Dong Xuebing: Promoting Coordinated Regional Development Guided by Xi Jinping's Economic Thought
Promoting coordinated regional development is an inherent requirement of Chinese-path modernization. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, General Secretary Xi Jinping has grasped the new characteristic features of China’s current stage of development and the new laws governing the evolution of regional economies. Planning coordinated regional development from the strategic height of the overall cause of the Party and the state, he has proposed a series of new visions, ideas, and strategies. Many of these important expositions are included in the first volume of the Selected Economic Works of Xi Jinping. For instance, "Ideas and Measures for Promoting Coordinated Regional Development Under the New Situation" points out: "The shift of China's economy from a stage of high-speed growth to a stage of high-quality development has placed new requirements on coordinated regional development." Furthermore, "Accelerate the Construction of a New Development Paradigm and Strive to Promote High-Quality Development" notes: "We must deeply implement the strategy for coordinated regional development, major regional strategies, the functional zone strategy, and the new-type urbanization strategy; optimize the layout of major productive forces; and construct a regional economic layout and a system of territorial space characterized by complementary advantages and high-quality development." As an important component of Xi Jinping’s economic thought, the General Secretary’s important expositions on coordinated regional development contain rich original contributions. They not only provide a profound epistemological answer to the question of "how to view" the promotion of coordinated regional development but also offer a fundamental compliance and a guide to action for the praxeological question of "what to do." The "Suggestions" of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee proposed to "optimize the regional economic layout and promote coordinated regional development," and made strategic deployments to this end. To implement the Central Committee’s major decisions and deployments, we must take Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era—particularly Xi Jinping’s economic thought—as our guide to construct a regional economic layout and territorial space system of complementary advantages and high-quality development, thereby writing a new chapter in coordinated regional development.
Elevating the promotion of coordinated regional development to a strategic blueprint for governance
In "The Change in the Principal Contradiction in Our Society is a Change of Global Significance," General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "The change in the principal contradiction in Chinese society [1] is a historic shift affecting the overall situation, and it places many new requirements on the work of the Party and the state. On the basis of continuing to promote development, we must focus on resolving the problem of unbalanced and inadequate development." Since the New Era, along with this historic change in the principal contradiction, profound shifts have occurred in the spatial structure of China’s economic development, with central cities and city clusters becoming the primary spatial forms for carrying the factors of development. General Secretary Xi Jinping has accurately grasped the concentrated reflection of the change in the principal contradiction within the spatial dimension. He has creatively employed coordinated regional development as a key handle for resolving the problem of unbalanced and inadequate development. He has personally planned, deployed, and promoted the implementation of major strategies such as the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, the integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta, and the ecological protection and high-quality development of the Yellow River basin. He has pushed forward the independent customs operations of the entire island of the Hainan Free Trade Port and consistently advanced the implementation of strategies for the East to take the lead in development, the rise of the Central region, the large-scale development of the West, and the full revitalization of the Northeast, leading China’s coordinated regional development toward historic achievements.
Using the new development philosophy as a guide to solve the problem of development imbalance through coordinated regional development. The new development philosophy is the most important and primary content of Xi Jinping’s economic thought, and coordinated development is an essential part of the organic whole that constitutes this philosophy. As the concentrated expression of the concept of coordinated development within the dimension of territorial space, the effectiveness of regional coordination directly concerns whether the new development philosophy can truly take root and whether the quality of development can meet the required standards. It is intrinsically linked to and mutually supportive of the other four components of the philosophy [2]. Without effective coordination between regions, it would be difficult to achieve the optimized cross-regional allocation of innovation factors; green transformation would struggle to form cross-regional ecological barriers and collaborative governance; the foundation of the national unified large market [3] required for high-level opening up would be difficult to stabilize; and the fruits of development would not truly benefit all regions and all people. Therefore, advancing coordinated regional development is not only a direct manifestation of practicing the concept of coordinated development but also the spatial prerequisite and operational foundation for ensuring that development—where innovation is the primary driver, coordination is an endogenous feature, green is the prevailing form, openness is the only way, and sharing is the fundamental purpose—unfolds systematically and advances collaboratively across our vast territory. Guiding regional development with the new development philosophy signifies that our Party’s understanding of the laws of socialist modernization and the complexity of spatial governance has reached a new height.
