Li Xiang

Sichuan University

Guo Zhongwei

Sichuan University Jinjiang College

Hu Ang＊

the University of Tokyo;Sichuan University

Abstract: China has fulfilled the First Centenary Goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. Under such circumstances, thriving businesses play a fundamental and crucial role in comprehensively promoting rural revitalization. As a major sector of modern service industries,tourism actualizes people’s aspirations for a better life. With regard to industrial structure, tourism constitutes a sure path for the revitalization of rural industry and the construction of ecological civilization, and organically integrates the development of the primary, secondary, and tertiary industries in rural areas. As an important Marxist research method, the social-system-based approach establishes a series of materialistic and dialectical methodological principles for the constituent element, functional optimization and formal evolution of the system, and clarifies the direction for the research on the basic laws of social development. For this paper, we have carefully reorganized the existing research findings on rural tourism in China and the world. We then proceed to contextualize rural tourism with a social-system-based approach, theorize the necessity and path of the development of rural tourism in a systematic way, circumstantiate the reality and realization of the current ruraltourism development, and propose policy-related suggestions on the prominent problems in relation to rural tourism in line with four principles, i.e., integrity, structuralism, hierarchy, and openness.

Keywords: social-system-based approach, rural tourism, development path, rural revitalization

Introduction

Historically, the course of socialist market-oriented reform has undergone the transformation from the rural area to the urban area and from the production field to the consumption field, which has helped to realize China’s transformation from an agricultural country to an industrial country and achieve a great leap from insufficient food-clothing supplies to a well-off society. The Chinese economy has continued to develop rapidly and healthily (Xing, 2017), and China has finished the arduous task of eliminating absolute poverty. Under the leadership of the Communist Party of China,the Chinese people have fulfilled the First Centenary Goal of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects. Under such circumstances, “as China embarks on a new journey toward the Second Centenary Goal, the focus of work concerning agriculture,rural areas, and rural residents has shifted to comprehensively promoting rural revitalization.” While implementing the rural revitalization strategy, we should actively conform to the development of social productivity and the change of the relationships of production, firmly grasp the evolution of the principal contradiction of work concerning agriculture, rural areas, and rural residents, and comprehensively boost the construction of rural economies, politics, culture, society, and ecological civilization, and take the road of rural revitalization with Chinese characteristics, in a bid to effectively address the unbalanced and inadequate development of agriculture and rural areas and constantly meet the ever-growing needs of urban and rural residents for a better life (Jiang, 2018).The implement of the rural revitalization strategy accords with the historical task in the new era. Rural revitalization not only embodies the requirement to satisfy rural residents’aspirations for a better life, but also plays an integral role in enabling rural residents to better enjoy the “policy dividends” of rural revitalization. As Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, emphasized that “We should seize the opportunity of the rise of rural tourism, turn resources into assets, and embrace the notion that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets.”①“Report on Xi Jinping’s Presence at the Deliberation of Guizhou Delegation to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.” [EB/OL]. http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2017- 10/19/c_1121828334.htm.How to give full play to the multiple advantages of rural tourism (as a poverty-alleviation industry,a comprehensive industry, and an industry related to a beautiful China and a happy China), make positive contributions to rural revitalization and ecological-civilization construction, forge a good environment for rural industrial revitalization (“One industry fosters many other industries,” “One industry promotes hundreds of industries”), and realize the dialectical unity of economic benefits, social benefits, and ecological benefits have become a question of the times that we must answer.

In April, 2021, Xi inspected Guangxi. He called for efforts to “comprehensively promote rural revitalization by relying on characteristic local resources, taking full advantage of science and technology to strengthen the agricultural sector, developing new industries and new business forms, such as rural tourism and leisure-oriented agriculture according to local conditions, connecting production, processing and marketing, integrating agriculture, culture, and tourism, fostering the development and growth of rural industries, and enabling rural residents to share more industrial valueadded benefits.”①“Xi Jinping Inspected Guangxi: To Emancipate the Mind, Deepen Reform, Make Concerted Efforts, Develop a Work Style of Being Responsible and Practical, and Build Beautiful Guangxi with Chinese Characteristics in the New Era.” [EB/OL]. http://www.gov.cn/xinwen/2021-04/27/content_5603266.htm.This intensified the important role of rural tourism in comprehensively promoting rural revitalization.Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on the Major Achievements and Historical Experience of the Party over the Past Centuryadopted at the Sixth Plenary Session of the 19th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, focuses on the major achievements and historical experiences of the CPC over the past century and points out that “The Party has always made issues relating to agriculture, rural areas and rural residents a top priority. It has introduced the rural revitalization strategy and accelerated the modernization of agriculture and rural areas.” In 2022, the No. 1 Central Document proposed to highlight rural industries and promote rural development, continue to advance the integrated development of the primary, secondary and tertiary industries in rural areas, and implement the rural leisure-tourism promotion plan. By 2019, in China, rural tourism had received more than 3.2 billion tourists in the entire year, accounting for half of the number of domestic tourists, with a total business revenue of more than RMB850 billion(see Figure 1), which had directly provided employment opportunities for 12 million people and generated more than 2.9 million enterprises in the field of leisure-oriented agriculture and rural tourism. The rural tourism industry started in 1986. Yet, it is confronted with such practical problems as weak scale effect, an unsatisfactory leading role, as well as a lack of development momentum. Additionally, there is more space to tap the industrial potentiality and benefits, with a big gap between the requirements for rural revitalization and the goal of high-quality development. To cultivate rural tourism as a mainstay for the revitalization of rural industry and build rural tourism into a happiness-related industry that truly benefits rural residents and meets the needs of citizens, we need to ground rural tourism in the methodology of Marxist social science and take the transformation and upgrading of industrial structures as a major foundation or strategy to achieve high-quality development. Therefore, in the research on the highquality development of rural tourism in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization, we must choose new angles with long-term strategic vision and dialectical critical thinking.

