Advances in Chinese Economic Studies series – serie

'This book offers an exciting indigenous perspective on Chinese governance model and Professor Hongjun Zhao is to be applauded for his invaluable contribution!'- Tony Fang, Stockholm University, Sweden'This book traces the root of China's past failure as well as its success since 1978 to the inertia of its government governance, which was in turn shaped by its environment, geography and natural endowment. The book makes an important contribution to the Neo-institutional school by introducing geographical factors to explain the puzzling stability of the traditional Chinese government governance and the new challenges this type of governance is facing in an increasing globalizing world.'- Guanzhong James wen, Trinity College, US'Professor Zhao's book offers us a unique and valuable perspective on China's present and future from a historical perspective. The book also makes use of a large amount of valuable quantitative statistics on various aspects of Chinese history.'- Debin Ma, London School of Economics, UK This book takes a long-term perspective to examine the evolution of Chinese governance and its lasting impact on Chinese economic development. Through its broad exploration of the style, strength, and effectiveness of Chinese governance through the years, it touches on a universal relationship between economic development and governance and institutions, translating the experiences of one of the world’s oldest civilizations into widespread, current economic relevance.Hongjun Zhao first examines the formation of Chinese style governance, the core contents of this governance, and its vitality compared with other governance patterns in Chinese history. He also discusses the effectiveness of this governance pattern in supporting the economic development before the Song dynasty, the failure of this governance during the past 3-5 centuries and the governmental role in pushing development since 1978. Finally, he makes a prediction of the direction of Chinese governance patterns in over the next 20-30 years.Scholars and researchers interested in China's long term economic development will appreciate this comprehensive examination of the subject, as will high level undergraduate and graduate students interested in keeping pace with China’s rapid development.

Before the 1990s, China's telecommunications sector was a lacklustre monopoly featured by poor-quality service and inadequate capacity. Today the country boasts a dynamic telecommunications industry with the world's largest communications network and user-base with over 460 million telephone subscribers. China's accession to the WTO in 2001 has opened this huge developing telecommunications market to foreign participation and investment.The authors examine the singularity of the Chinese experience in building up its extensive telecommunications network in merely a decade, by reviewing China's national industrial policies and institutional reforms within the industry. The reader will find in this volume a unique and in-depth analysis of the interplay between political and economic forces amidst the industry's structural overhaul and regulatory reforms. The accounts of industrial features and market conditions are enriched with up-to-date data, which are extremely useful for appreciating the development and prospects for this fast-growing market, set against the backdrop of China's accession to the WTO.Scholars of China or Asian studies and researchers of information-communications industry and Asian/China studies will find this work of great interest, as will governmental policymakers, both in China and beyond. For foreign business practitioners eyeing this market, this volume provides a helpful guide to understand China's various interests and public welfare considerations that motivate changes in policies towards foreign investment and participation.

China's prospects of successfully completing the transition to a market economy and becoming the world's largest economy during the 21st century depend on the future sustainability of high rates of economic growth. This book is a comprehensive, balanced and realistic assessment of China's financial reform program and future direction. Covering not only the banking sector but also non-bank financial institutions, stock market development and external financial liberalization, the authors examine the impact of financial reform on economic development in China during the reform period. This volume will facilitate a more accurate assessment of the Chinese approach to financial reform, and will therefore, allow more informed future policy choices for both China and other developing and transitional countries. Financial Reform and Economic Development in China contains a wealth of information for anyone concerned with China's economic future, and should be required reading for those in the corporate business sector, academics and government analysts.

The establishment of the Shanghai Stock Exchange in December 1990 was a landmark in China's institutional transformation. With this in mind, the authors consider the factors relating to institutional change - such as changes in the financial system, the scale and structure of stock market, operational efficiency and the regulatory system of the stock market. During the course of its development the Chinese stock market has experienced speculation, dramatic fluctuations and violations of market regulations of frequent and diverse natures. There is therefore, urgent need for the discussion contained within this volume of best procedure policies for the establishment of a properly ordered and regulated market.The authors assess the operational performance of listed companies, and changes in the external environment such as the impact of China's accession to the WTO on the stock market. The authors find that WTO accession will have a more serious impact on the more heavily protected agricultural sector and on capital-intensive industries such as automobile, instruments, cotton and wheat to name a few. They argue that the fundamental reason for the inefficiency of China's stock market is the weakness of the competitive mechanism leading to imperfect competition and rent-seeking activity. This book will be of great interest to academics and researchers of Asian studies and money and finance. Multinational enterprise managers, as well as brokers, dealers, business economists and others involved in the global financial markets will also find this book of value.

