Since the 1990s, global urban development has shown the trends of “cultural turn” and “tourism transformation”. Since the start of the 21st century, many cities have been upgrading from functional material cities to living culture cities (Lewis, 2005). This transformation reflects the law of urban development. The development of a city is not only a long-term process of material environmental construction, but also a long-term process of cultural development and civilization accumulation. When a city’s material civilization is built to a certain extent, the excessive materialization needs cultural harmony. The purpose of urban development is not only to increase the urban population, but also to gather the economic aggregates and wealth. Therefore, the essence of urban development is that the city can provide people with a kind of “valuable, meaningful, tasteful, dignified, and Dreamy” quality of life.

The Capital of Culture in East Asia is an important achievement of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in implementing the consensus of the leaders of three countries. It is a medium- and long-term cultural exchange and cooperation project jointly implemented by China, Japan, and South Korea. The project promotes mutual understanding and respect for each other's cultures through the exchange of culture, art, tourism and people, and ultimately maintains the peaceful development of Asia. Since 2013, China, Japan and South Korea have selected 21 cities in the three countries as the “Cultural Capitals of East Asia” (see Fig. 1). Therefore, the construction and development of the Capital of Culture in East Asia requires culture to lead the updating and upgrading of the urban hardware facilities and software environments. It also requires culture to enrich the urban cultural connotation, improve the urban cultural system, enhance the urban cultural quality, strengthen the urban cultural confidence, and promote the progress of urban civilization and urban economic prosperity. Through “influencing people with culture, benefiting people with culture, creating flourishing businesses with culture, thriving cities with culture, and making friends with culture”, the people will eventually enjoy more colorful and more diverse cultural resources and realize their new expectations for a better life.

The cities of the Capital of Culture in East Asia are all historical and cultural cities, and each one has a long history and deep cultural accumulation. They pay attention to ecological environmental protection. They regard green water and green mountains as golden mountains and silver mountains, and pursue the inheritance and protection of various historical and cultural tourism resources such as excellent historical and traditional culture, intangible cultural heritage, cultural relic resources and many others (Wu, 2017; Zhang and Jiang, 2011). This concept will be scientifically developed and utilized eventually. First and foremost, the Cultural Cities of East Asia should strengthen their protection and utilization of cultural relics. At present, the Capital of Culture in East Asia has formed a cultural protection system covering “protection consciousness, protection system, protection legislation, protection technology”. On the one hand, this system strengthens the management of national key cultural relic protection units, clarifies the value of cultural relics, and conducts targeted protection and management of cultural relics to ensure the integrity of the resource system. On the other hand, the cultural relics with the value of development and utilization should be used for rational protection tourism development. Cultural relics are not only exhibits, but also important carriers for cultural and historical learning and inheritance, and even foretell the formation of future cultural relic resources. Secondly, based on cultural resources, we should build a system of cultural and tourism products that keeps pace with the times, paying special attention to the activation and utilization of intangible cultural heritage, and develop various and multi-purpose cultural creative products.

