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The power of policy networks in authoritarian regimes: Changing environmental policy in China: Teets
Abstract
In this article, I examine how civil society organizations (CSOs) in China created policy networks among government officials to change environmental policies. I contend that these networks work in similar ways to those in democracies, despite the focus in the literature on how policymaking in authoritarian regimes lacks societal participation. China adopted strict regulations to control CSOs by requiring registration with a supervisory agency. However, CSOs exploit the regulations to use the supervisory agency as an access point to policymakers whom they otherwise could not reach. I use case studies to demonstrate how the strategies used to construct policy networks determined their success in changing policy. This finding represents an initial step in theorizing bottom-up sources of policymaking in authoritarian regimes given that these regimes all create mechanisms for government control over CSOs, have difficulty accessing good information for policymaking from society, and a policy process formally closed to citizen participation.
... Personal relationships can sometimes substitute for similar beliefs at an individual level and work as shortcuts for actors to choose partners in an authoritarian setting. For example, strong personal connections can generate a greater feeling of responsibility and obligation to help one another achieve goals, even when the parties are not like-minded (Teets, 2018;Zhan & Tang, 2016). Indeed, actors with strong personal connections are more likely to form a collaboration, provide suggestions, deliver policy proposals, advocate policy changes, and influence policy outcomes (Mah & Hills, 2012;Silveira et al., 2016;Teets, 2018). ...
... For example, strong personal connections can generate a greater feeling of responsibility and obligation to help one another achieve goals, even when the parties are not like-minded (Teets, 2018;Zhan & Tang, 2016). Indeed, actors with strong personal connections are more likely to form a collaboration, provide suggestions, deliver policy proposals, advocate policy changes, and influence policy outcomes (Mah & Hills, 2012;Silveira et al., 2016;Teets, 2018). Moreover, personal connections are transferable through nodes (Teets, 2018), which indicates that actors can also collaborate with a broader range of others via interpersonal ties despite not having a direct connection. ...
... Indeed, actors with strong personal connections are more likely to form a collaboration, provide suggestions, deliver policy proposals, advocate policy changes, and influence policy outcomes (Mah & Hills, 2012;Silveira et al., 2016;Teets, 2018). Moreover, personal connections are transferable through nodes (Teets, 2018), which indicates that actors can also collaborate with a broader range of others via interpersonal ties despite not having a direct connection. ...
This article highlights the role of political context in shaping motivation of actors from the public sector, the private sector, and civil society to work together collaboratively. Most studies on motivations for collaborative governance come from Western, democratic contexts, and a comprehensive assessment of motivations in authoritarian contexts is missing. We bring political context in by investigating what motivates state and non-state actors to collaborate in China, a classic example of an authoritarian state. By conducting a systematic review of 264 empirical studies on collaborative governance in China published from 2006 to 2021, this paper reveals prevalent motivators including vertical commands, material-resource dependence, rules and regulations, legitimacy, economic benefits, and political resources; and uncommon motivators including asset specificity and share beliefs for both state and non-state actors in Chinese cases. We conclude by reflecting on the ways common theoretical frameworks, including transaction cost theory, resource dependence theory, the advocacy coalition framework, and social capital theory, explain motivations in China.
... However, in the Chinese context, environmental NGOs have managed to exert influence in the policy arena through formal and informal approaches (Cooper, 2006). Teets (2018) also found that social organizations can utilize supervisory agencies as access points to policymakers. Since GONGOs have easier access to domestic policymaking by leveraging their connections with the government (Çelebi, 2022), their cooperative characteristics within policy networks remain largely unexplored. ...
... As a popular approach for analysing policy networks, SNA stress the structural and relational aspects of networks (Kapucu et al., 2017). In contrast, the Advocacy Coalition Framework and its several strains emphasize the beliefs and interests of actors within policy network (Teets, 2018). Combined these two perspectives and follow the notion of Dowding (1995) that the triads of actors, relations, and power are essential to depict policy networks, we propose a 'Mission-Network-Influence' framework. ...
... In terms of network composition, Party and government institutions, particularly administrative departments, play a primary role. This reflects the asymmetrical power relations among various actors in China's policy network, wherein policymakers hold a privileged position vis-à-vis citizens (Teets, 2018). In terms of network structure, CAST serves as a bridge, facilitating cooperation between the government and civil society. ...
With changes in the governance environment, social organizations are increasingly involved in public affairs. Government-organized non-governmental organizations (GONGOs) is a unique type of social organizations positioned at the junction of the state and community. Although GONGOs are easily embedded in policy networks due to their close ties with the government, their operational dynamics within policy networks need to be further explored. This paper analyzes the case of the China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) under the 'Mission-Network-Influence' framework. We begin by examining the evolution of CAST's mission, and then conduct a social network analysis and content analysis of 272 policies jointly formulated by CAST and other agencies. Results show that GONGOs prioritize public service in their policies. They serve as bridges between the government and the third sector and can even play the leading role in certain policy domains. ARTICLE HISTORY
... In other words, can NGOs enjoy the same social recognition as members in the expert community for their knowledge contribution? Members of the expert community often acquire their expertise through their scientific knowledge, while in the case of Chinese NGOs, they focus more on reframing issues and increasing understanding of solutions instead of producing scientific knowledge (Hasmath and Hsu, 2014;Teets, 2018). NGOs in China do not enjoy the same level of recognition (by society) as expert members in the community, such as research institutes and universities, despite the fact that certain NGOs have already attained a certain level of knowledge in the conceptualization of the climate issue. ...
... Climate policymaking in China takes a top-down approach with the state at the center (Wang et al., 2018;Zhang, 2022), which makes the construction of policy networks especially important as NGOs lack other channels to access the policymaking process. NGOs constructing these networks exchange technical expertise and reliable information for policy access (Teets, 2018). Teets' study found that government agencies, NGOs, and the NGO's supervising unit are the "iron triangle" for policy networks. ...
... G:hub have achieved its policy objectives regarding China's overseas development policies regarding green finance. I found that G:hub used other ways to expand their networks with the key members of the Chinese climate expert community, in addition to exploit their relationships with their supervising unit in the government as the starting point for access as suggested by Teets (2018), such as by a joining cooperative platform and sharing resources between members of the NGO community. ...
This article examines the relationship between grassroots non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the authoritarian state of China in terms of mobilizingpolicy changes in response to the climate crisis. It focuses on the advocacystrategy of NGOs and seeks to explain how NGOs in China use their expertise asthe entry point to establish policy networks with the country’s most influential policymakers and experts. Greenovation Hub (G:hub) is the case study for this investigation. I used the policy networks framework to look into the interaction between G:hub and other experts. I discovered that mutually aligned policy objectives are the key for the effectiveness of NGOs’ expert advocacy strategy ofconstructing policy networks within the expert community in China. Cooperating with other experts can help NGOs create an “insider” role for themselves. In addition, this research also discussed the conditions for NGO inclusion. I found opportunities and limitations linked to the alignment of NGOs’ policy objectives with the state’s vision for climate policy. The research conducted by NGOs also faced rejection if it failed to identify the state’s priorities, highlighting the limitations of this approach. The significance of this finding is that the expertise strategy works for policy advocacy regardless of regime type, but that accessing policy networks are even more vital in a closed policymaking process. This case study further enhances the comprehension of the policy influence that NGOs have on the climatic effects of China’s overseas development policies.
... Our dataset provides evidence of structural exclusion of policy actors that do not belong to the executive or the governing party. Obstacles for participation include legal restrictions on advocacy groups and on the free flow of information through, for example, censorship and media control (Ba et al., 2022;Khayatzadeh-Mahani et al., 2017;Schlaufer et al., 2023;Schlaufer, Pilkina, et al., 2022;Teets, 2018). To illustrate, Tan (2007, p. 63) states that the Chinese government tends to "inhibit any mobilization that is not initiated by itself." ...
... Pholsim and Inaba (2022, p. 381) show how a think tank in Thailand strategically "conducted formal and informal dialogues with the central bureaucrats," which led to policy change. Teets (2018) argues that, in the context of China, civil society organizations (CSOs) operate in networks with state actors. While CSOs may not be able to change power relationships, they may be able to influence problem definition and agenda setting. ...
... While CSOs may not be able to change power relationships, they may be able to influence problem definition and agenda setting. Moreover, CSOs use regulation that is meant to control civil society to create personal connections with government officials and use this access to policy makers to influence policy change (Teets, 2018). Studies on CSOs in Russia (Bindman et al., 2019;Schlaufer, Pilkina, et al., 2022) show that organizations adhere to the official governmental discourse and attempt to keep a good relationship with government officials in order to influence policy. ...
