Chinese Local Congresses in Urban Communities: Political Communication through the Liaison Station

• In Event: Societal Inputs and Policy Implementation in China

Abstract

The People’s Congress Representatives liaison station in residents’ community (人大代表社区联络站, hereafter “liaison station(s)”), first set up in Shenzhen in 2005, is recognized as a permanent agency within the urban neighborhoods in China after the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party in 2012. Owing to the growing numbers and visibility of liaison stations, this study investigates whether such an institutional arrangement promotes the communication between the People’s Congress representatives and their constituencies, and decreases the compartmentalization between elite participation and non-elite participation.
Drawing on the three representation-types of the People’s Congress representatives classified by Melanie Manion (2014) and the compartmentalization theory elaborated by Woo Yeal Paik (2009), I developed a theoretical framework on two dimensions (representation-type and compartmentalization) with six potential models (pork-barrel, deliberation, penetration, mobilization, corporatism, and meritocracy). Based on the data collected through fieldwork in Shenzhen (during 11 months; cold-visited to 105 liaison stations; interview staff and representatives; observe their daily work) and from online archives, I then investigated which models could explain the political communication between the People’s Congress representatives and their constituencies through the channel of liaison stations.
The findings suggest that liaison stations provide a form of political communication encouraging non-compartmentalization between the participation of the People’s Congress representatives (elites) and that of their constituencies (non-elites). Three of the potential models—pork-barrel, deliberation, and meritocracy—are considered suitable for explaining the process of such political communication, while the explanatory power of the other three models, especially the corporatism model, still cannot be fully ruled out. This mix situation implicates that the move toward non-compartmentalization remains limited and in an early stage, but has the potential to develop into a more mature form in the future. One unexpected finding deserves to note is that the residents’ committee, although a thoroughly grassroot-level organization, plays an important role as mediator between elites and non-elites, which is crucial for the liaison stations’ efforts to advance non-compartmentalization.

Author

• Ruozhu Li, City University of Hong Kong