On this basis, the urban culture of East Asian cultural cities and the culture between cities are still constantly being exchanged and promoting each other, and constantly developing new culture and future culture (Lv and Feng, 2014). For example, the Capital of Culture in East Asian cities of Jinan, Yantai, Zibo, Taiyuan and Wenzhou all share some common characteristics, such as keeping up with the times and carrying forward the past (see Fig. 2). These cities pay special attention to cultural exchange and the interaction and integration with East Asian countries such as Japan, Korea and others, and they also present trends of diversification, multi-level structuring and internationalization. In this process, some common cultural resources of China, Japan and Korea were excavated and highlighted, and they have become the most important cultural force for uniting the people in these three countries. For example, Cheongju, South Korea holds the “Chopstick Contest” and “Chopstick Festival” based on the cultural factors shared by China, Japan and Korea. Through the chopsticks, which are the prototype of the common culture of East Asia, Cheongju has become the center of the chopsticks culture in the world, promoting the living culture centered on chopsticks. The city of Nara, Japan invites young people to participate in the Three Kingdoms Chinese Character Cultural Circle for Chinese character cultural exchanges (Li, 2021). In addition, in the new historical era, there will be new common cultures, including new tourism cultures, new living cultures and cultural relics and cultures associated with the cultural capital of East Asia (Li and Song, 2020). For example, Quanzhou has set up “the Capital of Culture in East Asia Monument”, which carries a new culture and means the regeneration of East Asian cultural resources. This is the most active and vital cultural force in the Capital of Culture in East Asia. In short, there is a growing cultural consensus and common culture in the cultural capital of East Asia, and the international cultural influence of its brand and the attention of the international community are increasing. The Capital of Culture in East Asia displays the similarities and diversity of East Asian culture, drives cities and citizens to participate more actively in East Asian and international cultural cooperation, enhances mutual understanding and appreciation among the urban people of East Asian culture, promotes the people's recognition of East Asian culture, and thus forms more common cultures (Yang and Zhang, 2020).

Culture has always been the most flexible and penetrating part of the relationships between nations. It brings spiritual communication and communication across time and space to the people, and establishes a lasting spiritual bond. Since ancient times, “good-neighborly friendship, exchanges and mutual learning, and common development” have been the common aspirations and expectations of most people in China, Japan and Korea. East Asian Culture is a regional cultural brand, so the urban culture is first and foremost cultural regionalization. That is to say, urban culture originates from East Asia. It has an influence on the East Asian region and can represent East Asian culture externally, not just the local culture of a city. The result of cultural regionalization is the formation of the common culture in East Asia. The mother culture of this common culture can be derived from the culture of a certain city in China, Japan and South Korea. That is, the local culture of a city has risen to the level of the culture of East Asia. Common culture can also be a cultural form that emerged in China, Japan and South Korea at the same time. For example, contemporary tourism culture is the culture formed by the people of China, Japan and South Korea collectively in the process of tourism exchanges. This kind of culture does not come from a certain country, but it is a cultural form created by the three countries. The people who unite in a region mainly rely on this common culture to form common values, thereby establishing regional identity and a sense of regional belonging.

The accumulation of urban history and culture still plays an active role in contemporary life. It provides strong support for the recognition of urban features and urban development, and it also plays a very positive role in regulating the lives of citizens. The value of culture derives from emotional resonance (Tan, 2018). Only when the common culture of East Asia is integrated into the lives of the people can it arouse the emotional resonance and cultural convergence of the people from the three countries. Therefore, the life of urban culture is the implantation of “regional awareness” in China, Japan and South Korea, which then forms “regional values” and “regional vision”. This requires the Capital of Culture in East Asia to respect and retain the traces of citizens’ lives and other details, in order to maintain the aboriginal life patterns and interpersonal relationships. By enhancing citizens’ participation and experience in regional culture, the “local awareness” and “local vision” are elevated to “East Asian awareness” and “East Asian vision”, thereby forming a sense of identity and belonging to the East Asian region. In practice, the incorporation into daily life and popularization of urban culture has enabled the people to have more opportunities to participate in culture and get in touch with international culture. This increases the possibility of people’s cultural and artistic enjoyment, and enhances the citizen’s cultural awareness and self-confidence. According to the data provided by cities in Japan and South Korea, the cultural activities of Huimin, the cultural capital of East Asia, are huge with an annual average of millions of participants. In 2015, Niigata, Japan held a total of 120 related activities, including 42 cultural exchange projects, with nearly 1.23 million participants. In 2016, the opening event of the Cultural Capital of East Asia in Jeju, South Korea invited nearly 3000 performers from China, Japan and South Korea. In 2016, nearly 100 events were held in Nara, Japan, involving 1.27×10⁶ people. In 2016, nearly 9.0×10⁵ Ningbo citizens participated in more than 100 “Cultural Capitals of East Asia” activities. These examples are representative activities in each season, and the objects of these activities include citizens of all ages and cultural classes. In 2017, Changsha hosted more than 20 large-scale Capital of Culture in East Asia themed events, and participated in Japanese and South Korean Capital of Culture in East Asia events more than 10 times. It has conducted more than 40 cultural exchanges with more than 30 countries and international organizations, such as European Cultural Capital and ASEAN Cultural City. Nearly a thousand people have exchanged visits.

