Strategic Modelling: “Building a New Socialist Countryside” in Three Chinese Counties

2013 ◽  
Vol 216 ◽  
pp. 831-849 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna L. Ahlers ◽  
Gunter Schubert
Keyword(s):  
Policy Process ◽  
Rural China ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
National Development ◽  
Local Models ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Rural Counties ◽  
Chinese Policy ◽  
China Today

AbstractModels, pilots and experiments are considered distinctive features of the Chinese policy process. However, empirical studies on local modelling practices are rare. This article analyses the ways in which three rural counties in three different provinces engage in strategies of modelling and piloting to implement the central government's “Building a New Socialist Countryside” (shehuizhuyi xinnongcun jianshe) programme. It explains how county and township governments apply these strategies and to what effect. It also highlights the scope and limitations of local models and pilots as useful mechanisms for spurring national development. The authors plead for a fresh look at local modelling practices, arguing that these can tell us much about the realities of governance in rural China today.

scholarly journals Does Social Support Affect the Health of the Elderly in Rural China? A Meta-Analysis Approach

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (18) ◽  
pp. 3471 ◽  
Author(s):  
Natuya Zhuori ◽  
Yu Cai ◽  
Yan Yan ◽  
Yu Cui ◽  
Minjuan Zhao
Keyword(s):  
Social Support ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Rural China ◽  
Statistical Significance ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Relevant Literature ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Meta Regression ◽  
The Impact

As the trend of aging in rural China has intensified, research on the factors affecting the health of the elderly in rural areas has become a hot issue. However, the conclusions of existing studies are inconsistent and even contradictory, making it difficult to form constructive policies with practical value. To explore the reasons for the inconsistent conclusions drawn by relevant research, in this paper we constructed a meta-regression database based on 65 pieces of relevant literature published in the past 25 years. For more valid samples to reduce publication bias, we also set the statistical significance of social support to the health of the elderly in rural areas as a dependent variable. Finally, combined with multi-dimensional social support and its implications for the health of the elderly, meta-regression analysis was carried out on the results of 171 empirical studies. The results show that (1) subjective support rather than objective support can have a significant impact on the health of the elderly in rural areas, and there is no significant difference between other dimensions of social support and objective support; (2) the health status of the elderly in rural areas in samples involving western regions is more sensitive to social support than that in samples not involving the western regions; (3) among the elderly in rural areas, social support for the older male elderly is more likely to improve their health than that for the younger female elderly; and (4) besides this, both data sources and econometric models greatly affect the heterogeneity of the effect of social support on the health of the elderly in rural areas, but neither the published year nor the journal is significant. Finally, relevant policies and follow-up studies on the impact of social support on the health of the elderly in rural areas are discussed.

Gendered caregiving and structural constraints: An empirical ethical study

2020 ◽  
pp. 096973302091251
Author(s):  
Xiang Zou ◽  
Jing-Bao Nie ◽  
Ruth Fitzgerald
Keyword(s):  
Rural China ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Family Care ◽  
Aged Care ◽  
Structural Constraints ◽  
Female Labour ◽  
Current Configuration ◽  
Normative Evaluation ◽  
The Impact

Background: The pressing issue of aged care has made gendered caregiving a growing subject of feminist bioethical enquiry. However, the impact of feminism on empirical studies in the area of gendered care in Chinese sociocultural contexts has been less influential. Objectives: To examine female members’ lived experiences of gendered care in rural China and offer proper normative evaluation based on their experiences. Research design: This article adopted an empirical ethical approach that integrates ethnographical investigation and feminist ethical inquiry. Participants and research context: This article focused on three cases of gendered caregiving for sick older members collected from a 6-month fieldwork conducted in a primary hospital in rural China. Ethical consideration: Approval was obtained from the university ethics committee. Findings: The empirical work highlights caregivers’ voices of weiqu (a sense of unfairness) resulting from their constrained choice when being pressured to engage in caregiving, which is associated with a disadvantageous socio-institutional and structural backdrop in current rural China. Informed by the conception of structural injustice, the normative analysis of this article traced various forms of social norms, structural deficiencies and ageing welfare institutions, as they intertwine and transmit into additional care deficiencies against rural families and their female caregivers. Conclusion: This article identified the constraint of gender hierarchy and its intersection with external social structure that exacerbate gendered oppression and exploitation of female labour in rural China. Normatively, this article argues that the current configuration of rural family care, featured by structural impediments and exploration of female labour, is unjust. Some policy recommendations are proposed to empower caregivers and advance care for rural older people.

scholarly journals Land Consolidation in Rural China: Life Satisfaction among Resettlers and Its Determinants

Land ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 118
Author(s):  
Weiming Tong ◽  
Kevin Lo ◽  
Pingyu Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Life Satisfaction ◽  
Rural Communities ◽  
Industrial Development ◽  
Rural China ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Land Consolidation ◽  
Chinese Government ◽  
Rural Villages ◽  
Urban Rural ◽  
Rural Dwellers

