Investigating the coordination between ecological and economic systems in China's green development process

A Place-Based Interdisciplinary Evaluation

Bibliographic Data

ID4240430
AuthorsKai-Di Liu, Kaidi Liu (0009-0009-8950-6342), Xi Xiong (0000-0002-2660-2435), Wenjing Xiang (0009-0003-3407-389X), Shuyao Wu (0000-0002-0057-5483), Dongsheng Shi (0000-0002-5701-9795), Wentao Zhang (0000-0001-6340-7551), Linbo Zhang (0000-0002-6771-5727)
Year2023
Volume28
Issue1
Publication date2023-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueConservation Ecology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1195-5449 • E-ISSN: 1708-3087
PublisherResilience Alliance (PUBLISHER • CA)
DOI10.5751/es-13724-280143
OpenAlexW4328025798
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited12

Harmonizing human activities with the natural environment has received much attention as a development goal and is a longstanding pursuit of human society. In this study, we investigated the sustainability of green development from the perspective of the coordination between economic and environmental subsystems at the place-based scale, with 290 cities in China as research objects. An interdisciplinary method combining an improved data envelopment analysis model and Lotka-Volterra model was conducted to examine the two subsystems’ development efficiency and their correlation (i.e., mutualism, commensalism, amensalism, sacrifice, competition, independence). The results indicate that one-third of the cities’ economic and environmental subsystems are in a mutualistic state, with a relatively stable social-ecological system. However, the two subsystems are in a state of competition in one-fourth of the cities, with rather intense vulnerability, where the harmonious coexistence of humans and nature is facing more significant challenges. In addition, vulnerability of the social-ecological system in economically developed cities shows substantial polarization. The two subsystems in most of these cities are in mutualism or amensalism relations, whereas the social-ecological system in economically underdeveloped cities shows even greater vulnerability

China · Economic system · Economics · Environmental resource management · Geography · Sustainability · Computer Science · Energy, Environment, Economic Growth · Land Use and Ecosystem Services · Sustainability and Ecological Systems Analysis · Ecology

Tools

Open DOIOpen Access