A Case Study of Collaborative Governance for Reforestation in Rural Shanxi, China

Sharing Capacity through Collaboration and Trust: A Case Study of Collaborative Governance for Reforestation in Rural Shanxi, China

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Authors Liu, Yurong

Citation Liu, Yurong. (2021). Sharing Capacity through Collaboration and Trust: A Case Study of Collaborative Governance for Reforestation in Rural Shanxi, China (Doctoral dissertation, University of Arizona, Tucson, USA).

Publisher The University of Arizona.

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Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/660141 SHARING CAPACITY THROUGH COLLABORATION AND TRUST: A CASE STUDY OF

COLLABORATIVE GOVERNANCE FOR REFORESTATION IN RURAL SHANXI, CHINA.

Yu-Rong Liu

A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the

DEPARTMENT OF ARID LANDS RESOURCE SCIENCES

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements

For the Degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

In the Graduate College

THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA

2021

THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA GRADUATE COLLEGE

As members of the Dissertation Committee, we certify that we have read the dissertation prepared by Yu Rong Liu, titled “Understanding Collaborative Governance for Reforestation in North China” and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

05/24/2021 ______Date: ______Diane Austin Kirk Emerson 05/27/2021 ______Date: ______Kirk Emerson Stuart E. Marsh 04/20/2021 ______Date: ______Stuart E. Marsh 04/20/2021 ______Date: ______Ben McMahan Katherine A. Snyder 04/20/2021 ______Date: ______Katherine A. Snyder KuoRay Mao 04/20/2021 ______Date: ______KuoRay Mao

Final approval and acceptance of this dissertation is contingent upon the candidate’s submission of the final copies of the dissertation to the Graduate College.

We hereby certify that we have read this dissertation prepared under our direction and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement.

05/24/2021 ______Date: ______Diane Austin Dissertation Committee Co-Chair Arid Lands Resource Sciences, GIDP Kirk Emerson 05/27/2021 ______Date: ______Kirk Emerson Dissertation Committee Co-Chair Arid Lands Resource Sciences, GIDP

Acknowledgements

To my parents, whose interests in people and passion for the common good constantly encouraged me, whose abilities to work across the boundaries of human institutions inspired me, and whose undying support made this journey possible. I will always be indebted to my committee members for their dedication and patience in supervising my work. Professor Diane

Austin, for taking on this project, mentorship, and introducing me to anthropology. Professor

Kirk Emerson, whose unflagging guidance helped me believe I can achieve a research like this, and whose integrity and encouragement raised my spirits when doubts about the worth of my endeavors crept in. Professor KuoRay Mao, whose strength of character and support made my research in rural China more meaningful. Professor Katherine Snyder, whose interpretation on my findings helped improved my discussion. I am grateful for the research participants in Shanxi province for answering my incessant questions, sharing their insights, and their hospitality; for the members of the Green Action Charity Foundation who supported me and the opportunity to learn about China. Special thanks to Professor Ching-Liang Lin who always took the time to chat with me, shared her experiences to help me see the bigger picture. Thank you to Dr. Yi-Jen

Hsieh for inspiring me to do a study on collaborative governance; to Professor Stevan Harrell for offering comments on my research when I was in a chaotic stage; to Dr. Brian McVeigh for the honest feedback and encourage me to ask hard questions; to Marie Blanche whose spirit helped me see the world in a different light and suggestions enhanced the quality of my research; to Dr.

Marianne Pugatch for being my accountability partner; to Nadia Moraglio for being a positive force during the last two years of dissertation writing.

3 Table of Contents

Lists of Figures…………………………………………………………...……………..……6 Lists of Tables …………………………………………………………………………..……7 Abstract……………………………………………………………………………….….…...8 Chapter 1 Introduction: Understanding Collaborative Governance in Rural China….……...10 1.1 Introduction……………………………………………………….………………….10 1.2 General Interest and Overarching Research Question…………….…………………11 1.3 Statement of the Problem………………………………………….…………………12 1.4 Consideration of Different Theoretical Lens…………………….…………………..14 1.5 Research Questions and Propositions…………………………….………………….15 1.6 Research Approach……………………………………………….………………….16 1.7 Organization of Dissertation…………………………………………………………18 1.8 Significance of Research…………………………………………………………….19 Chapter 2 Literature Review………………………………………………………………...22 2.1 Introduction………………………………………………………………………….22 2.2 The Context of Collaborative Governance in the US and China……………………22 2.3 A Conceptual Framework for Understanding Collaborative Governance…………..31 2.4 The Context of Environmental Governance in Rural China………………………...39 2.5 The State and Society Nexus…………………………………………………..….....42 2.6 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………..….....58 Chapter 3 Research Design and Methods……………………………………………….…...59 3.1 Introduction……………………………………………………………………….….59 3.2 Case Study Approach…………………………………………………………….…..59 3.3 Data collection and Analysis……………………………………………………..…..70 3.4 Conclusion………………………………………………………………………..…..83 Chapter 4 Rural Development Challenges………………………………………………..….84 4.1 Introduction………………………………………………………………………..…84 4.2 Rural Livelihoods in Shanxi Province, Loess Plateau…………………………….....84 4.3 The Impacts of Rural and Fiscal Reform………………………………………….....92 4.4 The Returning Farmland to Forest Program……………………….………………..105 4.5 Shilou County in Context…………………………………………………………...111 4.6 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………..126 Chapter 5 Reforestation Implementation Context and Challenges………………………….127 5.1 Introduction………………………………………………………………………….127 5.2 Policy Implementation Contexts and Challenges……………………………………132 5.3 Forestry in Shilou County……………………………………………………………138 5.4 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………...166 Chapter 6 The Case of Shilou Reforestation Partnership……………………………………168

4 6.1 Introduction…………………………………………………………………………..168 6.2 Case Overview……………………………………………………………………….168 6.3 The Initiation Phase: Multi-level Leaders Initiating Collaboration………………….188 6.4 Phase Two: Collaboration in the Face of Limited Deliberation……………………..206 6.5 Phase Three: Enhanced Capacity and Increased Participation……………………....219 6.6 Is Shilou Reforestation Partnership an Example of Collaborative Governance?...... 228 6.7 Performance………………………………………………………………………….232 6.8 What Contributed or Hindered the Collaboration’s Productivity…………………....238 6.9 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………243 Chapter 7 General Discussion and Conclusion………………………………………………245 7.1 Introduction…………………………………………………………………………..245 7.2 Case Analysis…………………………………………………………………...……245 7.3 Re-Examine Previous Assumptions……………………………………………….....254 7.4 Implications for Theory, Research and Practice……………………………………..255 7.5 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………259 References……………………………………………………………………………………262