Tourism is an important way of urban cultural life in East Asia, and a kind of cultural life in essence. The seeking of similarities and differences in culture has driven a large number of tourism activities between China, Japan and South Korea. In addition, the Capital of Culture in East Asian cities are almost all excellent tourist cities in China. They attract large numbers of tourists, and have a remarkable effect on tourism. For example, after Quanzhou was selected as the cultural capital of East Asia, tourists and overseas Chinese came to Quanzhou to visit their relatives. The tourism income of Quanzhou has increased by leaps and bounds. Since 2014, the total tourism income and the number of tourists in Quanzhou have both increased by 16% every year. In July 2016, Changsha was elected as the cultural capital of East Asia, and received 1.292×10⁶ inbound visitors in 2017, a rise of 6.3% compared with the previous year. In 2018, 1.304×10⁶ inbound tourists were received, up 0.9% year-on-year; while China, Japan and South Korea received 181.87 thousand visitors, up 55.5% year-on-year, and inbound tourism revenue was 6.199×10⁸ yuan, up 19.99% year-on-year. Driven by the series of events in the Cultural Capital of East Asia and Internet celebrity Ips, such as “Xi’an Year • Most China” and “Chang’an Twelve Hours”, Xi’an received 1.75×10⁸ tourists from home and abroad during January to July 2019, a year-on-year increase of 21.46%. The total revenue of tourism was 1.7665×10¹¹ yuan, a year-on-year increase of 25.85%. The Year of Activity in the capital of East Asian culture brings an increase in the cultural exchanges in East Asia (see Fig. 3). In the massive tourist flow, tourists from the three countries form a new common culture, namely, new tourism culture, based on tourism behavior.

The regional cultural center is in the city, and urban culture needs space to carry it, which requires urban tourism to create cultural space consciously. The urban cultural space has the compound functions of cultural resource gathering, urban cultural display, and urban cultural production and consumption (Bao, 2003). At present, the cultural space of the Capital of Culture in East Asia is expanding continuously, and the development trend of cultural space production and agglomeration is obvious. For example, the proportions of cultural space in Shaoxing and Wenzhou have exceeded 60%. The first function of cultural space construction is to promote the gathering of cultural and travel enterprises in a certain spatial scope or the selling of products through a certain spatial carrier, so cultural space growth has the economic strength of industry support and sustainable development (see Fig. 4). Generally speaking, the number of cultural and tourism enterprises that are larger than the size of the cities in East Asia is relatively high, such as 713 in Wenzhou and 432 in Jinan. Moreover, the added value of culture and tourism is high, with Dunhuang reaching 60%. Secondly, the construction of cultural space needs to be based on the cultural characteristics and market demand, through the transformation of the system of signage, marketing plans and policy supply, so that it becomes a relatively concentrated space for cultural consumption in a city, which facilitates the convergence of various consumption modes such as literature, travel, commerce and maintenance. For example, Harbin promotes the deep integration of culture and the tourism, fashion, music, health, and sports industries through the joint construction of provinces and cities. However, the Yantai Library has set up a separate tourist information window, book zones in sister cities, and a living coffee bar in the cultural center, all of which are innovative and worthy of mention. In addition, through creative power, the urban public space, public facilities, environmental arts, architectural features, visual signs and other features are carefully designed, and the urban spatial resources are optimized and reconstructed; thus the urban cultural and tourism space quality and cultural grade can be improved.

