中国经济增长的政治经济学——读《转型中的地方政府:官员激励与治理》(第二版)

The Political Economy of China’s Growth:After Reading Local Governments in Transition:Officials’ Incentives and Governance (2nd ed.)

过去40年,中国经历了奇迹般的经济增长。对这一现象,有多种解释,如人口红利、高投资等。本书致力于揭示中国经济增长的政治经济学逻辑,并提出了'行政发包制'和'政治锦标赛'两个核心概念。中国政府间关系长期以来表现为行政发包制。行政发包制有三大特征:行政分权、财政包干和结果导向性考核。政治锦标赛发生于不同区域的同级别官员之间。从毛泽东时代到邓小平时代,政治锦标赛的标准从政治效忠向经济绩效转变。行政发包制和政治锦标赛一起构成了独特的中国政府治理模式。行政分权、财政分成、晋升竞争为地方官员推动经济发展提供了制度基础。但这一治理模式亦有其内在弱点,如预算软约束、腐败、地方保护主义、过度竞争、激励扭曲等。实现国家治理体系和治理能力现代化,需要对行政发包制和政治锦标赛做出一定修正。

The past four decades have witnessed China’s growth miracle. There are a variety of explanations for this phenomenon such as the population bonus, the high investment, and so forth. This book seeks to reveal the political economy logic behind China’s economic growth model. Two important theoretical concepts, that is, administrative subcontracting and political tournaments, are crafted in this analysis. Chinese intergovernmental relations have long followed a top-down subcontracting practice, featuring the de facto power of subcontractors, fiscal or budget subcontracting with significant self-financing, and outcome-oriented evaluations. Political tournaments, which have shifted their focus from political loyalty-based competition during the Mao era to economic performance-based competition during the Deng era, take place among local leaders of the same rank in the different regions of the country. Chinese governance is characterized by administrative subcontracting and political tournaments. Administrative decentralization, fiscal sharing, and the promotion of competition motivate local leaders to seek all possible ways to boost their local economies. However, this governance model also has weaknesses, such as soft budget constraints of local governments, bureaucratic corruption, local protectionism, excessive competition, distorted incentives, and so forth. Some modifications should be adopted in order to modernize the system and capacity of governance.