Restructuring rural settlements based on subjective well-being (SWB): A case study in Hubei province, central China
Introduction
China’s continuous urbanization and industrialization bring unprecedented changes to rural areas, like changes in agricultural production, land-use types, demographic composition, community organizations, and industrial structure (Korten, 1980, Long et al., 2007, Long et al., 2009, Siciliano, 2012). Rural restructuring is therefore resulted from the responses local government and rural residents make facing with rural transformation developments, which can be identified as spatial restructuring, economic restructuring, and social restructuring (Long and Liu., 2016).
A rural settlement is a type of rural locality where rural residents live and engage in producing (Yang et al., 2015). Rural settlements face changes as well as challenges along with the rapid and radical rural development. Huang et al. (2011) pointed out that rural settlement expansion is one of the most important symbolization of China’s rural development, however occupation of cultivated land and expansion at small-scale sparsely are its main characteristics. The conflict between rural population loss caused by rural-urban migration and rural settlement maintenance caused by the limitation of urban household registration policy (Hukou policy) contributes to the scatter and chaos of rural settlement distribution (Long and Liu, 2016), which brings about some problems like encroachment on cropland, shortage of public facilities, and rural hollowing (Brown et al., 2005; Long, Tu, Ge, Li, & Liu, 2016; Tian et al., 2012). Long and Liu (2016) pointed out that these problems hinder the implementation of new-type urbanization and agricultural modernization in China. To deal with these problems, rural spatial restructuring is necessary to optimize, adjust and even change the process of production, living and ecological spaces. As part of rural spatial area, rural settlement is included in rural spatial restructuring.
The essence of rural settlement restructuring is to restructure its spatial carrier, namely land. Two main stages of it are then identified as figuring the rural settlements which are in need to relocate and deciding the directions to which they are going to be relocated. Disperse rural settlement land can be consolidated into necessary land according to local development goals, while the place where people plan to relocate their houses should balance the relationship between rural settlements and other land-use types. In the perspective of readjusting and rearranging land-use structure, rural settlement restructuring is part of land consolidation (Li et al., 2014, Long, 2014). However, land consolidation in China is usually decided by regional development plans and macro-economic strategies. Land consolidation of rural China before 2000 was simple, and was conducted by local government themselves since there were no detailed guiding rules. It mainly comprised reclamation of farmland, improvement of drainage systems, and readjustment of land tenure, with purpose of raising farmland productivity (Huang et al., 2011). In 2001, The Ministry of Land and Resources of China launched the 1st Ten-Year (2001–2010) national – level land consolidation program, requiring land consolidation, reclamation and exploitation of unused, waste and damaged land, with focus of “maintain the dynamic balance of cultivated land. Compliment the quantity and improve the quality of cultivated land”.
During the process of rapid rural development, the importance of restructuring rural settlements is gradually recognized. An innovative land-management policy “increasing vs. decreasing balance” land-use policy (Zengjian Guagou) was proposed to control the overall construction land area at national and state levels in 2005, which aimed to control the sum of construction land of urban and rural areas. Any increase of urban construction land should be in consistent with equal decrease of rural settlement land (Long et al., 2012). This policy indicates the necessity of restructuring rural settlements to optimize utilization of rural land use and release latent land-use potential. “New type urbanization” was proposed in 2006 to accentuate “protect cultivated land, improve public infrastructure, and manage rural settlements”.
In order to ensure food security, in 2009, a national plan on overall farmland-use passed by the State Council of China, claiming the goal of maintaining the total farmland area no less than 120 million ha by the time of 2020.1 However, the fast urbanization and disorder expansion of rural settlements bring threat to the protection of cultivated land. Besides, problems like low land-use efficiency, poor living conditions and rural hollowing also trigger concerns. More attention has been paid to rural settlement restructuring. Both national – level land consolidation planning of China of period from 2011 to 2015 proposed in 2010 and that of period from 2016 to 2020 proposed in 2016 emphasized the importance of optimizing rural settlement distribution to implement the economical and intensive land use. Additionally, the latter planning proposed “raise the livability of villages”,2 which indicates the importance of improving living condition and convenience of rural residents.
Most related policies about rural settlement restructuring in China are embedded in regional strategies at macro-level, and are described abstractly. Current literature on rural settlement restructuring is mainly about to find appropriate restructuring methods for implementation at micro-level. Three methods have been identified. (1) Comprehensive evaluation, involves building comprehensive indices to score villages and towns; the scores are then used to identify the ideal relocation area (Qingjun et al., 2010, Zhang and Zhu, 2012, Zhu et al., 2010). (2) Accessibility evaluation, involves calculating the accessibility of certain services or facilities to rural settlements and identifying settlements with poor access for relocation (Linard et al., 2012, Rushton, 1984). (3) Model simulation, involves simulating the spatial distribution of rural settlements through different models, such as Voronoi diagrams, cellular automatons, and genetic algorithms (Deadman et al., 1993, Mu, 2004, Neto et al., 2011). These methods are generally based on objective evaluation. The subjective feelings of rural residents and their willingness to participate in rural settlement restructuring are usually ignored.
Rural settlement offers space for people to live and produce, and supplies basic needs in several ways (Cloke, 2013). Any change in rural settlements will affect the subjective well-being (SWB) of individuals. Based on Cernea (1985) recommendation, rural development should consider individual preference and the willingness to participate. The National New Urbanization Planning (2014-2020) emphasized focus on urbanization in China to raise the quality of life (QoL) of rural residents and thereby increase their SWB. SWB should be considered in the process of restructuring rural settlements.
