Hostname: page-component-89b8bd64d-5bvrz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-09T18:16:50.100Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Structural Changes in Chinese Corruption

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 August 2012

Kilkon Ko  and
Cuifen Weng
Kilkon Ko*
Affiliation:
Seoul National University
Cuifen Weng
Affiliation:
East Asia Institute
*
Email: kilkon@snu.ac.kr (corresponding author)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Given the rapid economic and administrative evolution that China has undergone during the last three decades, it is likely that corruption in China has been directly and indirectly affected by the changes that have taken place. However, the existing literature pays little attention to the impact of such changes on Chinese corruption, while emphasizing the seriousness of corruption. This article reviews how the major causes of Chinese corruption in the reform era have been alleviated in the 2000s. Some of the recent changes include the progress of the market economy, the advent of a merit-based civil service system, improvement of the budgeting and auditing system, fiscal recentralization and better monitoring of local governments' activities, and progress in anti-corruption regulation and enforcement. Consequently, we hypothesize that changes in the causes of corruption have led to structural changes in Chinese corruption. Our empirical analyses reveal that administrative reform has resulted in a decrease in the number of corruption cases related to the internal administrative process (embezzlement and misappropriation of public funds). At the same time, we also observe the aggravation of bribery. This suggests that Chinese corruption has made a transition from being an administrative issue to being a private–public transactional problem.