The Chinese government has pursued rural land consolidation under the Building New Rural Communities (BNRC) initiative. The consolidation projects aim to address the hollowing village problem, improve the living standards of rural dwellers, and promote urban-rural integration. Rural villages with small populations and poor infrastructure are merged into a centralized rural community, and their inhabitants are resettled. The newly vacated buildings are then converted to agriculture land, which allows cities to expand under the “no net loss” land-use policy. Despite the significance of the initiative, both in terms of the scale of operation and the impacts on the affected households, there are few empirical studies that scrutinize this form of rural restructuring. Drawing on data collected via surveys and interviews, this paper examines the processes of land consolidation and its impacts on villagers. From a development-as-modernization perspective, we outline three main processes of land consolidation: village mergers and resettlement, land circulation to rural cooperatives, and rural industrial development. Overall, the effects of land consolidation on the livelihood of resettled villagers are positive. This system generally improves housing and living conditions through increased levels of off-farm employment and income, but there are a number of barriers that may hinder a villager’s ability to find different employment. Housing and neighborhood characteristics have significant effects on the life satisfaction of villagers.

scholarly journals From “Blood Transfusion” to “Harmonious Development”: The Political Economy of Fiscal Allocations to China's Ethnic Regions

2012 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 11-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carla Freeman
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Blood Transfusion ◽  
Development Strategy ◽  
Policy Process ◽  
Development Policy ◽  
National Development ◽  
Policy Instrument ◽  
The Political ◽  
National Integration ◽  
Ethnic Tensions

For six decades, China's central authorities have promoted development in ethnic regions through special fiscal allocations with the idea that economic development is the key to national integration and inter-ethnic harmony. Yet, inter-ethnic tensions and violence persist in China. Focusing on historical changes to fiscal allocations as the principal policy instrument used by Beijing to promote development in ethnic areas, this analysis finds these changes mirror broad shifts in the country's national development strategy. As the study argues, this pattern reflects an approach to development policy in ethnic regions whereby policies serve central objectives consistent with a policy process for determining the fiscal allocations to ethnic regions that has been both centrally concentrated and non-participatory. With evidence that this “non-engaging” approach may be exacerbating ethnic tensions, Beijing has made efforts to introduce more “inclusive” approaches to determining policies for ethnic regions; however, whether these approaches will be institutionalized remains unclear.

scholarly journals Understanding beverage taxation: Perspective on the Philadelphia Beverage Tax’s novel approach

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryan M. Kane ◽  
Vasanti S. Malik
Keyword(s):  
Policy Process ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Health Impact ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Sugar Sweetened Beverage ◽  
Novel Approach ◽  
Global Trend ◽  
Health Impact Assessments ◽  
Political Entrepreneurs

Despite the growing global trend of sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes for their potential as an untapped source of revenue and as a public health boon, these legislative efforts remain controversial. Multiple articles have reviewed this trend in recent years from modeling of long-term impacts to short-term empirical studies, yet most comprehensive, long-term health impact assessments remain forthcoming. These multi-faceted efficacy studies combined with case-based assessments of the policy process, descriptive pieces highlighting unique features of the policy and reflective perspectives targeting unanswered questions create a comprehensive body of literature to help inform present and future legislative efforts. The passage of the Philadelphia Beverage tax required a mix of political entrepreneurs, timing and context; while uniquely employing a nonpublic health frame, specific earmarking and a broadened scope with the inclusion of diet beverages. This perspective on the Philadelphia Beverage Tax will describe the passage and novel features of the Philadelphia Beverage Tax with a discussion of the ethical questions unique to this case.

Income Distribution in Small Rural Chinese Communities

1976 ◽  
Vol 68 ◽  
pp. 797-816 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Blecher
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Income Distribution ◽  
Agricultural Development ◽  
Rural China ◽  
Modern China ◽  
Equal Distribution ◽  
Rural Income ◽  
Interview Research ◽  
China Today ◽  
Modest Level

The issue of equality has become the focus of increasing attention in both China and the west in the past several years. But the empirical basis for analyzing the extent and nature of equality in modern China remains weak, relying as it has on impressions and scattered statistics brought back by visitors. The most systematic summary of available data on one form of equality – income distribution – is Professor Martin Whyte's recent article in The China Quarterly (No. 64) entitled “Inequality and stratification in China.” Whyte's measure of inequality is the ratio of the income of the highest earner to that of the lowest. In his treatment of rural income, Whyte reports intra-team ratios for 18 communes visited by Keith Buchanan as around 3:1, a ratio of 14:1 for Liu-lin village visited by Jan Myrdal in 1962, and 3:1 or 4:1 for villages in his own interview research. On the basis of this kind of data, Whyte concludes that income inequality within China's production teams is relatively low but not outstandingly so in comparison with pre-1949 China or with other Asian countries. He suggests that the “modest” level of income inequality in rural China today may be as much the result of a relatively equal distribution before 1949 as of post-Liberation agricultural development and redistribution of the means of production.

scholarly journals Trajektoria trwania opancerzonych demokracji

2019 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 63-82
Author(s):  
Joanna Rak ◽  
Roman Bäcker
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Ideal Type ◽  
Analytical Tool ◽  
Political Regimes ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Scholarly Literature ◽  
Defensive Strategies ◽  
Theoretical Category ◽  
New Criteria