The policy process frameworks and theories that are currently considered mainstream were originally developed in the United States, before traveling to other countries. Despite their roots in democratic values, these frameworks and theories are increasingly applied to autocracies. Given important differences between democracies and autocracies, this raises questions about the desirability, limitations, and future directions of this development. In response, this article synthesizes findings from studies that apply existing policy process frameworks and theories to autocracies with the aim of assessing the extent to which the theories are, can, and should be used to explain key aspects of the policy process in autocracies. Based on qualitative content analysis of 146 English‐language peer‐reviewed journal articles that apply the Advocacy Coalition Framework, the Multiple Streams Framework, the Narrative Policy Framework, and the Punctuated Equilibrium Theory to 39 autocracies, we show that these theories help identify influential institutions, actors, networks, ideas, beliefs, and events. The analysis reveals important differences in policy processes between autocracies and democracies. Future research ought to bring existing literature on authoritarianism and authoritarian politics into policy process research to test existing and new hypotheses.
... Second, society plays a role in influencing policy-making and environmental actions (Teets, 2018;C. Zhang, 2023;Zhu et al., 2023). ...
... The so-called authoritarianism is actually fragmented, allowing societal groups and individuals to influence the political process "by adopting strategies necessary to work within the structural and procedural constraints of the fragmented authoritarianism framework." (Mertha, 2009, p. 996) For example, Teets (2018) contends that civil society organization can access government officials to change environmental policies, challenging the previous understanding of authoritarian environmentalism. Civil activism is tolerated to monitor local officials and enhance accountability in environmental governance (Zhu et al., 2023). ...
... The tables are described through four components: (1) the coalitions, (2) the activities deployed to strengthen the capacity of a coalition to influence a public policy, (3) the activities deployed to influence a policy, and (4) external events that influence the dynamic of the policy-making process. • Non-government (Sengchaleun et al. 2021;Stensdal 2014;Zhan and Tang 2013) • NGOs, scholars, scientists, and media (Stensdal 2014) • Investment in knowledge acquisition and dissemination • Civil society organizations, NGOs (domestic and international), researchers, subnational government • Civil society organizations, media, and government allies (Teets 2018) • Business actors, local government, national commission, scholars • National institutes, NGOs, media, and scholars (Han et al. 2014) • ...
... The non-government coalitions bring together experts, journalists, civil society organizations, and/or residents (individuals who are the primary agents concerned by the policies), NGOs and/or international organizations (e.g., United Nations agencies) (Francesch-Huidobro and Mai 2012; Hu 2019; Sengchaleun et al. 2021;Stensdal 2014;Zhan and Tang 2013). The mixed coalitions are composed of government (e.g., ministries, local government) and non-government actors (e.g., civil society organizations, business actors, academia, and/or NGOs) (Guo et al. 2016;Han et al. 2014;Lee 2016;Li and Wong 2020;Teets 2018;Wong 2016aWong , 2016bXu and Pittock 2020;Zhou et al. 2021). One study allowed identifying the existence of policy brokers. ...
The Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) is a theoretical approach developed for the study of the emergence of public policies in pluralist countries. Little is known about the relevance of the framework for the study of policies in non-pluralist countries (NPCs). A review of the literature was conducted on the use of ACF in studies performed in NPCs. Nineteen documents were identified. They were based on studies conducted in China, Laos, and Vietnam. The results show that the ACF is a powerful theoretical approach for highlighting the dynamics of interactions between coalitions that exist in NPCs, as in pluralist countries, and for highlighting their specificity. ACF is a relevant tool for the study of the determinants of the emergence of public policies in NPCs.
... The competition for rights and resources among government departments encourages industrial associations to invest more into policy discourse and advocacy (Yan, 2018). NGOs can achieve policy interests by mobilising their relations with their superior department in charge (Teets, 2018). The mutual enhancement of vertical and horizontal networks between NGOs and local government can improve NGOs' policy advocacy (Wang and Zhang, 2014). ...
Drawing on data from the 2019 China Social Work Study, this study examines the main factors that influence social work non-governmental organisations’ (NGO) policy advocacy. To this end, it employs an analytical framework to assess the impact of both institutional (political embeddedness) and cultural (social networks) factors. The findings indicate that the overall level of NGOs’ policy advocacy in China is relatively subdued, encompassing both direct and indirect forms, and predominantly adopts an embedded approach, characterised by dependence on governmental support. Furthermore, elements of political embeddedness, such as experience as deputies to the National People’s Congress or members of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, involvement in party construction, receipt of government support and engagement in administrative affairs, were found to significantly enhance NGOs’ policy advocacy. This enhancement was notably more pronounced in both direct and indirect advocacy efforts. Additionally, social network factors, including relationships with universities, enterprises, hospitals, lawyers and association memberships, were identified as having a significant positive impact on direct policy advocacy. Moreover, the study reveals that the influence of political embeddedness on NGOs’ policy advocacy is stronger than that of social networks. Finally, organisational capacity factors, including organisational age, size, award, social media usage, information transparency and professional technical staff composition were identified as having a significant positive impact on policy advocacy. These insights suggest that NGOs could benefit from bolstering their connections with local governments, while also leveraging social networks to enhance their policy advocacy capabilities.
... In investigating the determinants of public social provision and outcomes in nondemocratic regimes, scholars mainly focus on the role of elections (Gandhi & Lust-Okar, 2009), legislatures (Williamson & Magaloni, 2020), party competition (Teo, 2019), and civil society organisations (Teets, 2017). According to these studies, policy concessions constitute a specific form of co-optation because they require nominally democratic institutions (e.g. ...
Empirical evidence suggests that contemporary authoritarian regimes face several incentives to redistribute social policy concessions to their citizens. Yet autocracies differ extensively in their capacity to implement policy decisions. In this article, we identify three distinct but interrelated mechanisms through which state capacity determines a more equal provision of social benefits and services in healthcare and education sectors. Administrative capacity allows the regime to manage the implementation of social policy, extractive capacity ties in with more resources and information to be used for the provision of social benefits and services, and coercive capacity permits the state to effectively enforce policies. Using static and dynamic regression models for over 120 countries from 1960 to 2016, our findings show that state capacity enhances social equality in authoritarian contexts through these three interrelated mechanisms. Further analysis though suggests that the overall effect of state capacity dissipates in the long run.
... Major international environmental NGOs, including the World Resource Institute (WRI), International Institute for Sustainable Development, ClientEarth, and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), have been frequent participants in conferences and research projects organized by these institutions [47]. Second, informal and private communication remains a popular, albeit often inconspicuous, way for transnational activists to make an impact on policy change in China [48]. Like the WRI, key positions in many transnational NGOs' China offices are often held by Chinese ex-government officials, and such personal ties help these organizations better understand the interests of relevant government agencies and design tailored engagement strategies. ...
... Unlike European countries and the United States of America, China, as a socialist country, has its own unique background. For example, in China, with its single ruling party, where the central government led by the Communist Party of China plays the pivotal role in policy formation (Guttman et al., 2018), a top-down and nonparticipatory policy environment (Teets, 2018) is the norm. China's political system is significantly different from multi-party systems, but this does not mean that policy network analysis is not applicable to studying the governance practices in China, in view of which, selecting empirical cases to conduct policy network analysis can undoubtedly make significant theoretical contributions. ...
The intercity ecological synergy regions are identified based on ecological networks. • Action objects are extracted through text analysis to build a policy network. • A policy network modeling method with superimposed action objects is proposed. • The structure and spatial characteristics of policy networks are quantitatively assessed. • Optimization suggestions are put forward from collaborative governance strategy. The development and governance of modern cities have gradually broken through the boundaries of administrative units. In recent times, with intercity ecological space becoming the focus of a series of development and conservation actions, identifying the intercity ecological synergy regions (maintaining connectivity within the ecological space to ensure the continuity of species migration and landscape) and realizing its collaborative governance has become extremely important to maintain sustainable regional development. Cross-border ecological governance involves many actors and forms a complex relationship network. At present, there are few quantitative evaluation methods for this problem, which limits our ability to manage the ecological space between cities. This paper uses the network method to establish and analyze the related ecological and policy networks in Shenzhen. The study results show that the ecological synergy regions are locally concentrated along the fringes of Shenzhen City, and the links between different levels of actors in the policy network are relatively weak. The action objects of ecological governance designated by different cities form convergence or divergence patterns, making it challenging to organize spatially integrated actions among different cities. Finally, suggestions for structural optimization are proposed concerning the policy network associated with the ecological synergy regions from the aspects of spatial implementation pathways and planning strategies.