Figure 1 The statistics of the number of tourists received and business revenues from rural tourism in China in 2012－2018 Data source: Data sorted from China Culture and Tourism Yearbook 2019 and China Tourism Yearbook 2013－2018

Related Literature Review

In developed countries, rural tourism has long been a mature form of tourism. Since the Industrial Revolution, urban residents have increasingly yearned for a quiet rural life and a beautiful rural environment. Rural tourism has developed as a means for urban residents to escape from industrial pollution and a fast-paced lifestyle. With the improvement of rural infrastructure and accessibility, rural tourism flourished, in which the mountain areas of the Alps in Europe and the Rocky Mountains in North America played a pioneering role in the world. Presently, in traditional developed countries like Germany, the US, the UK, and France, the scale and professionalism of rural tourism constantly improve and display enormous vitality and development potential. In most developing countries, the main forms of rural tourism are agricultural sightseeing tourism and local landscape touring. With the acceleration of urbanization and the improvement of rural residents’ living standards, the overall development level of rural tourism will achieve a qualitative leap.

Foreign scholars have carried out long-time and wide-ranging research on rural tourism and concentrated on national and regional policies. Relevant research findings mainly center on the formulation and implementation of rural-tourism policies, the evaluation of policy-implementation effects, the impact of stakeholders on rural-tourism policies, and rural-tourism-related policy tools. Additionally, foreign scholars categorize international rural tourism into eight types, i.e., sightseeing tourism, leisure and vacation tourism, participation and experience-oriented tourism, culture and entertainment tourism, learning and education tourism, tasting food and shopping tourism, recuperation and fitness tourism, and return-to-nature tourism (Guo and Han, 2010). The European Union (EU) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)define rural tourism as a tourist activity that takes place in the countryside. Rurality is the key core and unique buy-in point of the rural tourism industry. Mazorra (2002)conducted in-depth research on the specific cases of the development of rural tourism in Spain and revealed that in Spain, those who migrate from urban areas to rural areas and engage in rural-tourism-related industries pursue individual independent employment in the process of counter-urbanization. Besides, relevant favorable policies will significantly increase the income of rural-tourism workers. T. Ying and Y. Zhou (2007) highlighted the importance of legal systems focused on rural tourism, and observed that legally clarifying the development rights of stakeholders in rural tourism constitutes the basic condition for establishing a healthy interactive relationship between stakeholders. Gurung and Seeland (2008) scrutinize the development of rural eco-tourism in Bhutan and argue that the government should reform the current tourism policies and deeply develop relevant tourism products in order to eradicate the dilemma of a single development model. Clayton (2009) encapsulates five basic means to optimize rural-tourism policies by comprehensively investigating rural-tourism policies in major countries and regions,i.e., fiscal stimuli, governmental expenditures, spontaneous tools, adjustment tools,and non-intervention policies. Grounded in the data from major villages that developed rural tourism along the Yellow River Basin in China, H. Zhang et al. (2021) examined the evolutionary trends and development mechanisms of rural tourism at the spatial level, and demonstrated that the sustainable development of rural tourism embodies great significance to achieving the complementary and coordinated integration of urban and rural areas, promoting rural transformations, and increasing the incomes of rural residents.

In the existent domestic research findings, the research on the conceptual definition and path interpretation of rural tourism has deepened. Since the rural revitalization strategy was launched, rural tourism has become a hot topic in domestic academic circles. In the CNKI database, academic journals under the theme of “rural tourism” have published 4,511 articles cited in PKUEAS and CSSCI as of May 12, 2022, whose research topics cover rural revitalization, a beautiful village, targeted poverty alleviation, leisureoriented agriculture, industrial integration, sports economy, and rural culture among many others. (see Figure 2). Presently, domestic scholars generally uphold that rural tourism refers to “a type of tourism that takes rural communities as the tourism sites and unique rural productive model, rural life and rural scenery as the object system” (Xiong,1999). Rural tourism signifies “a tourist activity that integrates sightseeing, investigation,learning, participation, entertainment, shopping and vacation with agricultural cultural landscapes, agricultural ecological environments, productive agricultural activities and traditional national customs as resources” (Du & Xiang, 1999). Research findings mainly focus on the relationships between rural revitalization and rural tourism as well as the development paths for rural tourism. First, with respect to the research on the relationships between rural revitalization and rural tourism, relevant scholars generally believe that the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy means a major historical opportunity for the development of rural tourism (Xu, 2020). Comprehensively promoting rural revitalization will provide crucial support for the development of rural tourism in terms of policies, funds, and talents, and play a positive role in solving the bottleneck problems in the current rural-tourism development (Geng & Zhang, 2021). In the context of rural revitalization, improving the quality and efficiency and upgrading of rural tourism via the integrated development of rural industries constitute an indispensable part of rural development (Lai et al., 2020). Second, in regard to the development path for rural tourism, relevant scholars generally consider that rural leisure-oriented tourism shares a “benefit multiplier effect” with other types of tourism and features multiple choices,large benefits, good accessibility, high-cost performance, and a low agglomeration degree(Li, 2020). Collective management is an important way to develop rural tourism (Wang,2018). There are development models, such as “company + rural residents,” “government+ company + rural tourism association + travel agency,” joint-stock cooperative system,“rural resident + rural resident,” and individual farm (Zheng & Zhong, 2004), as well as specific development paths, such as the village-type rural-tourism cluster development model, garden-type characteristic agricultural industry supporting model, courtyard-type leisure resort supporting model and small-town-type ancient-street-style folk sightseeing and tourism model (Ma et al., 2007). Third, some domestic scholars have conducted empirical research on rural tourism in combination with cases. For example, Zhu (2017),Gui et al. (2016), Feng et al. (2007), Zhu (2006), Wang et al. (2006), and Li (2003)respectively investigated rural tourism in the Shanghai suburbs, Linzhai (Guangdong),Wuyuan (Jiangxi), Chengdu (Sichuan), Beijing suburbs, Nanjing (Jiangsu) and other places, with new research paradigms and innovative research findings. In general, as rural tourism in China started late, the overall research on rural tourism is at the initial stage,and the understanding of the basic ideas of rural tourism remains vague and superficial.Terminologically, there are misuses of words, such as agricultural tourism, agricultural sightseeing, sightseeing agriculture and leisure-oriented agriculture, which generally blurs the differences and connections between rural tourism and common tourist sightseeing in the realization path. Simultaneously, the fragmentation of research imposes restrictions on the development ideas and models of rural tourism, and nags at the formulation of ruraltourism development policies.

