Does culture-tourism integration policy enhance urban ecological resilience? Evidence from a multi-period difference-in-differences analysis of Chinese cities

Objective: Global climate change and intensive human activities have posed escalating threats to urban ecosystem stability, underlining the critical role of strengthening ecological resilience in safeguarding environmental health and sustainable urban development. However, whether comprehensive industrial policies such as culture-tourism integration can effectively enhance ecological resilience remains insufficiently examined, particularly through causal inference approaches. Methods: Using panel data from 284 prefecture-level cities in China spanning 2010-2023, this study employs a multi-period difference-in-differences design as the core identification strategy to investigate the impact of culture-tourism integration policies on urban ecological resilience. A battery of robustness checks including PSM-DID, placebo tests, instrumental variable estimation, and double machine learning are adopted to support the reliability and plausibility of the results. Results: The results demonstrate that these policies significantly enhance urban ecological resilience, and this conclusion remains robust across multiple specifications. Mechanism analysis reveals that culture-tourism integration policies operate via three potential transmission channels: industrial structure upgrading, green technology innovation, and increased public environmental awareness. Heterogeneity analysis further reveals that the policy effects are statistically significant across all regions but exhibit greater marginal effects in central and western regions; the effects are more pronounced in non-designated historical and cultural cities and in higher-tier cities such as municipalities and provincial capitals. Conclusion: These findings provide robust empirical evidence that integrated culture-tourism strategies can synergize economic growth and ecological conservation, may generate public health co-benefits and have potential implications for environmental health. This study yields important policy implications for environmental health governance and sustainable development in emerging economies in alignment with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.