Against the complex backdrop of China’s socio-economic development in the new era, exploring pathways to enhance urban economic resilience has thus become a particularly crucial contemporary imperative. As the central nervous system of urban agglomerations, core cities play a pivotal role in regional economic stability and recovery. Improvements in the technological innovation capacity of core cities may generate a “siphon effect”, thereby suppressing economic development in surrounding areas. However, they may also produce “diffusion effects”, such as knowledge spillovers, and thus stimulate economic growth in peripheral regions. Consequently, how precisely the advancement of technological innovation in core cities impacts the economic resilience of peripheral cities warrants thorough investigation. In fact, in the face of the current severe internal and external shocks, clarifying this issue will not only help China respond more effectively to complex and changing circumstances and challenges, thereby promoting stable and healthy economic operations, but also provide valuable empirical support for the ongoing debate concerning whether further enhancing the development of central cities can effectively coordinate economic growth across urban centres.
Using sample data for peripheral cities in 19 Chinese urban agglomerations from 2008 to 2022, this paper examines the impact of technological innovation in core cities on the economic resilience of peripheral cities and its underlying mechanisms. Findings indicate that technological innovation in core cities enhances the economic resilience of peripheral cities, with this conclusion remaining robust after undergoing a series of robustness tests including Doubly Debiased LASSO and instrumental variables. Mechanism analyses at both city and enterprise levels indicates that technological innovation in core cities stimulates innovation and entrepreneurship levels in peripheral cities, thereby strengthening their economic resilience. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that the positive externalities of core city innovation are more pronounced in peripheral cities that are geographically closer to the core city, share a common dialect, exhibit higher levels of population interaction, and are located within eastern urban agglomerations.
Compared with previous studies, this paper makes three main contributions. First, it supplements research on factors influencing urban economic resilience. Past studies have predominantly focused on how internal urban characteristics affect local economic resilience, with limited attention paid to the role of surrounding urban characteristics in shaping a region’s economic resilience. This paper innovatively approaches the subject from the perspective of technological innovation in core cities within urban agglomerations, thereby providing a valuable addition to existing literature.
Second, this study enriches existing research on the economic consequences of technological innovation in core cities within urban agglomerations. Current investigations into technological innovation in these core cities predominantly focus on aspects such as industrial structure upgrading and optimisation, alongside coordinated development. By adopting an economic resilience perspective, this paper expands upon the existing body of research. Furthermore, within academic circles, there persists debate concerning whether developing large cities can harmonise economic growth across urban centres. This study offers a fresh perspective for addressing this contention.
Third, amidst the current severe internal and external shocks confronting China, this paper highlights the profound significance of technological innovation in core cities within urban agglomerations for enhancing the economic resilience of peripheral cities. This underscores the necessity of improving the technological innovation capacity of core cities, giving full play to their leading role in innovation, and promoting the coordinated economic development of urban agglomerations. Concurrently, the heterogeneity tests conducted herein offer fresh perspectives for governments to further refine urban agglomeration development planning.
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