Anchoring the strategic needs of the new development paradigm to optimize economic spatial layout and smooth the national economic circulation through coordinated regional development. To implement the new development philosophy in the new stage of development, we must necessarily construct a new development paradigm [4]. In "On Constructing the New Development Paradigm," General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "Each region must find its own position and comparative advantage within the domestic cycle and the domestic-international dual circulation, and organically link the construction of the new development paradigm with the implementation of major regional strategies, the strategy for coordinated regional development, the functional zone strategy, and the construction of pilot free trade zones." In "Accelerate the Construction of a New Development Paradigm to Grasp the Initiative for Future Development," he noted: "We must prevent various localities from engaging in their own 'small circulations' [5], dismantle regional barriers, and truly form a national unified large market." The key to constructing the new development paradigm lies in the unimpeded flow of economic circulation, which requires breaking through "chokepoints" in production, distribution, circulation, and consumption. Currently, regional barriers and market fragmentation are major obstructions. The "Suggestions" of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee proposed to eliminate local protectionism and market fragmentation, and to comprehensively rectify "involutional" competition [6]. Coordinated regional development can provide the organizational basis and operational guarantee for accelerating the construction of the new development paradigm. By promoting a higher level of regional coordination, eliminating invisible barriers in factor acquisition and qualification certification, and standardizing the economic promotion behaviors of local governments, we can effectively leverage the advantages of our domestic ultra-large-scale market and improve the overall efficiency, circulation effectiveness, and resilience of the national economic system. Placing coordinated regional development in a supporting role for the new development paradigm signifies a shift in its strategic function: from a previous focus on helping specific local regions integrate into economic cycles to a greater emphasis on serving the overall operation of the national economy and cultivating endogenous drivers for development. This is an important cornerstone for ensuring the steady and long-term progress of Chinese-path modernization.
Focusing on the theme of high-quality development to promote the transformation of development modes and cultivate new quality productive forces through coordinated regional development. Promoting high-quality development is the theme of economic and social development during the "15th Five-Year Plan" period (2026–2030), and coordinated regional development is its inherent requirement. The overall high-quality development of a country necessarily requires a universal improvement in the development level and quality of all its regions. Any "short boards" [7] in the development of any region—such as extensive development modes, lagging innovation capability, or fragile ecological environments—will restrict the improvement of the nation's overall development quality. At the same time, high-quality development is not a "one-size-fits-all" uniformity, but rather encourages different regions to adapt to local conditions and pursue distinctive developmental paths. For example, promoting the development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt with the guidance of "well-coordinated environmental protection, not large-scale development" is a powerful practice in exploring a modernization path of harmony between humanity and nature under the theme of high-quality development. Currently, we are taking the development of new quality productive forces as a key focus to promote high-quality development. By promoting coordinated regional development, optimizing the allocation of spatial resources, and guiding various localities to develop new quality productive forces according to their resource endowments and industrial foundations—while avoiding low-level repetitive construction—we can optimize the layout of major productive forces and promote efficient collaboration between regional innovation chains and industrial chains, thereby enhancing the nation's overall development quality, structural resilience, and sustainability. By closely revolving around the theme of high-quality development and cultivating new drivers and advantages in economic development through regional coordination, we will push regional development into a new stage that emphasizes intensive, qualitative improvement.
Closely following the value objective of common prosperity to promote the sharing of development fruits and move steadily toward common prosperity for all. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "Common prosperity for all is an essential feature of Chinese-path modernization, and coordinated regional development is an inevitable requirement for achieving common prosperity." Implementing the new development philosophy, constructing the new development paradigm, and promoting high-quality development must ultimately center on achieving common prosperity for all people. To achieve common prosperity, we must place equal emphasis on "making the cake bigger" and "dividing the cake well." On one hand, we must support economically strong provinces in "carrying the heavy beam" [8], taking the lead and serving as examples in advancing Chinese-path modernization and functioning as the power sources for high-quality development. On the other hand, we must increase differentiated policy support for old revolutionary base areas, ethnic minority areas, and border regions. It should be recognized that promoting coordinated regional development is not simply about promoting a mechanical balance of economic growth between regions, but rather about constructing a fairer and more reasonable regional development order. By promoting the optimized allocation of production factors, advancing the equalization of basic public services, improving mechanisms for inter-regional benefit compensation and assistance, and strengthening the construction of inclusive and basic livelihood projects that provide a "safety net," we lay a solid foundation for different regions and different groups to move gradually toward common prosperity. Establishing coordinated regional development as an inevitable requirement for common prosperity is an innovative practical exploration of Marxist thought on the gradual elimination of regional differences. It profoundly reflects the people-centered philosophy of development and centrally demonstrates our Party’s firm determination to promote social fairness and justice and to lead all people in creating a better life.