Besides the traditional visitation forms of museums, cultural galleries and theatres, the production methods of urban cultural spaces are becoming more diversified, technological and novel (He and Cao, 2018). The first is scientific and technological displays, which activate cultural resources through virtual technology and artificial intelligence into live products with interactive functions, and at the same time they promote the modernization, technological and intelligent development of urban cultural facilities. For example, after Changsha was elected as a Capital of Culture in East Asia, the city opened the construction of the Binjiang Cultural Park venues, such as “Three Hall and One Hall”, Li Zijian Art Gallery, Meixi Lake International Cultural and Art Center, as well as major projects such as Tongguanyao International Cultural Tourism Resort, Malan Mountain Video Creation Industrial Park and the projects of the characteristic cultural industry park. The second production method for tourism utilization is to make scenic spots out of the cultural venues, former residences, etc., such as the Jin Ancestral Hall in Taiyuan Shanxi Province and the former residence of Lu Xun in Shaoxing, which will eventually become windows for helping citizens and tourists to understand the city’s culture. The third is life experience. Since cultural consumption does not necessarily separate the cultural resource area and the living area, urban cultural production and urban life can be integrated organically, especially in ancient urban areas, old blocks and so on, which need overall scientific protection of the cultural lives of the host and guest. Many cities rejuvenate the traditional cultural space, improve the utilization rate of the old cultural venues, and transform the historical culture into the contemporary social values. For example, developing a single street in Jinan’s Hanzaimen, an ancient county town in Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, etc., is a good way to combine the life of residents, tourism and cultural protection with production. Cultural creativity is the main means of urban cultural space production, using creative design to create cultural value and develop urban cultural creative industries, and to realize the integration of cultural production and cultural sales. For example, the Taoxichuan Creative Square in Jingdezhen, Zibo’s Porcelain Creative Park, and others, have a good blend of cultural production, cultural product exhibition and the leisure life of the main guest. All these have become the typical modes of production of cultural space in the Capital of Culture in East Asia.

Based on the “East Asian Vision”, the space construction of the Capital of Culture in East Asia should also highlight the East Asian cultural characteristics of the city, strengthen international exchanges, and improve the level of internationalization. The urban local culture is relatively conservative and closed, and lacks “East Asian vision”. Therefore, it is necessary to inject the connotation and characteristics of East Asian culture into the urban style, signage system, and urban landscape. We must build multilingual signage systems and improve foreign language service capabilities. Its space production should highlight the content production of East Asian culture. We should carry out regional cultural tourism activities in East Asia, build a series of cultural travel activity brands, and integrate more Japanese and Korean cultural activities and cultural travel services into our cultural tourism activities, so that the citizens can highlight the East Asian elements and experience East Asian cultural content in their daily cultural integration. In addition, we should also consider building a series of iconic projects in the Capital of Culture in East Asia to form a unique East Asian cultural landscape and promote the organic growth of urban cultural spaces(Liu and Byung-Ok, 2019; Qiu, 2019).

The Capital of Culture in East Asia is ultimately a kind of cultural city branding, which enhances the taste, value and competitiveness of urban culture through branding strategies (Wang, 2019; Yuan and Wang, 2021). This kind of brand covers at least two levels. The first is the urban local cultural brand based on local culture, which is mainly used for intra-regional competition; and the second is the urban regional cultural brand based on East Asian culture, which mainly responds to the needs of cultural competition between global regions. At present, in terms of urban local cultural branding, the media has massively reported and publicized the elections of the cultural capitals of East Asia. The exposure of the elected city has increased, tourism attraction has rapidly increased, and cultural influence has been widely spread due to tourism, all of which have greatly improved East Asian culture. Both tourism attraction and cultural influence have promoted the innovation and development of urban brands. For example, Ningbo has carried out cultural exchanges and tourism promotion around four cities, namely, the Capital of Culture in East Asia, City of Bookscent, City of Music, City of Film and Television and City of Creativity, which has made the brand effect of the Capital of Culture in East Asia gradually expand, and as a result the city’s cultural quality has continuously improved, and the city’s internationalization level improved significantly. Harbin, the cultural capital of East Asia in 2018, focused on creating urban brand images such as the Ice and Snow Pact, the Summer Capital Tour, and the City of Music. Xi’an has deepened the construction of six major cities as the World Cultural Capital and the World Tourism Fashion Capital. Shaping a new international image of Xi'an—a city of scholarly fragrance, a city of music, a city of museums, a city of conventions and exhibitions, a city of competitions, and a city of cultural creativity.

