Typology and differentiated development paths of rural revitalization in Hebei counties from an urban rural system perspective

Facing the strategic requirement of promoting rural revitalization in a region-based and categorized manner under the 15th Five-Year Plan, and considering the complex natural conditions and remarkable regional disparities in Hebei Province, exploring differentiated pathways for rural revitalization is of great practical significance. Taking 164 county-level administrative units in Hebei Province as the research objects, this study starts from the perspective of urban-rural system integration. Drawing inspiration from the modernization requirements and regional coordination concepts emphasized in the Plan, this study develops a four-dimensional matrix of “physical geography—economic level—social function—leading industry”. A classification framework is constructed with ArcGIS and the entropy weight method, exploratory type classification is conducted via Ward’s hierarchical clustering method, and differentiated reference development pathways aligned with the 15th Five-Year Plan are proposed in light of the classification results. The results show that all county-level units in Hebei Province are divided into two major categories, urban-type and county-type, which are further subdivided respectively. All types present marked differentiation in development conditions and functional characteristics, and exhibit a certain degree of correspondence with Hebei’s development pattern of “stronger performance in eastern and central Hebei, weaker in northern and western Hebei”. It should be clarified that this classification is an exploratory analytical result under specific methodological settings. Category membership is dependent on the choice of methods, and there are systematic differences in unit assignments across different distance metrics and clustering algorithms. Therefore, the classification scheme in this study should be interpreted as an analytically useful typological reference, rather than a definitive judgment on the affiliation of each county-level unit. Rural revitalization development ideas for different feature combinations are proposed based on the above findings, so as to provide methodological references and decision-making insights for the orderly, categorized and region-based implementation of the rural revitalization strategy.