Figure 2 CiteSpace clustering diagram of high-frequency keywords in modernization research Picture source: Citespace v6.1.2 Data source: China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI)

To sum up, the existent research findings generally recognize the two-way interactive relationships between the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy and the development of rural tourism, and substantially explore the countermeasures on how to better seize the opportunity of rural revitalization. However, as the rural revitalization strategy has been theorized recently, the existing scholarship overstates policy interpretations and ignores theoretical analysis. Scholars have rigidly adhered to the research paradigm of “what” and “how” rather than search for “why.” While elucidating the research topics and methods and criticizing the existent research findings in a detailed way, we dialectically analyzed the necessity and development path for the current rural tourism development in China by combining the contemporary background with the development of rural tourism (as the research object), and taking the Marxist social-system-based approach as the research paradigm. Meanwhile,we provide relevant policy-related suggestions to address the common problems in the current ruraltourism development process (see Figure 3).

Figure 3 Technological roadmap of rural-tourism development and research based on the social system approach

Figure 4 The changing trend of China’s per capita GDP and the incidence of poverty: 1978-2021Data source: National Bureau of Statistics

The Development Path for Rural Tourism Based on the Social System Approach

The founders and successors of Marxism have placed a high premium on the significance of methodology. Marx once asserted that “The mode of production of material life restricts the whole process of social life, political life, and spiritual life”(Collected Works of Marx and Engels, 2009). Speaking of the dialectical unity of history and logic, Engels emphasized that “The ideological process started the moment history started” (Selected Works of Marx and Engels, 2012). Likewise, Comrade Mao Zedong once stated that “We should not only assign tasks, but also solve the problem of how to accomplish them. If we do not solve the methodological problem, the tasks will just be nonsense” (Selected Works of Mao Zedong, 1991). This chapter expatiates upon the connotation and constituent elements of the social-system-based approach, the necessity of the development of rural tourism in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization, as well as the path for high-quality development of rural tourism in order to provide new ideas for the development and upgrading of rural tourism.

The Connotation and Constituent Element of the Social-System-Based Approach

The social-system-based approach denotes a set of methodological systems that comprehensively and accurately investigate society by centering on the idea of the system, according with the systematicness of the practice of social productionper se, and taking into account the relationships between society as an ensemble and its constituent elements and structures, as well as the interrelationships, interactions and mutual restrictions of natural systems. Social-system-based approaches function as a powerful ideological means for Marxists to understand and transform societies (Wang et al., 2002). In the process of delving into the development of human societies, based on the practice of social production, Marxist Political Economics has established a series of materialistic and dialectical methodological principles for the constituent elements,their historical evolution, and the optimization of the social system which represent the comprehensiveness, overlapping and scientificalness of the social-system-based approach,and unravel the objective laws guiding the development of societies (Yang, 2018).

The social system includes five subsystems (i.e., the productivity system, the relations of the production system, the superstructure system, the ecological environmental system, and the population system) and two specific forms, the socio-economic form and the technological and social form. The research principles of the social system can be summarized as integrity, structuralism, hierarchy, and openness (Yang, 2018). Marx and Engels clearly revealed that “Society is not a solid crystal, but an organism that can change and often keeps changing” (Selected Works of Marx and Engels, 1995). In the complex system of social evolution, “There are interactions between various factors and every organism” (Selected Works of Marx and Engels, 1995). The social system as an ensemble looks complex and contains many factors, with a high degree of integrity and a complex structure. Its features are randomness, instability, nonlinearity, and asymmetry.In research on social phenomena and social sciences, we can fully use the characteristics of the social-system-based approach. Therefore, the use of the social-system-based approach is of great importance in the process of understanding and transforming society as a powerful ideological weapon to explore and study the law and essence of economic issues.

The Necessity of Developing Rural Tourism in the Context of Comprehensively Promoting Rural Revitalization

Rural tourism acts as an important way to promote the transformation and upgrading of the agricultural industrial structure, fully use rural surplus labor resources, effectively improve the income levels of rural residents, and ensure the sustainable development of rural economies and societies. The interactions between productivity and the relations of production, economic foundations, and superstructures necessitate the development of rural tourism.