... Government actors are important members of advocacy coalitions in various political systems but are dominant in some authoritarian regimes (Osei-Kojo et al., 2022). In China's party-state, the fragmented, multi-level, and often decentralized state structure for policy implementation is found to enable societal actors to identify government allies in pushing for policy changes (Mertha, 2009;Teets, 2018). In recent years, with more centralized control over local policy implementation by the party-center (Shen & Jiang, 2021), central-local governments are expected to share policy beliefs and coalition membership. ...
Drawing on a review of 112 Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) applications to China published during 2006–2022, this article finds that, consistent with ACF assumptions, policy processes in China are complex processes of top‐down decision making, horizontal negotiation, networked influence, and bottom‐up initiation. The review finds policy processes in many subsystems of China inconsistent with one implicit assumption of the framework: the difficulty of reconciling conflicting beliefs between warring coalitions. Compared with the results from a review of the English ACF applications to countries around the globe, policy‐oriented learning and imposition by a hierarchically superior jurisdiction were identified more frequently as pathways to policy change in reviewed applications to China. The Xi Jinping administration encourages between‐coalition learning and negotiation to pursue the ideal of building a well‐off and equitable society. At the same time, his top‐level reforms have changed the long‐time status quo in some subsystems by national policy reforms.
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... Some networks are constructed primarily through personal connections (guanxi), which leads to the expansion of policy networks across a wider range of actors. However, the level of commitment to policy change within these networks tends to vary [89]. Certain networks adopt a vertical structure, aiming to influence policymakers directly but lacking cooperation among non-state actors [90]. ...
... This work suggests that within the context of illiberal politics, some policy initiatives will foster social capital accumulation as an unintended consequence of policyinduced interactions among social forces and between the state and society. The intuition is confirmed by growing evidence of the accumulation of social capital, linked to specific policies such as housing (Borisova, Polishchuk, and Peresetsky 2014;Zhelnina 2020) or environmental protection (Teets 2018). The intuition also holds across different authoritarian contexts. ...
Can autocratic policy generate incentives for the accumulation of social capital and political engagement? This question is important to understand stability in authoritarian regimes that increasingly rely on governance to build legitimacy and social support. While existing research shows that the incentives for societal interaction embedded in policies can yield new forms of social capital and political engagement in democratic regimes, the top-down nature of policy and the corrupt and information-poor context of policy implementation could undermine this mechanism in authoritarian regimes. We explore this question by examining the effect of the Moscow Housing Renovation Program, a massive urban renewal project, that required residents to organize to obtain new housing. Comparing a matched sample of 1,300 residents living in buildings included and excluded from the program, we find that interactions induced by the program led to changes in the level of social capital among residents in included buildings. We also find spillover effects on political engagement and collective action against pension reform.
... Instead, they also need to acquire political support from groups outside the ruling coalition in order to strengthen their position in power (Geddes 1999;Gandhi and Przeworski 2007;Gandhi 2008). In doing so, rulers are not immune from groups' pressure and, under some circumstances, their preferences may even influence policy decisions in those contexts (Teets 2017;Steinberg and Shih 2012;Böhmelt 2015). ...
The literature on authoritarian regimes argues that societal participation is limited as the policy- making process is dominated by the ruler and access is restricted to the members of the ruling coalition (Boix and Svolik 2013; Svolik 2012). But recent studies and other contributions to this volume demonstrate that autocratic leaders do not govern in isolation. Instead, they also need to acquire political support from groups outside the ruling coalition in order to strengthen their position in power (Geddes 1999; Gandhi and Przeworski 2007; Gandhi 2008). In doing so, rulers are not immune from groups’ pressure and, under some circumstances, their preferences may even influence policy decisions in those contexts (Teets 2017; Steinberg and Shih 2012; Böhmelt 2015).
This chapter asks under which conditions nondemocratic regimes
develop routinized mechanisms for societal interest representation in
the policy- making process. By focusing on rulers’ need for informa-
tion, I analyze the conditions that facilitate interest groups’ access
under authoritarianism. I demonstrate that autocracies that legitimize their position in power by using claims of socioeconomic performance and democratic procedures need to collect more information about citizens’ preferences. This in turn creates more opportunities for civil society organizations (CSOs)1 to interact with public officials than in autocracies that rely on other sources of legitimation. Unlike the previous chapters in this section that shed light on outcomes in one policy area (land in Zimbabwe and social services in Russia and Belarus), I focus on the outcome of institutional changes creating consultative mechanisms, and argue that they are catalyzed by specific regime information needs and the ability of advocacy groups to provide this information.
... Despite the inadequacy of environmental policy network studies involving and mapping all relevant actors holistically, various studies have addressed the roles of civil society and social movements in Turkey's environmental policymaking (see Adaman and Arsel 2005;Paker et al. 2013;Özler and Obach 2018). In the international literature, although not with a focus on Turkey, it is possible to come across studies that deal with environmental policies within the scope of policy networks in different sample countries (see Daugbjerg 2002;Montpetit 2002;Teets 2017). ...
... Rather than openly opposing the state, many social organizations, including domestic and international grassroots NGOs, collaborate with the government, and they devote considerable energy to forging and taking advantage of formal and informal networking with authorities (Ho 2007;Noakes and Teets 2018;Saich 2000;Teets 2013). Whereas some researchers note approvingly that the collaborative strategy helps NGOs to improve governance and promote political pluralism (Teets 2018;Yang 2005), others argue that cooperation enables state control and cooptation (Dickson 2000;Kang and Han 2008). Still others focus on how such relationships both limit and enable activism (Ho 2007) and encourage the simultaneous expansion of civil society and the development of more indirect state control (Teets 2013). ...
China has become a land of social protests. Yet the Chinese state possesses considerable capacity and is rising on the world stage day by day. Why and how do Chinese people take to the streets? Where does their activism lead? This paper draws on a rich body of existing literature to provide an overview of the broad landscape of Chinese contentious politics and to dig deeper into a few common or emerging forms of social conflict. It then explores the various structural and political opportunity-based explanations for why protest occurs in China, before describing the ways in which different organizations and different framings of issues by citizens affect how protests play out. Shifting to where protests lead, the paper briefly surveys a variety of coercive and conciliatory institutions China possesses for social control and then documents distinct patterns in the state’s handling of different types of resistance—repressive, tolerant, concessionary, and mixed approaches—followed by an examination of the multifaceted impact of unrest. The conclusion offers suggestions for future researchers. Reviewing major concepts, debates, perspectives, and emerging research directions in studies of contentious politics in the world’s most populous country, this paper contributes to a more nuanced understanding of authoritarian politics and authoritarian resilience more generally.
... Issues related to weak rule of law, unclear land tenure and disconnects between research and management implementation also present challenges (Grumbine & Xu, 2011). While environmental policies in China increasingly recognize the importance of coordinated community development (People's Republic of China, 2017b), citizen participation remains limited despite recent improvements (Teets, 2018;Zhang et al., 2016;Zheng & Cao, 2015). In conclusion, the mere presence of genuine political will does not resolve the complexities of developing and implementing durable and sustainable solutions at different levels. ...
Political will is a critical determinant of the success or failure of environmental policies and interventions. Harnessing the political will necessary to implement environmental solutions can be challenging because environmental priorities may compete with other societal interests in policymaking.
Environmental solutions are more politically feasible if fundamentally aligned with the core interests of key policymakers. Understanding the political agendas of decision‐makers enables conservationists to identify where political will already exists, and allows environmental objectives to piggyback on the motivation to deliver results.
In this paper, we explore the core interests of the Chinese leadership to uncover opportunities to leverage Beijing's political will for sustainability and conservation gains. China's growing influence on ecosystems and natural resource use both within and beyond its borders makes an analysis of its leadership's political will valuable and timely.
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... Despite the inadequacy of environmental policy network studies involving and mapping all relevant actors holistically, various studies have addressed the roles of civil society and social movements in Turkey's environmental policymaking (see Adaman and Arsel 2005;Paker et al. 2013;Özler and Obach 2018). In the international literature, although not with a focus on Turkey, it is possible to come across studies that deal with environmental policies within the scope of policy networks in different sample countries (see Daugbjerg 2002;Montpetit 2002;Teets 2017). ...
