Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: Welfare Provision under Authoritarianism - Explaining Variation in Welfare Provision among Chinese Localities

政治学博士论文研究：威权主义下的福利供给——解释中国各地福利供给的差异

• 批准号: 1226681
• 负责人: Elizabeth Perry
• 金额: $ 1.76万
• 依托单位: Harvard University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2012
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2012-09-15 至 2013-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1226681&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Political; Science

Over the past twelve years, the central Chinese government has pushed to expand social policies in areas ranging from minimum income guarantees to health care insurance, but city and county governments, which have substantial authority in allocating expenditures to these programs, have conferred very different levels of benefits to their localities. The proposed project seeks to examine the sources of this variation in social policy provision, and in doing so, advance knowledge of social policy development and political decision-making in authoritarian regimes. The main explanation to be explored is whether the actions of citizens influence the provision of welfare and lead to the observed variation in a context without electoral competition. And if so, how or through what channels do citizens influence these policy decisions and who are the citizens that governments are responsive to? Do citizens exert influence through official channels such as public hearings or People's Congresses, or do they exert influence through protest or other activities that take place outside of formal institutions? Is it the wealthy that exert influence or it is the middle class or under class? These questions will be addressed by using multiple sources of data and a combination of qualitative and quantitative methodology. Case studies of localities with different levels of social welfare provision will be constructed using interviews and archival records. Quantitative analysis of counties and cities across China will also be used to address the research question.The intellectual merit of this project is in its theoretical and empirical contributions to the study of authoritarian distributive politics. Although many social welfare policies were first adopted under authoritarian regimes, there is a lack of theoretical and empirical understanding of the motivations for these actions. Studying social policy development is important to advance understandings of where social politics come from. As well, because of the highly visible and influential programs associated with social policies, research in this area helps shed light on how political choices are made in authoritarian regimes. This project focusing on China is part of the investigator's longer-term research goals to examine the theoretical foundations of the origins of welfare regimes and expand empirical knowledge of political decision-making in authoritarian regimes.The broader impacts of the proposed project include promoting training, enhancing infrastructure for research, and broadening dissemination to enhance future research. This project promotes training by involving undergraduates in the research experience and exposing them to content knowledge, statistical tools, and new methods of text analysis. Through partnerships with Chinese universities and research centers, this project also enhances the infrastructure for research. Key results of the project will also be shared online, as well as through workshops and conferences.Finally, this project provides social value by improving our general understanding of how essential social goods such as health care can be provided to the poor and disenfranchised. As well, by identifying the forces that shape crucial political choices in the Chinese state, this research seeks to provide more precise characterizations of who influences politics and how they influence politics in a context without elections.

在过去的12年里，中央政府大力推进从最低生活保障到医疗保险等社会政策的扩大化，但拥有相当大的经费分配权的市、县政府却对地方政府的福利水平差别很大。拟议的项目旨在研究社会政策规定中这种差异的来源，并在这样做的过程中，促进对专制政权中社会政策制定和政治决策的了解。要探讨的主要解释是公民的行动是否影响福利的提供，并导致在没有选举竞争的情况下观察到的变化。如果是这样，公民如何或通过什么渠道影响这些政策决定，政府对谁作出反应？公民是通过公开听证会或人民代表大会等官方渠道施加影响，还是通过抗议或其他在正式机构之外的活动施加影响？是富人施加影响，还是中产阶级或下层阶级？这些问题将通过使用多种数据来源和定性与定量相结合的方法加以解决。将利用访谈和档案记录对社会福利提供水平不同的地方进行个案研究。本研究的学术价值在于对权威主义分配政治的理论和实证研究做出了贡献。虽然许多社会福利政策最初是在专制政权下采取的，但对这些行动的动机缺乏理论和经验上的理解。研究社会政策的发展对于加深对社会政治从何而来的理解具有重要意义。此外，由于与社会政策相关的项目非常引人注目和有影响力，这一领域的研究有助于揭示专制政权如何做出政治选择。本研究课题以中国为研究对象，是为了探讨福利制度起源的理论基础，扩大威权体制下政治决策的经验知识，从而实现长期研究目标的一部分。本研究课题的更广泛的影响包括促进培训、加强研究基础设施、扩大传播，以促进未来的研究。该项目通过让本科生参与研究体验并让他们接触内容知识、统计工具和文本分析的新方法来促进培训。通过与中国大学和研究中心的合作，该项目还加强了研究基础设施。该项目的主要成果也将在网上以及通过讲习班和会议分享。最后，该项目通过提高我们对如何向穷人和被剥夺权利者提供医疗保健等基本社会商品的普遍理解，提供社会价值。此外，通过确定在中国国家中形成关键政治选择的力量，本研究旨在提供更准确的描述谁影响政治以及他们如何在没有选举的情况下影响政治。