Understanding Local Agency in China’s Policy Reform

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xix

   PDF

2. Social Policy Reform and Local Agency in China

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 1-23

3. Authoritarian State, Growth Strategies, and Subnational Welfare Politics

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 25-67

4. The Pro-growth National Reforms: State-Led Commodification Before 2000s

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 69-89

5. The Return of the State? The New Reforms and Changing Local Agency

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 91-120

6. Limits of Fragmented Universalism: Local Agency in Healthcare

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 121-154

7. Asset-Based Welfare or Public Rental? Local Agency in Affordable Housing

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 155-196

8. Local Agency in Old-Age Care: Articulating State, Society, and Family

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 197-239

9. State Responsibility or Societal Participation? The Future of Authoritarian Social Policies

   • Xiaoye She

   Pages 241-255

10. Back Matter

    Pages 257-267

    PDF

This book challenges the common perception or assumption that greater state intervention and re-centralization will result in convergence towards a more equitable and inclusive growth model in China. Instead of asking whether local agency matters, this project examines the conditions and latitude of local agency under initial decentralization followed by increasing top-down re-centralization. The central argument is that in response to common policy directives and pressures from above, disparities in local growth strategies have interacted with political institutions in generating “embedded” sub-national welfare mix models, with varying articulations of state, market, community, and family in Chinese welfare production. The bottom-up feedback effects from these embedded models have somewhat offset growing top-down pressure for re-centralization, contributing to persistent sub-national variations. This author contributes to a growing literature of comparative political economythat seeks to examine the political and economic logics of social policy in non-western and authoritarian political systems. 

• Welfare
• Xi Jinping
• China’s Social Policy Reform
• China
• equity
• social justice

“The meticulously researched case studies in this book reveal the nuance and complexity of Chinese politics and the modern authoritarian welfare state. Xiaoye She challenges the outdated notion of an unchanging authoritarian welfare state that is all too often treated as an afterthought. Her refreshing focus on sub-national politics speaks to pressing debates about economic development paradigms. This is a must-read for anyone who wants to better understand the realities of Chinese politics today, and authoritarian regimes more broadly.” (Sarah Wilson Sokhey, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Colorado Boulder, USA)

• Department of Political Science, California State University San Marcos, San Marcos, USA

  Xiaoye She

Xiaoye She is Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science at California State University San Marcos, USA.

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