Children can easily generalize the information they have learned at an early age for their entire life. In this respect, the kindergarten age emerges as the golden years for them in terms of instilling environmental awareness. As the protection of the natural environment is a vital issue for achieving the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the investment into children in the context of a sustainable environmental policy can provide a better return for SDGs. The Foundation for Environmental Education is the founder of the “Eco-School program” established on a global scale, which was initiated to provide environmental awareness in children and contribute to sustainable development through families, schools, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and businesses partners. The foundation defines the program as a most comprehensive project, global and sustainable by design, and it also includes sample applications in Turkey. This chapter firstly evaluates the efforts and needs of Turkey to achieve the SDGs by scrutinizing a variety of official national policy reports, triangulating this with academic literature on the subject. Then, the chapter deals with the concepts of policy networks and policy mapping in producing sustainable national environmental policies and explores the importance of investing in children for a sustainable environmental policy in Turkey. Environmental education given to children at an early age is identified as a priority policy in terms of investment in children while presenting the “Eco-School program” as a tool. In this context, the chapter conducts qualitative research consisting of in-depth interviews with “Eco-School program” coordinators and kindergarten teachers as well as content analysis on the sampled kindergartens’ annual activity reports. The chapter concludes that the program, which is implemented by many preschools (such as kindergartens) and primary education settings worldwide, has a great potential to be an essential tool in raising environmental awareness in children at an early age though it also has various points open to further development and improvement.
... Corporate top executives are responsible for making all kind of strategies. Therefore, in the context of Chinese market they have a lot pressure from government and other authorities to participate in business environmental strategies (Teets, 2018). In addition, the role of gender diversity is highly important in Chinese market. ...
Environmental issues are getting greater attention now that experts and authorities are paying attention to global warming. The industrial segment is mostly to blame for these environmental hitches, according to past research. The industrial sector is actively addressing the issues brought on by climate change. This study’s primary focus is on business environmental strategies in green innovation, which takes into account the company’s goals for sustainable development. This study also takes into account the importance of corporate management (CEO, ownership concentration, and gender diversity) for green innovation. This study evaluated fact by natural resource theory, resource dependency theory, agency theory and Porter hypothesis. Results from practical generalized least squares and generalized moments approaches provide various conclusions. The findings of this study demonstrated that companies with business environmental strategies as, environmental regulation, proactive environmental plans, corporate social responsibility, and board sustainable committees were more likely to implement green innovation practices. Additionally, corporate management (CEO, ownership concentration, and gender diversity) supports businesses’ efforts to innovate in the green sector. Importantly, our research showed that the importance of corporate management (CEO, ownership concentration, and gender diversity) in business environmental policies cannot be overstated (environmental regulations, proactive environmental strategies, corporate social responsibility, board sustainable committee, and green innovation). green innovation, as well. These findings significantly expand the scant amount of knowledge on corporate environmental initiatives and green innovation. In order to encourage green innovation for higher profitability while minimizing negative industrial consequences, this study also provides a number of suggestions and recommendations for stakeholders, including regulators, owners, and governments.
... Truex (2016) finds that the party uses the National People's Congress for information about citizen preferences and incorporates deputies' ideas into its policy making. It also utilizes other channels, including petitions, investigative reporting, policy networks cocreated by civil society organizations, and public consultation, to collect necessary information for dealing with public discontent and improving governance (Dimitrov, 2015;Lorentzen, 2014;Teets, 2018;Kornreich, 2019). The distribution of a major social assistance program, Dibao, is also used as a tool of repressive assistance to preempt disorder (Pan, 2020). ...
To explain the factors behind the regime resilience in China, this article focuses on the foundational and institutional resources that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) accumulated in the earlier stages of regime development and their lasting influence on regime trajectory. At the stage of regime foundation, the CCP successfully constructed the founding myth of the party-state as the foundational resource to legitimize its rule. At the later stage of regime adaptation, institutional adaptation during the process of achieving modernization allowed the CCP to accumulate substantial institutional resources to further buttress the regime. While negotiating the space between state and society, the CCP regime demonstrated high capacity in granting more autonomy to market actors to accelerate growth while increasing the embeddedness of economic strata in the system through informal and formal institutional arrangements. When confronted with a serious crisis, the CCP was able to draw strength from the foundational and institutional resources to survive. This article argues that the CCP’s efforts in accumulating strength at the early stages of regime development continue to exert strong influence on China’s regime trajectory at later stages.
The four major countries of East Asia—China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan—form one of the most densely populated regions on earth, and through the course of the late 20th and early 21st centuries the region experienced some of its fastest economic growth, propelled by the policies of state-led developmentalism. As a result of this density and these policies, the four countries in turn became some of the most environmentally degraded. As each achieved middle-to-high income status, however, the populace and then the regime in each country realized that they could not sustain either rapid economic growth or popular legitimacy without addressing the environmental consequences of this fast growth. The four states thus changed their fundamental economic policies from pure developmentalism to what we call eco-developmentalism, an attempt to reconcile economic prosperity with environmental sustainability. Although success so far has been mixed, this turn to eco-developmentalism has allowed these states to claim world leadership in mitigating environmental degradation.
Since Kingdon’s 1984 canonical study of federal-level agenda setting in the USA, the multiple streams framework has been used to examine not just other democracies, but also autocracies. Based on a dataset of 101 English language journal articles, we provide an overview of how the MSF has been used to examine policy processes in autocracies. Priorities for future MSF research on autocracies are (1) integrating the literature on authoritarianism (2) shifting from case studies to examining individual MSF elements across time, jurisdictions, and policy areas. To this end, we present a list of theory-grounded expectations and corresponding research questions pertaining to each MSF element. To make it easier for future MSF studies to connect their findings to prior research on authoritarian settings, we provide a list of existing MSF journal articles on autocracies.
We advance a novel perspective to study how field actors co‐develop field governance through continuous interactions. Field governance determines the formal and informal rules of a field, defining membership boundaries and core practices. Prior research has mostly studied the establishment of top‐down regulations or the work of advocacy and social movement organisations to influence or overthrow existing regimes. We review 147 previously disconnected articles on field governance and institutional work and identify interactional governing activities (IGAs), the concept we advance and define as the strategic and interactional activities actors deploy to develop, disrupt and maintain field governance. Depending on field conditions, we propose that actors combine IGAs in various interaction modes to either oppose the existing order, lobby for change or collaborate to jointly develop field governance. We contribute to the scholarly understanding of field governance development by proposing a continuous process that extends beyond influencing regulatory decision‐making to include knowledge‐building and interactional infrastructure‐development activities. Our study provides novel insights on collaborative institutional work for field governance co‐development by heterogeneous actors. By defining and categorising IGAs, we contribute to both a more integrative theoretical understanding of field governance as well as a playbook for practitioners, collective interest organisations and regulators engaged in field‐building work.
Over the past 20 years, the People’s Republic of China has been subject to rapid
urbanization. The speed of technological development, combined with significant
demographic and economic growths, contributed to a large increase in the number of Chinese cities. To address the housing demand, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) carried out a large-scale urban policy leading to the development of megacities such as Shanghai or Guangzhou, which today constitute the two most densely populated urban areas in the world. To achieve rapid and efficient urbanization of the country’s coastals and inland regions, the Chinese government initiated urban-land reforms and decentralization to delegate authority and to grant financial autonomy to lower levels of governments, i.e. provincial and municipal ones. By doing so, the CCP intended to exercise more diffuse power in China with
the support of autonomous local governments that are more likely to understand local issues, lay stress on urban development and implement relevant policies. From this perspective, it is important to examine the process of decentralization and
delegation of authority from central to local government, and to analyze its political effects. In particular, some scholars have been interested in exploring the relationship between the process of urbanization by local authorities and the early stage development of a Chinese civil society. Thus, this paper intends to review the literature. While scholars will first question the urban-land reform and decentralization’s capacities to set up local-level governments’ power
and authority, the second part of the summary will focus on its political effects, i.e. Chinese citizens’ growing capability to exercise political influence. Following an evaluation of the literature, this paper will finally assess whether or not speaking of a nascent politicization of the society is relevant at the present time.
This article examines the role of policy entrepreneurs in countering regulatory capture, a phenomenon whereby regulatory bodies influenced by industry lobbying often prioritize private over public interests. The study employs an abductive process‐tracing approach to investigate the 2013 drug pricing reform in Morocco, illustrating how substantial policy shifts can occur even in authoritarian contexts susceptible to regulatory capture. The findings underscore the pivotal role of Houcine El Ouardi, the former Minister of Health, whose strategic leadership exemplified policy entrepreneurship. His capacity to navigate and surmount industry resistance was instrumental to the reform's success, culminating in a significant reduction in drug prices. This case challenges conventional wisdom regarding regulatory capture, demonstrating that individual agency can reshape regulatory outcomes despite opposition. By elucidating how policy entrepreneurs can drive transformative change in resistant regulatory environments under authoritarian regimes, the study contributes to the literature on policy entrepreneurship and regulation.
The integration of information and communication technology (ICT) has significantly transformed the interaction between governments and citizens. While past studies have focused on how citizen appeals affect responses from public servants, less attention has been paid to the role of officials’ attributes in shaping government responsiveness. This paper explores how political connections influence responsiveness within the Chinese court system. Using a formalized principal-agent model, we argue that connected local judges, who have better information about central authority’s task priorities, tend to allocate less effort to routine tasks of lower importance. To test this hypothesis, we constructed a novel database containing biographical information of provincial chief judges in China and their online interactions with citizens from 2014 to 2020. Our empirical analysis shows that politically connected judges are less responsive in routine tasks of responding to citizens. This study offers new insights into how internal political dynamics impact the responsiveness of government institutions.
