A healthy community-protected area relation essentially relies on the fair and sustainable development of rural livelihood. In order to promote community's approval, acceptance of, and participation in the construction and management of protected areas, authorities gradually set store on community interest and continue complying livelihood transition with conservation. However, it is an under-explored domain that how community livelihood development progressed across different protected areas in China, especially when regional industry development is an important way of maintaining and improving rural livelihood because community people are actively engaged in diverse industry practice, managing production and operation, and participating in industry division. This research uses qualitative content analysis to induce the inherent logic of rural livelihood transition and industrial development of protected areas from case studies of different perspectives, geographic locations and policy background. Research papers were firstly searched in the CNKI journal database with the Research Topic covering "community", "livelihood" and "conservation" as at the same time. Only case studies of protected areas were selected and cases without enough information of livelihood transition or industrial development were further omitted. In total, 28 paper were used and about 30 cases were reviewed, covering a time range of 30 years and including different ecosystems. A grounded theory approach has been followed to produce six core categories of content, incentives, policy guarantee, outcomes, success/failure analysis, and development countermeasures. The relations among these categories have formed a dynamic pathway of community livelihood transition in the protected areas. Each of the categories has related concepts and facts to support this category. The core facts of the first five categories are summarised to motivation and forms, and outcomes and their causes. The sixth category is developed to provide principles of community livelihood transition and industrial development in protected areas. Finally, some suggestions are put forward to national park management according to its features and objectives. Research reveals that coordinating conservation and development at community level is basically a process of risk reduction, during which natural risks, policy risks and market risks should be controlled for rural households. The dual aims of sustainable and fair livelihood are realised through ecologicalisation of industries, partial substitution of industries or complete substitution. Results show that livelihood transition facilitated by industrial development can lead to not only economic benefits but also social and cultural benefits. However, to fully achieve these benefits, authorities should respect local culture, guarantee land use right of rural households, and encourage multi-party participation to allocate resources and activate market and civil power. Thus, policies and projects can be designed and implemented to match individuals and households with different capabilities, and capacity building is a more targeted process other than a universal one. During the construction of national parks, community livelihood development should rely on local resources, carter to market demands, promote industry ecologicalisation and expand traditional industrial functions. The final objective is to enhance transition of ecological and cultural values to economic values through a collaborated artificial and natural system.