5 List of Figures

2.1 The spectrum of collective actions and governance………….……………….…….…...26 2.2 Integrative Framework for Collaborative Governance. …………………...….…………34 2.3 The relation between public and private in Euro-American societies (left) and Japanese society (right). …………………….…………………………………...….48 3.1 The study site Shilou county on the topography Map of Shanxi Province……….……...62 3.2 Shanxi province administrative map…………………………………………...…...……63 4.1 Shanxi province vegetation map and Shilou county’s location………………………….85 4.2 Forest coverage change (shaded areas) on the Loess Plateau from BC 700 (top-left), AD 100 (top-right), AD 800 (bottom-left), to AD 1800……...………………88 4.3 The structure of government in China forming five level of vertical hierarchy: central, provincial, prefectural, county and township level………………………………………94 4.4 Shilou county administrative map……………………………………………………...113 4.5 Dam-land as a management and development unit……….……………………………124 4.6 Shilou county land expropriation valuation standard based on regions………….…….115 4.7 The fiscal position of Shilou county in Lulian prefecture in 2015……………….…….116 4.8 The distribution of GDP across three sectors of economy in Luliang prefecture. …..…117 4.9 Corn storage (left) and pen-raising …………………………………….………………122 4.10 Precision poverty alleviation poster…….……………….……..…………………...…..125 5.1 Flat upland area is planted with Red dates, walnuts or other economic tree species. Sloped areas are planted with Black locust and Arborvitae. ………...………………...144 5.2 Preparing land for planting by weeding and ploughing farmland according to the elevation line in order to reduce runoff. …………………………………….………….144 5.3 The Designated areas for each forest rangers (red tags) in Hehe township, Shilou county, who also receives poverty alleviation compensation…...………………….…….……..155 6.1 Study site is located in Shilou County (red shade), Luliang prefecture (yellow), Shanxi province, China. ………………………………………………………..………………170 6.2 Key actors in the case study. Shilou county government, forestry bureau, village government and GACF are the main actors.………..……………………………..……184 6.3 Reforestation areas funded by GACF. ………………….……………………...……....192 6.4 The Soil pit example using GACF’s approach.… ….………………………...…….….195 6.5 Site grading approach for farmland on hillslopes…………………………………..…..195 6.6 The bridge was funded by both GACF and county government………………….…....224

6 List of Tables

2.1 The logic model of collaborative governance framework………………………………35 3.1 Shadowing that involved interactions between the participants shadowed and other stakeholders at county, township and village level…………………………………….. 74 3.2 Key informants’ affiliation, number code and interview times….……………………... 79 4.1 Farmland categories based on historical agro-ecological zones on the Loess Plateau…..89 4.2 Change of units of organization in rural China.………………...……………….……….93 4.3 Policies that affected local government’s (township, village) ability to provide public good and those that have direct impact on farmers………………………………….….110 4.4 Basic statistics of Shilou county.……. ……………………………………………...…112 4.5 The extent of land conversions under RFFP per household in Shilou county………….118 4.6. Land use change (Hectare) in Shilou county………………………………………..….119 4.7 Income source diversification………………………………….……………..………...121 4.8 Hehe Township 2016 Labor statistics………………………….……………..……...…121 4.9. Shilou county’s “Twelve poverty alleviation actions” in 2018 ……………..……...….125 5.1 National environmental programs relevant to Shanxi province…..……………………128 5.2 Shilou county government’s forestry projects……….……………………….……...…140 5.3 Shilou county Walnut and Red date Economic Forest Cost Estimates.…...... …...146 5.4 Shilou county Walnut management categories……………………………….……..….146 6.1 The Key actors and their respective affiliation and responsibilities………..……..……171 6.2 The three phases of Shanxi Reforestation Partnership……………………………...... 172 6.3 Participants’ perception of reforestation in relation to rural development….………….175 6.4 GACF and the Shilou county forestry bureau’s annual budget and reforestation area for comparison……………………………………………………………………………...190 6.5 GACF planting designed according land types, slope and tree species……….………..196 6.6 Comparison of Shilou Forestry Bureau and GACF reforestation approaches and expenses in 2017………………………………………………………………………..………...199 6.7 Mechanisms created during process of engagement for the Shilou Reforestation Partnership (SRP) ………………………………………………………………………212 6.8 Major deliberation, participants, and issue raised based on documents, interviews and participant observation.…………………………………………………………………213 6.9 Stakeholders’ different understanding of social ecological system will make room for different management institutions, forest values, uses, species, and economies ………219 6.10 Non-reforestation projects and outreach initiated by key actors in SRP…………...... 223 6.11 Evaluation of the case of Shilou using process and productivity (outcome) from the perspective of the case as a whole, and respective key actors………………………….233

7 Abstract

The goal of this dissertation is to understand the application of collaborative governance as a response to reforestation challenges in rural China and the external and internal factors that affect the collaboration. The emergence of collaborative governance is important for the relationship between state and society in China as the central government attempt to balance between centralization and private initiatives to achieve development goals. Understanding the formation and sustainment of collaborative governance in this context can improve the utilization of this approach to support meaningful participation in governance as well as increase resilience to future social-environmental challenges. The collaboration between a Hong Kong based non- governmental organization (NGO) and the Shilou county government in western Shanxi province, China, is used as a case study for understanding this topic. This study site is located on the eastern part of the Loess Plateau, a region with continental monsoon climate and semi-arid sloped lands. I use the Collaborative Governance Regime framework to analyze how the institutional environment embedded in the system context, the drivers, and the collaborative dynamics interact with key actors to produce actions and outcomes, and how barriers that emerged before and during the collaboration were resolved. The dissertation is primarily based on data gathered during five month-long trips to Shanxi province in 2013, 2014, and from 2017-

2018. I used a variety of research methods, including participant observation, open and repeated interviews, shadowing, and secondary data collection.

The findings indicate that the success and sustainment of the collaborative governance in

Shilou hinged on cross-sector leadership. Through sharing capacity between different levels of the government and key leaders’ ability to build trust, participants gradually gained trust and

8 legitimacy in the decision-making process. As a result, the capacity for joint action increased and participants’ concerns and conflict were addressed in an effective way. However, because of the lack of structured interactions among key actors, actions and adaptation to address emergent problems were delayed, causing the less powerful stakeholders to bear more cost in the process.

Local key actors’ willingness and ability to induce collective learning were crucial for sustaining interactions and enabling institutional change. Nevertheless, the most significant challenges for the collaboration comes from the external institution environment, which key actors have little control over. The case study shows that collaborative governance opened up a space for cross- sector communication, sharing risk and resources, which allowed local legitimate leaders to apply their skills to generate larger impact. The analysis also suggests that local actors’ desire to learn and work with an NGO with a mission to support rural development was a consequential incentive itself. Finally, the application of collaborative governance in rural China can benefit greatly from cross-sector leadership and an understanding of local institutions in the context of scarce-resource. It is concluded that one of the critical ways to improve societies’ resilience is to cultivate the capacity of cross-sector collaborative governance.

9 Chapter 1 Introduction: Understanding Collaborative Governance in Rural China

This dissertation is inspired by the emergent local forms of collaborative governance driven by both environmental degradation and the decentralizing institutional environment in

China. The growing application of collaborative governance is part of a larger global shift in cross-boundary governance reforms in public management, shifting from government to governance. However, applications of collaborative governance (CG) that look similar on the surface may prove to be different in character, and in their underlying state-society relations.

This study will explore environmental governance that adopted public participation as part of its strategies. Specifically, the study examines implementation of reforestation programs in Shanxi province of northern China. Reforestation programs have dual goals of poverty alleviation and environmental protection, and their implementation has induced various local responses to resolve the tensions that arise in trying to meet both goals simultaneously. In this context, many

Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO) responded to these challenges and led to the development of various governance regimes remain poorly understood but are crucial to sustainable environmental protection and local development.

