Who You Know Is Why You Spend: Provincial Public Goods Provision in the PRC

• In Event: Social Welfare and Redistribution in Post-Communist Nations

Abstract

This study examines how political elites’ individual characteristics influence provisions of different types of public goods in China. Despite the ongoing “common prosperity” campaign rhetoric, the unequal provision of public goods persists across the country. Some provincial governments prioritize investing in public education, while others prioritize their investments in public health or social security. What explains the variation among provincial governments’ investment priority on different types of public goods? This study argues that education, health, and social security are public goods of varying natures, and they provide political elites with different career incentives and payoff structures for cooptation. Thus, political elites’ career attributes have distinct effects on each type of public goods. This study uses the Chinese Political Elite Database (CPED) and China Statistical Yearbook data to examine the provincial governors and secretaries’ educational, regional and career backgrounds and their impacts on how provincial governments allocate social expenditure among education, health and social security. The study points to distinct political mechanisms that underpin provisions of different types of public goods in China, and offers implications for both the utility limitation of public goods as a cooptation tool in an authoritarian country.

Authors

• Haruka Nagao, University of Oregon

• Howard Bartlett Sanborn, Oklahoma State University