数字治理与城市经济韧性

Digital Governance and Urban Economic Resilience

公共治理能力是缓解外部冲击的重要保障,数字政府建设为实现政府职能转变和城市治理能力现代化提供了新的契机。本文基于2013-2022年中国政府采购合同数据和地级市面板数据,从政府数字治理角度切入,探究数字治理对城市经济韧性的影响和作用机制。结果表明:数字治理对城市经济韧性表现为显著的促进作用,通过一系列稳健性检验后依然成立。机制分析表明,在数字政府建设过程中,数字治理能够通过降低交易成本、维护有序竞争和鼓励市场创新有效缓解市场失灵,对城市经济韧性产生积极影响。异质性分析发现,在基础实力薄弱、制度环境较差的城市,数字治理对经济韧性的促进作用更大。另外,数字治理的韧性提升效应因经济韧性基础而异,呈现U型特征。本研究为政府治理能力在数字时代更好地发挥经济稳定器作用提供了理论依据和经验证据。

Public governance capacity has become a crucial factor in mitigating the impact of external shocks.With the extensive application and ongoing evolution of information technology,government digitization has emerged as a pivotal factor in facilitating the transformation of governmental functions and the modernization of urban governance capabilities.External risks to the stable economic operation of China have increased due to factors such as Sino-US trade frictions,the COVID-19 pandemic,and geopolitical conflicts.The construction of a digital government improves government governance capacity,which has the potential to make urban governance more synergistic,smoothly organized,and efficient,thereby providing strong support for the urban economic system to cope with external shocks.This paper examines the effects and mechanisms of digital governance on urban economic resilience from the perspective of digital governance based on Chinese government procurement contract data and city panel data from 2013 to 2022.Furthermore,this paper explores the varying effects of digital governance on economic resilience in terms of foundational city characteristics,the quality of institutional environments,and economic resilience.This paper finds that the increase in digital governance significantly improves urban economic resilience,reflecting the superiority of the socialist market economy system that combines“active government”and“effective market”.The enhancement of digital governance capacity is conducive to high service efficiency,intervention precision,and regulatory effectiveness,maintaining the fairness and adequacy of market competition and creating favorable external conditions for the optimization,reconstruction,and deep integration of resources during the period of shocks,thereby enhancing the stability and adaptability of the economic system.The conclusion still holds when conducting a series of robustness tests,such as considering endogeneity problems,replacing the core variables,and adding high-dimensional fixed effects.Considering the regulatory and productive attributes of data elements,this paper explores the mechanisms at the transactional,regulatory,and production levels,identifying the reduction of transaction costs,the maintenance of competitive order,and the stimulation of market innovation as important mechanisms for digital governance to enhance urban economic resilience.Heterogeneity analysis shows that digital governance has heterogeneous impacts on urban economic resilience,as evidenced by a greater promotion in cities with weak foundations and relatively poor institutional environments.The facilitating effect of digital governance on urban resilience exhibits a U-shaped pattern,indicating that it narrows the resilience gap in less resilient cities while potentially exacerbating disparities in more resilient cities.The research conclusion provides a theoretical basis and empirical evidence for the governance capacity to play the role of economic stabilizer in the digital age.The findings of this paper have significant policy implications and practical insights.Firstly,it is essential to leverage the development of digital governance as a key strategy to continuously strengthen the government's digital governance capabilities,thereby further leveraging the driving effect of digital governance on urban economic resilience.Government departments should appropriately advance the procurement of digital products and services and accelerate the construction of government business information systems and technological innovation of government service platforms at the present stage.Secondly,in line with the trend of digitalization in the economy and society,it is necessary to promote the construction of government data open platforms to stimulate the important role of government data in market competition and innovative activities.On the one hand,the government can use data regulation to guide enterprises to devote more resources to innovative R&D rather than rent-seeking.On the other hand,it is important to pay attention to the expectation management of government information.Thirdly,integrating the current state and impact patterns of digital governance,we should promote the development of digital governance in various cities according to local conditions,enhancing the targeted nature of digital governance for urban economic resilience.The marginal contributions of this paper lie in three aspects.Firstly,unlike existing studies that explore the factors influencing economic resilience from the perspectives of industrial structure,innovation activities,and agglomeration levels,this paper reveals the impact of government digitalization from the perspective of digital governance.Secondly,this paper optimizes the measurement method for urban digital governance,providing a more reasonable indicator for subsequent research.Thirdly,this paper enriches the mechanisms through which digital governance influences urban economic resilience by examining the regulatory and productive attributes of data elements.