This dissertation used a qualitative case study approach to study the development and practices of collaborative governance in the context of reforestation in rural China. Using secondary data, participant observation, and in-depth interviews with officials, villagers, researchers and members of NGOs, I sought to understand how national development strategies interact with local governance to influence the decision making of local agents. The application of collaborative governance, and how people in different positions in the government respond to

10 policy implementation was examined. This research provides concrete examples that show how collaborative governance operates in a top-down institutional context, expand our understanding of the impacts of rural development policies, and build knowledge about how local communities adapt to globalized forms of environmental governance.

The current governance challenges faced by both policy-makers and policy implementers at the frontline has contributed to the emergence of use of collaborative governance. The first part of this dissertation establishes the context of reforestation in Shilou county in Shanxi province of northern China and the institutional environment that shaped it. The second part focuses on a collaborative governance case study of an NGO-initiated reforestation project with the Shilou county government. The case study demonstrates the local dynamics that formed the process, evolution, and operation of collaborative governance that may help us understand one of the ways to overcome institutional and environmental challenges faced by local communities in rural China. This research concludes that one of the critical ways to improve societies’ resilience is to cultivate the capacity of cross-sector collaborative governance.

1.1 General Interest and Overarching Research Question

There are two broad themes in this dissertation: reforestation in rural China and collaborative governance. They intersect in the aim to understand how collaborative governance is formed and organized in rural China and the role of local agents in shaping that collaborative governance. The phenomenon of collaborative governance is important for the relationship between state and society in China as the central government decentralizes political and social

11 resources while still directing the overall trajectory of economic development. The formation and sustainment of collaborative governance in this context leads to a series of questions. It is crucial to understand how collaborative governance can emerge from this particular power dynamic and become part of governance strategy among market, policies, and bottom-up approaches to achieve development goals. More importantly, scholars have identified the critical need to evaluate whether the application of collaborative governance as a governance tool can provide more equal access and meaningful participation in environmental governance, rural development, effective policy outcome, and facilitate the practice of democracy.

1.2 Statement of the Problem

In the past three decades, various forms of collaborative governance have emerged as a new approach to solve problems that “cannot be solved or easily solved by single organizations”

(O’Leary et al. 2010) in Euro-American societies and developing countries. In this context and in the literature of collaborative governance, the focus of analysis has been on how to work across bureaucratic and institutional boundaries while at the same time operate within the legal frameworks that structure the collaborative endeavor made by different actors and agencies.

Though similar challenges exist in the Chinese context in terms of coordinating societal and governmental interests, the use of collaborative governance in the Chinese context may face a different set of barriers than those presented in the Western context and emerge in different forms.

12 In these last three decades, rural China has experienced multiple changes brought by decentralization, land reform, urbanization, agriculture modernization, and industrialization.

These rapid socio-environmental changes create challenges for rural residents, local decision- makers and stakeholders as they searched for ways of governance that could help them achieve their development goals. The main challenges facing China’s governance are the transitioning institutional environment, the state-centered hierarchical governance, and the top-down nature of policy implementation (Ding 1994). In this context, the use of collaborative governance by local actors is a different approach to achieve policy goals than the usual approach, which is more commonly initiated by the state government in China (Unger and Chan 1995). Specifically, the role of local government in shaping collaborative governance is less understood. Local governments may play the role of mediator of resource allocation and distribution and thus has the potential to influence collaborative governance processes and outcomes that occur at the local level. Similarly, the use of collaborative governance by the private and nonprofit sectors are also poorly understood. Whether there are common challenges facing local governments or the private sector were poorly understood. The lack of understanding of the specific public challenges and innovative solutions to address them can create more costly decisions and less relevant and ineffective ways to identify problems and their solutions.

The challenge of reforestation in semi-arid regions of rural China represent a tension between the development imperative and environmental conservation. In this context, tural communities’ ability to respond and adapt to potential social environmental change is often assumed to be weak or that they are not aware of the severity of land degradation. In this dissertation, I aim to identify the cause of these multiple challenges and tensions through a case

13 study of collaborative governance in rural China. In the liminal space of collaborative governance, the weaknesses and strengths of the external institutional arrangements may be exposed and identified.

1.3 Consideration of Different Theoretical Lens

Until more recently, the Social-Ecological System approach to address and study environmental issues has paid less attention to power dynamics (Thiel et al. 2015). On the other hand, most environmental governance and political ecology literature stress the centrality of power in environmental issues (Gilley 2012, Osborne 2015). Environmental issues are not necessary the only motivation for strong state (or government) capacity as ordinarily assumed; authoritarian state is not necessary the only source of environmental degradation as normally assumed as well. For example, if a civilian considers environmental degradation as a responsibility of the state, it is unlikely that he or she would consider changing his behavior that may contribute to the problem, let alone participate in policy-making. Without understanding the source of legitimacy of the authoritarian state, it is likely that observers may mis-interpret the so called “environmental values” of the state and the masses. Environmental politics eventually is the manifestation of the national politics. While both environmental governance and political ecology mentioned the importance of state-society relations in environmental change in China, these literatures focus more on central-local relations between different levels of government rather than local social dynamics.

14 In this sense, I apply collaborative governance framework as an integrative approach that meet both research and practical needs. I focus on the local dynamics and the process of collaborative governance and explore how collaborative is sustained over time. In line with what

Kostka and Mol (2013) had highlighted in their study on China’s local environmental politics, I draw attention to the innovativeness of local agents developing solutions and creating new institutional spaces for participation and policy implementation. With these considerations in mind, this research sought to understand the larger socio-political changes in China through the study of natural resource management.

1.4 Research Questions and Propositions

By focusing on the internal dynamics of a local collaborative governance case study and its relations to the external environment that includes national and global level concerns, this dissertation’s potential contribution is to fill the research gap in collaborative governance and local government in rural China. I also aim to connect with wider research agenda examining the challenges facing the reform of public sector around the globe. By coming to terms with a key concept such as collaborative governance, we can obtain a clearer picture of an entire array of other issues in China's sociopolitical and economic life.

1. How do state-society relations shape collaborative governance?

2. How do local officials respond to reforestation policy, and why?

3. How does collaborative governance work in rural China, and why?

15 Collaborative governance is embedded in both broader institutional environment and local governance. The research proposes that there are three factors that shape the process of collaborative governance: deliberation, trust, and knowledge (See Chapter 2). In addition, the role of leadership is relevant to the initiation of collaborative governance, as discussed in

Chapter 6. Leadership may come from government officials, stakeholders, villagers or civic sector. They are generally thought to play a crucial role in interpreting environmental problems, implementing solutions, and mobilizing resources. In this research, leadership was initially treated as a given condition.

1.5 Research Approach

The research questions and the practical and theoretical concerns are operationalized through the case study of collaborative governance in Shilou county. Shilou county is an agriculture-based and nationally designated “poverty county” located in Luliang prefecture,

Shanxi province. Poverty county status was designated in the 1980s by the central government while the term “fragile ecological region” and “marginal” is also often used to describe the region in general. Luliang prefecture is located in western Shanxi province bordering the yellow river and located more broadly on the eastern part of the Loess Plateau. Reforestation has been one of Shilou county’s major concerns due to state authorities’ effort to reduce erosion and

“green” the landscape on the Loess Plateau. In this context, the Hong-Kong based NGO came into contact with Shilou county through the shared concern for reforestation. The initiation of collaborative governance among these two key actors is discussed in Chapter 6.