MILITANT DEMOCRACIES’ TRAJECTORY OF CONTINUANCEThe theoretical category of militant democracy in Karl Loevenstein’s meaning is described well in world scholarly literature. Notwithstanding, there is no comprehensive typology of militant democracy which would allow for identifying and diversifying various political regimes which meet the distinctive features of the Weberian ideal type of militant democracy. Therefore, the main aim of this paper is to formulate a typology of militant democracies which would be a useful analytical tool for studying diverse political regimes. Importantly, this paper contributes to the field by proposing the framework of the theory, i.e., militant democracies’ trajectory of continuance which consists of the types of militant democracies and the relationships between them. It is significant to assume that the subjects of militant democracy use offensive and defensive strategies which are characterised by the following degrees of intensity: low, moderate, and high. Hence, nine types of these strategies’ configurations are determined. They generate nine types of militant democracies. Moreover, there are nine factorial relationships between them, which are useful for assessing whether and how empirical exemplifications of political regimes change. This proposal of the typology of militant democracies is highly applicable to empirical studies and worth developing in a theoretical way on the basis of new criteria such as the potential of regime regeneration.

scholarly journals Hygiene, Sociality, and Culture in Contemporary Rural China. The Uncanny New Village

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lili Lai
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Production ◽  
Rural China ◽  
The Political ◽  
Rural Welfare ◽  
The Mean ◽  
China Today ◽  
Village Life ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Contemporary Chinese ◽  
Mean Time

By taking the lived body as local, unstable, diverse, and open to urban and global incorporations, this book highlights contemporary Chinese and global reductions of diverse conditions into generalized objects, especially in the Chinese state's well-intended social welfare effort of "building socialist new villages" which in the mean time shows clearly how judgments come to be disguised as facts (Cf. Pigg 1992). The political economic roots and social determinants of "dirty villages," the strategies of inhabiting "villages with empty centers," and the local and national projects of cultural production all reveal much about class and power in China today. Unlike other close ethnographies of small places in China, this reading of local culture is considered in the context of the national and global practices that maintain a deeply divisive rural-urban divide in everyday hygienic practices. This book argues that substantive ethnographic attention to the specificities of village life in the contemporary Henan context can destabilize China's chronic rural-urban divide and contribute to an effective rural welfare intervention to improve the hygienic conditions of village life at present.

scholarly journals Illegal Gambling and Its Operation via the Darknet and Bitcoin: An Application of Routine Activity Theory

2020 ◽  
pp. 3-23
Author(s):  
Sinyong Choi ◽  
◽  
Kyung-Shick Choi ◽  
Yesim Sungu-Eryilmaz ◽  
Hee-Kyung Park ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Routine Activity Theory ◽  
Online Gambling ◽  
Routine Activity ◽  
Policy Recommendations ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Illegal Gambling ◽  
Illegal Activities ◽  
Surface Web ◽  
Gambling Activities

The Darknet and Bitcoins have been widely utilized by those who wish to anonymously perform illegal activities in cyberspace. Restricted in many countries, gambling websites utilize Bitcoin payments that allow users to freely engage in illegal gambling activities with the absence of a formal capable guardian. Despite the urgency and limited knowledge available to law enforcement regarding this issue, few empirical studies have focused on illegal gambling websites. The current study attempts to examine the characteristics and operations of online gambling websites on both the Darknet and Surface Web, which allow Bitcoin payments. The findings suggest that both websites on the Surface Web and Darknet have similar and distinctive features that attract and encourage online users to engage in extensive illegal gambling activities and potentially other illegal activities as well. The study concludes with policy recommendations to remedy the issue of online gambling.

scholarly journals How “Peasant Apartments” Could Undermine Rural Governance in China: Spatial Realignment, Moral Reconfiguration and Local Authority

2019 ◽  
Vol 242 ◽  
pp. 376-396 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ray Yep ◽  
Ying Wu
Keyword(s):  
Local Authority ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Rural China ◽  
Original Data ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
Political Challenge ◽  
The Face ◽  
To Come ◽  
Residential Pattern ◽  
China Today

AbstractA seismic change in the residential pattern is emerging in rural China today: traditional rural houses have been rapidly erased from the face of the countryside with large numbers of peasants being relocated to modern high-rise buildings. This process of “peasant elevation” has had a monumental impact on rural China. It redefines the entitlement to land use by the rural citizenry and negotiations for a new regime of property rights concerning land administration, while, most importantly, it undermines the position of the local state in rural China, whose authority is an aggregation of three distinctive elements: coercive power inherent in the state apparatus, control over economic resources, and resonance with local morality. Based on original data collected in Chongqing, Nantong and Dezhou, this paper argues that the comprehensive uprooting of the Chinese peasantry from the land and the resulting complications have caused moral disorientation among the relocated peasants and fragmentation of local authority. The difficulty in establishing community identity in the new setting has further undermined local governance. This may in turn trigger a wave of social and political tensions that may eventually turn out to be a major political challenge to the regime for years to come.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document