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Alrite, Here's an article (essay, morelike) I penned some time ago on China's fiscal reforms post-1980, and central-local interactions thereof as part of my study on Chinese economics, posted exclusively here for your reading pleasure and feedback.
Do not reproduce w/out permission. Article protected by the 'Rage-will-bash-your-head-in' Act.
The saga of post-1980’s Chinese fiscal reforms is an interesting one. Not only does it represent a pivotal point in Chinese economic and political history, it constitutes a novel approach in linear intra-state engagement for post-command economy countries and carries far-reaching implications for states confronted with that crucial dilemma of reconciling a centrist, command economy system with what is largely decentralized, free market-style economic liberalization. Prior to the fiscal reforms and the attendant ‘cadre evaluation system’, China was a unitary political state, with decisions- key economic as well as political, handed down from the centre (Tsai and Youqiang 71). The 1980’s fiscal reforms saw a revolution in this geospatial political and economic structure: with increasing power and decision-making capability transferred to the states. What brought about this change? What were its key features? Why was it so significant? What did the Centre, and the states, stand to gain? This paper aims to posit answers to such questions, and hypothesizes that: while the 1980’s fiscal reforms sought to delegate increasingly facultative and selective fiscal powers to the states, and represented some erosion in the centre’s ascendancy, control and directive prerogative, the concessions actually pandered to the Centre’s interests more than it did to the states’, and eventually sought to benefit the Centre’s agenda of economic reform and rapid economic development more than any presumptive anticipation of economic and political decentralization.
Do not reproduce w/out permission. Article protected by the 'Rage-will-bash-your-head-in' Act.
Centriole Cynosure: Central –Local Interactions In post-1980 Chinese Fiscal Reforms
The saga of post-1980’s Chinese fiscal reforms is an interesting one. Not only does it represent a pivotal point in Chinese economic and political history, it constitutes a novel approach in linear intra-state engagement for post-command economy countries and carries far-reaching implications for states confronted with that crucial dilemma of reconciling a centrist, command economy system with what is largely decentralized, free market-style economic liberalization. Prior to the fiscal reforms and the attendant ‘cadre evaluation system’, China was a unitary political state, with decisions- key economic as well as political, handed down from the centre (Tsai and Youqiang 71). The 1980’s fiscal reforms saw a revolution in this geospatial political and economic structure: with increasing power and decision-making capability transferred to the states. What brought about this change? What were its key features? Why was it so significant? What did the Centre, and the states, stand to gain? This paper aims to posit answers to such questions, and hypothesizes that: while the 1980’s fiscal reforms sought to delegate increasingly facultative and selective fiscal powers to the states, and represented some erosion in the centre’s ascendancy, control and directive prerogative, the concessions actually pandered to the Centre’s interests more than it did to the states’, and eventually sought to benefit the Centre’s agenda of economic reform and rapid economic development more than any presumptive anticipation of economic and political decentralization.
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