16 This dissertation relies on an empirical case study and targeted qualitative approach. The first step is to understand the larger context and institutional environment in which collaborative governance operates. The key actors are local officials, which embodied local government, the other key actors are village leader, villagers and NGO actors. Understanding the institutional environment allow me to appreciate how local government mediate resources between stakeholders and why. I used both targeted, repeated and single rounds interviews to collect primary data. To understand local government, I followed the approach used by (McVeigh 1998) to understand bureaucratic organizations by focusing on interactions between individuals and institutions. Because individuals within different positions within the pollical economy could posse different understanding and motivations for collaborative governance and environmental issues, while still driven by the development imperative.

Shilou county’s development reflects a familiar pattern in China in terms of policy implementation deficit and the lack of alternatives. Understanding policy implementation is thus important for the study. This dissertation provides evidence of how local government at the county, township and village level operate in the context of China’s current reforestation and poverty alleviation policies and fiscal reforms. This case study further fleshes out the implications of such an institutional context on rural development and how collaborative governance interact with local actors operating in such environment.

1.6 Organization of Dissertation

17 The thesis is divided into seven chapters. Chapter 2 discuss theories and concepts that guide my research approach, methods, and analysis. These theories and concepts frame the research questions and my approach to understand collaborative governance with reference to relevant literature. The first body of literature focus on the application of collaborative governance in the US and China. The literature that illustrate collaborative governance in rural

China and local government is discussed. The second part explore the concept of state society relations from historical perspective and its implications for governance. The third part collects empirical studies in China from the perspective of rural natural resource management that are most relevant to my research. The last part is historical understandings of state to provide cultural groundwork to better understand “the complex balance between cooperation and competition [that] constitutes the story of state formation” (Weiss and Hobson 1995).

Chapter 3 provide details on the qualitative methods used for data collection and analysis.

It discusses the research process and limitations of case study approach in rural China. In chapter

4, I introduce the physical context of the Loess Plateau and the impact of land tenure reform and fiscal reform on local livelihoods. Shilou county’s current development in terms of governance, agriculture and forestry is discussed to highlight current livelihood condition and the exiting institutional and resource conditions that hinder sustainable rural development. Finally, the

Returning Farmland to Forest Program is introduced to shed light on current reforestation challenges in rural China and its potential impact on rural communities’ wiliness and capacity to participate in collaborative governance. In chapter 5, the disconnection between different reforestation policies and their implementation is discussed to understand local officials’ strategies for development, and the barriers to successful reforestation policy implementation.

18 These institutional and environmental challenges form the background and drivers for collaborative governance. Both Chapter 4 and 5 provide important context for the case study in

Chapter 6 in terms of understanding the interdependence among key actors, the challenge of cross-sector collaborative governance, and how local governments and villagers address their current development challenges. In Chapter 6, an in-depth examination of the Shilou

Reforestation Partnership’s initiation, processes and outcomes from the perspectives of the stakeholders is described and analyzed. Specifically, the role of key actors, their actions and adaptation to internal and external challenges is documented. Chapter 4-6 present all empirical findings and analysis.

Building on these findings, the three research questions could be addressed. Chapter 7 discusses key findings and its implications for both rural China and collaborative governance.

The results of the case study reflect a more complex form of local state-society relationship that is different from those commonly associated with oppositions and conflicts in China studies.

Finally, the implications for theory, research, and practice is discussed.

1.7 Significance of Research

This research will be of interest to public policy makers and scholars interested in policy development and implementation. The study documented elements of policy implementation that are recognized by literatures and the chronological development of a policy as it interacted with different components and actors of the society. The study’s analytical focus through collaborative governance is a rare case in the study of natural resource management in China. It

19 changes the focus from top-down social structure and institutions to a focus on actors who engage with the reforestation activities that are allowed to be executed differently than those mandated by policy authorities. The actors in the study represent a different dimension of both the local community the non-governmental organizations, or the civil society, in contrast to studies that focus on local communities who are passively negotiating with policy implementers to claim their benefits or rights.

This study is also an important contribution to social and environmental scientists conducting research in rural China. This study is a case study of collaborative governance in rural China. Most scholars in the field of environmental governance do not characterize dynamics between local communities and officials as collaborative, and they tend to focus on villagers’ perspectives of and response to social and environmental changes, without discussing the role of local government in mediating these changes or how local government response to these changes. The role of local government is especially important to rural areas that does not depend on industrialization as means for economic development but are sensitive to natural resource management. The data collected in this study revealed some of the development patterns in unindustrialized areas in rural China. Reforestation practices and impacts in this region of China is also under-studied.

Policy implementers, practitioners from the private sector and non-governmental organizations will be interested in the empirical part of the research especially if they were in the field of environmental management. The research documented the initiation of collaboration between local communities, the public and non-governmental sectors in non-traditional ways,

20 and its development and interaction with policy development up to current times. It revealed how participants struggle and negotiate the terms of collaboration with each other, how they resolve disagreements, and how they perceived their benefits through the process. The study’s focus on state-society relations could help inform those who will be working with communities in rural

China what to expect from local communities and officials, and the dynamics between different sectors of the society.

Finally, the methods and approach adopted in this research could be of interest to those studying institutional change and the linkages between non-governmental organizations, local community and state. The study relies on job shadowing, participant observation, and multi-sited research to study the nature of policy implementation and NGO practice. These are practical ways to collect data in a data poor region and critical to understand the dynamics between different actors which are usually informal and not visible. If the researcher does not understand the specific relationships between actors and their perspectives on state-society relations, which configured their motivations and actions, it would be difficult to interpret their behaviors.

21 Chapter 2 Literature Review

2.1 Introduction

The goal of the chapter is to identify research gap, introduce key concepts and theories, and how it informed research methodology adopted in Chapter 3. The first part of the chapter is to introduce the concept of collaborative governance in the context of the United States and China, and the key concepts I used within the collaborative governance regime framework. The objective of the second part is to lay the cultural groundwork for understanding collaborative governance in China. Empirical research from environmental studies, geography, sociology, anthropology and political science are drawn to understand the intersection of governance, institutional and environmental change in rural China. The concept of state and the logic of developmental state is discussed to understand state society relations and their role in collaborative governance and how it can be studied. The state-society relations are important to my study because of how the term "cooperation" and "collaboration" between public and private sectors are being used in the US and China. The ideological supports of collective life in China is discussed to understand how legitimacy works, what motivates policy-makers, and what motivates people to engage in collaborative governance.

2.2 The Context of Collaborative Governance in US and China

One of the most imminent challenges in the 21st century is the environmental limits to human development and the ability of humankind to respond. Public infrastructure, both

22 institutional and physical, plays an indispensable role in managing both environmental problems and shaping future directions of economic development. With increasingly complicated political processes and interdependence between public, private and the so-called civic sectors, Western

(broadly defined) experiences in the last three decades suggest that the government has come to rely more on tools of governance, such as collaboration, that require concerted action across multiple sectors (Kettl 2006, Bingham et al. 2005). As Salamon (2002) defines the new governance as a framework for recognizing “the collaborative nature of modern efforts to meet human needs, the widespread use of action that engage complex networks of public and private actors, and the resulting need for a different style of public management, emphasizing collaboration and enablement rather than hierarchy and control.” (p. 20). Scholars have called for the recognition of the enhanced role for the public in the governance process (Bingham et al.

