ABSTRACT
We have discussed how debates on economic restructuring in China have revolved primarily around the adoption of market mechanisms in a gradual transition from the centrally planned economy that existed in China up until 1978. In this chapter we examine one important aspect of these debates, that relating to the discontinuation of the CRS which governed relations between the enterprise and the state in China from the early 1980s until 1994-1995. This analysis is derived mainly from textual materials (official reports, journals, newspapers, etc.) and qualitative, interview-based, field research conducted by members of the research team in the mid-1990s at Beijing’s Capital Iron and Steel Corporation (Shougang), since this was the flagship of the CRS experiment and exemplifies some of the system’s problems, which came to be perceived by the state to outweigh its benefits. Although Shougang is an untypical enterprise in important respects – mainly due to its special status in China (see below) – its experience with the CRS and its problematic transition from this system make it an important case study in the debate on state-enterprise reform in China.
