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This paper examines the development of government-business relations in China’s recent economic reform and development. The paper first provides a review of theoretical issues about the role of government in economic development and the concepts of business promotion and government regulation. Next, the paper introduces major policies and changes that have been developed by the Chinese government. On the business promotion side, it includes major changes in incentive policy, government structure, and management operation that have been implemented during the reform years. On the government regulation side, the paper identifies new challenging issues in consumer, environment, and labor protection that may affect China’s future development. Finally, lessons and implications about the development of Chinese government-business relations are emphasized in the conclusion section.

Wonders whether, owing to severely restricted access, China’s government policy towards digital communications will remain in a constant state of flux – or will it gain economic benefits without a social penalty? Concludes that China has to link the forces of change to channel and deflect domestic resistance.

This paper aims to explore the relationship between ethical self-fashioning and citizenship practices in the ongoing revival of “Chinese Traditional Culture” pursued in tandem by the party-state and by private actors in present-day China.

Adopting an anthropological approach, the author draws from three sets of resources: (1) research literature on China’s political history and key texts of early Chinese thought, (2) contemporary state discourses on citizen formation, and (3) participant observation notes and interviews with organizers and followers of the Wu-Wei School (a pseudonym). The author conducts a textual analysis of primary and secondary literature and a critical discourse analysis of the ethnographic data and examines emerging themes.

Firstly, the author identifies a crucial dimension in the historical and cultural roots of Chinese citizenship practices: an enduring conception that binds individual ethical self-improvement with socio-political flourishing. Secondly, examining contemporary state discourses on “citizen quality” and “reviving China’s outstanding traditional culture”, the author showcases how party-state authorities call on individuals to self-reform for national rejuvenation. Thirdly, the author investigates how members of the Wu-Wei School construe their individual pursuits of ethical self-improvement as significant for societal progress.

Based on these findings, the author demonstrates the ways in which autochthonous conceptions of Chinese citizenship give a central place to private acts of self-fashioning. The author argues that the entanglement between individual ethics and citizenship practices constitutes a crucial but largely understudied dimension of Chinese citizenship.

Using cointegration and Granger causality tests, examines the causal relationship between defence spending and economic growth in mainland China over the period 1950‐1991. The results show that defence spending is not cointegrated with the real economic growth rate, implying the lack of any long‐run equilibrium relationship between the two variables. In addition, Granger causality tests indicate causal independence between the two variables.

Since the late 1970s, Chinese policymakers have implemented many policies to reform their country's administrative systems for the purpose of promoting economic development. In the area of public budgeting and finance, reform policies have been introduced to improve China's taxation system, budgeting system and intergovernmental fiscal relations. The implementation of these policies has resulted in many changes and improvement to China's society and has also created new challenges to China's future development. This symposium introduction provides a brief review of the development of reform policies and a summary of five articles that examine China's revenue system, public expenditure structure, budgeting control, incentive policy, and education finance.

Through Chinese experience, the purpose of this paper is to underpin the hypothesis of institutional change as cultural change.

The paper compares Chinese postsocialist transformation to a chemical change reaction. So, the paper discerns initial conditions, factors which triggered the reaction, catalysts, and elements of synthesis. Chinese institutional change per se derived from a cultural shock induced by the economic, political, and cultural opening which acted as trigger. Then, it deals with the other elements of the process.

The paper reveals that Chinese postsocialist transformation is based on change in values and mentalities particularly in the Chinese Communist Party. In this perspective, institutional change is not only an economic or a political process but also it is fundamentally cultural.

This paper shows the process of postsocialist transformation in a different light. Whereas, economists often only focus on political considerations or conflicts of interests, it insists on the cultural dimension of the process.

The National People’s Congress (NPC) of People’s Republic of China, the highest organ of state power, is popularly seen as a rubber-stamp entity. However, it has been substantially evolving its roles to accommodate the governance discourses within China’s political system over the decades. This study aims to explore the changes of governance discourse of the NPC within China’s political system through which to offer a thorough understanding of the NPC’s evolving substantial role in current China.

This study deploys a historical approach to explore the changes of governance discourse of the NPC that has seen a growing importance in China’s political agenda, as argued by this study.

The authors find that the NPC has been substantially evolving its role within China’s political system in which the Chinese Communist Party has created different governance discourses. Besides, the NPC and its Standing Committee have asserted its authority as a substantial actor within China’s political system. The NPC is no longer functioned as a rubber-stamp institution, though it is still popularized as a rubber stamp by many scholars.

This study is a historical elaboration on the development of NPC under three governance discourses. It might be, to some extent, relatively descriptive in nature.

This study, therefore, sheds some light on a revisit on the governance discourses in current China.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors that affect the stability of interfirm trading ties in China's transitional economy. In particular, the paper explores whether the propensity to engage in repeat transactions with past partners is attributable to rational choice based on expectations for the benefits of social capital, or an outcome of institutional pressure that binds firms sharing similar positions within the institutional structure bequeathed from China's socialist past.

This study utilizes data on the actual trading ties between 32 final vehicle assemblers and 477 parts and components suppliers in the auto industry during the period from 1998 to 2005. Using logistic regression analysis, the study highlights the factors that lead to the greater likelihood of repeat transactions between a particular pair of assemblers and suppliers.

The result of the analysis suggests that while rational motives, such as transaction cost economization, do account for the propensity to engage in repeat transactions with past partners, it also confirms the persistence of a strong tendency to continue transacting with firms sharing similar institutional lineage, regardless of the benefits that could be accrued from such durable networks.

This study adds to the existing literature on social networks in China by highlighting the path‐dependency and institutional legacy in the formation of business networks during China's transition towards a market economy.

The purpose of this study is to investigate union effects on wages, employment, and productivity in China. The relationships between unionization and these three economic variables are first tested at the national level and then examined in the eastern, central, and western regions, respectively.

Provincial-level panel data from 1994 to 2014 are used in this study, compiled from various Chinese Statistics Year Books, and covering 29 provinces. The Ordinary Least Square is firstly employed to examine union impacts. Then, in view of the endogeneity of unionization, the Two-Stage Least Square estimation with instrument variables is adopted to reexamine union effects. Overidentification tests are conducted, verifying the validity of these instruments.

At the national level, Chinese unions have significantly positive effects on wages but no significant effect on employment and productivity. In the eastern region, unions are significantly related to increased employment. In the western region, union activity not only significantly promotes wages but also improves productivity. In the central region, unionization has no significant impact. These findings suggest that equipping Chinese unions with a collective and cooperative face can generally help them improve workers' interests. Their effectiveness varies across the three economic regions.

Compared with the survey data conducted in certain cities and industries, the provincial-level panel data used in this article have the advantage of capturing the overall effects of unionization. An instrument variable method is used to address the endogeneity issue. After exploring union effects at the national level, this paper focuses on observing the differences in union roles in three economic regions.

China′s market‐oriented reforms have brought about fundamental changes not just to its economy, but also to urban governance. The reforms have significantly changed urban development from its previous pattern which was largely determined by decision makers within the central government. Reform measures have transformed the role, functions and processes of urban government and have made them a force to be reckoned with in the whole reform endeavour. Examines and analyses issues of administrative reform at the urban government level in ten years of economic reform since 1979. Looks at three aspects of the problem – the trend towards financial decentralization; institutional changes in local administration; and changes in the relationship between urban government and the local economy. Argues that there is an unfinished agenda of administrative reform that needs to be faced by the authorities concerned if the mighty endeavour of economic reform is to succeed.