通往集体债务之路：政府组织、社会制度与乡村中国的公共产品供给

The Road to Collective Debt Supply:Bareaucratic Organizations, Social Institutions, and Public Goods Supply

通过中国北方一个农业镇推行"村村通"修路工程的故事片段,讨论了以下两个研究课题:第一,国家政策、政府官员以及村干部在提供公共产品过程中的作用,以及那些始料未及的导致集体债务和削弱集体治理的后果;第二,地方制度和社会关系在动员资源、解决问题和应对危机过程中的作用。这些故事片段为我们提供了一个契机来审视政府在经济发展中的作用以及"国家的视角"的经验教训。

Focusing on the episodes of the government’s Paved Road to Every Village (PREV) project in an agricultural township in northern China, this article examines two research issues: First, the role of state policies, government bureaucracies, and village cadres in the provision of public goods, especially the unintended consequences that led to huge collective debts and the erosion of the collective basis of governance; second, the role of local institutions and social relations in resource mobilization, problem solving, and response to crises, especially in the aftermath of the PREV project. The episodes provide an occasion to rethink the role of governments in economic development and the lessons learned from, to borrow an expression by James Scott, 'seeing like a state.'