A river basin is a complex system of tributaries and a mainstream. It is vital to cooperatively manage the mainstream and the tributaries to alleviate water pollution and the ecological environment in the basin. On the other hand, existing research focuses primarily on upstream and downstream water pollution control mechanisms, ignoring coordinated control of the mainstream and tributaries, and does not consider the impacts of different environmental and economic conditions in each region on pollution control strategies. This study designed a differential game model for water pollution control in the Yellow River and two of its tributaries, taking regional differences into account and discussing the best pollution control strategies for each region under two scenarios: Nash noncooperative and cost-sharing mechanisms. Furthermore, the factors influencing regional differences in pollution control costs are analyzed, and their impacts on the cost-sharing mechanism of pollution control are discussed. The results show that: (1) The cost-sharing mechanism based on cooperative management can improve pollutant removal efficiency in the watershed and achieve Pareto improvement in environment and economy. (2) The greater the economic development pressure between the two tributaries, the fewer the effects of the cost-sharing mechanisms and the higher the proportion of pollution control costs paid by the mainstream government. (3) Industry water consumption, the proportion of the urban population to the total population at the end of the year, the value-added of secondary sectors as a percentage of regional GDP, the volume of industrial wastewater discharge, and granted patent applications all influence industrial wastewater pollution treatment investment. (4) The greater the coefficient of variation in pollution control costs between the two tributary areas, the less favorable the solution to water pollution management synergy. These findings can help governments in the basin regions negotiate cost-sharing arrangements.

Establishment of a watershed ecological compensation mechanism between multiple subjects is an effective means to realize the collaborative governance of water pollution and maintain the security of water ecology. This paper breaks through the conventional upstream and downstream perspectives of watershed ecological compensation design research and combines them with uncertainty factors. The watershed ecological compensation mechanism for the mainstream and branches was established based on the evolutionary game and the random process. Then, taking the midstream of the Yellow River as an example, some constraint conditions and influencing factors were explored. Results show that: (1) The branch government (i.e., the Shanxi provincial government) is the key to establishing an ecological compensation mechanism between the river mainstream and branches. (2) The proportion of pollution transferred by other branches, the initial probability and the random factors are the main factors affecting the decision-making of branch governments (Shanxi and Shaanxi provincial governments). (3) The compensation and reward of the mainstream government to the branch government and the compensation of the branch government to the mainstream government are the main factors affecting the decision-making of mainstream and branch governments (Shanxi–Henan provincial governments, Shaanxi–Henan provincial governments). The study may provide scientific guidance for the construction of a watershed ecological compensation mechanism between mainstream and multiple branches.

With the rapid development of mobile networks and citizen journalism, public opinion supervision has become an essential social supervision on engineering quality. They consider the dynamic characteristics of the spread process of public opinion and the game process of social supervision on engineering quality. The tripartite evolutionary game model of the government, contractors, and the public was constructed by coupling the Susceptible-Exposed-Infected-Removed (SEIR) model of public opinion spread and the evolutionary game model. Then, the influence laws of public opinion spread on the tripartite evolutionary game were analyzed and discussed through numerical simulation analysis. The results show that the public with more significant influence or authority is more able to restrain the quality behavior of government and contractors; increasing the probability of transforming ignorant into latent, the probability of converting latent into the communicator and topic derivation rate or reducing the direct immunization self-healing can improve the effectiveness of public opinion supervision; the true online public opinion can effectively restrain the quality behavior of contractors and urge the government to supervise actively. The research conclusions can provide a reference for improving the social supervision mechanism of engineering quality in the era of network citizen journalism.

Both water and sediment resource allocation are critical for achieving sustainable development in sediment-laden river basins. However, current understanding lacks a holistic perspective and fails to capture the inseparability of water and sediment. The Yellow River Basin (YRB) is the world’s most sediment-laden river, characterized by pronounced ecological fragility and uneven socio-economic development. This study introduces integrated water-sediment allocation frameworks for the YRB based on the perspective of the water-sediment nexus, aiming to regulate their impacts on socio-economic and ecological systems. The frameworks were established for both artificial units (e.g., irrigation zones and reservoirs) and geological units (e.g., the Jiziwan region, lower channels, and estuarine deltas) within the YRB. The common feature of the joint allocation of water and sediment across the five units lies in shaping a coordinated water–sediment relationship, though their focuses differ, including in-stream water-sediment processes and combinations, the utilization of water and sediment resources, and the constraints imposed by socio-economic and ecological systems on water-sediment distribution. In irrigation zones, the primary challenge lies in engineering-based control of inflow magnitude and spatiotemporal distribution for both water and sediment. In reservoir systems, effective management requires dynamic regulation through density current flushing and coordinated operations to achieve water-sediment balance. In the Jiziwan region, reconciling socio-economic development with ecological integrity requires establishing science-based thresholds for water and sediment use while ensuring a balance between utilization and protection. Along the lower channel, sustainable management depends on delineating zones for human activities and ecological preservation within floodplains. For deltaic systems, key strategies involve adjusting upstream sediment and refining depositional processes.

Horizontal ecological compensation represents a significant institutional innovation aimed at advancing ecological civilization and serves as a key functional strategy within China’s current management framework. This paper employs the horizontal ecological protection compensation agreement of the Yu-Lu section of the Yellow River Basin as a case study. Using a game theory model and theoretical analysis, the paper explores the underlying connotations, theoretical foundations, and legal characteristics of the basin’s horizontal ecological protection compensation mechanism. This analysis reveals several challenges within the existing horizontal ecological protection compensation system in the Yellow River Basin, including the predominance of a single compensation entity, unclear compensation standards, a compensation model limited to monetary transfers, and the absence of an effective dispute resolution mechanism. This paper further examines potential improvements to the horizontal ecological protection compensation framework in the Yellow River Basin from a legal system perspective, with the aim of addressing these practical challenges and fostering the region’s ecological, environmental, and economic development.