ABSTRACT
The important role played by the Chinese local state in promoting economic development is by now well established. It has been shown by a number of scholars how local governments use their administrative control to further the growth of township and village enterprises (TVEs) within their locality. The phenomenon of local governments doing business has been variously described as the ‘developmental state’ [Blecher, 1991; Blecher and Shue, 1996], ‘local governments as firms’ [Walder, 1995], ‘local market socialism’ [Lin, 1995], ‘village conglomerates’ [Chen, 1998], ‘entrepreneurial state’ [Duckett, 1998] and ‘bureaucratic entrepreneurs’ [Gore, 1998 and 1999]. Jean Oi [1992, 1995 and 1999] has written extensively on rural industrialization and she coined the concept of local state corporatism, where local governments are viewed as business corporations. Officials are literally acting as board of directors of their collective enterprises, over which they exercise control. Oi’s model of local state corporatism has been the most influential to describe rural economic development and analyse the role of the local state. With the rapid changes taking place in rural China, it can be asked what parts of the model of local state corporatism are still applicable and what parts of the model need to be modified. The notion of local state corporatism defined the field of China rural studies in the 1990s, and the question is what relevance the model holds in the coming decades. This study links up with the ongoing debate on TVE development and the role of the local state in rich and poor areas, and points to which new issues must be addressed.
