利益冲突与制度扭曲——论政府在经济发展和转型中的作用

The Interest Conflict and the Institutional Distortions——On the Role of Government in Economic Development and Transition

本文在McGuire和Olson(1996)的基础上进一步讨论了政府在经济活动中的地位和作用。我们发现,即使是具有共容利益的政府,其与社会之间依然存在着利益冲突。因此,政府的存在总会造成一定的制度扭曲,使经济处于非最优效率状态。本文还研究了政府与社会之间的利益冲突在转型经济中的表现。研究表明,政府与社会之间的利益冲突会随着经济体制的改进而得到强化,从而使新制度受到更大的扭曲。另外,政府与社会之间的利益冲突会对经济体制的优化产生不同的影响,但最终都会妨碍制度变迁达至最优状态。本文的研究实际上指出了政治体制改革对经济发展和转型的重要意义。我们也指出,在转型经济中,政治体制改革的时机选择不当可能会导致结果事与愿违。

Based on McGuire and Olson（1996）, this paper discusses the role of govern- ment in economic development and transition. We find that there is the interest conflict be- tween society and government, even for the government with encompassing interests. Thus the government could make the institutional distortions, causes the economy could not achieve the optimal efficiency. This paper also studies on the performance of interest conflict between government and society in transition economy. We show that the interest conflict between government and society will increase with the improving of the economic system. Moreover, the interest conflict between government and society could make different ef- fects to the optimization of the economic system, but eventually could prevent the institu- tional change achieve the optimal state. This paper in fact shows the important significance of political reform to economic development and transition. But we also point out that the improper timing of the political reform may lead to counterproductive results in transition economy.