Recognition of innovation and diffusion of welfare policy: Alleviating urban poverty in Chinese cities during fiscal recentralization

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Zhu, Xufeng; Zhao, Hui
• 署名单位: Tsinghua University; Capital Normal University
• 刊物名称: GOVERNANCE-AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF POLICY ADMINISTRATION AND INSTITUTIONS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0952-1895
• DOI: 10.1111/gove.12332
• 发表日期: 2018
• 关键词: social-policy; rural china; health-insurance; ECONOMIC-REFORMS; decentralization; FEDERALISM; experimentation; responsiveness; transfers; POLITICS

摘要

This article explores the complicated triangular architecture among innovation diffusion, fiscal recentralization, and authoritarian welfare regimes. We argue that local governments' adoption of innovative welfare policies attracts the attention of central authorities who tend to recognize spontaneous local innovation by releasing central administrative signals. During the era of fiscal recentralization starting from the Chinese Tax-Sharing System Reform in 1994, cities with higher fiscal dependency are more likely to behave innovatively by adopting a new welfare policy for potential fiscal transfer rewards. The central government's recognition of this innovation stimulates cities' adoption but would reverse the effects of fiscal dependency because of the loss of the innovativeness of the adoption and its effectiveness in attracting the attention of superior authorities. We test our theories on the dynamic diffusion with the case of China's Urban Minimum Living Standard Assistance system, an urban poverty-alleviation policy implemented fully in 1999.