Profoundly revealing the inherent laws of coordinated regional development
During the "14th Five-Year Plan" period (2021–2025), under the guidance of Xi Jinping’s economic thought, major regional strategies and the strategy for coordinated regional development have been pushed forward in depth. The three major economic engines—Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and the Yangtze River Delta—have continued to exert their power; the balance among the four major plates [9] has steadily increased; and the level of marine economic development has significantly improved. Looking at the data, from 2020 to 2024, the ratio of per capita GDP between the East and the West decreased from 1.68:1 to 1.65:1. Looking at the trends, the proportion of the total economic output of the Central and Western regions has remained stable at over 40% of the national total in recent years, with economic growth rates faster than the national average. With the in-depth promotion of the high-quality joint construction of the "Belt and Road," the Central and Western regions—especially the West—are moving from being the "tail end" of opening up to the forefront, demonstrating strong vitality in their opening to the outside world. Each region is finding its proper positioning and playing to its strengths, with East-West mutual assistance, North-South synergy, and land-sea coordination injecting surging momentum into Chinese-path modernization.
An important reason why China’s coordinated regional development has been able to achieve historic success lies in our firm grasp of the inherent laws of regional coordination. In "Deeply Understanding the New Development Philosophy and Promoting Supply-Side Structural Reform," General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "Coordination is the unity of balance and imbalance in development; moving from balance to imbalance and then to a new balance is the basic law of the development of things." In "Ideas and Measures for Promoting Coordinated Regional Development Under the New Situation," he noted: "Imbalance is universal; we must promote relative balance within development. This is the dialectics of coordinated regional development." General Secretary Xi Jinping adheres to and applies Marxist stances, viewpoints, and methods, focusing on the prominent contradictions in regional development in the New Era. He has systematically explained and scientifically coordinated a series of important relationships affecting the overall situation of coordinated regional development—such as human and nature, efficiency and equity, the whole and the part, and leveraging strengths while compensating for weaknesses—profoundly revealing the inherent laws of regional coordination.
Scientifically coordinating the relationship between humanity and nature defines the practical principles of economic development and ecological protection. In "How to View the New Normal and What to Do Under the New Normal," General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "We must promote the balance between economy and population among regions and narrow the gap in per capita GDP, but we must also promote the compatibility between regional population/economy and the carrying capacity of resources and the environment, narrowing the gap between the population/economy and the resources/environment." Traditionally, measuring whether development between regions is coordinated and balanced often focused on economic aggregates or per capita economic indicators. However, it should be seen that a region is not an isolated economic unit but a community of life in which humans, economic activities, and the natural environment interact and depend on each other. General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important expositions elevate coordinated regional development from a single economic dimension to the height of harmony between humanity and nature. This transcends previous "anthropocentrism" or one-sided developmental views that "emphasized development while neglecting protection." It emphasizes firmly establishing and practicing the concept that "lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets," [10] taking the carrying capacity of resources and the environment as a prerequisite and foundation. At the same time, it adheres to land-sea coordination, treating the ocean as a strategic area for high-quality development. Integrating the concept of ecological civilization into coordinated regional development requires constructing a spatial layout of efficient production space, livable living space, and beautiful ecological space based on the functional zone strategy. It also requires expanding the blue economic space, strengthening the comprehensive management of coastal zones and marine ecological protection, and promoting the smooth flow of land and sea resource factors, thereby constructing a new regional development pattern of land-sea coordination and human-sea harmony.
Correctly handling the relationship between efficiency and equity, and emphasizing the promotion of relative balance within dynamic development. How to dialectically view and correctly handle the contradiction between efficiency and equity arising from unbalanced regional development is a key issue in promoting regional coordinated development. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out in Deeply Understanding the New Development Philosophy and Promoting Supply-Side Structural Reform: "Emphasizing coordinated development is not about pursuing egalitarianism [11], but rather about placing greater emphasis on equity in development opportunities and balance in resource allocation." This provides scientific guidance for addressing regional development gaps under the conditions of a socialist market economy. It requires viewing regional development gaps through a dynamic, developmental, and interconnected lens—correctly handling the relationship between efficiency and equity on the basis of respecting objective laws, and promoting relative balance through the process of development. On one hand, we must acknowledge and utilize the developmental momentum inherent in "imbalance," supporting major economic provinces in "playing the leading role" [12], and allowing and encouraging regions with the necessary conditions to leverage their comparative advantages to take the lead in development, thereby forming growth poles and power sources that radiate and drive high-quality development across the entire country. On the other hand, through national macro-control and institutional arrangements—such as fiscal transfer payments, paired assistance [13], and the equalization of basic public services—we must proactively regulate "imbalance." This ensures the protection of basic livelihoods and development opportunities in underdeveloped areas, moving solidly and steadily toward common prosperity amidst high-quality development. This dialectical thinking and policy orientation, which both confronts gaps to stimulate vitality and proactively regulates to promote equity, represents a profound answer and theoretical sublimation of the major task of handling efficiency and equity under socialist market economy conditions.
