Research on the coupling coordination of digital economy and urban green development in the Yangtze River Delta of China

Digital economy has become an important engine for promoting green development.The existing literature mainly analyzed the impact of digital economy on green development, but rarely examines the coordinated development relationship between the two. This study contributes to the literature by constructing a research framework for the coupling coordination of digital economy and urban green development, using entropy method, coupling coordination model, and spatial auto-correlation to examine the coordinated development relationship between the two.The results show that:(1) During the research period, the comprehensive level of digital economy and urban green development in the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) both showed an upward and consistent trend. The level of digital economy was significantly lower than that of green development, but the gap between the two continued to narrow. (2) The overall coupling coordination level between digital economy and green development in the 41 cities of YRD was relatively low but showing a continuous upward trend. It has undergone a transition from near imbalance to primary coordination, still with a long way to realize high-quality coordination. (3) The coupling coordination level of digital economy and urban green development in different regions of YRD showed spatial differences, the order from high to low was Shanghai, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Anhui province respectively. (4) The coupling coordination of digital economy and urban green development in the YRD exhibited significant spatial positive correlation and spatial dependence characteristics. The research results can provide a new perspective to promote the positive interaction between green development and digital economy.