Objective/Meaning  The integrated development of rural areas across the Taiwan Strait is a crucial field for deepening the cross-strait integration. In this process, the government plays a core role, and its operational mechanism urgently needs to be systematically researched from the perspective of modern governance theory.

Methods/Procedures  Based on the analysis framework of governance network theory, Sanming City of Fujian Province, the first “Cross-Strait Rural Integration Development Pilot Zone” in China, was selected as a case study, and the role orientation and action path of the government in promoting the cross-strait rural integration were systematically examined in this paper.

Results/Conclusions The research showed that in the governance network of integrated development, the government transcended the role of a traditional manager and played the triple roles of “network builder and rule setter”, “network manager and resource integrator”, “network facilitator and service enabler”. Although the practices in Sanming City have achieved notable success, they still faced the systemic obstacles such as the network coordination failure, network management ineffectiveness and network participation imbalance. Therefore, it was necessary to systematically improve the governance efficiency of the government by reconstructing the high-level integrated governance mechanism, optimizing the precise empowerment-oriented service mechanism, and constructing the institutionalized multi-stakeholder co-governance mechanism, so as to provide theoretical reference and practical pathways for the cross-strait rural integration.