Correctly handling the relationship between the whole and the parts, and establishing the concept of "the whole country as a single chessboard" [14]. General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly emphasized adhering to the principle of the whole country as a single chessboard, requiring the proper handling of relations between the local and the global, the present and the long-term, and the key and the non-key. The "Proposals" of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee [15] put forward "promoting regional linked development," further deepening the understanding of adhering to the whole country as a single chessboard and expanding the strategic depth of China's economic development. Adhering to the whole country as a single chessboard requires both full respect for the objective differences in regional development and the creativity of local practice in top-level design and strategic implementation, as well as requiring each region to consider and position its own development within the overall context of national development. In practice, we must construct a multi-level, three-dimensional new pattern of regional linkage, leveraging the foundational supporting role of cross-regional and cross-basin major corridor construction to strengthen infrastructure interconnectivity between different regions and bridge the spatiotemporal distance between them. We must leverage the role of key city clusters as carriers, promoting the deep integration of industrial and innovation chains in key clusters such as Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the Yangtze River Delta, and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. We should support cross-regional connective areas located at strategic intersections to break through administrative barriers, play a role as hub nodes, and explore new models such as the "enclave economy" [16]. By correctly handling the relationship between the whole and the parts and strengthening regional linkage, we can make the "whole country as a single chessboard" dynamic and effective.
Grasping the methodology of "leveraging strengths and compensating for weaknesses" [17], and promoting the collaborative progress of advantaged and disadvantaged regions. China's regional resource endowments vary thousands of times over, development foundations are inconsistent, and functional positionings have different emphases; the coexistence of advantageous "long boards" and deficient "short boards" is a fundamental national condition. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "Each region should combine its actual conditions, suit measures to local conditions, leverage its strengths and compensate for its weaknesses, and find a path of high-quality development suited to its own reality." "Leveraging strengths" means giving full play to the comparative advantages of each region, promoting the rational flow and efficient aggregation of various factors, and allowing regions with good resource endowments, strong innovation capabilities, and superior locations to lead the way in making breakthroughs and becoming stronger, thereby accelerating the creation of growth poles and power sources for high-quality development. "Compensating for weaknesses" means clearly identifying and striving to overcome weak links in development, continuing to increase support for special types of regions such as old revolutionary base areas, ethnic minority areas, border areas, and ecologically fragile areas. In particular, we must solidly promote the construction of border towns, treating them as key "short boards" concerning national security and people's well-being that must be completed and strengthened. We must persist in combining the goals of prospering the border and enriching the people with stabilizing the border and consolidating the defense, promoting social equity, justice, and national security. Promoting regional coordinated development requires abandoning "one-size-fits-all" [18] approaches, implementing differentiated and precise regional policies, and encouraging each region to find a path of high-quality development that suits its local reality.
Guiding the Practice of Regional Coordinated Development Toward Steady and Long-term Success with Xi Jinping Economic Thought
Realizing regional coordinated development is a long-term historical process and a complex systemic project. While recognizing the historical achievements made in China's regional coordinated development since the New Era began, we must also clearly realize that the problem of unbalanced and inadequate regional development still exists, and promoting regional coordinated development still faces many difficulties and challenges. For example, because the natural resource endowments and economic development foundations of different regions vary greatly, economic development cannot proceed in "lockstep"; because different regions undertake different functional positionings in the overall national development, economic indicators cannot be used as the sole standard; and so on. The "Decision" of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee made important deployments for "improving the mechanisms for implementing regional coordinated development strategies," and the "Proposals" of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee made further important deployments for promoting regional coordinated development. These include the continuation, deepening, and specification of already deployed reform tasks, as well as new tasks and measures proposed according to the new situation and requirements. To implement the decision-making deployments of the Party Central Committee, we must take Xi Jinping Economic Thought as our guide, focus on building a regional economic layout and territorial space system characterized by complementary advantages and high-quality development, further comprehensively deepen reform, and continuously shape new patterns and advantages for China's regional development.
