With Strings Attached? Improving the Administration of Central State Financed Investment Projects in the PRC

This article takes a new look at the institutional core of China's economic planning—the State Development and Planning Commission (SDPC, 1998–2003)—focusing on its role in approving and fundraising for major capital investment projects. The primary objective of this inquiry is to identify changes in the network structure and procedures of inter-agency relations and central planners’ interactions with national legislators, which have produced a diversity of ‘organizational microclimates’ that shape the coherence of the national economic bureaucracy and central–local fiscal relations. Based on interviews of high-level officials and case studies of investment projects in energy, information technology, and transport sectors, it is argued that administrative reforms aiming to improve SDPC's regulatory capacity have been predicated on a concerted effort by key agencies and ministries under the State Council to reduce the window of opportunity for local and industrial interests to politicize capital allocation decisions. This finding suggests caution in interpreting contemporary China through the comparative lenses of a developmental state, a regulatory state, or a fiscal federalist system.     

The changing nature of the transatlantic link: U.S. approaches and implications for Central and Eastern Europe

This article examines the changing security, economic and diplomatic components of the transatlantic link, with a particular focus on Washington's approach and implications for Central and Eastern Europe. The United States continues to play an essential role as security underwriter in the region, but the military dimension of the transatlantic relationship is transforming and will result in greater burdens on Europeans. Economic links between the U.S. and Central Europe are developing more strongly than generally understood, and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership is likely to drive both political and economic ties. Unconventional gas developments are enhancing U.S. engagement in European energy markets. Finally, the U.S. remains keen to engage its European partners on a broad agenda of global and regional issues and retains its own interests in working particularly with Central and Eastern European countries to lend stability to ‘wider Europe’.     

筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行的基本思路及对策建议

为促进亚洲地区互联互通建设和经济一体化进程,中国政府倡议筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行,得到东盟的赞赏和支持。筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行已经提上重要议事日程。本文拟阐述筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行的重大意义,分析筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行面临的困难和挑战,研究提出筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行的基本思路,建议筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行率先在中国—东盟区域实现突破,取得好的成效、积累一定经验后再逐步扩大到整个亚洲地区。本文设计了亚洲基础设施投资银行的性质宗旨与职能定位、机构设置与总部选址、资金来源与合作方式等,尤其对在中国—东盟区域起步的亚洲基础设施投资银行的合作方式、期初的股本资金、各国出资金额及所占比重进行较为深入的研究,提出可行性初步操作方案,抛砖以引玉,供决策参考。需要说明的是,本文提出的观点仅是我们个人学术观点,不代表任何组织和机构。     

亚洲开发银行的运行分析及其对筹建亚洲基础设施投资银行的启示

亚洲开发银行的成立是在特定的时代背景下,各方国际力量追逐利益博弈的结果。经过40多年的运营,亚洲开发银行在资金来源、职能定位、组织结构、主要业务及未来重点发展领域等方面日趋成熟与完善。通过对亚洲开发银行运行现状进行分析,可归纳出四个方面的成功经验,但也存在五个方面的问题,这些经验与问题给亚洲基础设施投资银行的创建和未来的运营带来了诸多的启示。     

Creation of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank as a part of China’s smart power strategy

The aim of this article is to assess the creation of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank within the scope of China’s smart power strategy, which will help not only to analyze China’s strategic use of its coercive and co-optive capacity, but also to understand better the concept of smart power. Given that the wisdom of statecraft can only be situationally determined, through this study I will propose the ability to achieve targeted objectives, the skill to use hard and soft power instruments in such a way that they reinforce each other, good interpretation of the existing regional and global contexts, time planning, and compatibility with long-term interests as criteria for judging the effectiveness of a smart power implementation.     

The PLA and regionalism in Hong Kong

This article examines the linkages between changes in international capital movements and currency values on the one hand and Asian regionalism on the other. It argues that economic ties within Asia in the late 1980s and early 1990s can be traced primarily to the increasing values of currencies in Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and Hong Kong. Foreign-direct investments from companies in these countries increased throughout the Asian region. Intra-regional trade grew rapidly as well. Still, by the turn of the century, in contrast to regionalism in Europe, that in Asia remained deeply institutionalized and far less responsive to any central direction from potential leaders such as Japan.     

Informal institutions and foreign investment in China

During the reform era, China has been very successful in attracting foreign direct investment (FDI) for its economic development. That this has taken place despite a rather weak legal system in China challenges conventional institutional theories, which emphasize the centrality of effective state institutions to economic development and international cooperation. This article suggests that the solution to the puzzle lies in the informal institutions underlying FDI development in China. On the basis of extensive interviews in the mid- and late 1990s, I find that networks of personal connections (guanxi), which are pervasive in Chinese society, have played a major role in facilitating FDI flows to China. They have done so by complementing and compensating for the weak Chinese legal system. This article dispels a number of misconceptions about the nature of guanxi, discusses its relationship with friendship, bribery, and social capital, and analyzes the conditions underlying the transnationalization of guanxi networks. It concludes with some important caveats to the major thesis and a discussion of possible future scenarios of institutional development in China.     

Austerity's Wasted Years

Austerity has become the norm of economic management in the EU, Britain and the USA. In each it is offered as the answer to different problems but everywhere the result is cuts in public spending, higher unemployment and low growth, none of which helps recovery from recession. Labour's response should not be to endorse or continue austerity but to initiate a Keynesian expansionary stimulus based on borrowing and spending on a huge programme of building public housing for rent. This should be accompanied by a competitive exchange rate, an industrial policy to boost the manufacturing sector and a National Investment Bank, the aim being to expand the production base so that it can pay the nation's way in the World and support the structure and the improvements Labour needs. This makes the choice at the next election the issue of what kind of Britain the electorate wants to see: a low wage, mean economy or a determined attempt to rebuild a stronger nation with a more powerful economy.     

The Legislative Origins of the MPs' Expenses Scandal

The MPs' expenses scandal of 2009 was one of the most controversial Parliamentary events of modern times. It had a profound impact on public perceptions of MPs and led to the Parliamentary Standards Act 2009. Little academic consideration has, however, been given to the legislative origins of the scandal and the role of ministers and MPs in the creation of the system for MPs' expenses under the Finance Act 1984. Using official documents obtained by Freedom of Information requests, we construct a comprehensive historical analysis of how – without one word of debate in Parliament and only minimal media coverage – ministers and MPs created a special statutory scheme for their own benefit, which they had effective control of and which exempted their expenses claims from the rules applying to other UK taxpayers and the jurisdiction of the Inland Revenue.     

经济危机下我国农村卫生保健投资的意义与内容——基于人口学视角的分析

中国政府应对金融危机的四万亿的投资中,包含用于医疗卫生、文化教育事业的投资400亿。长期以来,受我国城乡医疗卫生资源可用性差距的影响,城乡居民健康水平存在着较大的差距。因此,充分利用这一契机来增加对农村卫生保健的投资将具有巨大的人口学意义。在投资内容上,要改变以往单独对硬件的投资,使硬件和软件都成为投资的内容。