First, the development of rural tourism in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization has reached a high level of productivity and formed a solid material foundation. Since the reform and opening up, China has successfully leaped from a lowincome country to a middle-income country. In 1978, China’s per capita gross domestic product (hereinafter referred to as “per capita GDP”) was only RMB381. In 2021, China’s per capita GDP reached RMB80,976, firstly exceeding the world’s per capita GDP level in history. The incidence of poverty has dropped from 97.5 percent (in 1978) to zero (see Figure 4). With the in-depth advancement of the Second Centennial Goal and the leapfrog development of socialist modernization, China’s achievements in the field of agriculture,rural areas, and rural residents have attracted worldwide attention. Agricultural productivity has significantly improved, rural relations of production have undergone great changes, and the spirit of rural residents has taken on a new look. However,“Currently, the biggest unbalanced development in China is the imbalance between urban and rural development;the biggest inadequate development is the inadequate rural development.”①“Major Deployment of Rural Revitalization and Decisive Victory of Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects: An Interview with Han Changfu,Minister of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.” [EB/OL]. http://www.moa.gov.cn/ ztzl/xxsjdjs/tpxw/201711/t20171117_5911068.htm.InRural Social Change, E. M. Rogers proposes seven-dimensional standards of the moder nization of American rural society and demonstrates the commonness of rural modernization,i.e., the improvement of agricultural productivit y and the reduction of the number of farmers, enhanced connections between agricultural industries and non-agricultural industries, higher professional levels of agricultural production, the uniformity of urban and rural values, more open social relations, the centralization of the rural system, and the changing status of various relations (Deng, 2008). Since the reform and opening up, China’s rural areas have gradually marched towards open restructuring.Accordingly, the proportion of the tertiary industries continues to rise, and social relations shift to the public-economy model. Rural areas and rural residents are transforming from a single function, individual agricultural production modes to multiple functions that integrate agricultural production, ecological conservation, sightseeing and leisure,farming experiences, education, and entertainment. This solidifies the material foundation for the development of rural tourism. Presently, we should understand the importance,arduousness, and urgency of solidly promoting the development of rural tourism and firmly grasp the overall role of rural-tourism services for issues concerning agriculture,rural areas, and rural residents from the perspective of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization. We should also fully understand the important role of developing rural tourism in improving rural living environments and increasing rural residents’ incomes from the perspective of solidly promoting common prosperity. We should also actively create a good environment with a new development philosophy so that the development of rural tourism plays a major role in expanding domestic demand and establishing a competitive domestic market from the perspective of accelerating the construction of a new development paradigm.

Second, the development of rural tourism in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization is an important guideline to follow when implementing the strategic decisions of the Communist Party of China and the country and an important way for urban areas to support rural development. Rural tourism is an emerging industry that is embedded in agriculture, aims to develop tourism, relies on service quality, serves urban-resident tourists, integrates the primary and tertiary industries, effectively connects relevant industries, and significantly stimulates domestic demands. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the development trend for industries promoting agriculture and urban areas’ support for rural development has been accelerating. The high-quality development of rural tourism effectively combines “big agriculture” and “big tourism,” and quickens the integration of urban and rural economies and the coordinated development of the primary, secondary, and tertiary industries. This not only expands the consumption of urban residents in rural areas, but also hastens the flow of urban information, capital, technology, and other resources to rural areas. To plan rural revitalization in an all-round way, thriving businesses play a fundamental and decisive role. Thriving businesses in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization basically refers to thriving modern agriculture. Simultaneously, modern agriculture not only relies on the primary industry, but also pursues the integrated development of the primary, secondary, and tertiary industries. As people’s material lives diversify, the total tourism expenditure of urban and rural residents in China continues to rise, yet the gap between urban and rural areas remains large (see Table 1). The practical and potential consumption demands for rural tourism grow constantly, which not only justifies the consumption psychology of urban residents (often understood as a “return to nature”) but also helps to enhance the market-oriented awareness of rural residents. Rural areas boast abundant tourism resources, and the development of rural tourism immensely diversifies the supply system of the tourism industry and transfers the majority of rural residents to non-agricultural industries, which possesses great practical significance in preventing a large-scale return to poverty. Also, rural tourism develops into a new growth point for the rural economy, increases the added value of traditional agriculture,accelerates the development of science and technology-based agriculture, sightseeing agriculture, and ecological agriculture, optimizes and adjusts the rural industrial structure, and further promotes rural productivity. Meanwhile, the development of rural tourism can effectively undermine the institutional mechanisms of urban-rural dualism,hoist the integration of urban and rural populations, technology, capital, and resources,strengthen the construction of rural infrastructure, improve rural environments and health, embellish rural scenery, re-shape rural residents’ ideas and civilized behaviors,and eventually help to achieve urban-rural integration.

Table 1 The total expenditure on tourism and D-value of urban and rural residents in China: 2012－2020

Third, the final purpose of developing rural tourism in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization is to meet people’s aspirations for a better life. The rapid development of rural tourism marks the great achievement of the reform and opening up, fulfills the needs of upgrading the consumption structure of residents,and vividly substantiates the increasing improvement of people’s lives. This agrees with both the objective law of socio-economic development and the development philosophy of people-oriented and people-first. Tourism consumption differs from daily-life consumption. Tourism consumption means a consumption behavior in that tourists buy tourism products to gratify their psychological states, like curiosity,aesthetic appreciation, and adventurous spirit while in the tourism scenes. In this way,tourists obtain spiritual enjoyment through sensory experiences, physical and mental pleasures, cultural knowledge, freedom, and happiness. To a large extent, to meet the needs of people’s spiritual and cultural lives via tourism, and to substantially increase the consumption of cultural entertainment and leisure-oriented tourism, epitomizes people’s pursuit of a better and happier life. In the 14th Five-Year Plan, the high-quality development of rural tourism, especially short-distance rural tourism, will promote the popularization of consumption, the uniqueness of products, the standardization of services, and the diversification of benefits in the development of rural tourism in China.In the new development stage, planning rural tourism requires us to consider how to meet people’s needs for a better life and serve the overall national development plan,adhere to improved quality and efficiency, ground developments in market demands and rural residents’ interests, and give priority to culture, ecology and service quality.Simultaneously, we should strengthen top-level design, stress demonstration and guidance, fully integrate the development of rural tourism with the construction of an ecological civilization, cultivate a number of rural-tourism destinations with ecological beauty, production beauty, and life beauty, and create a number of rural-tourism routes with distinct local features, cultural significance, and high-quality infrastructures to attract more tourists who will choose rural tourism, experience rural tourism, and like rural tourism.

