An Empirical Study On The Impact Of Rural E-commerce Development On Rural Governance Effectiveness In Western China

Improving the effectiveness of rural governance is an important goal of China’s rural development in the14 th Five-Year Plan period and a major task of the "three rural areas" in the context of rural revitalization strategy.In 2014,the Ministry of Commerce launched the first comprehensive demonstration of e-commerce in rural areas,which aims to take advantage of e-commerce to solve the problems of In 2015,"e-commerce poverty alleviation" was listed as one of the "Ten Projects for Precise Poverty Alleviation In 2020,our government announced that the countryside was completely free from the constraints of absolute poverty,and in 2022,the development of rural e-commerce entered the stage of "digital business for rural development".As an emerging digital economy in rural areas,rural e-commerce plays an active role in promoting rural revitalization and rural governance in China.Based on transaction cost theory,e-commerce market theory and collaborative governance theory,this paper uses literature analysis,empirical analysis and a combination of qualitative and quantitative analysis to study the specific effects of rural e-commerce development on rural governance effectiveness in the western region of China.Specifically,we analyze the direct and indirect paths of the impact of rural ecommerce development on rural governance effectiveness at the theoretical level,put forward relevant theoretical research hypotheses,and further analyze the current situation of rural e-commerce development and rural governance in western China and the impediments to the improvement of governance effectiveness.For the development of rural e-commerce,the study concludes that the comprehensive demonstration of ecommerce into rural areas in the western region is effective,and the environment for rural e-commerce development continues to improve,but there is still a large regional imbalance in the development of rural ecommerce;for rural governance effectiveness,the study concludes that rural anti-poverty governance in the western region is effective,the effectiveness of rural democracy and rule of law continues to improve,and the digitalization of rural governance gradually increases,but the main However,the lack of motivation for participation,insufficient effective coordination and single means of governance are still hindering factors for the improvement of governance effectiveness.Again,by constructing a comprehensive evaluation index system of rural e-commerce and rural governance effectiveness,we use the entropy method to measure the level of rural e-commerce development and rural governance effectiveness index in western China from 2015 to 2021,construct a mediating effect model based on the data samples of western China from 2015 to 2021,and use the stepwise regression method to empirically test the direct and indirect paths of the impact of rural e-commerce development on rural governance effectiveness.The direct and indirect paths of rural ecommerce development on rural governance effectiveness are examined.Finally,the Sobel test and Bootstrap self-sampling method in the multiplicative coefficient method and replacement of explanatory variables are used to conduct robustness tests.The results show that the development of rural e-commerce can directly improve the efficiency of rural governance.The intermediary effect test shows that the efficiency of rural resource allocation,digital inclusive finance and rural industrial agglomeration play a partial intermediary role between rural ecommerce and the improvement of rural governance efficiency.That is,rural e-commerce can improve the efficiency of rural resource allocation,force digital inclusive finance to effectively serve rural areas and promote rural industrial agglomeration.These three different indirect paths are positively improving rural governance efficiency.In addition,government involvement,rural human capital,and rural affluence are the main positive influences on the improvement of rural governance effectiveness,while urbanization and rural relative poverty rate have a negative impact on the improvement of governance effectiveness.Based on the above findings,the article proposes policy recommendations that can help improve rural e-commerce development and governance effectiveness in the western region of China: first,to promote the regional synergistic development of rural e-commerce,and to enhance rural governance effectiveness by driving rural subjects’ participation dynamics,enhancing effective synergy and innovating governance means with rural e-commerce development;second,to give full play to the resource allocation effect of rural e-commerce development to improve governance effectiveness;third,to give full play to the industrial agglomeration effect of rural e-commerce development to enhance governance effectiveness.