Understanding social space is a prerequisite for analyzing local environmental protection. A new theorized social space-the environmental field-is proposed to analyze local environmental protection practices in China, as the existing three types (environmental state, community, and network) can miss the main logics, actors, or practices. First, the actors' positions in the field, where environmental and political-economic capital operate, significantly affects their perceptions, practices, and power relations. Second, the field transforms in terms of new power relations and orders-if certain actors have accumulated significant temporary successes from the struggles with others after rupturing moments. This theory is illustrated by Latent Transition Analyses of the two species of capital in County T, China, from 2014 to 2019. I then analyze selected actors to examine whether their environmental protection practices echo the LTA results and whether the theory could explain their practices and transformation. This theory can help practitioners understand and evaluate environmental protection in developing countries.
What constitutes an enabling environment for nutrition advocacy in low- and middle-income countries? While a sizeable body of scholarship considers the enabling environment for nutrition policy, we focus specifically on the necessary conditions for advocacy. We argue that three factors—voice, access, and ownership—provide a useful lens into the advocacy enabling environment. These are operationalized, respectively, as the space to articulate and frame policy positions, entry points to interact with policy decision makers, and the existence of committed decision makers rather than those responding to pressures from external actors. These three factors are explored vis-à-vis a comparative analysis of two federal democracies—India and Nigeria—that each have vibrant advocacy communities confronting persistent malnutrition. Drawing on more than 100 structured interviews with nutrition advocates, government actors, donors, and researchers in the two countries, we highlight the ways in which voice, access, and ownership interactively shape advocacy efforts. In doing so, we find that Nigeria has a less ideological approach to certain nutrition issues than in India but also perceived to be more beholden to external actors in defining its nutrition actions. Recent restrictions on freedom of speech and association shrunk the civic space in India but these were less problematic in Nigeria. In both countries, the multi-tiered, multi-party system offers many different points of access into the policy arena, with sometimes negative implications for coordination. Overall, the paper contributes more broadly to the literature on enabling environments by highlighting potential indicators to guide nutrition advocates in other settings.
Under what conditions might authoritarian states adapt public policies to social preferences? How could social actors push the window for policy change? How might state–society interactions induce policy change as the practice of authoritarian adaptation? This article utilizes a new database of case evidence and the qualitative comparative analysis method to explore the relationship between state–society interaction and policy change as the practical manifestation of authoritarian adaptation in China. The study presents three approaches to policy change: state–society interactive strategies, policy entrepreneurs and the political opportunity structure. The empirical results reveal three patterns of state–society interaction leading to policy change, while submission is not a viable option for society under state suppression. Media presence may impede policy change, and the diverse functions of social organizations should be related to interactive strategies. In addition, social actors may identify political opportunities through multiround interaction, while the role of joint administration in effecting policy change remains unclear. This study offers a novel understanding of authoritarian adaptation.
To what extent do expert opinions affect public opinion in policy making? While most existing studies were conducted in democracies, experts' influence under authoritarian settings is still understudied. This paper examines how expert opinion and vocational affiliation influence public attitudes toward genetically modified (GM) food in China. Through a survey experiment with over 1600 respondents, we find that experts' endorsement can increase policy support for GM food but that their opposition exerts no influence. Different vocational affiliations do not generate significantly different effects, although endorsement from foreign experts has larger effects than endorsement from domestic counterparts, who have closer connections with the Chinese government. We finally discuss the policy implications of expert involvement in policy making and promoting GM food in China based on the above findings.
Lobbying, and its role in the policy process, has been extensively studied in democratic states, but much less is known about similar practices in authoritarian political systems. Although a few studies have identified lobbying in China, most have focused on big businesses and national policy making, and some have argued that it is unaffected by differences in political institutions. Our paper challenges this portrayal of business lobbying in autocracies. Through a study of the lobbying activities of business associations based on documentary research and fieldwork in the northern Chinese city of Tianjin between 2011 and 2013, we show that although business associations have similar lobbying motivations to their counterparts in democracies, their specific practices are often shaped by authoritarian political institutions. While they are similar in seeking to build informal relationships with public officials, provide expertise to shape policies, and raise their profile through public relations activities and media engagement, they differ in focusing their relationship‐building efforts on helping officials with routine work, helping Communist Party organizations establish cells in businesses, and brokering between businesses and government. Rather than donating to political campaigns like their counterparts in democracies, they become legislators themselves, hire retired officials, and seek positions on advisory bodies. Rigged elections, an unreliable legal system, and restrictions on media and freedom of movement are key authoritarian institutions that shape these distinctive lobbying practices.
Private sector plays an increasingly vital role in nature conservation globally. This study explores the concept of political embeddedness, which suggests that governments and environmental nongovernmental organizations (ENGOs) can leverage each other's strengths to achieve both formal and informal goals. Using the case of Laohegou Nature Reserve in China, this study illustrated how the complementary advantages of the government and ENGOs form the foundation of a land trust reserve. Within the case, the study found that power and interest balance between the government and ENGOs during project implementation supported their formal cooperation in nature conservation. This study proposed a political perspective to elaborate power and interest in the formal and informal dimensions of nature conservation public-private partnership (PPP) project. Moreover, it noted that a balance of power between the government and ENGOs is essential in building partnership networks with inclusive interests.
Expert involvement has received increasing academic attention, and expert typology, organizational types and knowledge utilization have been well documented and well theorized. However, the literature on expert involvement is remarkably silent on how to understand the internal structure of expert groups and the influence they bring to bear. In this study, we seek to bridge this gap by theorizing and empirically demonstrating the internal discrepancy in expert network. We do so through an in-depth qualitative analysis of data from an empirical study on urban planning decision-making in China. Building on existing literature, participant observation and interview data, the study elaborates an expert network model that analyses how government choices, organizational characteristics, and capital in network resources shape expert influence. The empirical analysis indicates that the role an expert receives in policy making is a consequence of different expert networks. Based on this, we developed the concept of “resources empowerment expert network” to understand the logic of resource flow in network and discuss how this concept can contribute to the broader literature on expert involvement.
The answer to the oft-asked question of state-civil society relations and the latter’s role in environmental governance in China seems to be “in the eyes of the beholder.” A number of discrepant accounts, narratives, and theories continue to be offered by China scholars and experts, largely due to methodological reliance on a snapshot of a given space and time. This article takes a different approach. Based on a more nuanced longitudinal analysis, we show that there have been at least three kinds of relationship between the Chinese state and environmental civil society in the last few decades, each defined by a distinct institutional field. The dynamics of these institutional changes have been anything but linear or predetermined. This article contributes to the existing debate by offering a more systematic and analytical account of the nature of state-society relations in China’s environmental governance. Findings also point to the need for more dynamic and evolutionary, rather than static, analyses in future scholarship.
In this work, we intend to present a reading of current society as the extinction society. Extinction society here means the characterization, both social and individual, of a highly developed reality, especially in terms of personal freedom, unable to face global collective threats, first of all the climate disaster. This involves the risk, within a few generations, of the extinction of both the type of society that at least in the West we have been accustomed to for a few hundred years, and in the apocalyptic perspective of the species. The attempt to represent this question is addressed here by referring to some recent authors of cultural studies and sociology, to try and understand the principles of this extinction process. Following the analysis of what is in fact a process of individual liberation, that is, of increasingly advanced individualization, we proceed by looking at the macro‐themes of consumption, politics and psyche. This is in order to understand the possible outcomes of this process and the overall sense of an extinction of the current society if not of the species.
China's green transition is often perceived as a lesson in authoritarian efficiency. In just a few years, the state managed to improve air quality, contain dissent, and restructure local industry. Much of this was achieved through top-down, 'blunt force' solutions, such as forcibly shuttering or destroying polluting factories. This book argues that China's blunt force regulation is actually a sign of weak state capacity and ineffective bureaucratic control. Integrating case studies with quantitative evidence, it shows how widespread industry shutdowns are used, not to scare polluters into respecting pollution standards, but to scare bureaucrats into respecting central orders. These measures have improved air quality in almost all Chinese cities, but at immense social and economic cost. This book delves into the negotiations, trade-offs, and day-to-day battles of local pollution enforcement to explain why governments employ such costly measures, and what this reveals about a state's powers to govern society.