SWB, which is one of the most important measurements of QoL, is proved to have implications on urban planning and community policy (Wang and Wang, 2016b). The majority of existing studies focus on the measurements, spatial pattern and determinants of SWB (Bieling et al., 2014, Dolan et al., 2008, Howell and Howell, 2008, Knight et al., 2009), and are mainly studied at macro-scales, including regional, national and city scales (Fischer and Van de Vliert, 2011, Knight and Gunatilaka, 2010, Wang and Wang, 2016a). Micro-scale studies are mainly about the effects of neighborhood on SWB in cities (Ludwig et al., 2012, Sugiyama and Thompson, 2007). Discussions on SWB in the context of rural areas are limited. A number of studies consider people’s willingness in rural settlement consolidation and relocation; however, most of these studies are about its effecting factors, influence, and effects of individual engagement in land use, planning, and policy (Walker and Ryan, 2008, Wang et al., 2012, Willock et al., 1999). The relationship of SWB with the spatial location of rural settlement and its application in rural settlement restructuring and planning have not been sufficiently discussed.
Current settlement restructuring researches in rural China show preference for objective evaluation and simulation and ignore SWB. Objective well-being (OWB) is another important component of well-being and is usually decided by the level of socio-economic development of communities or environments. The relationship between SWB and OWB is complicated. They are relevant, and sometimes overlapped (Gasper, 2010). The relationship between SWB and OWB in the rural context remains unclear. There are numbers of questions to be raised: Whether the location of rural settlements affects the SWB of rural residents? If it does, how are they related? Do people living in developed villages (with higher OWB) feel happier than people living in poor villages (with lower OWB)? Does access to facilities and services matter? If accessibility to facilities affect SWB, is individual satisfaction with daily activities related to SWB? Can SWB be considered in the process of rural settlement restructuring? This study fills the gap by exploring the relationship between SWB and the location of rural settlements to identify a restructuring model for rural settlements that considers SWB. The end goal is to craft a restructuring process that involves improvement of land-use efficiency, willingness to participate and well-being.
Based on the discussion, we developed the following two hypotheses.
(1) SWB is positively correlated with accessibility to villages with high OWB.
Accessibility to certain facilities and services affect SWB (Arifwidodo and Perera, 2011, MacKerron and Mourato, 2009). Paucity of data increases difficulty in identifying detailed facilities and services in rural areas. However, we can estimate the OWB of every village based on statistical socio-economic data of villages. Villages with high OWB are usually equipped with improved facilities and abilities to serve. We believe SWB of every settlement is more related with its accessibility to well-developed villages than with the development level of the village where it is located in. We address the difficulty of identifying rural settlements that need to be relocated by hypothesis.
(2) Individual satisfaction level of daily activities is positively correlated with SWB.
If a positive relationship exists between SWB and spatial accessibility, a positive relationship should exist between SWB and individual satisfaction of daily activities at individual level.
This study analyzed the factors that affect SWB at two scales. At a village scale, we evaluated the OWB of every village based on socio-economic indices. We also calculated the ideal service radii of villages based on spatial accessibility. We used crosstabs analysis to explore the relationship between SWB and accessibility and between SWB and OWB and tested our first hypothesis. At an individual scale, we used ordinary least squares regression model to explore the relationship between SWB and individual characteristics, including personal satisfaction of daily activities, therefore our second hypothesis was tested. Based on the results, we developed a rural settlement restructuring model that considers SWB. This model can recognize rural settlements which are in need to relocate and decide the optimal direction of restructuring. The paper is organized as follows. First we outline our main methodologies. Second, we introduce the study area and data source. Third, we present the measurements and correlates of SWB, as well as a novel rural settlement restructuring model based on SWB. Fourth, we discuss our findings and their impacts and implications.
Section snippets
Methodology
We used self-reporting to estimate the SWB of individuals (Brereton et al., 2011, Gilbert et al., 2016). SWB and OWB are important components of QoL (Gasper, 2010, Veenhoven, 2013). SWB encompasses people’s subjective feelings about their life, whereas OWB represents the objective conditions of their environment. QoL is related to the extent to which human needs are met (Costanza et al., 2007). Woods (2012) explained that rural communities offer services to rural people, such as hospitals,
Correlates of SWB
We estimated the OWB values of 53 villages in Liji using PCA method based on the comprehensive evaluation of OWB. We used the natural break method to classify the villages into four categories: key (0.636–1.000), sub-key (0.396–0.635), general (0.195–0.395), and marginal villages (0.000–0.194). Liji, which is the administrative village, is the only key village in the district. Paotongdian, Songji, Wuxianmiao, and Shanggusi are sub-key villages. The majority of villages (31) are “general”
Discussion
Top-down approaches to land management and planning were popular in the 20th century in areas like Russia, Eastern Europe, Latin America, Africa, China, and other parts of Asia, with focus on land redistribution from large landowners to landless people (Sikor and Müller, 2009). The purposes of land reform and land consolidation at that time can be identified as land property reallocation, rural poverty alleviation, and local government authority consolidation. Top-down strategies were hence
Conclusion
This study described the village system based on a comprehensive OWB evaluation. 53 villages of the study area were classified into four types. One village was established as the key village, and four villages were classified as sub-key villages. Most of the villages (31) were general type, and 17 were marginal villages. Marginal villages are less developed than others, and usually are located at marginal positions where they have limited influence. However, not all rural settlements located in
Acknowledgement
This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41371429).
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