Financial reform has been a major concern for China's transitional economy - especially in the realms of banking and insurance - since accession to the WTO in 2001. This book scrutinizes the development and limitations of these industries during the process of institutional transformation, and demonstrates that they are now facing severe challenges as well as opportunities. The relationships between the market structure, behavior and performance of China's banking and insurance industries are analysed. The strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threat (SWOT) approach is utilized in investigating the impact of WTO accession on Chinese banking and insurance, and strategies for the prevention of future financial crises are prescribed. Exploring the juxtaposition of institutional transformation in China and the financial risk inherent in the old system, the book concludes that with WTO accession and the opening up of financial services to foreign companies, competitiveness will become fiercer, resulting in increased uncertainty, intensifying the level of risk even further. Banking and Insurance in the New China will prove invaluable to multinational enterprise managers, brokers, dealers and investors, business economists, students and academics with a specific interest in the Chinese economy.

The emergence of a stock market in China only occurred a decade ago and it remains something of an unknown quantity to many observers and traders outside of the country. This book provides an extensive historical and empirical analysis of the Chinese stock-market, the development of which is an integral part of the process of economic modernization that began in China in the late 1970s.The authors address a variety of critical topics to assess the efficiency, predictability and profitability of the Chinese stock-market. They carefully examine the evolution and performance of the market over the past ten years and measure its level of efficiency using an array of empirical studies. The results reveal that not only is the stock market far from efficient but that it has also failed to properly integrate with other regional markets. Thus, the authors propose further reforms which they argue are necessary for the stock market to realize its full potential contribution to the operation of China's financial markets and to its continuing economic development. The stock market in China will undoubtedly grow in importance and international influence during the next ten years. As such, this valuable new book will be required reading for economic researchers, business economists and market analysts, as well as academics with an interest in Chinese business and Asian finance.

Following China's accession to the WTO in 2001, reform of its science and technology system has deepened. This book provides an in-depth analysis of the high-tech sector, examining Chinese high-tech industry policy, the emergence of industrial clusters, the R&D activities of multinational corporations operating in China, and the prospect of commercialization of high-tech achievements. The authors argue that since commercialization has become the ultimate objective of innovation activity, the relationship between R&D facilities, the local economy and local enterprises has become closer, thereby boosting the technology innovation capability of the corporate sector. They go on to explore regions with the greatest scale and depth of high-tech industry development: Beijing, Shenzhen, Shanghai and Shaanxi; which now serve as models for other regions. The book concludes that although high-tech exports have become an important contributing factor to China's economic growth, the country still has no effective mechanism for high-risk investment, therefore Chinese high-tech enterprises still find it difficult to secure financing.This book will strongly appeal to those affiliated to multinational enterprises: managers, brokers, dealers and investors, as well as academics and researchers specialising in business economics and Asian studies.

China's accession agreements to the World Trade Organization promised to open up the financial sector to foreign competition by the end of 2006, affording a wealth of opportunities for domestic and international investors. However, there also exist inherent risks and challenges, including inefficient financial markets, inadequate and fast-changing regulations, excessive governmental influence, and lack of transparency in accounting and corporate governance. The contributors to this book explore these perplexing and intertwined issues as they systematically document and analyze the capital market's development in association with the banking system and legal framework. China's economy has been growing rapidly since the late 1970s and is expected to maintain this momentum in the foreseeable future. Coupled with the biggest population in the world, there is tremendous growth potential for China's capital markets and financial services industry, both vital to the continued development of the economy. The contributors present research on all facets of China's markets including: stock and bond markets; futures and over-the-counter markets; regulatory issues; and the development and roles of financial institutions such as brokerage firms, banks and insurance companies. Also addressed are the recent performance of equity markets, the emergence of small and medium enterprises, and the state banks' bids to be listed in overseas stock exchanges. Taken together, the book sheds a welcome light on China's overall economic growth.This comprehensive look at the future of China's economy will be of great value to students and scholars of China. Investors and policymakers will also find it of great practical use.

Market Development in China presents the analysis of leading specialists on the causes, benefits and problems resulting from China's transition to a market economy. As the authors illustrate, it is generally recognized that in the last 25 years China has achieved a rate of economic growth unmatched in any of the world's major countries. However, this growth has been unequally shared, so that by the year 2000, China also exhibited what to many observers was an alarming degree of income inequality at individual, sectoral, and regional levels.This books deals with several facets of China's spectacular economic growth and its rising income inequality. It is shown that geographical and sectoral distribution of social services has increased the degree of inequality among Chinese households. On the positive side though, there is evidence that regionalization of commodity markets has decreased, promoting pricing equality, which is surely a cornerstone of income equality. Analysis is also presented on regional technology spillovers, rural-urban labor migration, and the relationship between FDI and the ability of state-owned enterprises to cope with the pressures of hard budget constraints. The book provides updated evidence on China's social and economic inequalities and their causes.The contributions make up a cohesive and valuable study that will appeal to scholars and researchers at many levels of academe in the fields of economics, Asian studies - and Chinese studies in particular - as well as development economists.