This study examines the configuration of conditions that trigger pro-environmental policy agenda setting (PAS) in an uncertain social context. It discusses the suitability and explanatory power of Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework (MSF) in this context. It employs the MSF and implements a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis on 25 pro-environmental cases in China. The results indicate that the seven solutions that could be recombined into three successful driven patterns may trigger the establishment of China’s pro-environmental policy agenda. China’s pro-environmental PAS does not require the complete collection of conditions for all three streams.
This study analyzes the role of civil society in China's clean energy transition from the perspective of Confucianism, an influential political-ethical doctrine with over 2000 years of history. An environmental non-governmental organization (ENGO), Friends of Nature (FON), was taken as a case study. FON is a pioneering ENGO in China and has become an influential actor in low-carbon energy transition in the country, primarily through its environmental litigation on energy projects. We argue that FON's legal actions, which focus on the climate and sustainability aspect of energy, are embedded in a Confucian understanding of justice, that is, justice as the pursuit of collective interest rather than the fair treatment of individuals; justice as nature-humanity harmony and the conservation of natural resources for future generation; and justice as an important manifestation of Confucian self-cultivation and a political obligation. This study contributes to the broader energy justice literature by proposing an understanding that goes beyond its Western origin.
Previous studies in China’s policy process have paid limited attention to public perceptions of experts. Through an original survey, we explore public attitudes on expertise, i.e., the merits of expert opinion and expert autonomy. We find that professional experience is the most important criterion on which respondents evaluate experts. The higher a respondent’s political trust is, the more likely he or she is to recognize the benefits that experts may offer. We also find an underlying populist tendency towards the role of experts in policy making, respondents in general agree that the will of the people should be prioritized over expert opinion.
Under President Xi Jinping, the strengthening of the Chinese Communist Party's political control occurs in conjunction with an evolving administrative role for government-affiliated associations. Analysing associations that are subordinate within China's strict hierarchy but which have degrees of operational freedom yields insights into the changing nature of public service and administration in China. Evidence from 63 interviews conducted from 2018 to 2022 with government departments and affiliated associations in the education sector reveals the complexity of state control and degrees of constrained autonomy achieved by affiliated associations. The government exerts control over financing, personnel appointments and core business activities but, over time, associations gain varying degrees of operational autonomy to influence the education agenda and fill gaps in public services. The interdependency and relational variance we find in the case of Ministry of Education-affiliated associations contributes to broader understandings of the complex and fragmentary nature of the Chinese state and public administration.
In May 2015, a draft of China’s new Overseas NGO Management Law was leaked to the media. International journalists and NGOs declared that this law was evidence of the Xi Jinping regime’s political repression and a “crackdown” on civil society. In this paper, we argue that the goal of the Chinese government is not to destroy the NGO sector and civil society, but instead a tactical move in a long term strategy so that the state can gain as much benefit (and minimize as much risk) from the NGO sector as possible. Moreover, the Chinese NGO sector is not a passive victim of oppression, but a dynamic actor that pushes back to serve its own interests. The second half of this paper examines the experiences of overseas NGOs in Yunnan, which have been operating under similar regulations since 2010. In Yunnan, similar policies did not result in the elimination or even diminishment of overseas NGOs. Instead, foreign NGOs were constrained in some aspects even as they benefited in other ways.
This paper focuses on the role of policy entrepreneurs in realizing water policy transitions. The central questions are to what extent have policy entrepreneurs played a role in realizing major change in water policies, who are these policy entrepreneurs, and what strategies have they used to bring about change? The policy science literature suggests that policy entrepreneurs have an arsenal of possible strategies for achieving change. Based on a comparative analysis of water policy changes in 15 countries around the globe and the European Union, we investigate which strategies have in practice been used by policy entrepreneurs, to what effect, and which lessons for managing water transitions we can draw from this. The comparative case analysis shows that individuals play complementary roles; hence, entrepreneurship in water management is often collective entrepreneurship. Strategies of coalition building, the manipulation of decision making forums, and the strategic framing of issues and windows are crucial to understanding water policy change, which suggests that the management of water policy transitions is a highly political game. We conclude by listing recommendations for those who would like to direct water policy change.
Over the past three decades, China has undergone a historic transformation. Once illegal, its private business sector now comprises 30 million businesses employing more than 200 million people and accounting for half of China's Gross Domestic Product. Yet despite the optimistic predictions of political observers and global business leaders, the triumph of capitalism has not led to substantial democratic reforms. In Capitalism without Democracy, Kellee S. Tsai focuses on the activities and aspirations of the private entrepreneurs who are driving China's economic growth. The famous images from 1989 of China's new capitalists supporting the students in Tiananmen Square are, Tsai finds, outdated and misleading. Chinese entrepreneurs are not agitating for democracy. Most are working eighteen-hour days to stay in business, while others are saving for their one child's education or planning to leave the country. Many are Communist Party members. "Remarkably," Tsai writes, "most entrepreneurs feel that the system generally works for them." Tsai regards the quotidian activities of Chinese entrepreneurs as subtler and possibly more effective than voting, lobbying, and protesting in the streets. Indeed, major reforms in China's formal institutions have enhanced the private sector's legitimacy and security in the absence of mobilization by business owners. In discreet collaboration with local officials, entrepreneurs have created a range of adaptive informal institutions, which in turn, have fundamentally altered China's political and regulatory landscape. Based on years of research, hundreds of field interviews, and a sweeping nationwide survey of private entrepreneurs funded by the National Science Foundation, Capitalism without Democracy explodes the conventional wisdom about the relationship between economic liberalism and political freedom.
This article uses an institutional approach to examine Chinese NGOs as an emerging organizational field. In mature organizational fields, the organizations are powerfully constrained to follow the institutional practices of that field. However, in an emerging organizational field, the institutionalized constraints are not yet established, so actors can try out a wide range of practices. Some of these practices will become the new “rules of the game” of the organizational field when it is established. The content of these rules will shape the relationship between NGOs and the Chinese party-state for future generations. We find that a Chinese NGO's resource strategy is shaped by two interacting factors. First, NGOs operate in an evolving ecology of opportunity. Second, the social entrepreneurs who lead Chinese NGOs perceive that ecology of opportunity through the lens of their personal experiences, beliefs and expertise. As a result, the initial strategies of the organizations in our sample were strongly influenced by the institutional experience of their founders. Former state bureaucrats built NGOs around alliances with party-state agencies. In contrast, NGO founders that had no party-state experience usually avoided the state and sought areas away from government control/attention, such as the internet or private business.
This article employs the advocacy coalition framework (ACF), a set of concepts developed to account for policymaking primarily in the United States, to analyze factors that led China to downsize its latest big hydropower project, on the Nu River. The ACF helps us identify two conflicting coalitions based on their policy beliefs and the resources they mobilized to translate their beliefs into policy change, which the ACF also helps us explain. Conflict between state agencies contributed to the rise of a societally based environmental coalition to oppose a state-centered development coalition, and struggle and strategic learning between these coalitions led to interventions by the premier and a scaling down of the project from 13 dams to four.
Environmental activism and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are not limited to major cities, but have gradually taken root in provincial and local politics in China. This paper compares the development and characteristics of environmental activism in Guangdong province and Guangxi autonomous region, with the aim of shedding light on the causes of regional disparities in this field. With extensive and strong ties to peer organizations across issue areas within the province, grassroots environmental groups in Guangdong have grown as an integral part of local civil society. They have survived, through mutual-support, on a larger scale than those in Guangxi. Also, with a higher level of networking and capacity, environmental NGOs in Guangdong are more able to utilize the new opportunities offered by recent institutional reforms in social management and environmental protection in the province. The paper, thus, challenges the argument that over-emphasizes the domination of the state and points out that inter-organizational partnerships and the overall maturity of the civil society sector contribute most to the uneven development of grassroots environmental activism.
In this article, I analyse civil society development in China using examples from Beijing to demonstrate the causal role of local officials' ideas about these groups during the last 20 years. I argue that the decentralization of public welfare and the linkage of promotion to the delivery of these goods supported the idea of local government–civil society collaboration. This idea was undermined by international examples of civil society opposing authoritarianism and the strength of the state-led development model after the 2008 economic crisis. I find growing convergence on a new model of state–society relationship that I call “consultative authoritarianism,” which encourages the simultaneous expansion of a fairly autonomous civil society and the development of more indirect tools of state control. This model challenges the conventional wisdom that an operationally autonomous civil society cannot exist inside authoritarian regimes and that the presence of civil society is an indicator of democratization.
The politics of policy-issue areas differ in multiple ways, including the venues where policies are enacted, the frequency and type of policy development, the relative importance of different circumstantial factors in policy change, the composition of participants in policymaking, and the structure of issue networks. The differences cannot be summarized by typologies because each issue area differs substantially from the norm on only a few distinct characteristics. To understand these commonalities and differences, I aggregate information from 231 books and 37 articles that review the history of American domestic policy in 14 issue areas from 1945 to 2004. The histories collectively uncover 790 notable policy enactments and credit 1,306 actors for their role in policy development. The politics of each issue area stand out in a few important but unrelated aspects.
