行政分权与县域创新——基于强县扩权改革的实证检验

Administrative Decentralization and County-Level Innovation: Based on the Empirical Tests of the Reform of County-Power-Expansion

21世纪初,中国各省开始进行强县扩权改革。基于这一准自然实验和双重差分方法的研究表明,行政分权显著促进了县域层面的创新,控制了时间趋势和其他政策冲击的稳健性检验和事件研究法的结果均支持上述结论,安慰剂检验和使用微观企业数据的结果也支持上述结论。机制检验结果表明,行政分权强化了县级政府之间的竞争,促进了基础设施的改善及固定资产投资的增加,从而促进了(规模)企业数量的增加;同时,行政分权使县级政府更好地利用当地的信息优势,改善了资源配置,从而促进了县级层面的创新。该研究结论不仅有助于认识行政分权与县域创新之间的关系,也为推动县域经济创新发展及之后的政策制定提供了经验支持。

At the beginning of the 21 st century, China’s provinces began to carry out the reform of county-power-expansion. This paper conducts a study based on the quasi-natural experiment with the difference-in-difference methods. The findings show that administrative decentralization has significantly promoted the innova tion at the county-level, the results of the robustness test by controlling time trend and other policy impacts, as well as other studies, all support the above conclusions. The results of the placebo test and the using of micro enterprise data also support the above conclusions.The findings of the mechanism test indicate that the administrative decentralization has strengthened the competition among county-level governments, promoted the improvement of infrastructure and the increase of fixed asset investment, thus promoted the increase of the number(scale) of enterprises. At the same time, the administrative decentralization enables county-level governments to make better use of local information advantages, improve resource allocation, thus promote the innovation output at the county-level. This research conclusion can not only help to understand the relationship between administrative decentralization and county-level innovation, but also provide empirical support for the promotion of the innovation and development of county-level economy and the subsequent policy formulation.