Patronage and Power: Local State Networks and Party-State Resilience in Rural China
Ben Hillman
Language: English
Pages: 216
ISBN: 0804789363
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
While many observers of Chinese politics have recognized the importance of informal institutions, this book explains how informal local groups actually operate, paying special attention to the role of patronage networks in political decision-making, political competition, and official corruption. While patronage networks are often seen as a parasite on the formal institutions of state, Hillman shows that patronage politics actually help China's political system function. In a system characterized by fragmented authority, personal power relations, and bureaucratic indiscipline, patronage networks play a critical role in facilitating policy coordination and bureaucratic bargaining. They also help to regulate political competition within the state, which reduces the potential for open conflict. Understanding patronage networks is essential for understanding the resilience of the Chinese state through decades of change.
Power and Patronage is filled with rich and fascinating accounts of the machinations of patronage networks and their role in the ruthless and sometimes violent competition for political power.
enterprises and by promoting private industry that could be taxed. Scholars working in these regions identified a “developmental” local state motivated to provide the conditions necessary for further industrialization and economic development.1 Subsequent case studies of China’s agricultural hinterland identified a very different type of local state. Without access to proceeds from industrialization, many rural counties and townships preyed on farmers by raising taxes and fees.2 The hardship
youth and elderly outreach activities supported by the Ministry of Civil Affairs.6 Special-purpose funds are usually allocated to specific bureaus for specific projects. In 2011, for example, Laxiang County was allocated a grant to earthquake-proof rural houses. A total of 4,150 houses were to receive a combined total of 15.5 million yuan for retrofitting and reconstruction.7 The funds were provided by the central government’s Construction Bureau for management and implementation by county
Effects, and Institutionalism.” Pp. 143–64 in Walter W. Powell and Paul J. Dimaggio (eds.), The New Institutionalism in Organizational Analysis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991. Jia Hao and Lin Zhimin, eds. Changing Central-Local Relations in China: Reform and State Capacity. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1994. Jin, Hehui, Yingi Qian, and Barry Weingast. “Regional Decentralization and Fiscal Incentives: Federalism, Chinese Style.” Journal of Public Economics 89, issue 9–10 (Sept. 2005):
in China.” World Politics 48, no. 1 (Oct. 1995): 50–81. Mood, Michelle. “Opportunists, Predators and Rogues: The Role of Local State Relations in Shaping Chinese Rural Development.” Journal of Agrarian Change 5, no. 2 (April 2005): 217–50. Nathan, Andrew. “Authoritarian Resilience.” Journal of Democracy 14, no. 1 (Jan. 2003): 6–17. . “A Factionalism Model for CCP Politics.” China Quarterly 53 (Jan.–Mar. 1973): 33–66. Naughton, Barry. “The Western Development Program.” Pp. 254–95 in Barry
Solinger, Dorothy. Contending Citizenship in Urban China: Peasant Migrants, the State, and the Logic of the Market. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. . “Despite Decentralization: Disadvantages, Dependence and Ongoing Central Power in the Inland—The Case of Wuhan.” China Quarterly 145 (Mar. 1996): 1–34. Su, Fubing, and Dali L. Yang. “Political Institutions, Provincial Interests, and Resource Allocation in Reformist China.” Journal of Contemporary China 9, no. 24 (2000): 215–30.