2005, Frederickson 1999). This does not always mean giving up formal government roles or powers, but the sharing of power to address different human, societal, and ecological needs, with the result being more or less or different roles for formal government (Margerum 2011).

Collaborative governance (CG) is seen as a response to the demand to complement the weakness in adversarial modes of policy-making and implementation. It also offers an approach to solving complex wicked problems, identified as problems that are difficult or impossible to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements. For example, issues like climate change healthcare provision, and homeland security all have these features (Rittel and

Webber 1973).

23 Collaborative governance has its risks and benefits. It is regarded as a concrete strategy for fostering deliberation and learning about our mutual interdependency and bringing public and private stakeholders1 together in collective forums to engage in consensus-oriented decision- making (Agranoff and McGuire, 2003). In addition to its benefits, researchers have also identified several obstacles that could hinder the success of CG, including historical and ideological barriers, uneven distributions of power between participants, differing organizational cultures, and different perceptions of the problem (Ansell and Gash 2008).

The new type of governance has expanded beyond the traditional role of the government to include other sectors of the society to deliver public services In reality, collaborative governance could involve all three sectors in the society: community, market and state, because of the mixture of approaches to environmental problems and the different extent to which each sector is able to contribute to collective decision-making outcomes (e.g. mandated regulation, watershed monitoring, and payment for ecosystem services) (Lemos and Agrawal 2006). It is important to note that, unlike collaborative governance, “public-private partnerships” do not aim to achieve decision making consensus, but rather simply achieve coordination to delivery certain services (Figure 2.1). Collective decision-making is therefore secondary in the definition of public-private partnership (Ansell and Gash 2008).

In the U.S., considerable experience and scholarship on collaborative governance has developed in the management of natural resources. According to Margerum (2011), this interest

1 I recognize that stakeholders hold different level of concerns and power positions with a collaborative setting and could exert different influence on the collaborative process, and this reality is also recognized by other studies (Hsieh 2012).

24 stems from the shift from more single-issue, single-organization approaches to more holistic and cross-jurisdictional responses. In the field of natural resource management, a lot of the CG cases stem from the motivation to reduce and manage conflict among stakeholders; build social capital; allow environmental, social, and economic issues to be addressed in tandem; and produce better decisions (Gray et al. 2001, Weber 2000, Conley and Moote 2003). In other words, collaborative governance is not a distinct form of institution (Emerson and Nabatchi

2015), and its formation is highly context-determined.

A range of terms are often used interchangeably with CG, such as participatory management, interactive policy making, stakeholder governance, alternative dispute resolution, and collaborative management. But most literatures of CG use the term governance because it encompasses various aspects of the governing process, including planning, policy making and management. The term collaborative emphasizes the deliberative and consensus-oriented approach that is of greater importance to the decision-making outcomes than in other forms of governance. Collaborative governance is a dynamic and complicated process and, as a result, is presented in various forms in different parts of the world. For the purpose of this study, I adopt a definition of collaborative governance as

“...processes and structures of public policy decision making and management that engage people constructively across the boundaries of public agencies, levels of government, and/or the public, private and civic spheres in order to carry out a public purpose that could not otherwise be accomplished.” (Emerson et al. 2012).

Figure 2.1. Spectrum of collective actions and governance.

In the U.S. and China, the interest in exploring Zhanging forms of governance has emerged for different reasons within different historical and political contexts. In China, a new spectrum of environmental governance has emerged with the transition from a planned economy to a market economy, as well as the so-called hybrid socialist-neoliberal form of political rationality that operates in a technocratic sense (Sigley 2007). In this light, the application of collaborative governance in China has also been influenced by the wider global reform process of public management (Adams et al. 2006, Brown et al. 2012). However, the meaning of collaborative governance in China or outside Western society in general, is ambiguous and lacks careful examination.

Beginning in the late 1970s, decentralization of China’s institutional environment granted local governments greater power, discretion, and responsibility (Van Den Hoek et al. 2012).

Both public and private sectors in China considered private-public partnerships as the main pathway for the provision of public goods due to rapid marketization and expansion of the private sector, and concerns about accountability and effectiveness of local governance (Adams et al. 2006; Brown et al. 2012, Jing 2015). However, it is important to note that during 1970s, the

Chinese government was lacking in capabilities to restructure its economy and had to rely on the private sector for knowledge and expertise. In the past two decades, concerns about

26 environmental pollution and resource security by the state have contributed to increased exploration and opportunities for collaboration in environment and natural resource management sector in China (Guo 2014; Bennett 2008; Mah and Hills. 2012).

However, most cases of collaborative governance in China are considered public-private partnerships that are highly controlled by the state, where private sector remains a supplicant to the state. Studies have examined the role of social network, science, social learning, institutional design in sustaining effective provisions of public goods in China and Hong Kong (Cao et al.

2009, Bennett 2008, Guo 2014, Brown et al.2012). Cases where collaboration creates opportunities for cooptation by the local government are also not uncommon in rural China

(Zinda 2012). Additionally, there are a few studies on collaborative governance in post- authoritarian societies that had reflected on state-society relations and their impact on collaborative approaches to community-based conservation and co-management of natural resource (Hsieh 2012; Lee 2003; Lu et al. 2012). These studies provide evidence that a less developed civic sector may present different kinds of challenge for collaborative governance.

The literature on the Chinese legal reform has recently focused on the “resurgence” of extra-judicial settlement mediation (Peerenboom 2008, Pia 2015), which is expected to provide better access to justice to rural communities. In short, part of the aim of the reform is to reduce the number of trials and reduce the level of exposure of the judiciary to huge fiscal expenditures rising from this expanded access. However, mediation mechanisms above village level in China are weak in terms of protection of parties with less privilege and power due to possible power intervention during mediation, and thus an advocate for strengthening the institutions and law for

27 public trials is recently being promoted by both Chinese government and researchers. Due to

China’s less deliberative and inclusive political culture, the application of CG may shows different characteristics. In addition to the hierarchal and unitary forms of governance, collaborative governance in China faces the challenge of navigating and adapting to existing corporatism that mediates between state and society (corporatism defined in Unger and Chan

1995). In the past 10 years, the Chinese state also has aimed to transform itself to a “service- oriented government”, and to re-cast the role of the party-state in order to address the challenge of globalization and the changing political landscape (Wong 2009).

Due to the growing interests among academics, governments and citizens, there is a critical need for a more systematic analysis of the patterns, process and challenges affecting collaborative governance’s long-term development as a way of governing in China. To help focus the study, I discuss key concepts in the next section that warrant attention when applying to China.

Collaborative Governance and Power

In the process of collaborative governance, empowering community capacity often undervalues the existing informal capacity of societies to exchange with each other and can politically reinforce paternalistic approaches to societies and led to tokenism (Watson 2013). In the participatory process, those situated outside the collaborative bodies may not recognize the authority of insiders and resist their decisions (Fung and Wright 2001). Collaborative governance processes may be manipulated to advance private or factional interests (Nikolic and Koontz

2008). Some institutions deliberatively incorporate check mechanisms to prevent the new form

28 of governance being absorbed into the old clientelist system. However, the extent to which the mechanism can effectively check this tendency is usually problematic (Fung and Wright 2001,

Ansell and Gash 2006). Most citizens are overwhelmingly consumed by daily life and are too busy to give the time, energy, and commitment that collaborative efforts require, and this can also lead to the temptation for some to free ride on the efforts of others (Fung and Wright 2001).