This unique annotated bibliography contains the most important studies of the Chinese business environment, comprising almost 1000 references to articles published in English-language journals in the past fifteen years or so. The editors have sought to focus on those writings that deal fairly directly with the impact of the Chinese business environment on foreign firms doing business in China. Each work is fully referenced in a standard format, has a brief description of its subject matter and has been given a classification code - ensuring quick and easy identification of all articles on any given subject.The indexes include a joint author index and a subject classification index which make the bibliography easily navigable and usable. There is also an introduction by the editors explaining the rationale behind the book and the selection criteria, along with a description of how it may be used most efficiently.This book will serve as an invaluable reference book for scholars and researchers of Asian studies - China most particularly - and international business. Senior executives and middle level managers of multinational corporations who have been operating in, or who wish to do business in and with China would also find this a useful and rich source of information.

This book surveys the competing, or sometimes complementary, roles of the state and the market in shaping China's pattern of regional development during the Communist era. The uneven pace of industrialisation across China's provinces during its economic transition raises numerous questions regarding spatial patterns of industrial development in a developing, transitional economy. Jane Golley's book answers questions such as: Why have inter-regional inequalities in industrial development come to exist? Why are they tending to increase? How have regional policies and reform strategies impacted on these trends? How, if at all, can these trends be reversed? A comparative economic systems analysis of the Mao and Deng eras, combined with theoretical and empirical evidence of the disequilibrium nature of regional development, depicts the recent trend of rising inequality across China as being both inevitable and ongoing. The central government's 'Western Development Strategy' is assessed in this context.The most novel contribution of the book is the development of a framework for thinking about regional development and policy, which combines two distinct approaches - 'new' economic geography and comparative economic systems analysis - which can be used to understand patterns of regional development anywhere in the world. The application of this framework to regional development during the Mao and Deng eras provides a uniquely holistic and easy-to-read coverage of the topic.The Dynamics of Chinese Regional Development will appeal to undergraduate and postgraduate students of the Chinese economy. The book will also find an audience in scholars and researchers of Chinese and Asian studies more generally as well as students and scholars of economics, political economy and regional science.

The rate of economic growth in China over the last 50 years has been remarkable. However this has only highlighted the inequalities between regions in China, making for considerable disquiet at the highest levels of Chinese policy-making. Not everyone has benefited from the same levels of prosperity and this book examines the many and varied policy solutions and proposals that have been applied to this thorny problem. The authors find that the industrial core of China (the South East and the Changjiang and Yellow River regions) is reasonably well integrated but not well connected to the remainder of the country. Indeed, evidence suggests that development in coastal areas comes at the expense of that in the interior while much of the policy designed to boost the interior actually flows to the coastal provinces.This original analysis of the linkages between regions in China, and regional policy since 1949, will prove an invaluable and illuminating account to a wide readership. This will include academics and researchers of Chinese studies and regional economics as well as policy-makers in the region.

The Chinese insurance industry has experienced rapid development during the past decade. This original book is the first English language study in the literature to address the efficiency issue of the Chinese insurance sector, and presents a comprehensive review on alternative methodologies for analyzing firm efficiency.The authors suggest alternative ways to improve performance of insurance companies in China and make useful policy recommendations on regulation, competition and development of the insurance industry. They expand the applications of data envelopment analysis and stochastic frontier analysis in the literature on technical efficiency and discuss managerial implications for both insurance companies and policymakers.Performance of the Chinese Insurance Industry under Economic Reforms will be significant for academic researchers and students of economics, finance and business. Managers of financial institutions in China and the rest of the world will find this important book intriguing, as will policymakers and regulators working in the financial and insurance industries.

The evolution of China's market economy is one of the most important developments in the world economy in the twenty-first century. The diverse contributors to this book provide a unique set of essays that evaluate legal, regulatory, and economic aspects of China's transition from planned to market economy. While market-oriented policy reform in China has led to substantial growth and progress since the onset of the reform period in 1979, many challenges remain. This study begins with a general survey of China's transition to a market economy and is followed by more elaborate analyses of specific sectors. The authors consider China's changing regulatory structure and the relationships of this structure to Chinese markets, developments in markets for goods, services, and production factors, changing trade patterns, and the determinants of foreign direct investment and its role in overall capital formation. They provide a comprehensive assessment of market reforms in China. In-depth yet accessible, the book will be of great value to policy makers, business planners, students and researchers concerned with China, as well as those interested in the world economy at large.

Since China's accession to the WTO in 2001, the Chinese government's original strategy of progressively opening up to attract foreign investment has resulted in capital flowing out as fast as it comes in. This book discusses cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&A) by Chinese companies, mainly to clarify their strategies and the effect of their M&A at an international level. Chien-Hsun Chen and Hui-Tzu Shih also explore the strategies and considerations of both Chinese and international companies - including those from Taiwan - who conduct M&A in China. This is an invaluable study on the acquisition and transfer of technology, branding and marketing channels within the context of competitive cooperation on development targets for foreign, Taiwanese and Chinese companies. Critical points of discussion include China's policy changes and Chinese companies as well as the M&A strategies of international companies in the Chinese marketplace.Mergers and Acquisitions in China will be a fascinating read for multinational enterprise managers, brokers, dealers and investors. The in-depth analysis will prove invaluable for scholars and researchers of business economics, international economics and Chinese studies.