Research on the Evaluation and Spatial Characteristics of China’s Provincial Socioeconomic Development and Pollution Control Based on the Lotka–Volterra Model

Aims: To evaluate the degree of mutualism between socioeconomic development and industrial and domestic pollution in provinces of China and to analyze the differences in spatial characteristics between their regions. Methods: This study used the HDI to measure socioeconomic development and the Lotka–Volterra model to group and estimate the force-on and mutualism degree indexes of industrial and domestic pollution and socioeconomic development in 31 provinces of China, which were then used to them. Then, the study calculated the global and local Moran’s I under different space weights matrices to analyze their spatial autocorrelation and heterogeneity. Results: The research showed that in 2016–2020, compared with 2011–2015, the number of provinces where socioeconomic development and industrial pollution control mutually promoted each other was approximately the same, while the number of provinces that promoted each other’s effectiveness with domestic pollution control was reduced. There were many provinces with industrial pollution ranked in the S-level, while most provinces placed a different emphasis on industrial and domestic pollution control. The rank in China tended to be spatially balanced in 2016–2020. There was a negative spatial autocorrelation between the ranks of most provinces and neighboring provinces in 2011–2020. The ranks of some eastern provinces showed a phenomenon of a high–high agglomeration, while the ranks of provinces in the western region were dominated by a high–low agglomeration.