Thus, it is important to address the role of power in collaborative governance. In the Chinese context, I assumed a less deliberative environment due to the lack of a well-defined civil society and the tendency of authoritarian governments to directly influence the civic sector.

Deliberation and Power

Collaborative governance has roots in deliberative governance, and Anglo-American theorists on deliberative governance emphasize the autonomous capabilities of individuals to engage in a “joint, cooperative process of clarifying, elaborating and revising common conceptions and values in the course of defining specific problems and determining how they should be addressed” (Buizer and Van Herzele 2012, Rosenberg, 2007). Chambers defines deliberation as “…debate and discussion aimed at producing reasonable, well-informed opinions in which participants are willing to revise preferences in light of discussion, new information, and claims made by fellow participants” (2003: 309). Accordingly, the purpose of deliberation is different from that of bargaining or rhetoric. However, these ideal forms of deliberative practices may not account for the occurrence of deliberation in different contexts on the ground, including those practiced under unintentional conditions, mandated participation, and collaborative governance. As with collaborative governance, it is important to note that forms of deliberation

29 depend on the scale the governance aims to address, which could manifest differently from local, national to international arenas. Tucker (2008) argued that

The abstract, even utopian, characteristics of purely normative discussions of

deliberative democracy have led some of its advocates to shift their research to the

examination of really existing deliberative democratic practices and institutions. Instead

of deducing deliberative democracy a priori from normative first principles, it is sensible

to build from the ground up, by looking for deliberative democratic practices, trends and

potentials embedded in existing institutions and to consider which deliberative

democratic institutional designs are better in different social contexts (p. 128).

Ideally, deliberative forms of governance have the potential to negotiate and accommodate different forms of power prevalent in the policy process, including empowerment

(Gray, 1989). Scholars of collaborative governance have recognized that power, capacity, and resource imbalances, and a prehistory of antagonism, will affect the incentives of groups to participate. It is theorized that stakeholders with different power positions may not have an incentive to participate in CG, particularly if they see alternative venues for realizing their agenda (Ansell and Gash 2008). The inherent tension between interdependency and autonomy in collaborative governance could be stronger in a mandated participatory process, where processes of reconciling individual and collective interests may require more facilitative efforts by the leadership (Thomson and Perry 2006). Specifically, participants may anticipate how power imbalance could increase opportunities for co-optation, control over information production and use, biased problem definition or agenda setting, and groups having to self-censor to participate

30 (Brisbois and de Loe 2016, Gray 1989, Ansell and Gash 2008, Emerson and Nabatchi 2015,

Hsieh 2012). Nevertheless, some initial situations such as perceptions of mutual interdependence and power imbalances could be Zhanged positively or negatively depending on the collaborative process, and effective leadership may be crucial in creating an institutional environment that supports empowerment of disadvantaged individuals or groups.

In short, power is not necessarily a negative force for public deliberation. Studies of deliberative democracy argues that coercive forms of power may be needed by some marginalized groups to push their issue onto the agenda, while more generative forms of power can inspire actors to engage in collective thinking (Brisbois and de Loe 2016).

I discuss the context of environmental governance in rural china to provide a foundation for understanding current rural governance in the next section.

2.3 A Conceptual Framework for Understanding Collaborative Governance

There are a number of conceptual frameworks developed around CG, including Bryson et al.

(2020), Ansell and Gash (2008), Provan and Kenis (2008), Emerson and Nabatchi (2015), Gray and Purdy (2018), and Innes and Booher (2018). The application of CG in rural China requires a flexible but comprehensive approach and framework. In this sense, the setting or the context is perhaps the most critical point of consideration when choosing a framework or designing collaborative governance. In the Chinese context, it is also important to consider power dynamics and agency, which may be exercised in different ways and appeared in different forms through interactions among participants. And as discussed in 2.5 and 2.6 sections, rural China

31 present its own set of challenges. Sieh’s (2012) empirical findings from Taiwan highlighted the importance of “triggering event” and “endogenous” approach to the initiation of collaborative governance, which can be understood as the antecedent conditions of collaborative governance and the “self-initiated” (Emerson and Nabatchi 2015) type of collaborative governance.

Based on these considerations, I have chosen to use the framework by Emerson, Nabatchi and Balogh (2012) due to its recognition of system context and the different levels of performance in each component within the collaborative governance regime (CGR). The differentiation between system context and the immediate drivers of CG, which was absent in

Ansell and Gash’s (2008), was part of the integrative approach to link multiple analytical categories. The CGR framework was created with evaluation in mind, which greatly increased its applicability in more diverse setting. Bryson et al. (2020) pointed out that Emerson and Nabatchi

(2015)’s framework emphasizes the creation of collaborative governance ‘regimes’, which pay more attention to actions, outcomes, and the broader system context and structures within which collaboration takes place. The contingent model of collaborative governance developed by

Ansell and Gash (2008) emphasizes government-initiated approach and focus on formal structure of collaborative governance, which may not be sufficient for understanding collaboration that are more informal and the actions that led to broader outcomes. The model pays less attention to the productive growth in organization capacity and leadership from different sectors other than the government.

The purpose of using an analytical framework in this study is not to determine a ‘best’ combination of variables that may be a panacea for all, but to understand and highlight the

32 relevance and relations between these dimensions (see Figure 2.2) in its context. More importantly, the goal is to help researchers and participants in public, private and civic sectors better understand the efforts required to engage in collaborative governance and the difficulties in determining relations between process and outcomes. Secondly, the analytic framework is also used as a guiding language for identifying and comparing different conceptualizations and patterns of collaborative governance.

For the purpose of this study, I adopt a definition of collaborative governance as

Critically for this research, the framework accepts different levels of formalization of collaboration, which is important for collaboration initiated in low trust condition that requires certain level of flexibility. Collaboration can be differentiated from public-private partnership by focusing on the level of collective decision making involved in the process and its contribution to the overall outcome. Among the many perspectives on CG that exist, the integrative framework for collaborative governance regimes is a good fit for this study because it addresses both bottom-up and top-down approaches. Collaborative governance could be initiated by central government, or from grassroots communities. It conceptualizes collaborative governance using a diagnostic approach that allow users to have an overview of potential barriers. It does not treat governance as a separate system from the environment, or merely institutions. It enables

33 comparison across different organizational scales and process and allows components to work together in a nonlinear and interactive fashion to produce actions and impacts, and in turn adaptation (See Figure 2.2). It differentiates a set of drivers, nested dimensions and a feedback process that could possibly influence successful collaboration.

Figure 2.2. Integrative Framework for Collaborative Governance. Source: Emerson and Nabatchi

2015.

In sum, the key perspective is to view collaborative governance as dynamic, context- based and recursive. From the left side of Figure 2.2, the emergence of collaborative governance begins with the system context that includes resource conditions, policy and legal frameworks, prior experiences, power relations, network connectedness, levels of trust, and socio-economic

34 and cultural health. The drivers include leadership, consequential incentives, interdependence and uncertainty. Environmental issues are seen as scientifically uncertain and locality-based

(Edge and McAllister 2009) and could affect the formulation of collaborative governance from the very beginning. Very often a local leader mobilizes resources and people to address a specific local concern that cannot be solved by the traditional form of governing. These local needs are shaped by their relation to “resource conditions” or their physical environment.