Fourth, the ultimate goal of the development of rural tourism in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization is to effectively improve the production and living standards of rural residents. As an important force for rural revitalization, rural tourism considerably expands the channels for rural residents to increase incomes and opens new development paths. Spurred by tourism policy, income growth, consumption upgrading, automobile popularization, urbanization, and investments (Ren, 2018), rural tourism features with larger scale, more extensive industry, and greater impact, the development of rural tourism not only realizes the integrated development of the primary,secondary, and tertiary industries but also promotes the modernization of agriculture and rural areas, which fundamentally ensures the healthy and sustainable growth of rural residents’ incomes. Since the 21st century, the income gap between urban and rural residents has shown a narrowing trend, the per capita disposable incomes and expenditures of rural residents have increased significantly, and the per capita net income has grown remarkably (see Figure 5), which has enriched the supply system of rural material means and the means of production, improved the quality and added value of the supply system, significantly consolidated the competitiveness and anti-risk ability of rural residents in the market economy,and laid a solid foundation for rural residents to increase their incomes and become prosperous. The highquality development of rural tourism is the sure path to rural revitalization and industrial integration and is an important means of integrating and upgrading the rural tourism industry to make rural areas more attractive places to live and work. Rural tourism aims to achieve the equalization of basic public services in urban and rural areas,promote the high-quality development of rural social undertakings, and boost the highstandard construction of rural infrastructure on the basis of establishing public facilitymanagement-protection mechanisms in a coordinated way.

Figure 5 Per capita net income and actual growth rate of rural residents in China in 2003－2021Data source: China Statistical Yearbook of relevant years

Figure 7 The development path for rural tourism based on the social system approach

The Realization Path of the Development of Rural Tourism in the Context of Comprehensively Promoting Rural Revitalization

Continuous technological innovations, industrial-structure upgrades, and relevant institutional reforms constitute the driving forces of long-term economic growth in modern society (Lin, 2010). Comprehensively promoting the rural revitalization strategy demonstrates not only the inevitable choice to adapt to the development of China’s social productivity and the evolution of relations of production in the new era but also a major measure to cope with issues concerning agriculture, rural areas, and rural residents as well as ecological environments. Simultaneously, it can effectively solve the fundamental problems in the development of agriculture, rural areas, and rural residents, and the unbalanced and inadequate development of both agriculture and rural areas. In consideration of the interactions between productivity and relations of production, as people’s needs for a better life increasingly grow, urban-rural integration and development will accelerate, and as the urban-rural spatial distance shortens, basic rural-tourism products will not be sufficient to satisfy the needs of rural people. This triggers the cross-regional, characteristic, quality-oriented, and green development of rural tourism, which will stimulate the development of new rural-tourism products and business forms, such as rural-scenery complexes, national agricultural parks, leisure farms and pastures, vacation villages, residents’ farms, high-tech agricultural parks and educational agricultural parks, cultural creativity agricultural parks, agricultural science and technology parks.

Following the basic principles of the Marxist social-system-based approach, we constructed a whole-process virtuous cycle of “rural revitalization-rural tourism-rural revitalization.” The development path for rural tourism in the new development stage is shown in Figure 6 below. In the basic direction, in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization, we highlighted the turn from “urban-rural integration”to “priority given to the development of agriculture and rural areas.” In the development goal, we upgraded “agricultural modernization” to “agricultural and rural modernization” to improve the quality and efficiency of modernization, promote the high-quality development of agriculture and reinforce the vitality of rural development.In the overall requirement, on the basis of the general goal of building a new socialist countryside featuring “advanced production, a well-to-do life, civilized folkways, a neat look, and democratic management,” comprehensively promoting rural revitalization further proposes to “build rural areas with thriving businesses, an eco-friendly environment, social etiquette and civility, effective governance and a prosperous rural population.”①Xi Jinping: “Secure a Decisive Victory in Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in All Respects and Strive for the Great Success of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.” Delivered at the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. [EB/OL]. http://www.gov.cn/zhuanti/2017-10/27/content_5234876.htm.This requires us to actively rely on agricultural and rural resources, give full play to the role of rural residents, and cultivate and expand modern planting and breeding industries, characteristic rural industries, agricultural-product processing and circulation industries, rural leisure-oriented-tourism industries, rural new-type service industries and rural information industries in order to establish rural industrial systems with distinctive characteristics, diverse types, and coordinated development. Presently,promoting rural revitalization with the development of rural tourism involves a multitude of difficulties and challenges, such as unreasonable allocations of resources, difficulties in increasing rural residents’ incomes, imperfect product structures, and varied local traditions and cultures. Therefore, we need to continually “mobilize the enthusiasm and creativity of rural residents, realize the integrated development of the primary,secondary, and tertiary industries, and maintain the vitality of the development of agriculture and rural economies” by prioritizing the development of agriculture and rural areas. Simultaneously, rural tourism can serve as a major way to accelerate “an ecofriendly environment, social etiquette and civility, effective governance and prosperous rural populations” via “thriving businesses.” A strategic plan that centers on “villagecleaning actions” and “a toilet revolution” can fundamentally alter the long-standing“dirty, disorderly and poor” situation in rural areas, and create an excellent and clean developmental environment for deepening rural reforms in all areas and the growth of high-quality rural tourism.

To achieve the high-quality development of rural tourism, we must follow the principles of pursuing market-oriented development and prioritizing benefits, respect the objective laws of the operation of a market economy, grasp the key fields of tourismresources investments, develop characteristic projects, expand the tourism market and produce the best comprehensive benefits. With the development of productivity and the adjustments of relations of production, “advanced production” in building a new socialist countryside cannot meet the multiple needs of urban and rural residents for rural business forms. As rural superstructures changes, “a neat look” cannot satisfy the evergrowing needs of urban and rural residents for ecological environments either (Zhang et al., 2019). We should always implement the basic principle of combining development with protection. On the premise of protecting rural tourism resources, we can choose areas with advantageous traffic locations, densely-distributed scenic spots, and favorable development conditions as major sites for development and construction to forge scale and agglomeration effects and realize the sustainable utilization of tourism resources. In the meantime, the social-system-based approach embodies the law of “the negation of negation” in materialist dialectics, which shows that the development of things contains the unity of the progressive and undulatory movements. In the development of rural tourism, the phenomenon of blindly or superficially imitating others exists. In many traditional rural-tourism scenic spots, there are such problems as having difficulty in normal operation, lacking ample tourist sources, and paying high marginal costs. In some new rural-tourism scenic spots, owing to inaccurate orientation, miscarried plans, and unsatisfactory operations, the benefits from some projects are much lower than expected.As above-stated, capital accumulation in various forms must face the entanglement of positive and negative factors in the natural and cultural environment (David, 2018). In the stage where rural tourism thrives, we must always apply Marxist theories and methods to all aspects of production and operation, extend the industrial chain, enhance the value chain, and vigorously upgrade the scale, efficiency, and quality of the rural tourism industry. Simultaneously, the experience of the development model and path of rural tourism is limited by temporal and regional factors. As social productivity continually improves and rural tourism constantly develops, the development path for rural tourism takes on a form of a spiral rise.

