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Chinese-style modernization has led to new requirements for city clusters strategies, which is highly important for the high-quality development (HQD) of city clusters and new urbanization. Based on the basic connotation of Chinese-style modernization, an evaluation index system for the HQD of city clusters is constructed from five dimensions, namely, demographic advantages, coordinated regional development, material and cultural-ethical advancement, ecological sustainability, and opening-up. The HQD of 19 city clusters was measured from 2011 to 2021 using the entropy weight-CRITIC method, and the dynamic evolution, spatial correlation and long-term trend were analyzed. The study revealed that (1) the overall HQD of Chinese city clusters has shown continuous growth, and the spatial distribution of the gradient of HQD in the 'East, Center and West' has decreased, but the spatial pattern of 'South High and North Low' has further emerged. (2) The overall and intra-regional differences in the HQD of city clusters gradually narrowed, while the differences between city clusters remained significant. (3) The HQD of city clusters shows obvious positive spatial correlation and obvious spatial agglomeration characteristics, with high-value agglomerations mostly in mature-stage city clusters along the east coast. (4) There is an obvious 'club convergence' phenomenon in the HQD of city clusters; the higher the HQD of neighboring regions is, the greater the probability of upward HQD of city clusters, and the higher the quality of Chinese city clusters shows an upward trend in the long run.
Li et al. (Mon,) studied this question.