Urban Governance Research Based on Conjugate Contradiction Analysis: Taking Zibo as an Example

From the perspectives of conjugate resources and their transformations, this paper proposes conjugate contradiction analysis method, and discusses the urban governance model and governance pathway of the popularity of "Zibo barbecue". The research suggests that there are two main contradictions in Zibo's urban governance. One is the contradiction between emotional governance and rigid governance, among which emotional governance involves mainly the allocation, optimization, and utilization of soft resources and non-material resources in the city. And the other is the contradiction between a proactive government and an effective market, involving mainly the allocation, optimization, and utilization of material and hard resources in the city. The study reveals that the "synergistic governance between an effective market and a proactive government with emotional governance as a core feature" is the main approach for Zibo to solve the above contradictions. Four governance pathways including "tempering hardness with emotion and coupling hardness with softness", "promising government and effective market", "online marketing, offline realization" and "endogenous drive, exogenous promotion" are refined. The research shows that the allocation, optimization, and utilization of governance resources in the urban governance process can be understood more comprehensively, and the essence and laws of urban governance can be revealed more profoundly with conjugate contradiction analysis method, which includes structure in terms of (soft part and hard part) systematicity, composition in terms of (real part and virtual part) solidity and function, value in terms of (negative part and positive part) oppositeness, and dynamics in terms of (latent part and apparent part) changeability. The research results provide useful references and insights for urban governance and high-quality development practices.