The greater value of the Capital of Culture in East Asia is its shaping of international cultural city brands and the formation of global influence and competitiveness. The establishment of international cultural city brands in the Capital of Culture in East Asia needs to be systematically promoted by several means. First, we must strengthen cultural exchanges between the city and East Asian countries to shape their urban brands. We must further strengthen international exchanges and cooperation, especially friendly exchanges with East Asian countries. In addition to economic and trade exchanges, we can deeply exploit the city’s historical and cultural advantages, carry out high-level cultural exchanges and raise the city’s international visibility. Second, we must strengthen the internationalization and modernization of important urban cultural facilities, as well as the maintenance and management of cultural relics and pavilions. Third, we should enhance the internationalization of urban tourism culture, strengthen the construction of East Asian cultural features and temperament, and strengthen the introduction and promotion of East Asian culture in important museums and famous tourist spots, especially in foreign language services. Fourth, through a deep understanding of the spirit and requirements of the Capital of Culture in East Asia construction, we must do a good job in the top-level design of urban culture and tourism construction, and also do a good job in the propaganda of the Capital of Culture in East Asia. We also need to guide the construction of culture and tourism in the whole city with the concept of the Capital of Culture in East Asia construction. We can comprehensively study and make effective use of the long histories of the cities, develop some tourism products that can better embody the East Asian cultural spirit, and promote cultural exchanges and development among East Asian cities. Finally, urban activity design should have distinct East Asian cultural themes and prominent features, and it should also have the characteristics, highlights, novelty and individuality that can shape the city, so that every city elected as a cultural capital of East Asia becomes a business card that can represent Chinese characteristics and interpret Chinese tradition and modern culture (Zhang and Han, 2008; Zhou, 2020).

Culture is the soul of city development. In evaluating a city’s comprehensive quality, in addition to the city’s cultural resources, the key point is to see the city’s humanistic spirit and cultural grade through the use of cultural values. The Capital of Culture in East Asia leads the high-quality development of cities in cultural features, urban cultural facilities, urban cultural travel space, urban cultural services, cultural life of the masses, and urban openness. The urban renewal of the Capital of Culture in East Asia needs to pay more attention to the humanistic “temperature” and “fireworks” of the city (Zhang et al., 2021). In accordance with the principle of continuing the pattern and the authenticity of the environmental context, we will improve the construction of the urban cultural system, enrich the cultural connotation of the city, and promote the progress of urban civilization and social prosperity. By enhancing cultural self-confidence, we will promote urban upgrading and accelerate the organic renewal and high-quality development of culturally-oriented cities. Finally, we will let the cultural capital of East Asia lead and promote the overall development of the city’s social economy.

The Capital of Culture in East Asia project conforms to the inherent and realistic needs for strengthening urban exchanges and cooperation among the three countries. The people of the three countries expand the supply of cultural products through cultural exchanges and cooperation. The cultural capital of East Asia has stimulated the awakening of each city's individuality. Each city will recognize its own strengths, roles and status in the entire East Asian culture. In the future, it will be urgent to build an exchange and cooperation platform for the cultural capital of East Asia, conduct exchanges and cooperation activities between the elected and candidate cities of the cultural capital of East Asia, provide opportunities for mutual appreciation and mutual learning, and promote the overall improvement in the development of the cultural capital of East Asia. Eventually, a network system of the cultural capitals of East Asia in China will be formed with “different characteristics, mutual learning and excellence, mutual coordination, joint marketing and consistent action”.