Village governments were once a dynamic force in China. Back in the early days of economic reform, when policy was guided by pragmatism, pilot projects were tested out in villages, which are at the lowest level of the Chinese government hierarchy. Breakthrough reforms, such as land reform and democratic elections, were all implemented in this vast experimental field. Such pilot schemes launched in villages between the late 1970s and the 2000s are perhaps best encapsulated in the saying “crossing the river by feeling the stones”. However, the glory days of rural governments are long gone. Researching and tracing the steps of village governments, I found that the overall number of these governments fell by more than 10 per cent in the last decade. More than 58,000 village-level governments have disappeared. The findings are more surprising if we scrutinise their geographic distribution. The decline of rural governments is mainly seen in a few provinces, such as Hunan, Shaanxi, Shandong and Zhejiang. Provinces in China’s central region seem to be endeavouring to break free from the shackles of villages – but why? An explanation that is often cited and not questioned is population loss: as the story often goes, the administrative bodies of these villages are simply dismantled as more people move out. In a few areas, it is probably the case that internal migration is resulting in the demise of the village. In 2014, the Shaanxi provincial government asked the northern region of the province to integrate villages of fewer than 800 people ; 160 village governments were eliminated after that. To reduce administrative costs, it does make sense to merge the villages with small populations. However, this serves as a sound explanation only for a few scenarios. It cannot explain the entire trend. Using gridded population data from the Centre for International Earth Science Information Network, we can easily observe that population declines have been most pronounced in provincial-level jurisdictions such as Sichuan, Chongqing and Hubei . Thus, it seems changes to local governments cannot simply be attributed to internal migration. The areas where rural governments are shrinking are not the areas with net outflows of people. If the adjustments to basic administrative divisions are not actually determined by population movements, then what are they determined by? In China, urbanisation, as it turns out, is not only a fact of development, it can also be a political act. All across the country, there has been a campaign to merge villages into urban communities and turn villagers into urban residents. Through measures such as merging existing villages, establishing new urban communities, and letting farmers live in apartments, villages can be transformed into urban areas. China’s ‘common prosperity’ goal won’t mean Robin Hood-style redistribution Consequently, several rural governments are consolidated to form one urban government. This urbanisation campaign is currently being rolled out in all of China’s provinces except Inner Mongolia. The high-sounding reasons for the policy include improving not only governance but also the efficiency of land use. After the mandatory urbanisation of rural areas, ideally, public services, such as medical care and education, can be provided more efficiently. In some cases, communities have truly benefited from better sewage pipeline networks, public security and even central heating systems. Public services such as medical care are also accessible to these communities. However, this compulsory urbanisation does not always improve the qualify of life. In mountainous areas, life has become more inconvenient for villagers who became urban residents. In a village in the city of Yulin in Shaanxi, it used to take only half an hour to walk to the village committee. Now that the village has been merged with another, a resident seeking government help has to travel one hour by motorcycle. Consequently, the government has become less accessible to the masses. Urbanisation is clearly a double-edged sword, so why are policymakers so keen to implement it? One reason might be the lure of a windfall. Following a tax-sharing scheme introduced in 1994, the sale of land use rights became the most important source of revenue for city governments. In the absence of other reliable resources, cities can only depend on land sales. In some places, the dependence on land revenue is over 100 per cent; land revenue has already exceeded taxation as a source of revenue. ‘Heartbroken’ rural residents decry China’s local government evictions Since the 2010s, with land in cities fully exploited, exploring and integrating vast tracts of rural land has become the next best option. By merging villages and moving farmers into apartments, governments can easily obtain more land. This phenomenon has become even more prevalent in the central region of China, which usually has an unfavourable investment and business environment. Lacking appeal, land in this region fetches far lower prices than that in coastal cities. This is why governments are able to raise their revenue by merging more villages and auctioning off rural land. Although villages are increasingly being merged into large urban communities, it is still unclear how the diminishing of rural governments is conducive to the country’s development. However, one thing is certain: if residents are not drawn back to these newly built urban communities, they might just become a new cluster of ghost towns. Han Wang is a PhD candidate in economic geography at London School of Economics and a consultant at Asian Development Bank. His research focuses on governance, inequality and social protections. His interest covers Asia and Europe