市场互联性、关系型合约与经济转型

Interlinking Markets, Relational Contract and Economic Transition

本文通过将单一市场的关系型合约推广到互联的关系型合约,刻画了社会分工程度(市场范围)与微观治理机制(基于关系型合约的治理还是基于正式合约的治理)之间的互动关系:基于何种合约来治理受市场范围的影响,市场范围越小,关系型合约越重要,正式合约越不重要;反之则反是。特别地,从这个视角看,计划经济向市场经济转型的过程,是劳动分工不断深化和市场范围不断扩大的过程,在微观治理上是一个从互联的关系型合约不断向正式合约过渡的过程。中国的渐进式改革之所以成功,很大程度上是由于渐进式改革使原来自我实施的关系型合约没有受到很大程度的破坏,在正式合约缺位时,关系型合约仍然能够维持社会经济的运行;俄罗斯的激进式改革几乎在一夜之间破坏了自我实施的关系型合约的可维持性,而短期内又不可能建立依赖正式合约的治理模式,出现了微观治理失效。本文还解释了中国经济在缺乏正式的法律和产权体系下取得骄人绩效的“悖论”,即由于关系型合约的自我实施性,因而并不需要相应的正式制度安排。本文总体上支持“后华盛顿共识”的渐进改革路径,并为其提供了动态的微观机制。

This paper extends the basic one-market relational contract to the interlinked one and characterizes the interactions between the degree of the social division of labor （extent of the market） and the modes of economic governance. A basic conclusion is that the dominant contractual form or governance is a function of the extent of the market. The less the extent of the market, the more important is the relational contract and vice versa. From this perspective, the transition from a central planning economy to the market economy is a process of more formal contracts substituting relational contracts. Chinese-style gradualism succeeded to the extent that the original self-enforcing relational contracts are still sustainable, while the Russian-style radical reforms rendered the original self-enforcing relational contracts unsnstainable and led to governance failure. This paper also sheds some light on the China paradox that China obtained miraculous economic growth despite her lack of the efficient formal legal system and other formal institutional arrangements, i.e., because of the self-enforcing nature of the relational contracts formal institutional arrangements are not needed. In general, this paper provides a theoretical support for the so-called “Post-Washington Consensus” and characterizes the underlying mieroeeonomie dynamics.