Consent to Contend: The Power of the Masses in China’s Local Elite Bargain
Year: 2019
Type: article
Abstract: This study explores how local officials tolerate and use mass mobilization to extract policy concessions from above. Local officials strategically tolerate mass mobilization when the demands of the masses are congruent with elements of their own agenda that they are otherwise unable to pursue. Protestors in the streets turn out to be a powerful bargaining chip for local officials: they illustrate ex ante that higher level leaders risk causing social instability if they reject the masses’ demands. The article lays out the institutional environment that gives rise to such a strategy, presents a detailed case study focusing on the alliance between local officials and citizens in a mass mobilization regarding administrative redistricting, and discusses the presence of such “consent instability” in other issue areas in China. The result from a survey experiment of Chinese officials is consistent with the hypothesis that officials are more likely to concede to the demands of their subordinates when popular pressure back their demand. The findings reveal a crucial elite-mass linkage in China’s bureaucratic politics that researchers have neglected.
Author: Xiao Ma
Institution: Peking University
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2981214985