancing community identity. Second, there exists an asymmetric interaction effect between perceived benefits and technological empowerment, where community identity is shown to be synergistically promoted, but residents’ participation is directly inhibited. This reveals the dual role of digital technology in community settings, simultaneously strengthening emotional bonds and substituting for physical involvement. Third, community identity acts as a pivotal mediating mechanism in the interaction between instrumental and value-based rationality. In essence, resident participation is shaped by the ongoing, technology-mediated interplay and negotiation between these two rationalities. Building on this, the study proposes a dual cycle model of digital participation to integrate these nonlinear relationships. It emphasizes that community participation is not a linear causal process but a dynamically evolving system shaped by the mutual construction of social psychology and technological context. The conclusions provide a theoretical framework that is both explanatory and practical for community governance in the digital era.