- 20 Apr 2021
- Working Paper Summaries
The Emergence of Mafia-like Business Systems in China
This study sheds light on the political pathology of fraudulent, illegal, and corrupt business practices. Features of the Chinese system—including regulatory gaps, a lack of formal means of property protection, and pervasive uncertainty—seem to facilitate the rise of mafia systems.
- 08 Dec 2020
- Working Paper Summaries
Party-State Capitalism in China
China’s political economy has evolved from “state capitalism” to a distinctly party-driven incarnation. Party-state capitalism, via enhanced party monitoring and industrial policy, deepens ambiguity between the state and private sectors, and increases pressure on foreign capital, prioritizing the regime’s political survival above all.
- 18 Jun 2020
- Working Paper Summaries
The Rise of the Investor State: State Capital in the Chinese Economy
Researchers document and explain the rise of a novel form of intervention on the part of the Chinese state: the expansion of state capital beyond ownership of state firms.
- 10 Aug 2019
- Working Paper Summaries
Varieties of Outward Chinese Capital: Domestic Politics Status and Globalization of Chinese Firms
Most popular and scholarly writing about China’s global push overemphasizes the power of the state. This paper explains how three types of domestic Chinese capital—state capital, private capital, and crony capital—differ in political vulnerability and pursue globalization in different ways. All prefer capital openness, but they do so for different reasons.
- 18 Feb 2016
- Working Paper Summaries
Urbanization with Chinese Characteristics? China’s Gamble for Modernization
If the Chinese Communist Party has its way in the coming decades, it will urbanize hundreds of millions of people, transform agriculture, and sustain economic growth--all without political instability. This paper details the risks and opportunities of China’s new-style urbanization reforms, arguing that proposals for urbanization and economic transformation are not a radical departure from the institutions that have structured Chinese society for the last 30 years.
- 10 Feb 2016
- Working Paper Summaries
Land Institutions and Chinese Political Economy: Institutional Complementarities and Macroeconomic Management
This paper shows the ways in which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has used land as a policy tool. CCP leaders intentionally reorganized fiscal, financial, and land institutions to put land at the center of local government finances in the mid-1990s. Since the late 1990s, the CCP has used the land supply as a key tool of macroeconomic expansion and contraction. Local officials act as agents of the center: pursuing land development when pushed to so do by central authorities concerned about managing economic growth.
- 07 Oct 2011
- Research & Ideas
The Steve Jobs Legacy
Harvard Business School faculty offer their perspectives on the legendary career of Steve Jobs, who remade several industries even as he changed how we use technology. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
How the Clean Network Changed the Future of Global Technology Competition
The Chinese telecom giant Huawei and other Chinese telecom firms, like ZTE, had been poised to lead the globe in 5G technology—until the U.S. State Department embarked on a global campaign to challenge the market dominance of Chinese firms with the Clean Network program. The initiative, launched in 2020 and led by Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, Energy, and the Environment, former Silicon Valley business leader Keith Krach, united countries and companies around a commitment to abide by a set of shared principles in technology adoption, data privacy, and security practices. Is this a new era of multilateral, democratic governance of the internet, or a “splinternet” forcing participants to choose between the U.S. and China? Krach (MBA 1981) and Harvard Business School Professor Meg Rithmire discuss how the Clean Network Program changed the competitive landscape for 5G in the case, "The Clean Network and the Future of Global Technology Competition." Open for comment; 0 Comments.