Digital Inequalities and E-Commerce Adoption in China: Polarization Patterns and Dynamics of Taobao Villages

This study analyzes digital inequalities in e-commerce adoption through the lens of polarization theory. We examine differences in socioeconomic and geographical conditions across e-commerce adoption areas, identify two e-commerce development regimes characterized as core and periphery, and subsequently explore the e-commerce adoption process within them and in relation to economic zones. At the village level, increased adoption in the periphery indicates an incipient polarization reversal, shaped by manufacturing and agricultural conditions. Besides, both between-regime dispersion and within-regime disparities increase over the period. At the macroregional scale, a pronounced core–periphery structure of e-commerce adoption persists, broadly consistent with the socioeconomic hierarchy, although there are signs of a nascent polarization reversal across regions. We propose that differences in socioeconomic and geographical conditions generate polarization patterns, which in turn shape inequalities in e-commerce adoption, with a possible polarization reversal in this process. Our work contributes to debates in economic geography by rethinking polarization theory in the digital economy era and advances the understanding of digital inequalities by incorporating spatiotemporal concerns.