ABSTRACT
Pay is not only an important part of the human resource strategy, but also an important topic for research in work and employment, and a frequent source of tension in labour-management relations. Pay determination involves a host of stakeholders and is influenced by a range of factors such as legislation, government policies, unions and professional associations’ policies, sectoral performance, and labour market conditions. Pay reform in China is a subject that has received considerable attention from scholars on China over the past two decades, although most of these studies have focused mainly on pay systems in the SOEs (e.g. Howe 1973; Walder 1987; Chew 1990a, 1990b; Tung 1991; Jackson 1992; Korzec 1992; Takahara 1992; Child 1994, 1995; Nyaw 1995; Warner 1996a, 1997a; Yu, K. C. 1998). This is understandable since most of the changes in the pay systems, as part of a wider reform, have occurred in enterprises which have been increasingly released from the once tight state control on their affairs. Despite the quantitative and qualitative significance of government organizations and the public sector as part of the state sector in China, insufficient information is known about their pay policy and practice, and any changes that may have taken place in the wake of the market economy. In addition, the diverse features manifested in the pay practices in the expanding private sector have received little attention, as have recent developments in pay schemes in general.
