Economic Growth, Social Welfare and Poor People’s Satisfaction with Local Government

• In Event: 066 - Section on Political Sociology Roundtables (one-hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 09. The Politics of Policy

Abstract

Citizens’ satisfaction with government is of great importance to political legitimacy and social stability, especially in China that has been undergoing large-scale socio-economic transformation .Using data from the baseline survey of Chinese Family Panel Studies (CFPS2010), this paper tries to examine effects of the poverty alleviation program (The Minimum Living Support Scheme, MLSS) and county-level economic growth on people’s satisfaction with county-level government. Empirical results show that: first, poor households who received subside from the Minimum Living Support Scheme are more satisfied with local government; second, although the economic growth could bring higher political support in general, it has smaller effect on the poor people’s political satisfaction. The findings indicate that to maintain political support from vulnerable social groups, the Chinese government should make more policy efforts to benefit them.

Author

• Zhonglu li, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology