Ben Hillman

• Australian National University

Under Xi Jinping, the Communist Party of China has systematically centralized decision-making power over a wide range of policy areas while strengthening the organizational capacity of Party institutions to implement the Party’s agenda. The Party has expanded its presence and influence across government agencies, private enterprise and non-profit o...

According to Communist Party discourse, China’s ‘New Era’ began when Xi Jinping was anointed Party boss in 2012. The shape of this New Era became eminently clear in 2023 when Xi commenced his third five-year term as General Secretary of the Party, a fortification of one-man authoritarian rule unprecedented in post-Mao China. Under Xi, the Party has...

During the past decade Xi Jinping has reasserted the Chinese Communist Party’s dominance of state and society, tightening political and social controls to consolidate the Party’s monopoly on political power in China. This volume brings leading China experts together to examine the changing mechanics of authoritarian rule in China, and the Party’s s...

In his first term (2012–2017), Xi Jinping’s signature domestic policy was an anti-corruption campaign that targeted political enemies and venality in public office. The anti-corruption work has continued in his second term while being superseded in domestic political importance by a campaign to “Sweep Away Black and Eliminate Evil (2018–2020).” On...

This article examines the urbanization of Tibet. We argue that urbanization is a new technique of colonial governance for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and is characterized by what Yen Le Espiritu calls ‘differential inclusion’: a form of forcible incorporation resulting in particular spaces and populati...

This article examines the impact of the legal candidate quota for women in Indonesia following the 2019 general elections. It argues that the legal candidate quota is working to increase women's numerical representation, even if progress is gradual and hard won. Second, it has become clear that the position of candidates on party lists is critical...

The Buddha Party: How the People's Republic of China Works to Define and Control Tibetan Buddhism. By John Powers. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017. xiv, 370 pp. ISBN: 9780199358151 (cloth, also available as e-book). - Volume 78 Issue 1 - Ben Hillman

The potential for gender quotas to increase women’s parliamentary representation has been the subject of intense scholarly interest around the world. Although, at a global level, quotas are believed to have contributed to a steady increase in women’s share of parliamentary seats, there is significant variation across regions and countries. The conv...

In recent years, governments across Asia and the Pacific have adopted gender quotas to increase women's representation in parliament. In 2003, Indonesia introduced a 30% gender quota that, over two election cycles, contributed to an increase in women's share of seats in the national parliament from 9 per cent to 18 per cent. In the most recent (201...

This chapter provides an analysis of Chinese government policies in the region and the role of local governments in formulating implementing state policies. The chapter asks why local governments have been unable to use decentralized powers to experiment with policies that address local grievances, in the same way that local governments in other pa...

This chapter reviews the recent wave of conflict and protest in Tibetan Xinjiang and outlines a framework for understanding the unrest.

Despite more than a decade of rapid economic development, rising living standards, and large-scale improvements in infrastructure and services, China’s western borderlands are awash in a wave of ethnic unrest not seen since the 1950s. Through on-the-ground interviews and firsthand observations, the international experts in this volume create an inv...

Chapter Four examines the hidden sinews of political power in the local state by examining the role of patronage networks in county and prefecture government. The chapter explains the origin of patronage networks in Poshan, tracing the configuration of present-day networks to the early post-Mao years of decentralization and economic reform. While a...

In a vivid portrayal of how kinship-based rivalries and personal networks influence township politics, Chapter Three provides an account of direct elections for the heads of two townships in Laxiang County (unlike almost all other parts of rural China, elections for township heads are held in Poshan due to an administrative anomaly). The fierce ele...

Chapter Five explains how networks compete over the control of fiscal transfers for rural development and poverty alleviation projects. The chapter demonstrates how patronage networks coordinate horizontally across Party and government agencies and vertically through the different tiers of sub-national government to channel resources to particular...

Chapter Six examines the politics of spoils in the rapidly growing local economy. The chapter explains how patronage networks influence local decision-making and resource allocation, and how such networks have been able to adapt to an increasingly sophisticated regulatory environment. By looking at public and private ventures in Poshan Prefecture's...

The final chapter reflects on the implications of the case study's findings for our understanding of local patterns of governance and political behavior in rural China today. It highlights the importance of understanding the unwritten rules of Chinese officialdom for understanding the resilience of the one-Party state. While patronage networks serv...

This chapter examines political institutions at the village level. While not formally a part of the state administration, the village is the basic unit of social organization in rural China and its politics affect not only the distribution of resources within the village, but also individuals’ relations with the state. And yet little is known about...

Chapter Two examines the changing dynamics between township government and village communities, paying special attention to the relationship between township and village leaders. Using interviews with village leaders, township officials, and local villagers, the chapter highlights the complexity of interests that connect the village and township. I...

This chapter argues that despite the voluminous literature on Chinese politics we actually know very little about how the Chinese one-Party state works, and how it has held together through decades of tumultuous social, economic and political change. In a political system in which personal power relations trump formal rules, the chapter argues that...

Drawing on more than a decade of fieldwork in a rural southwest China county, this book examines the unwritten rules of Chinese officialdom and suggests that these rules have helped to hold the one-Party state together during decades of tumultuous political, social, and economic change. While scholars have long recognized the importance of informal...

In contrast with China's coastal regions, where rural urbanisation has largely been a result of industrialisation, urbanisation in the once predominantly rural towns of the interior is sometimes driven by local government policies. This article focuses on a case study of Zhongdian (Shangri-la), where urbanisation has mainly been driven by tourism....

SUMMARY Post-conflict reconstruction programs increasingly include components designed to strengthen the performance of the public service and to support public sector reform. Although there is a growing body of literature on the relationship between public administration, and peace and development, there have been few case studies of donor efforts...

Since Indonesia's return to multiparty democracy in 1999, national law makers have introduced regulations that effectively ban ethnic or regionally based political parties. A major exception to the rule can be found in the province of Aceh where ethnic separatists were granted the right to form their own political party to contest local elections i...

Establishing legitimate political leadership through non-violent means is an essential step in the rebuilding of post-conflict societies. For this reason the successful holding of democratic elections is often seen as the crowning achievement of the peace process. In recent years, however, it has become clear that elections do not always guarantee...

Rebuilding and strengthening the essential functions of government is a critical aspect of peace-building and recovery after conflict. There is now a wide literature on the challenges of post-conflict state-building based on the international community's experiences in such places as Kosovo, East Timor, Iraq and Afghanistan. Much of this literature...

Using Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture as a case study, this article argues that local governance and local policies have had a major impact on local Tibetan economies and societies in China. It argues that a combination of liberal social policies and smart economic policies have helped Diqing to achieve both growth and stability in recent year...

This article explores the role of masculinity in articulating ethnic Tibetan identity in China. Based on interviews with Tibetans and Han Chinese in a Tibetan autonomous prefecture in China's southwest and on an examination of recent Chinese publications, the study explores the dialogue between Tibetans’ own perceptions of their ethnic identity and...

Wild Grass: Three Stories of Change in Modern China (Pantheon, 2004) looks at how an authoritarian government can keep up with the pressures for change from a rapidly modernizing society, where levels of education and prosperity are rising every day. Told through the eyes of three remarkably unremarkable people, the stories are also allegories for...

Until recently, Zhongdian County was a little known corner of Northwest Yunnan. All that changed when it began to call itself 'Shangri-la', the mythical paradise of the Tibetan Himalayas. On 17 December 2001, after years of intense lobbying by the county government, the State Council finally granted Zhongdian permission to officially rename itself...