Abstract:Improving the land property rights system is an effective way to enhance the rural economy and resist the effects of rural decay caused by rapid urbanization. However, in many developing countries, farmers’ perception of the security and integrity of their allocated land rights, which is the core of farmers’ decision making, deviates from the forms stipulated by formal land property rights systems. China is no exception in this regard. Based on two household surveys conducted in Jiangsu, Jiangxi, and Liaoning Provinces in China, which cover 2014 and 2018 information, this paper uses an ologit model to explore the impact of the democratization level on farmers’ perception of land rights security and integrity and identifies the moderating effect of social network abundance. The results show that a higher democratization level of village governance enhances farmers’ perception of the effectiveness of land certificates and the integrity of the bundle of rights but exerts an insignificant impact on farmers’ perception of land reallocation. We also find that social network abundance has a moderating effect. Social network abundance weakens the effect of democratization level on the perception of certificate effectiveness but enhance its effect on the perception of rights integrity. Furthermore, our findings provide a reference for reforming rural land property rights systems and rural governance systems during the process of developing rural revitalization strategies.

       Keywords: Land property rights; Village governance; Democratization; Social network abundance; Rural China