Tripartite evolutionary game and simulation analysis of cultivated land protection policies implementation in China

China has established the world’s most stringent cultivated land protection policies (CLPP) system. However, the key to policy is its implementation. This study constructs two tripartite evolutionary game models for CLPP implementation, and studies behavior strategy evolution with the help of numerical simulation technology. The results show the following: (1) The existence of principal-agent problems will lead to administrative phenomena such as obstruction, flexibility and collusion in CLPP implementation. (2) The evolution of the behavior strategy of the tripartite game depends on factors such as penalties on farmers, rent-seeking compensation given to farmers by local governments, cost of farmers’ safeguarding rights, cost of cultivated land protection, land finance and promotion opportunity, degree of stricter control, political punishment, and possibility of collusion being detected and punished. (3) The behavioral optimization mechanism of CLPP implementation can be used to propose more efficient governance schemes.