It is widely accepted that transboundary pollution problems require international co-operation for their solution, because many countries suffer the effects of such degradation and no country is unilaterally capable of managing the issue. While most environmental issues share these characteristics, which inhibit their resolution internationally, these issues are really little different from other global issues involving ‘common property resources’ — for example, trade and security. In all of these matters, national leaders are usually averse to serious co-operative efforts because of their doubts about reciprocity and verification, as well as common political antipathies among states.1 While these problems appear to reflect some mutual interests — all countries are affected by environmental degradation and a unified response is universally preferable to a patchwork of disjointed efforts — enduring and profound differences of interest impede co-operation. Differences about who pays, states’ unwillingness to forego short-term economic welfare and other distributional disagreements typically inhibit the formation of strong collective arrangements. Environmental issues are little different from the type of zero-sum bargaining efforts with which students of international relations are so familiar. Further, many less developed countries (LDCs) view efforts by the developed world to promote environmental protection as duplicitous efforts to retard economic growth in the Third World.2 In short, mutual interests are actually quite weak, and countries are often reluctant to co-operate unless they are certain that the protection costs will be equally distributed.
Despite the dominant narrative of the repression of civil society in China, Civil Society Under Authoritarianism: The China Model argues that interactions between local officials and civil society facilitate a learning process, where by each actor learns about the intentions and work processes of the other. Over the past two decades, often facilitated by foreign donors and problems within the general social framework, these interactions generated a process in which officials learned the benefits and disadvantages of civil society. Civil society supports local officials’ efforts to provide social services and improve public policies, yet it also engages in protest and other activities that challenge social stability and development. This duality motivates local officials in China to construct a "social management” system — known as consultative authoritarianism – to encourage the beneficial aspects and discourage the dangerous ones. Although civil society has not democratized China, such organizations have facilitated greater dialogue between citizens and state as part of politics in an authoritarian system that normally lacks such channels for participation.
Received wisdom suggests that social organizations (such as non-government organizations, NGOs) have the power to upend the political status quo. However, in many authoritarian contexts, such as China, NGO emergence has not resulted in this expected regime change. in this book, Timothy Hildebrandt shows how NGOs adapt to the changing interests of central and local governments, working in service of the state to address social problems. in doing so, the nature of NGO emergence in China effectively strengthens the state, rather than weakens it. This book offers a groundbreaking comparative analysis of Chinese social organizations across the country in three different issue areas: Environmental protection, HIV/AIDS prevention, and gay and lesbian rights. it suggests a new way of thinking about state–society relations in authoritarian countries, one that is distinctly co-dependent in nature: Governments require the assistance of NGOs to govern while NGOs need governments to extend political, economic, and personal opportunities to exist.
In recent years China has been remarkable in achieving extraordinary economic transformation, yet without fundamental political change. To many observers this would seem to imply a weakness in Chinese civil society. However, though the idea of democracy as multitudes of citizens taking to the streets may be attractive, it is simultaneously misleading as it disregards the nature of political change taking place in China today: a gradual shift towards a polity adapted to a pluralist society. At the same time, one may wonder what the limited political space implies for the development of a social movement in China. This book explores this question by focusing on one of the most active areas of Chinese civil society: the environment. China's Embedded Activism argues that China's semi-authoritarian limitations on the freedom of association and speech, coupled with increased social spaces for civic action has created a milieu in which activism occurs in an embedded fashion. The semi-authoritarian atmosphere is restrictive of, but paradoxically, also conducive to nationwide, collective action with less risk of social instability and repression at the hand of the governing elite. Rich in case studies about environmental civic organizations in China, and written by a team of international experts on social movements, NGOs, democratization, and civil society, this book addresses a wide readership of students, scholars and professionals interested in development, geography and environment, political change, and contemporary Chinese society. © 2008 Peter Ho and Richard Louis Edmonds. All rights reserved.
Not long ago, the number of think tanks in Ghana began to increase steadily. These organizations have now carved out a niche as repositories of ideas for government to tap when formulating and implementing good policies for development. Unfortunately, while their role in the policy making process is well accepted, whether they actually have a substantial impact on policy outcomes is as yet undetermined. In this paper, we will examine the impact of think tanks on policy outcomes in Ghana by looking at two major policy areas where policies have been initiated either by these institutions or by government itself.
The responsiveness of policy to election results is a central component of democracy. Do the outcomes of autocratic elections also affect policy choice? Even when the threat of turnover is low, I argue that autocratic elections influence policy by allowing citizens to signal dissatisfaction with the regime. Supplementing existing work, this study explains how this opposition is communicated credibly and then shows that ruling parties use this information to calibrate policy concessions. In the first cross-country analysis of autocratic election outcomes and policy choice, I find that negative electoral shocks to ruling parties predict increases in education and social welfare spending and decreases in military spending following elections. In contrast, there is no policy effect leading up to elections, in response to violent contestation, or in resource-rich regimes, illustrating a potential mechanism for the resource curse.
A theory of political communication is employed which stresses the importance of citizen discussion beyond the boundaries of cohesive groups for the dissemination of public opinion. If the social communication of political information is bounded by cohesive social groups and strong social ties, we should expect the social flow of political information to be independent from opinion distributions in the larger environment. In contrast, when social communication extends beyond socially cohesive groups, the flow of information should reflect these opinion distributions. We analyze a 1992 election survey which includes a battery of questions regarding the construction of respondents' social networks. The analysis is undertaken with respect to opinion distributions in the larger environments (counties) where the respondents reside. Individuals are differentially exposed to larger environments of opinion depending on micro environmental patterns of social interaction and political communication. Hence, the construction of a citizen's social network serves as a filter on the macro environmental flow of political information. In this way, the consequences of the larger environment of opinion depend on the existence of micro environments which expose citizens to surrounding opinion distributions.
Using a model of "fragmented authoritarianism," this volume sharpens our view of the inner workings of the Chinese bureaucracy. The contributors' interviews with politically well-placed bureaucrats and scholars, along with documentary and field research, illuminate the bargaining and maneuvering among officials on the national, provincial, and local levels.
Drawing on political opportunity and resource dependency theories, this paper traces the development of 28 environmental NGOs (eNGOs) in China and examines the political and institutional factors that have constrained or facilitated these organizations' policy advocacy activities. The paper shows that political structural changes have created greater opportunities for eNGOs' policy advocacy, and eNGOs with better financial resources and connections to the party-state system are more capable of utilizing these opportunities to enhance their policy advocacy capacity. Yet party-state connections may in turn constrain the types of policy advocacy pursued by these eNGOs.
Ideas are strangely absent from modern models of political economy. In most prevailing theories of policy choice, the dominant role is instead played by "vested interests"—elites, lobbies, and rent-seeking groups which get their way at the expense of the general public. Economists, political scientists, and other social scientists appeal to the power of special interests to explain key puzzles in regulation, international trade, economic growth and development, and many other fields. Why does regulation favor incumbent firms at the expense of consumers or potential entrants? Because bureaucracies can be captured by well-organized "insiders" who can shape regulation in their favor (Stigler 1971; Peltzman 1976; Laffont and Tirole 1991). Why are trade restrictions so rampant despite the well-known gains from trade? Because import tariffs and quotas redistribute incomes to politically powerful business groups and lobbies (Krueger 1974; Grossman and Helpman 1994; Rodrik 1995). Why do political elites not favor growth-promoting policies and institutions? Because growth-suppressing policies, such as weak property rights, excessive regulation, or overvalued currencies provide these elites with access to rents that would disappear otherwise (Bates 1981; Acemoglu and Robinson 2006, 2012). Insights from political-economy models in each of these fields exert a strong influence on the way economists think of societal outcomes and the operation of the political system.
Why do some dictatorships establish institutions that may constrain their leaders? We argue that institutions promote the survival of dictatorships by facilitating authoritarian power-sharing. Specifically, institutions such as parties, legislatures, and advisory councils alleviate commitment and monitoring problems between the dictator and his allies caused by the secrecy in authoritarian governance. However, because authoritarian power-sharing succeeds only when it is backed by a credible threat of a rebellion by the dictator’s allies, institutions will be ineffective or break down when an imbalance of power within the ruling coalition undermines this threat’s credibility. Our arguments clarify the complex interaction between collective action, commitment, and monitoring problems in authoritarian governance. We use both historical and large-N data to assess new empirical predictions about the relationship between political institutions, leader survival, and the concentration of power in dictatorships.