Promoting regional linked development in an orderly manner. To promote regional coordinated development in the New Era and on the new journey, we must uphold and strengthen the centralized and unified leadership of the Party Central Committee over regional coordinated development. We must fully, accurately, and comprehensively implement the Party's general ideas for promoting regional coordinated development under the new situation, leverage the overlapping effects of regional coordinated development strategies, major regional strategies, the functional zoning strategy, and the new-type urbanization strategy, and promote regional linked development. In practice, we must increase the intensity of implementation, both promoting the deep integration and functional complementarity of various strategies and resolutely overcoming the tendency toward fragmented strategic execution. At the same time, we should leverage the supporting and driving role of cross-regional connective areas, deepen cross-administrative region cooperation, and expand the basin-based economic model. We must strengthen the monitoring, evaluation, and supervision of planning implementation to ensure that the Party Central Committee's strategic intentions are accurately transmitted and effectively landed, truly achieving a "view of the whole situation, planning for the long-term, and deployment of the overall layout," so that the overall efficiency of national strategy is maximized and a strong collective force is formed to promote regional coordinated development.
Promoting relative balance within dynamic development and taking the path of rational division of labor and optimized development. Based on the reality of China's regional development, and firmly grasping dialectical thinking methods, we can continuously improve the quality of regional coordinated development only by guiding various localities to follow paths of differentiated, characteristic, and intensive development based on their own functional positioning and resource and environmental carrying capacity. To this end, we must optimize the layout of major productive forces, promote efficient collaboration in regional innovation and industrial chains, and encourage various localities to develop new quality productive forces according to local conditions. In practice, we must persist in the path of rational division of labor and optimized development, supporting advantaged regions with the right conditions to enhance their capacity as sources of innovation and their radiating and driving functions, and building international science and technology innovation centers in Beijing (Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei), Shanghai (Yangtze River Delta), and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. We should increase differentiated policy support, promoting the revitalization and development of old revolutionary base areas, ethnic minority areas, and border areas through more precise and effective fiscal transfer payments, regional assistance, and industrial collaboration. At the same time, we must promote the dynamic matching of industrial structure and population distribution with resource and environmental carrying capacity, integrating the concept of harmony between humanity and nature throughout the entire process of regional development.
Promoting the free flow and efficient allocation of factors to inject lasting impetus into regional coordinated development. Regional coordinated development is an important means of realizing spatial integration and a powerful support for accelerating the construction of a unified national market. Promoting the free flow and efficient allocation of factors is both an inherent requirement for promoting regional coordinated development and an internal necessity for smoothing the domestic cycle and building a unified national market. In practice, we must improve systems for factor acquisition, qualification certification, and bidding/tendering, resolutely breaking down various explicit and implicit barriers that hinder the free cross-regional flow, fair competition, and efficient allocation of productive factors such as labor, capital, technology, and data, and eliminating market segmentation. We must continue to create a market-oriented, law-based, and internationalized first-class business environment, deeply address "involutionary" [19] competition, and promote the smooth flow and optimal combination of advanced productive factors toward regions and industries with higher efficiency and better returns, thereby enhancing resource factor allocation efficiency over a wider range and at a deeper level. At the same time, we should persist in the "connotative" [20] development of cities, building vibrant and innovative cities and enhancing the ability of certain megacities to allocate high-end global productive factors.
Continuously promoting innovation in systems and mechanisms to provide a solid and long-term guarantee for regional coordinated development. Looking to the future, we must place institutional building in a more prominent position to provide a systemic guarantee for regional coordinated development. To this end, we must improve statistics, fiscal, tax, and evaluation systems that are conducive to building a unified national market, and promote the establishment and practice of a correct view of political performance. We should optimize interest-sharing between corporate headquarters and branches, and between production and consumption locations, and improve mechanisms for inter-regional planning coordination, industrial collaboration, and profit sharing. We must deeply promote people-centered new-type urbanization and implement a system where basic public services are provided based on place of permanent residence rather than household registration [21]. We must deepen the reform of the land system, giving provincial governments greater autonomy in coordinating construction land. We must improve diversified ecological compensation mechanisms, expanding channels for realizing the value of ecological products according to local conditions—particularly improving horizontal ecological protection compensation mechanisms to ensure that "protectors benefit and users pay." Through the continuous improvement and synergy of systems and mechanisms, we will ensure that regional coordinated development continues to reach higher levels on a track of legalization and standardization, writing a new chapter for regional coordinated development in the New Era.