After initiation of collaborative governance, the organization and mobilization then enter a “regime” phase, meaning a sustained and continued interactions, where the process of collaboration dynamics start to evolve. The dynamics can be seen through three closely linked components: principled engagement, shared motivation and joint capacity. Based on the system context, the collaboration dynamics could produce contrasting processes and actions by different actors. The immediate and long-term outcome of collaborative governance serve as a bases for continue or dis-continue of collaboration. Here I focus on legitimacy, leadership, trust and knowledge within the collaboration dynamics to shed light on its potential productive role in sustaining collaborative governance. These four elements were chosen based on literature review and empirical observation prior to conducting fieldwork.

Table 2.1 The logic model of collaborative governance framework.

Legitimacy

Provan and Milward (1995) view internal legitimacy as relational and interpersonal validation. Internal legitimacy of a collaborative governance regime (CGR) could support trust building and build confidence of the overall process of collaboration even when there is no visible outcome. Participants and leaders of CGR rely on legitimacy to leverage resource and justify actions. The source of legitimacy may come from institution or knowledge. In the context of rural China, legitimacy is crucial for trust building and is contextualized later. In an example case from Guadalupe Valley, Mexico, Pells (2015) point out the importance of understanding what constitute internal and external legitimacy in a collaborative governance for groundwater management by central government and local communities. The presence of appropriate authorities helps secure funding, mediate conflicting objectives and support administrative functions. Her case study suggests the use of formal regulation to secure autonomy and

36 legitimacy of actors in collaborative governance. In rural China, legitimacy and autonomy may come from many sources depend on local institutions and social dynamics.

Leadership

Collaborative governance theories and evidences both identify leadership as an important element of joint capacity (Ansell and Gash 2008, Bingham and O’Leary 2008, Carlson 2007,

Saint-Onge and Armstrong 2004, Susskind and Cruikshank 1987. In the context of collaborative governance, however, leadership usually needed to be expanded far beyond the leader of a single institution or organization to include additional roles. The formation of collaborative governance requires initiating leadership and depending on the dynamics build up within the collaboration, additional recruitment or supporting leadership may be needed to address new issues or leverage resources. Studies had pointed to the skills and attributes collaborative leadership usually required including flexible, risk-oriented, communication skills, problem solving and so on.

More importantly for this study, leaders that could work across the boundaries of public, civic, and private sector and possess broad knowledge about institutional Zhange and social dynamic within the community (O’Leary and Bingham 2007).

In the context of rural China, as will be explained in chapter 4, taking responsibility for public affairs could be a fruitless effort when the activities engaged has limited institutional legitimacy.

Communities in rural China has extreme variation in terms of social coherence and social capital.

This why knowledge on local social dynamics is crucial for leaders. The ability of leaders to work across level of government is also important.

Knowledge

An aspect of knowledge that is crucial for collaborative governance is how it is being processed and integrated into the value system of collaborative governance participants. As discussed in the leadership section, knowledge is not simply the technical know-how but includes socialized experience accumulated through time. If people were not willing to share what they know, it is unlikely that the collaborative process would be productive. Knowledge in the forms of scientific itself could bring new ideas into the collaboration or being used for legitimizing purposes (Lafferty and Meadowcroft 1996).

Environmental issues often require a broader integration of knowledge from different sources due to the complexity of solutions and cross-boundary nature. Environmental-based problems also often need a place-based approach to understand local socio-ecological system to better facilitate who should be included and how to establish a working process with local communities. Many researchers (Bryant and Wilson 1998) had identify the gap between established scientific and local knowledge, which reflect different or even contrasting approaches to define solutions.

In rural China, state authorities often hold the power to define and divide people and environment into different categories for governance purposes. The strong tendency to use technocratic approach to environmental and social management had led to environmental crisis

38 in different localities (Yeh 2005). For example, areas zoned as degraded by central government may not be degraded in the eyes and knowledge of local rural residents.

Trust

Trust has been identified as instrumental in reducing transaction costs, improving stability in relations, stimulating learning, knowledge exchange, and innovation (Thomson and

Perry 2006). In the context of rural China, community level interpersonal trust may support leadership and conflict resolution. In the context of collaborative governance regime, trust is especially needed when there is no institutional support beyond basic legal foundation. In this sense, trust is also a product of consistence engagement and performance (Gray 1989). The linkage between informal norms of trust and public sphere is discussed later (in the section public sphere and civil society) to contextualize the concept of trust in collaborative governance.

2.4 The Context of Environmental Governance in Rural China

Local environmental governance is embedded in rural governance and regional development process. The reform of institutions since 1978 and the continuing democratic decentralization have increased the demand for collaborative governance in rural China. The introduction of the ‘household responsibility system’ in 1979 returned land use rights to individual households although direct ownership was retained by the collective and state (Table

2). In the early 1990s, China started experimenting with participatory development and conservation projects in collaboration with or guided by World Bank and other international

39 organizations (JICA 2008, WB 2007). The Loess Plateau Watershed Rehabilitation Project, and

Water User Association are two projects that are most comparable ones to the Returning

Farmland to Forest Program in terms of scale (Song et al. 2014, Guo 2016, Pia 2015). Together with economic reform and increased access to regional and global markets, the implication of these institutional Zhanges for rural communities is the emergence of varied and complex forms of land tenure, and of financing mechanisms for environmental management (Hershkovitz 1993).

In 2002, the term “eco-civilization” was officially adopted in the 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China and has since become a top priority of national development goals. In 2016, China’s President Xi adopted the phrase “Lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets” to promote and instruct the further institutional reform and development of

“eco-civilization” in the “new era”. The discourse of eco-civilization now infiltrates all aspects of citizens’ life, from tackling corruption to mitigating air and water pollution, and has transformed into a plethora of hard measures for local government’s performance. In early 2018, the Ministry of Environmental Protection of China underwent institutional reform and multiple agencies integration and renamed itself as the Ministry of Ecological Environment. These new concepts and institutional motivations and changes are the background against which local collaborative governance is developed.

Agricultural mechanization has been at the very center of China’s reforms after 1975

(White 1998:9; Oi 1999). Technological innovation has intensified and greatly improved agricultural output. Farmers have been able to diversify employment by venturing into non-farm production and adjusting to a market-oriented economic environment, albeit with different levels

40 of success. As this trend continues, rural households will be less available to provide labor and resources for collective environmental management than they used to be.

In the meantime, the fiscal reform in 1994 re-centralized the banking and taxation system and has since pushed forward the process of privatization (Whiting 2001). The continuing reform of the fiscal system had reorganized the fiscal relationships between central and local governments and recognized formal accountability of county governments to provide basic public services instead of focusing on pursuing revenue extraction. In 2015, 46% of national fiscal expenditures were provided by county governments, while only about 14% of those were provided by central government; and about 46% of public revenue were allocated to central government (TE 2017). The fiscal reform also created problems such as the increasing reliance on ‘earmarked funds’ and the rise of governing through ‘targets’ and ‘projects’ (Wong 2009).

County government, where the locus of financial accountability is situated, will be responsible for the provision of environmental public goods by negotiating resources from both central and provincial government and lower level administrative units (Table1). As the private sector becomes more prominent, the opportunity for conflicts, competition and genuine collaborative governance should increase.