This article applies a modified conceptual framework derived from Sabatier’s advocacy coalition framework and Haas’ epistemic communities’ framework to analyze climate advocacy coalitions in Guangzhou, China, a largely unexplored area of study. Our analysis reveals several key features of the climate policy advocacy groups working to promote policy change within the policy subsystem of a nonpluralistic regime: (a) mutual interdependence (consensus building) in the creation of an advocacy coalition system, (b) government recognition and endorsement of newly established or professionally oriented coalition organizations, (c) coalition formation in a top-down manner rather than by accumulative bottom-up demands, and (d) bottom-up motivators, such as changing societal values and the external environment, which contribute to and accelerate the reform of policy orientation and the administrative structure of coalition formation.
We offer the first large scale, multiple source analysis of the outcome of what may be the most extensive effort to selectively censor human expression ever implemented. To do this, we have devised a system to locate, download, and analyze the content of millions of social media posts originating from nearly 1,400 different social media services all over China before the Chinese government is able to find, evaluate, and censor (i.e., remove from the Internet) the large subset they deem objectionable. Using modern computer-assisted text analytic methods that we adapt and validate in the Chinese language, we compare the substantive content of posts censored to those not censored over time in each of 95 issue areas. Contrary to previous understandings, posts with negative, even vitriolic, criticism of the state, its leaders, and its policies are not more likely to be censored. Instead, we show that the censorship program is aimed at curtailing collection action by silencing comments that represent, reinforce, or spur social mobilization, regardless of content. Censorship is oriented toward attempting to forestall collective activities that are occurring now or may occur in the future --- and, as such, seem to clearly expose government intent, such as examples we offer where sharp increases in censorship presage government action outside the Internet.
Does the surge of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in China indicate a shift in power away from the party-state and the emergence of a civil society? In an attempt to shed light on the relationship between the state and the NGOs, this article examines the aims of official NGO policy and its influence on the growth patterns of NGOs. The discussion is divided into three sections. The first section analyzes the NGO concept in China and the features of official policy. The second and third sections address two models of Chinese NGOs. The study concludes that even as the Chinese government remains the most decisive component in the development of NGOs, the state is withdrawing from responsibilities toward society. The interactive and mutually dependent relations between the government and NGOs indicate the continuing power of the party-state as well as the decline in its capacity to control the growth of organizations.
The ability of citizens to make discriminating judgments regarding the political expertise of other individuals is centrally related to the potential for !deliberative democracy. If people are unable to render such judgments - if the communication of political expertise is, for example, fundamentally compromised by political bias - then the purposeful basis of political communication and deliberation among citizens is called into question. This article focuses on (1) the criteria that people employ in making judgments with respect to the political competence of other individuals, (2) the consequences of these judgments for the pattern and frequency of political communication, and (3) the implications for the effectiveness of collective deliberation among citizens. The database is taken from a study of political communication in the 1996 election, built on interviews with registered voters and their discussants in the Indianapolis and St. Louis metropolitan areas.
Two types of explanations of state government innovation have been proposed: internal determinants models (which posit that the factors causing a state government to innovate are political, economic, and social characteristics of a state) and regional diffusion models (which point toward the role of policy adoptions by neighboring states in prompting a state to adopt). We show that the two are conceptually compatible, relying on Mohr's theory of organizational innovation. Then we develop and test a unified explanation of state lottery adoptions reflecting both internal and regional influences. The empirical results provide a great degree of support for Mohr's theory. For the empirical analysis, we rely on event history analysis, a form of pooled cross-sectional time series analysis, which we believe may be useful in a wide variety of subfields of political science. Event history analysis may be able to explain important forms of political behavior (by individuals, organizations, or governments) even if they occur only rarely.
Policy is not made in the electoral arena or in the gladiatorial confrontations of Parliament, but in the netherworld of committees, civil servants, professions, and interest groups. This collection explores the private world of public policy. It provides a survey of the literature on the concept of policy networks and demonstrates its importance for understanding specific policy areas. The case studies cover policy-making in agriculture, civil nuclear power, youth employment, smoking, heart disease, sea defences, information technology, and exchange rate policy. Finally the editors attempt an overall assessment of the utility of the concept, focusing on such questions as why networks change, which interests dominate and benefit from networks, and the consequences of the present system for representative democracy. To describe policy networks is not to condone political oligopoly. Britain has witnessed the substitution of private government for public accountability. The analysis of policy networks draws attention to this erosion of representative democracy and exposes the private government of Britain to public gaze.
Slightly over a decade ago, the Chinese leadership recognized the escalating environmental cost of economic development and decided to engage social organizations to support its environmental awareness and protection campaigns. Environmental nongovernmental organizations (ENGOs) have emerged and expanded in the 1990s, carving a space that is politically non-threatening to the Communist Party and government. The central government recognizes the social and economic importance of protecting the environment and the role NGOs play in mobilizing the population towards that end. The continued growth of ENGOs is assured, particularly due to growing popularity for supporting environmental issues among the population, but importantly also because of the willingness of NGOs to pursue their interests within well-defined, yet unwritten political boundaries that assure the continued leadership of the Party and the government. Like environmental degradation, a weak healthcare system unable to effectively deal with emerging infectious diseases threatens to undermine economic growth and social stability. While the previous generation of Chinese leaders oversaw the emergence of "green" NGOs and actively enabled their growth, the current generation of leaders took power in the midst of the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak and has subsequently invested greater attention and resources in improving public health, including the incubation of health NGOs. Health NGOs seem poised to make up the "second wave" of civil society development in China.
One of the most important, but under-researched and least well understood, instruments of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is the extensive national network of Party schools (approximately 2,700). They serve as the key institution of mid-career training and indoctrination for all Party cadres, many government cadres, some military officers and selected businessmen. In addition to its training and indoctrination functions, the Party school system (particularly the Central Party School in Beijing) is also an important generator of policy initiatives. Not all Party schools are stalwart institutions, with some being involved in corruption scandals, but on the whole they have come to play an increasingly important role in the CCP's rebuilding efforts in recent years.
Exclusive focus on 'state-dominant' theories, and even the more 'society-informed' concepts of social corporatism or a state-led civil society, risk obscuring the dynamics of change in China and the capacity of the 'co-opted groups' to influence the policy-making process or to pursue the interest of their members. First, while the state appears to exert extensive formal control, its capacity to realize this control is increasingly limited. There is a significant gap between rhetoric and practice and between the expressed intent of the party-state authorities, a system that is itself deeply conflicted, and what can actually be enforced for any significant period throughout the entire country. Secondly, such a focus can neglect the benefits the 'subordinate' organizations and their members derive from the institutional arrangements. The interrelationships are symbiotic rather than unidirectional. Thirdly, these relationships are symbiotic because social organizations have devised strategies to negotiate with the state a relationship that maximizes their members' interests or that circumvents or deflects state intrusion. A study of the social organization sector sheds light on these aspects and the complex interplay between the party-state and society. Structures and regulations exist to bind these organizations to state patronage and control their activities. However, social practice reveals a pattern of negotiation that minimizes state penetration and allows such organizations to reconfigure the relationship with the state in more beneficial terms that can allow for policy input or pursuit of members' interests and organizational goals. This article first reviews the state's strategy for a traditional Leninist reordering of the sector, then looks at the strategies of negotiation, evasion or feigned compliance of the social organizations, and concludes with some comments on the nature of state-society relations in comtemporary China.
Communication within friendship networks can provide gains in efficiency that help individuals enrich their understanding of politics. Through two panel survey experiments, we demonstrate that the dissemination of an individual's opinion about the hazards posed by public policies can have both durable and significant effects on the policy judgments of friends. These effects are conditioned by both the content of the communication and the recipient's level of political awareness. Opinions emphasizing potential risks carry more weight than those that attempt to alleviate concerns about potential risks. Moreover, opinion transmission is more effective for subjects who are less politically aware when policy issues are salient; but when the political issue is more esoteric, friends who are more politically aware evidence greater opinion change.
This paper discusses new developments with regard to the regulation of civil society organizations in China that reflect local experiments to eliminate the dual management requirement in a variety of different ways. After a description of how dual management works in Part II and an historical look at the ways in which the CCP and the government bureaucracy had indicated their interest in the problem in Part III, the practical solutions are discussed in Part IV. These include a modified dual management system for small community civic organizations (CCOs), a documentation system, and a system of registration and management by the local Civil Affairs department. Other recent developments are discussed in Part V, including the use of “NGO incubators,” which are supported by local government, foreign funding, and local business people alike. Concluding with the note that there may be some difficulties in scaling all of this up to the national level, the paper suggests that additional study of cases is warranted to identify concrete issues; this study is expected to be conducted in China during summer 2010.