Corruption in transitional China: An empirical analysis

China Quarterly

Volumn , Issue 194, 2008, Pages 349-364

  Guo, Yong ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CORRUPTION; EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS; MARKET TRANSITION; STATISTICAL ANALYSIS;

ASIA; CHINA; EURASIA; FAR EAST;

EID: 45749091340     PISSN: 03057410     EISSN: 14682648     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0305741008000416     Document Type: Article

References (47)

1. Jean-Louis Rocca, "Corruption and its shadow," The China Quarterly No. 130 (1992), pp. 402-16.
2. Economic transition in this article refers to China's transition after 1978 from the centrally planned economy to the market economy. More precisely, the period from 1978 to 1992 may be regarded as economic reform in preparation for the post-1992 economic transition, but both periods are collectively referred to here as economic transition.
3. This article does not discuss institutional or political corruption. For institutional corruption, see Yong Guo and Angang Hu, "The administrative monopoly in China's economic transition," Communist and Post-Communist Studies, Vol. 37 (2004), pp. 265-80.
4. Arnold J. Heidenheimer, "Perspectives on the perception of corruption," in Arnold J. Heidenheimer, Michael Johnston and Victor T. Levine (eds.), Political Corruption: A Hand Book (New Brunswick and London: Transaction Publishers, 1993), pp. 149-64.
5. Jeremy Pope, Zhiyue fubai: Jiangou guojia lianzheng tixi (Confronting Corruption: The Elements of the National Integrity System) (Beijing: Fangzheng Press, 2003), p. 5.
6. In this article, graft only refers to illegal possession of public funds or assets.
7. Official profiteering refers to the situation where public officials profit from getting access to government-priced goods and then selling them at higher market prices. It was facilitated by the former "dual-pricing" system.
8. These activities are prohibited by internal documents and disciplinary rules of the Chinese Communist Party and Chinese government, but not clearly defined in law. Offending public officials are therefore subject to disciplinary or administrative sanctions only, not criminal punishment.
9. As an example, in 2001 Columbia University carried out the State Capacity Survey, which covered 121 countries, upon US-resident country experts (including policy analysts, academics and journalists).
10. IMD, World Competitiveness Yearbook, http://www.imd.ch/wcy.
11. Political and Economic Risk Consultancy, Asian Intelligence Issue, http://www.asiarisk.com/.
12. WER, Global Competitiveness Report, http://www.weforum.org.
13. http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi.
14. http://info.worldbank.org/governance/.
15. This method has other problems. For example, it adopts different definitions of corruption and has limited scope and methods of inquiry. These problems, however, are not critical, and the method can be improved gradually.
16. Grand cases involve huge amounts of money. According to definitions by China's procuratorial organs, before 1998 grand corruption cases are graft or bribery cases involving more than 10,000 yuan or embezzlement cases involving more than 50,000 yuan, and after 1998 are graft or bribery cases involving more than 50,000 yuan or embezzlement cases involving more than 100,000 yuan.
17. Major cases are cases by senior officials. They generally refer to those in which the highest-ranking official is of county or division level or above.
18. Wang Chuanli, "1990 nian zhi 1999 nian Zhongguo shehui de fubai pindu fenxi" ("Analysis on the frequency of corruption in China in 199-99"), CASS Journal of Political Science, No. 1 (2001), pp. 38- 55.
19. Andrew Wedeman, "The intensification of corruption in China," The China Quarterly, No. 180 (2004), pp. 895-921.
20. Alan P. L. Liu, "The politics of corruption in the People's Republic of China," American Political Science Review, Vol. 77 (1983), pp. 602-23.
21. Wenhao Cheng, "An empirical study of corruption within China's state-owned enterprises," The China Review, Vol. 4, No. 2 (2004), pp. 55-80.
22. I have co-operated with a particular central government department for a statistical analysis on all corruption cases in certain sectors from 1990 to 2005. Although I cannot release the results because they form an internal central government project, they are in line with the findings in this article. With more similar projects in the future, the two databases discussed here can be further improved.
23. Major corruption cases always have greater social influence. They show institutional loopholes more obviously and affect people's confidence in fighting against corruption more directly.
24. Main sources include the Justice Network of the Procuratorate Daily, the "Anticorruption and clean government" column of the People's Daily Network, the Procuratorate Daily, documents of all sessions of the Central Committee of Discipline Inspection, the China Procuratorial Statistical Yearbook from 1988 to 2004, and various corruption casebooks.
25. This far exceeds the 21 corrupt senior officials at or above the vice-province or vice-ministry level as listed by Yan Sun, Corruption and Market in Contemporary China (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press), pp. 49-50.
26. Admittedly, it is not a scientific sampling of corruption activities, but only of corruption cases involving senior officials in transitional China.
