The Administrative Boundary Effect Of Foreign Direct Investment

Since the 21 st century,the Yangtze River Delta(Yangtze River Delta)has become one of the largest regions in China to introduce foreign direct investment(FDI).The research shows that foreign direct investment is one of the most important driving forces to promote regional economic growth.At the same time,FDI plays an important role in optimizing the allocation of factors and promoting coordinated economic development.It can not only increase the domestic capital stock,but also promote the technological progress of domestic enterprises through knowledge spillover effect,market competition effect,correlation effect,demonstration effect,and finally promote regional economic growth.However,the study found that the spatial distribution of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta was seriously unbalanced,and there was a large gap in the level of FDI among regions.In order to explore the reasons for this phenomenon,this paper put the research perspective on the administrative boundary.As an administrative barrier,the boundary hindered the flow of economic factors,while FDI as a resource aggregation integrating capital,technology,management experience,etc,Will its flow between regions also be hindered by administrative boundaries? Therefore,from the perspective of foreign direct investment,this paper studies the impact of administrative boundaries on the regional disparity of FDI,and hopes to put forward constructive suggestions to solve the unbalanced regional distribution of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta,promote the cross regional flow of FDI,and further promote the coordinated development of the Yangtze River Delta.The main contents and conclusions of this paper are as follows:1.On the basis of the convergence theory,this paper deduces the theoretical model of the administrative boundary effect of FDI,expresses the administrative boundary through the differentiated foreign direct investment policies implemented by economies,and constructs a framework that can analyze the impact of administrative boundary on regional differences of FDI.And based on the duality of administrative boundary effect,it analyzes the reasons for the formation of administrative boundary effect.Natural barriers,administrative divisions,promotion of officials and other factors are the reasons for the shielding effect of administrative boundaries,while spatial diffusion,industrial transfer,geographical interaction and other factors are the reasons for the intermediary effect of administrative boundaries.2.This paper analyzes the temporal and spatial evolution of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta and the regional gap.Use Arcgis software to draw FDI spatial distribution map using natural fracture method to analyze the spatial and temporal evolution of FDI,and use standard deviation and coefficient of variation method to analyze regional differences of FDI.The study found that there was an obvious imbalance in the distribution of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta,and the county FDI in the Jiangsu Zhejiang Anhui provincial border area showed a low level of "contiguous" phenomenon,while in the Jiangsu Zhejiang Shanghai border area showed a high level of concentration with Shanghai as the core.In addition,based on Arcgis software,we calculated the global Moran index of per capita FDI data of counties in the inter provincial border area of the Yangtze River Delta from 2011 to 2019.From 2011 to2019,the global Moran index was significantly positive,indicating that the county FDI in the Yangtze River Delta showed a positive spatial autocorrelation,but the spatial connection of FDI among counties still needs to be strengthened.From the perspective of the regional gap of county level FDI in border areas,the inter provincial gap of county level FDI in Anhui and Jiangsu,Zhejiang and Jiangsu,Shanghai and Jiangsu border areas is basically larger than the intra provincial gap.It is speculated that there may be administrative border shielding effect,which paves the way for the following empirical research.3.In the empirical part,this paper studies the administrative boundary effect of FDI in the border areas of the Yangtze River Delta based on the county panel data of the border areas of the Yangtze River Delta from 2011 to 2019.The original assumption that there is no structural change between counties within and across provinces in the Yangtze River Delta has been rejected,indicating that there is an administrative boundary effect between counties across provinces in the Yangtze River Delta border area.In addition,the regression results of the administrative boundary effect of FDI in the inter provincial border areas of the Yangtze River Delta show that the gap of per capita FDI growth between the two counties compared across provinces is greater than the gap compared with the same province,that is,the administrative boundary will hinder the cross regional flow of FDI,and the administrative boundary shielding effect of FDI is dominant.4.According to the regional and phased regression analysis of the administrative boundary effect of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta,the administrative boundary effect of Zhejiang and Jiangsu,Anhui and Jiangsu,Anhui and Zhejiang,Shanghai and Jiangsu,Shanghai and Zhejiang are all significantly positive,showing obvious shielding effect,which hinders the free flow of FDI between regions.The staged regression results show that the administrative boundary effect between other provinces is shielding effect,and only the boundary effect coefficient of Anhui and Zhejiang has changed from negative to positive,from the border intermediary effect to the border shielding effect.Finally,according to the empirical results that the administrative boundary effect in the Yangtze River Delta is mainly manifested as the shielding effect that hinders the flow of FDI and expands the regional gap of FDI,this paper discusses the policy suggestions on how to break the administrative barriers between regions and how to narrow the regional gap of FDI.Proceeding from the duality of the administrative boundary effect,it is necessary to eliminate the shielding effect of the administrative boundary and encourage the intermediary effect of the administrative boundary.The government should crack the administrative region economy,promote the transformation of the administrative region economy to the economic region economy,build an integrated transportation system,and promote the coordinated development of investment attraction in the neighboring regions between provinces.