Keywords

Chinacorruptionstructural change

Information

Type
Articles
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 211 , September 2012 , pp. 718 - 740
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2012 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Bergsten, C. Fred, Freeman, Charles F., Lardy, Nicholas R. and Mitchell, Derek J.. 2008. “Corruption in China: crisis or constant?” In Bergsten, C. Fred, Lardy, Nicholas R. and Mitchell, Derek J. (eds.), China's Rise: Challenges and Opportunities. Washington, DC: Peterson Institute for International Economics: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 91–104.Google Scholar
Berkley, George E. and Rouse, John E.. 2010. The Craft of Public Administration (10th ed.). Boston: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Burns, John P. 1993. “China's administrative reforms for a market economy.” Public Administration and Development 13 (4), 354–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
CCDI and Ministry of Supervision (eds.). 2005. Dangfeng lianzheng he fanfubai xianxing fagui zhidu quanshu (Pandect of Current Anti-Corruption Laws and Regulations). Beijing: Zhongguo fangzheng Press.Google Scholar
Deng, Xiaogang, Zhang, Lening and Leverentz, Andrea. 2010. “Official corruption during China's economic transition: historical patterns, characteristics, and government reactions.” Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice 26 (1), 72–88.Google Scholar
Gong, Ting. 1993. “Corruption and reform in China: an analysis of unintended consequences.” Crime, Law and Social Change 19 (4), 311–27.Google Scholar
Gong, Ting. 2006. “Corruption and local governance: the double identity of Chinese local governments in market reform.” The Pacific Review 19, 85–102.Google Scholar
Guo, Yong. 2006. National Integrity System – Transparency International Country Study Report: China 2006. Berlin: Transparency International.Google Scholar
Guo, Yong. 2008. “Corruption in transitional China: an empirical analysis.” The China Quarterly 194, 349–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Han, Jie. 2007. “Zhongguo gonggong yusuan gaige luxiantu riqu qingxi” (“China's route map for public budgeting reform is getting clearer”), Xinhua Net. http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2007-01/11/content_5594855.htm. Accessed 18 October 2010.Google Scholar
Hao, Y. and Johnston, M.. 1995. “China's surge of corruption.” Journal of Democracy 6 (4), 80–95.Google Scholar
He, Qinglian (ed.). 2004. On Systemic Corruption in China and Its Influence. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
He, Zengke. 2000. “Corruption and anti-corruption in reform China.” Communist and Post-Communist Studies 33 (2), 243–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hu, Angang. 2001. Zhongguo: tiaozhan fubai (China: Fighting against Corruption). Hangzhou: Zhejiang People's Press.Google Scholar
Huang, W. 1999. The Lost Dignity: A Memo on Anticorruption. Beijing: World Knowledge Press.Google Scholar
Ko, Kilkon and Weng, Cuifen. 2011. “Critical review of conceptual definitions of Chinese corruption: a formal-legal perspective.” Journal of Contemporary China 20 (70), 359–78.Google Scholar
Ko, Kilkon and Han, Lulu. Forthcoming. “An empirical study on public service motivation of the next generation civil servants in China.” Public Personnel Management.Google Scholar
Kwong, J. 1997. The Political Economy of Corruption in China. New York: M.E. Sharpe, Inc.Google Scholar
Landry, Pierre F. 2008. Decentralized Authoritarianism in China: the Communist Party's Control of Local Elites in the Post-Mao Era. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lan, Z. 1999. “The 1998 administrative reform in China: issues, challenges, and prospects.” Asian Journal of Public Administration 21 (1), 29–54.Google Scholar
Legal Daily . 2009. “The Supreme People's Procuratorate has received over ten thousand citizen tips five days after the open of hotline.” 29 June 2009. http://politics.people.com.cn/GB/101380/9558519.html. Accessed 19 October 2010.Google Scholar
Liu, A.P.L. 1983. “The politics of corruption in the People's Republic of China.” The American Political Science Review 77 (3), 602–23.Google Scholar
Liu, J. 2002. “Government budgeting and accounting reform in China.” OECD Journal on Budgeting 2 (supplement 1), 52–80.Google Scholar
Liu, Xiao-xuan. 2009. The Micro-foundation of China's Market Economy. Singapore: Gale Asia.Google Scholar
Lu, Xiaobo. 2000a. Cadres and Corruption: the Organizational Involution of the Chinese Communist Party. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Lu, Xiaobo, 2000b. “Booty socialism, bureau-preneurs, and the state in transition: organizational corruption in China.” Comparative Politics 32 (3), 273–94.Google Scholar
Ma, Jun and Xing, Ni. 2008. “Toward a clean government in China: does the budget reform provide a hope?” Crime, Law and Social Change 49 (2), 119–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manion, M. 2004. Corruption by Design: Building Clean Government in Mainland China and Hong Kong. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University.Google Scholar
Montinola, G., Qian, Y., and Weingast, B.R.. 1995. “Federalism, Chinese style: the political basis for economic success in China.” World Politics 48 (1), 50–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Myers, James T. 1989. “China: modernization and ‘unhealthy tendencies’.” Comparative Politics 21 (2), 193–213.Google Scholar
Park, Albert, Rozelle, Scott, Wong, Christine and Ren, Changqing. 1996. “Distributional consequences of reforming local public finance in China.” The China Quarterly 147, 751–78.Google Scholar
Quade, Elizabeth A. 2007. “The logic of anticorruption enforcement campaigns in contemporary China.” Journal of Contemporary China 16 (50), 65–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ren, Jianming and Du, Zhizhou. 2008. “Institutionalized corruption: power overconcentration of the First-in-Command in China.” Crime, Law and Social Change 49 (1), 45–59.Google Scholar
Rose-Ackerman, Susan. 1978. Corruption: A Study in Political Economy. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Sapio, F. 2005. “Implementing anticorruption in the PRC – patterns of selectivity.” Working Papers in Contemporary Asian Studies. Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies, Lund University.Google Scholar
Sun, Yan. 1999. “Reform, state, and corruption: is corruption less destructive in China than in Russia?” Comparative Politics 32 (1), 1–20.Google Scholar
Sun, Yan. 2004. Corruption and Market in Contemporary China. New York: Cornell University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sun, Yan. 2008. “Cadre recruitment and corruption: what goes wrong?” Crime, Law and Social Change 49 (1), 61–79.Google Scholar
Theobald, Robin. 1989. Corruption, Development and Underdevelopment. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Transparency International. 2006. Global Corruption Report 2006. Ann Arbor, MI: Pluto Press.Google Scholar
The U.S. Department of Justice. 2006. Report to Congress on the Activities and Operations on the Public Integrity Section for 2006. Washington DC: United States Department of Justice.Google Scholar
Wang, Y. 2005. “Corruption and anti-corruption policy in today's China.” Hitotsubashi Journal of Law and Politics 33, 1–5.Google Scholar
Wedeman, Andrew. 2004. “The intensification of corruption in China.” The China Quarterly 180, 895–921.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wedeman, Andrew. 2005. “Anticorruption campaigns and the intensification of corruption in China.” Journal of Contemporary China 14 (42), 93–116.Google Scholar
Wedeman, Andrew. 2008. “Win, lose, or draw? China's quarter century war on corruption.” Crime Law and Social Change 49, 7–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weng, Cuifen. 2009. “Analysis on the growth of bribery in China – a preliminary study.” Unpublished master's thesis, National University of Singapore.Google Scholar
White, G. 1996. “Corruption and the transition from socialism in China.” Journal of Law and Society 23 (1), 149–69.Google Scholar
Wong, Kar-Yiu. 1992. “Inflation, corruption, and income distribution: the recent price reform in China.” Journal of Macroeconomics 14 (1), 105–23.Google Scholar
Wu, Jinglian. 2002. “Fubai yu fanfubai de jingjixue sikao” (“Economic thoughts on corruption and anti-corruption.”) Lanzheng liaowang 11, 20–23.Google Scholar
Yan, Q. 2006. “Institutions, corruption, and anti-corruption policies: the case of China.” Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association.Google Scholar
Yang, Dali. 2004. “Has corruption peaked in China?” EAI Background Brief no. 214, East Asian Institute, National University of Singapore.Google Scholar
Zhan, Jing Vivian. 2009. “Decentralizing China: analysis of central strategies in China's fiscal reforms.” Journal of Contemporary China 18 (60), 445–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zhang, Jun. 2009. Transformation of the Chinese Enterprises. 30 Years of China's Reform Studies Series. Singapore: Gale Asia.Google Scholar
Zhang, Lening. 2001. “White-collar crime: bribery and corruption in China.” In Liu, Jianhong, Zhang, Lening and Messner, Steven F. (eds.), Crime and Social Control in a Changing China. London: Greenwood Press, 23–36.Google Scholar