27. For instance, if an official engaged in corruption activities for the first time in 1993 and was discovered the same year, the latency period is 0 year. If he started corruption in 1988 and was discovered in 1993, the latency period is tive years. In this article, year is the basic unit for calculation because the data are only accurate enough for this.
28. Such as a promotion from county level to vice-city level, or from bureau level up to vice-ministry level.
29. Leaving-position audit refers to an audit to be carried out before an official leaves his current position for another one, on economic responsibilities in relation to his current position.
30. Including audit, inspection, fleeing abroad with money, confession, exposure by the media and incidental exposure (such as huge amount of property exposed by theft).
31. According to a report by the Supreme People's Procuratorate, of the grand graft and bribe-taking cases investigated by the procuratorates at all levels in 1988, 50% were exposed by reporting. See Huang Xiurong and Liu Songbin (eds.), Zhongguo gongchandang lianzheng fanfu shiji (Record of Integrity and Anticorruption of the Chinese Communist Party (Beijing: Fangzheng Press, 1996), p. 352.
32. According to Huang Weiding's estimates, from 1988 to 1994 China's procuratorates received 1.69 million reports, and 80% of all corruption cases were exposed by reporting. Huang Weiding, Shiluo de xunyan." cheng fubei wanglu (The Fallen Dignity: Memorandum of Punishment on Corruption) (Beijing: World Knowledge Press, 1999), p. 343.
33. This article only includes tive types of corruption in its calculation of this average amount: Graft, bribe- taking, bribe-offering, embezzlement and obtaining large amounts of property from undeclared sources.
34. According to annual reports by the Supreme People's Procuratorate, the number of extra-grand cases involving more than 1 million yuan increases around ten times in every four years. Because of changes to the statistical criteria applied by the procuratorates, however, it is difficult to make a comparative time series analysis. The statistical criteria for grand cases by China's procuratorates was 10,000 yuan for graft in 1980, and 10,000 yuan for bribery or graft in 1981. Since 1993, embezzlement cases involving over 50,000 yuan were also included as grand cases. After 1998, the criteria were changed to 50,000 yuan for graft or bribery and 100,000 yuan for embezzlement. Thereafter, these were 500,000 yuan for graft, bribery or embezzlement, and in another year 10 million yuan for graft or bribery. Andrew Wedeman noticed this and used data from provincial statistical yearbooks in his study instead. Wedeman, "The intensification of corruption in China," pp. 895-921.
35. For instance, Li Ping (mistress of Cheng Kejie) acted as an intermediate for the bribe-taking of Cheng Kejie (former vice-chairman of the National People's Congress).
36. According to the CCDI's report to the 14th National Congress of the CCP, 110 officials at or above vice-province or vice-ministry level were subject to disciplinary punishment, including 79 officials punished in 1990-92. Reasons for punishment include corruption, dereliction of duty and non- compliance with China's family-planning policy. Among those punished for corruption, most did not receive any criminal sanction because their cases were not very serious. What merits attention is that the report referred to the year of punishment, while this article is based on the year of discovery.
37. On 15 August 1989, the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate jointly published the "Notice on requiring those criminais who have been convicted of graft, bribe-taking and official profiteering to surrender before the deadline." That year, the prosecution authorities in China received 116,763 corruption cases, and processed 58,926, representing respectively 1.6 and 1.8 times the number of cases in the previous year. See the annual report of the Supreme People's Procuratorate in 1990.
38. Corruption cases in database A are up to 2005, and those in database B to 2004 only.
39. In the CPI rankings published by Transparency International, China's scores range between 2.43 and 3.5 from 1996 to 2006 and between 3.1 and 3.5 from 1998 to 2006.
40. See Samuel Huntington, Political Order in Changing Societies (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968).
41. Yufan Hao and Michael Johnston, "Corruption and the future of economic reform in China," in Arnold J. Heidenheimer and Michael Johnston (eds.), Political Corruption: Concepts and Contexts (3rd ed.) (New Brunswick and London: Transaction Publishers, 2006), pp. 583-604.
42. Ting Gong, The Politics of Corruption in Contemporary China: An Analysis of Policy Outcomes (Westport, CN: Praeger, 1994).
43. Xiaobo Lü, "Booty socialism, bureau-preneurs, and the state in transition: Organizational corruption in China," Comparative Politics, April 2000, pp. 273-94.
44. Wu Jinlian, "Xunzu lilun yu woguo jingji zhong de mouxie xiaoji xianxiang" ("Rent-seeking theory and certain negative phenomena in China's economy"), in Comparison of Economic and Social System (ed.), Fubai xungeng: Zhongguo chengwei xunzu shehui le ma? (Root of Corruption: Has China Become a Rent-seeking Society?) (Beijing: China Economy Press, 1999), pp. 5-7.
45. Susan Rose-Ackerman, Fubai yu zhengfu (Corruption and Government) (Beijing: Xinhua Press, 2000), pp. 38-42.
46. Minxin Pei, "Fenquanhua shifou hui zengjia fubai?" ("Will the decentralization of power increase corruption?"), Zhongguo guoqing fenxi yanjiu baogao (China's National Conditions Analysis and Studies Report), No. 47 (2002).
47. Yong Guo, "The micro-mechanism by which economic transition breeds corruption," Comparative Economic and Social Systems, No. 5 (2006), pp. 53-59.