In line with the overall requirements of “thriving businesses, an eco-friendly environments, social etiquette and civility, effective governance and prosperous rural populations” for rural revitalization, we have summarized five basic paths for the development of rural tourism in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization. First, make “thriving businesses” the core development path for rural tourism. Thriving businesses means the requirement for both economic scale and economic quality. Rural tourism has turned from a spontaneously-developed industry in the early stage to a cross-field industry that integrates sightseeing, leisure, experiences,vacations, health care, and cultural creativity. Noticeably, achieving thriving businesses requires us to diversify industrial forms rather than simply develop tourism products,actively take part in the structural reforms of supply-side agriculture, and accelerate the construction of modern agricultural industrial systems, production systems, and operating systems. On the basis of the requirements of rural industrial integration and cross-regional tourism development, we need to promote the agglomeration and extension of the rural-tourism industry and industrial chains, cultivate high-end business forms,such as rural leisure vacations, elderly care and health care, and strengthen the innovation and vitality of rural tourism. Second, take “an eco-friendly environment” as an important way to realize the transformation of rural tourism. In essence, “an eco-friendly environment” represents the organic integration of production, life, and ecology. In the transformation of rural tourism, we need to fully combine the development demands of the tourism industry with specific requirements for promoting the construction of an ecological civilization, enlarging the value of natural capital, and improving the quality of living environments. Besides, we need to clarify the functional zoning,business layouts, and development blueprints in a coordinated way and understand the rural ecological environment as a complex systematic element. In the spatial layout,we cannot separate adjacent villages or focus too narrowly on specific environments.Rather, we need to take a holistic perspective and bear in mind the overall interests of both the villagers and the prospective tourists in order to develop and construct an ecofriendly village, county, or region. Third, take “social etiquette and civility” as the representational form of the rural-tourism development path. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, has attached great importance to the construction of spiritual civilization in rural areas. He regards “social etiquette and civility” as an urgent task for rural revitalization, emphasizing that the construction of spiritual civilization in rural areas is a work to nourish, moralize and unite the people.As an important part of rural tourism, “social etiquette and civility” not only materially embodies the civilized degree of rural society, but also spiritually carries the nostalgia for hometown. While actively improving the spiritual outlook of rural residents and abandoning outdated social mores in rural areas, we need to sublimate the mind of rural residents with culture, so as to effectively enhance their “master” consciousness. In this way, rural residents can play an active role in participating in the whole industrial chain of rural tourism, heighten confidence in traditional regional cultures, return to and carry forward rustic local civilizations, improve friendliness to tourists, and create a warm and simple tourism atmosphere by nurturing healthy folk customs, cultivating fine family traditions, and encouraging virtues in individuals. Fourth, take “effective governance” as the guarantee for improving the quality and efficiency of rural tourism.With the in-depth development of rural tourism, rural residents will have diverse natural resources and uneven abilities and may or may not choose to participate in rural tourism independently. As a result, there may be a significant gap in their incomes from rural tourism. In some areas, there are such problems as the lack of interest-distribution mechanisms and inadequate protections of rural residents’ rights and interests. We should accelerate the improvement of rural-tourism operational mechanisms, especially economic-interest distribution mechanisms, to timely respond to or effectively coordinate the interest demands of various subjects and ensure the legitimate rights of rural residents who can actively participate in the development of rural tourism and continuously obtain the benefits therefrom. As modern rural social governance systems mature, we should give play to the role of collaborative governance, build rural communities, and cultivate rural-tourism talents by establishing and improving the interest-distribution mechanisms and the rights-interests-protection mechanisms. We can, and should, allow the “new local talents” to create or tap into the value of rural tourism in order to promote rural governance in a more effective, dynamic, harmonious,and orderly way with the system of co-governance and mutual benefits. Fifth, take“prosperous rural populations” as the ultimate goal of the development of rural tourism.Common prosperity is the essential requirement of socialism. Rural revitalization and common prosperity complement each other. Rural residents’ benefits from rural tourism are largely restricted by natural and geographical conditions, regional cultures, seasonal cycles, business abilities, and service qualities, with prominent problems in the short term being instability and unsustainability. “Prosperous rural populations” require us to fundamentally ensure that rural residents obtain healthy and sustainable benefits from rural tourism. We cannot solely rely on a single tourism product or scattered ruraltourism businesses. Instead, we should develop innovative organizational forms for rural tourism and optimize the business models of rural tourism. In particular, we should combine the development of rural tourism with the cultivation of new-type agricultural business entities and vigorously support cooperatives, associations, and companies that engage in rural tourism. Grounded in the comparative advantages of regional tourism industries, we should promote rural revitalization and improve the organizational level and intensity of rural tourism by expanding and strengthening rural tourism so that the vast majority of rural groups can enjoy the dividends of tourism development.

