Characteristics And Formation Of Public Space Of Specialized Villages

The construction of rural public space, which is an important content of new socialist countrysideconstruction and new rural community construction in china, acts as a key section of rural geography study.The present research on public space paid less attention to public space in rural areas. The researchesfocused on rural public space mostly see it as a homogeneous unity of the whole or just study a specificpublic space independently. This paper focused on specialized villages, which is a unique rural economicdevelopment entity, then selected Chungang village, Nanzhuang village and Wanggongzhuang village,Henan Province as the research object. On the basis of the field survey data in October18-19andNovember13-18,2012, taking ArcGIS9.3and SPSS17.0as the main instruments, the paper analyzed thecharacteristics of public space of specialized villages. The paper attempted to adopt the theories ofgeography, sociology and behavior science to establish an analysis framework about the factors andmechanism on formation of public space of specialized villages.Through the above analysis, the paper draws the following conclusions:(1) The constitution of public space of specialized villages was diversified; especially theeconomic public space was becoming more and more prominent. The complexity of households’ behaviorled to the vagueness of public space. The distribution of public space was unbalanced, which may take onthe characteristic of partial concentration and extended along the main street. The scale of public space wasnot large, and there were certain differences between specialized villages and the types of public space.(2) Without considering the impact of the special historical and cultural customs, the public spaceof specialized villages was larger and richer. Stores, companies and squares were the basic public space forhouseholds’ public activities. Owning to the rise of economic level, the public cultural service space andgreen space develops rapidly. In addition, the implementation of construction of specialized villages’sustainable development contributes to the expansion and improvement of public space.(3) The public space of specialized villages was influenced by a range of factors, including:macroscopic factors, microscopic factors and the exclusive factors of specialized villages. The expansion ofpopulation scale contributes to the increase of the number of public space and the improvement of itsfunction in the moderate range. The density of public space was significantly negative correlated to per capita net income of households. This may be commonly associated with the concept that the constructionof public space should depend on government’s planning and investment.(4) The formation of public space was in the process of households’ public life, and the mainforce was the needs of public exchange and public activities among households. The common interest, thedemand for communication among families and public service were considered as the general dynamicmechanism on formation of public space of specialized village. In addition, the intervention ofadministrative strength also played an important role in the formation of public space.(5) The households’ behavior of participated in public space was centralized, geospatialdiscontinuities, and was affected by many factors. The age of the respondents was a positive factor. It wasfound that the desire and tendency to participate in public space raised as the age increased. In terms ofgender, men were more likely to participate in the economic and political public space than women. But thehouseholds with high income from the leading industry of village were less likely to participate in thepublic space.