The Systemic Architecture of Sustainable Urban Vitality: Modelling Interdependencies in Citizens’ Perceptions of Future Cities

Cities are open adaptive systems in which territorial resources, governance arrangements, civic relationships, and social, economic, and environmental capabilities interact. Drawing on complex adaptive systems theory and urban vitalism, this study develops and tests a resource–capacity architecture of Perceived Sustainable Urban Vitality (PSUV). Survey data from 563 citizens were analysed using hierarchical partial least squares structural equation modelling with 10,000 bootstrap resamples. The model links citizens’ evaluations of territorial-resource attributes with institutional, civic, and adaptive-capacity domains and PSUV. Institutional Governance Capacity was associated with Adaptive Urban Capacity both directly and along an indirect sequence involving Collaborative Civic Capacity, while two serial indirect associations linked territorial-resource evaluations with PSUV. Adaptive Urban Capacity showed the strongest direct association with PSUV and explained approximately half of its variance. Additive and linear benchmark specifications achieved lower prediction errors, delimiting the forecasting scope of the proposed architecture. Its value lies in showing how resource and capacity domains are organised within a theoretically ordered system, providing an explanatory and diagnostic framework that can locate weaker connections and areas where intervention may be most relevant. The study thereby offers a systems-based basis for urban governance and citizen-centred place marketing.