Conclusion and Suggestions

“Respecting the laws, adjusting measures to local conditions, making progress while maintaining stability and encouraging innovation” not only reflects the basic principles of Marxism but also constitutes an integral part of the development of rural tourism in the future. Global trade systems are being restructured at an accelerated pace, and the roles of investments and exports in stimulating the China’s economy are increasingly weakened. Under such circumstances, expanding domestic demand may become the core driving force for China’s economic growth. Consumption plays a solidified role in spurring economic growth, and it is of great practical value to vigorously promote tourism consumption, propagate moderate, reasonable, orderly, green, low-carbon, civilized, and healthy lifestyles and consumption models, and develop unique, complete, comfortable,convenient, stimulative and standardized rural tourism industries (Li & Li, 2019).

Research Conclusion

In the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization, local governments at various levels have continuously released supporting policies and constantly improved the top-level design. As evinced above, we have drawn two principal conclusions.

First, rural tourism has come to a crucial stage of high-quality development in the context of comprehensively promoting rural revitalization. Theoretically, the essence of high-quality rural tourism is to realize the free and all-around development of people. In the realization path, we should adhere to the movement laws of productivity and relations of production (as two sides of a contradiction), place emphasis on the advancement of rural revitalization via economic foundations, and pay close attention to the impacts of infrastructure improvements on rural tourism. To organically combine top-level design with the spirit of “crossing the river by feeling the stones”and firmly clinging to historical materialism and dialectical materialism as related to the healthy and sustainable development of rural tourism. Practically, the development of rural tourism relies on institutional reforms that serve as an external driving force and happen in a passive way. More importantly, we need to accurately understand the objective laws of natural geography, industrial systems, market cultivation, and organizational construction in various regions, under the guidance of the market, to guide high-quality development with a new development philosophy. Additionally,urban-rural differences nurture and develop rural tourism. In turn, the development of rural tourism can help to narrow or even eliminate urban-rural differences through the interactive relationships between the subject and the object, transforming the objective world of urban and rural areas and the subjective world of urban and rural residents at the same time.

Second, we constructed a development path for rural tourism using the social-systembased approach and analyzed the interactive mechanisms between the subsystems of the rural tourism system. From the perspective of the driving factors, we theorized the endogenous driving forces and mechanisms of the development of rural tourism in China.Limited only by the comprehensive effects of the major systems of productivity, relations of production, superstructures, and ecological environments, we can comprehensively promote rural revitalization by following the principles of integrity, structuralism,hierarchy, and openness. We can then judge the core driving forces and ultimate goals of the development of rural tourism on this basis and provide ongoing practical, effective support for the development of rural tourism in China. Presently, the development stage and economic foundation in China determine the necessity of the development of rural tourism. It is an urgent task for us to construct the superstructure systems that will meet people’s yearnings for a better life and effectively improve the production and living standards of rural residents. While conforming to the construction of an ecological civilization, we should promote the development of rural tourism from the previous model of “tourism +,” in which the tourism industry connects other industries into a new trend of “+ tourism,” in which other industries integrate into the tourism industry.We should take thriving businesses as a measure, the high-quality development of rural tourism as the goal, “an eco-friendly environment” as the bottom line, and the increase of rural residents’ incomes as the central task to eliminate the dualistic urban-rural structure.

Policy-Related Suggestions

Considering the current trend of the generalized idea of tourism in rural tourism, we offer four suggestions.

First, guided by the principle of integrity, high-quality planning plays a leading role in the development of rural tourism. The principle of integrity aims to explain that social systems have many parts. In terms of overall function, the ensemble has additionality and restricts the parts. To achieve the high-quality development of rural tourism, we need to take the leadership of the Communist Party of China in all respects as the most important guarantee, and strengthen the joint efforts of the CPC secretaries at five levels (provincial, municipal, county, town, village) in rural revitalization, give full play to the guiding role of the Communist Party of China in rural communities and the leading role of models and pioneers, connect and coordinate the development of rural tourism with policies and measures in various fields in rural areas, and integrate central and local efforts among different departments, to ensure that the plan of rural tourism is carried out in the right direction. This will not only create a good institutional environment for the high-quality development of rural tourism, but also make due contributions to stable economic development, the effective expansion of domestic demand, and the transformation of the development model. We should adhere to the principle of attaching equal importance to construction and management, protection and development, and infrastructure and service, put into effect the development philosophy of urban-rural integration, overall design and unity of multiple rules, and lay stress on the foresight, binding force, guidance and operability of the county-level rural-revitalization plan. The market plays a major role in thriving businesses, and the innovation of products establishes a market foundation for high-quality development. The innovation of rural-tourism products is not to simply imitate others or blindly follow suit. We should not only act with the requirements of the 14th Five-Year Plan to continually promote the construction of major rural-tourism villages and towns but also strictly adhere to the bottom line of ecological protection,cultural inheritance, and rural residents’ interests to accurately grasp the change of consumer’s demands. In this way, based on characteristic scenic spots, we can enlarge the use of information technology, accelerate the improvement of the supply system of rural-tourism products, and reduce the manifold waste caused by ineffective supply (Qiao et al., 2010). We should also focus on bolstering seamless connections between popular rural tourism projects and high-quality tourist routes. Grounded in resources concerning “agriculture, rural areas, and rural residents,” we can innovate rural tourism by highlighting the ecological and cultural charm of rural areas, develop new product forms, such as rural homestays, rural health care, high-quality vacation resorts, local experience projects, creative agriculture, agricultural research, and ecological camping according to local conditions, and integrate the orientation of the tourist market and the expansion of the tourism market. Therefore, we can change the scattered distribution of tourism resources by co-building regional rural-tourism brands together with adjacent villages and intensively publicizing rural tourism.

