The decision-making behavior of local governments is not isolated. Their policy responses are influenced by the actions of surrounding cities, creating complex patterns of policy diffusion across multiple levels of government. The “spatial turn” in policy diffusion research has yielded a valuable spatial perspective on intergovernmental interaction, offering a clearer understanding of local government decision-making processes. This article focuses on ride-hailing regulatory policies in 277 Chinese prefecture-level cities, using spatial econometric models that consider geographic, economic, and administrative distances. The study empirically analyzes the intergovernmental interactive decision-making and spatial diffusion patterns during policy adoption of local government. It is found that a significant positive spatial dependence exits in China’s ride-hailing regulatory policies. Horizontal diffusion reveals that local governments tend to follow cities with similar economic levels and adopt alternative policy content in alignment with cities at the same administrative level. Such decision-making interaction among peer governments amplifies the diffusion effect of top-down coercive mechanisms, while vertical diffusion from different sources exhibits overlapping influences. This article re-examines traditional policy diffusion theories and assumptions from a spatial perspective, contributing to a deeper understanding of local government agenda setting and policy adoption processes.

政策扩散过程中,地方政府决策并非彼此独立,周边城市的政策响应情况会影响地方政府的政策采纳,进而在多层级政府间产生复杂的政策扩散模式,空间转向的政策扩散为厘清地方政府决策行为提供了府际互动的空间视角。本文以277个中国地级城市的网约车监管政策为研究对象,通过分别引入地理距离、经济距离和行政距离的空间计量模型,实证分析了地方政府政策采纳过程中的府际互动决策行为与空间扩散模式。结果表明,中国网约车监管政策存在明显的正向空间依赖性特征,地方政府选择跟进经济水平相似的城市,并与相同行政层级的城市出台互补或替代性的政策内容。这种同级政府间的决策互动增强了自上而下的强制扩散效应,而不同来源的纵向扩散效应具有重叠性。本文从空间视角重新审视了传统的政策扩散理论与假设,有助于增进对地方政府议程设置和政策制定问题的理解。