Second, guided by the principle of structuralism, the implementation of precise policies can promote the development of rural tourism. The principle of structuralism intends to explain that the structure of social systems determines the function of the system, that a change in the structure determines the change of the function, and that adjustments to the employment structure help to realize functional optimization. To achieve the high-quality development of rural tourism, we should adhere to the core philosophy of the optimal allocation of resources and advantage-based development.According to the multi-level, diversified, and high-grade characteristics of regional rural-tourism resources and the targeted demands of local tourism development,we should correctly deal with the relationships between the development of ruraltourism resources and the layout of the primary industry productivity in the region to prioritize the advantage-based development of each local tourism economy. Based on the overall characteristics of the diversity of rural areas in China, we should follow the development laws in different villages and take and implement measures according to local conditions in order to promote the “wild goose array layout” of villages that belong to agglomeration and upgrading types, urban-suburb integration types, special protection types, demolition, and merger types. Spatial agglomeration is an important guarantee for thriving businesses and an effective means of preventing the disorderly development of rural tourism (Wang and Guo, 2010). With the influx of social capital and the urgency of village-town development, rural tourism is springing up all over the country, which counts against the spatial agglomeration of industrial factors and the realization of the scale effect. Spatial agglomeration can boost the transformation and upgrading of ruraltourism industrial structures (Zhang, 2019), guide industrial factors to flow to rural areas with obvious resource advantages and mature industrial conditions, enlarge the popularity of rural areas via the construction of tourism brands, improve industrial scale levels and competitiveness, avoid disorderly development, excessive development and repeated construction, and vigorously transform the “temporary beauty” and “local beauty” into “everlasting beauty” and “overall beauty” of rural areas. We should also respect the willingness of rural residents and give full play to their role, strengthen the construction of rural tourism professional training teams via talent-introduction policies,establish a sustainable, effective, and all-round training mechanism, improve the service capacity and level of rural tourism, and promote the high-quality development of rural tourism. In terms of ecological environments, we often rely on original ecological patterns and develop rural tourism along the mountains, rivers, and green belts. Therefore, we should strive to form a cross-regional natural system and deeply integrate the natural systems with a spatial landscape in rural tourism, strictly control the development intensity of rural tourism and the land scale for tourism plans and construction, and build a more targeted regional integrated ecological green chain.

Third, guided by the principle of hierarchy, deepening rural reform in all areas invigorates the market. The principle of hierarchy specifically sets forth the common movement laws and special movement laws of various levels in social systems. In practice,we should avoid theex parteunderstanding of reductionism and ensure the coordinated and orderly state of various levels in social systems. We should resolutely implement the requirements for comprehensively promoting rural revitalization, respect the objective laws for the development of rural-tourism markets, clarify the relationships between rural-tourism markets and governments at all levels, fully stimulate the market potential,guide the restructuring and adjustment of industrial layouts with the market, and improve the development mechanisms and operation systems of rural tourism. To accelerate the activation of market factors, we should optimize the allocation of resources, revitalize all kinds of resources, raise the utilization efficiency of resources, and advance the reform of the rural collective property rights system. We should effectively activate market entities,enhance human capital and technological and organizational advantages, cultivate newtype rural-tourism operators and build a new-type socialized service system. For rural areas that lack resources and market factors, we need to strengthen the top-level strategic design and coordinate the multi-level plans, stimulate the development vitality of rural areas and rural residents, encourage rural residents to find jobs or start businesses in local areas, and take multiple measures to guide tourism entities and resources to return to rural areas with the opportunity of the development of rural tourism. These changes and upgrades are a prerequisite for smoothly realizing agricultural and rural modernization and rural revitalization. It is noteworthy that land provides the basic means of production for the development of rural tourism, constitutes the source of production and development, and guarantees the life of rural residents in a fundamental way. Revitalizing land resources is the cornerstone of rural development, by which we can accelerate the establishment of a property rights system with clarified rights and responsibilities,effectively re-organize various rural production factors, and improve the utilization efficiency of various factors.

Fourth, guided by the principle of openness, the integration of diversified industries supports the development of rural tourism. From the perspective of openness, social systems can effectively exchange and integrate with external systems in terms of natural factors, information, and human factors and constantly maintain and update their own structure. Achieving the high-quality development of rural tourism requires us to dialectically understand the view that industrial integration functions as a driving force for the upgrading of industrial development and is an important way to solve the problems of single industrial structures and weak internal potentials of rural tourism in China.The development of tourism calls for the support and drive of other industries, as well as favorable and stable external environments and policy-making space. The sustainable

vitality of rural-tourism development lies in the continuous integration and innovation in other industries. In the development of rural tourism, the single traditional business models, e.g., “tasting food in rural families,” “sightseeing at farmland,” and “living in the farmyard,” prove inadequate and unsustainable. Therefore, we should take industrial integration as a means of expanding the industrial structure and internal force of rural tourism. By focusing on a rural-scenery complex, characteristic towns, industrial parks,and other tourism elements, we can inherit and propagate an excellent agricultural farming culture, strengthen the innovation of systems, technologies, and business models and enormously raise total factor productivity and product added value with the emphasis on the protection of rural resources and environments as well as the increase of rural residents’ incomes. Besides, we need to constantly tap the diversity of local cultures,promote the whole-chain organic integration and development of diversified industries,such as agricultural tourism, cultural tourism, forest tourism, industry-supported tourism, and finance-supported tourism, continuously enhance industrial dependence and integration, and further extend the industrial chain of rural tourism (the downstream industry in particular) (Jiang and Li, 2020). We should continue to optimize the supply of rural-tourism products, tap new business forms, new sites, and new highlights in rural tourism, promote the development of the whole industrial chain of rural tourism, advance the construction of rural-tourism infrastructure, strengthen the support from ruraltourism talents, quicken the development of innovative, unique, flexible and extensible rural-tourism resources, and unique foreground cultural (e.g., folk customs) and ecological elements of rural tourism to attract more tourists. Finally, we should recognize the complementarity of diverse supply chains of urban-rural tourism resources, understand the practical needs of tourists (especially young tourists), and develop new interactive models for rural tourism. In this way, tourists can deeply participate in the whole-chain rural tourism development.