Finally, in the context of decentralization and rapid marketization, implementation of public policies is increasingly shifting from government control to incentive-based negotiations.

The increasing costs of having many potential service providers and beneficiaries, developing contracts, as well as the technical support needed for fair and individualized trades would tend to inflate external transaction costs that are usually internalized in a top-down implementation

41 regime (Kolinjivadi and Sunderland 2012). Appreciating these macro and micro political- economical contexts are crucial for understanding local social dynamics. In the next section, I explore the relationship between state and society to help ground these concepts in this study.

2.5 The State and Society Nexus

Developmental state

For the purpose of this study, “Developmental state” could be seen as an operating environment where “cooperation between private and public sector is nationally sanctioned”

(Woo-Cumings 1999) This is relevant to this study because it explains (1) part of the motivations behind how policy-makers, government officials and civilians see their role in the society, (2) the motivations behind and how institutional arrangements is formed between state and society, (3) how the concept of “public-private partnership” or “Collaborative Service Delivery” (Jing et al.

2009) could often be misunderstood as the emergent “Collaborative governance” in China.

When Johnson (1982) invoked the concept of “developmental state” to characterize the role the Japanese state2 played in Japan’s extraordinary post-war enrichment, he did not imply that the state was solely responsible for Japan’s economic achievements or that it behaved like the state in command economies (Woo-Cumings 1999). Johnson used a historical and qualitative approach to study the institutional arrangements of the Ministry of International Trade and

2 Comparing China with Japan had always made more sense to me than comparing it with ex-socialist states in Eastern Europe. Although Japan is not an authoritarian state (it became an authoritarian state between 1930s and 1945), Japan’s fast pace modernization process and its economy is considered part of national security by their elites, which is similar in other Asian societies. The Japanese state relies heavily on nationalism and other ideologies to influence society, an approach similar in China. More importantly, China’s state-society relations is much more similar to Japan than to those of Eastern European states. Japanese elites also went through ideological struggles throughout their nation-building process, but the common denominator or driver is often nationalism rather than communism, socialism or capitalism. See McVeigh (2006).

42 Industry from 1925-1975 in Japan3. The PRC, at least from their political elite’s perspective, is trying to emulate Japan in terms of balancing state power, centralization with private initiatives.

China is very different from Japan in many ways, especially because PRC is a party-state, a state within a state. It is the Chinese Communist Party (henceforth “Party”), at the end of the day, who dictates policies. The Japanese, unlike the PRC, does not constantly and publicly advocate for a

Japanese model of development. Nevertheless, the concept of developmental state is useful for understanding the relations between state and society, which is a focus of this study. The following section I describe the key conclusions and implications from the developmental state literature. The next section I introduced the concept of civil society and its role in governance in

China.

Johnson stated that Japan’s case would be hard to emulate due to historical particularities including war and the postwar international environment, and it was not his intention when he did his research. Nevertheless, just because Japan’s model is hard to emulate does not mean other countries, especially “developing countries”, would not try to do so in a way that fit their circumstances. Although overgeneralization of history is not wise, dealing with both the generalizable and the particular is considered an important aspect of social science (Woo-

Cumings 1999). Part of my research objective is also driven by finding lessons that could be of pragmatic use and adapted to different contexts.

3 The concept created a controversy at the time but now the idea is much more accepted by people, especially with the rise of People’s Republic of China (PRC) as a powerful economic actor with much of its motivations coming from capitalism.

43 Onis (1991) synthesized the characteristics commonly observed in institutional arrangements of the developmental states in East Asia: (1) a small-scale, elite economic bureaucracy, recruited from the best managerial talent available in the system, (2) within the bureaucracy4, a pilot agency plays a key role in policy formulation and implementation, (3) close institutionalized links are established between the elite bureaucracy and major private business for consultation and cooperation, (4) a political system in which the bureaucracy is given sufficient scope to take initiatives and operate effectively. An additional factor not mentioned directly in Onis (1991)’s list but appeared in many developmental state literatures is an educated labor force that is willing to work in exchange for betterment of life. The fourth characteristic is similar to what Evans

(2012) called “embedded autonomy” between state and society and what others (Haggard 2015,

Wade 2014) called state or bureaucratic autonomy. Finally, strategic industrial policy forms a central component of the developmental state. The industrial policy’s goal is to selectively rewards and incentivizes strategic sectors (science and technology) to improve competitiveness, not subsidizing industries with financial difficulties. In short, it is a state with priorities of rapid industrialization and the necessary capacity to carry out those policy goals. Wade (2014) called the model “governing the market”. The selective and strategic policy choices made by elites and the capacity and autonomy (from society) of the elites to carry out its missions distinguish developmental state from the concept of “corporatist state” in the European sense. Despite all these focuses on the internal organization of the state, “the nature of the state itself derives from comprehensive state-society relations” (Wade 2014).

4 The term bureaucracy has a negative connotation in much of the social science. In this study it has two meanings: (1) from a historical perspective, "bureaucratized" is meant to stress that the processes of hierarchization, standardization, and categorization increased greatly as societies modernized, especially during the 1800s (McVeigh, personal communication). (2) bureaucracy is also used to indicate the specific institutions and institutional arrangements within the society.

Is developmental state authoritarian? This question points to the source of legitimacy of the state. The short answer is no. Nevertheless, accountability is a serious issue for developmental state due to the institutional arrangements between state and society.

“Authoritarianism can sometimes mobilize the majority of the population to work and sacrifice for developmental projects” (Woo-Cumings 1999). However, authoritarian government face the significant challenge of maintaining legitimacy, especially when the state has limited capacity to deliver outcomes and autonomy from powerful groups in society (Onis 1991, Migdal et al.

2004). Wade pointed out that one of the necessary conditions for bureaucratic effectiveness in developing countries is autonomy and that “autonomy is not a condition which is fixed, based on law; paradoxically, autonomy depends on political connections and is inherently relational”

(2014). This is why, at the macro level, the state may see their role as establishing closer working relations with society, and see a need to integrate civil society, especially important private actors. Johnson argued that the developmental state “possess legitimacy that comes from devotion to a widely believed-in revolutionary project” (i.e. nation building in the face of external threats). “This legitimacy is not a mandate bestowed on them by civil society and that the legitimacy of the developmental state cannot be explained by using the usual state-society categories of Anglo-American civics” (1999).

In sum, the developmental state is important in understanding state-society relations and where legitimacy comes from – economic development, for the purpose of nation-building.

Johnson (1999, 60) stated: The concept “developmental state” means that each side (state and civilian) uses the other in a mutually beneficial relationship to achieve developmental goals and

45 enterprise viability. Of course, this does not mean powerful elites do not take advantage of the situation to benefit themselves at the expense of others (the elites are committed to economic development as important part of national security, not just economic development for its own sake). However, the overarching goal is agreed upon by both state and society, which provides strong legitimizing power. The nature of state and society relations in PR of China makes it difficult to separate the original source of economic development between state and society. The

PRC elite and civilians alike do not see a clear division between state and society (yes, people will reject working with officials, but an overall perception of belonging to the state is strong), and the state constantly see a need to maintain legitimacy through taking credit for the outcome of economic development (as seen in my case study and state media). This is partially why the

Chinese Communist Party continue to remain in power despite its lack of accountability and one aspect of the absence of a well-defined space between state and society. In short, economic prosperity as a source of legitimacy will continue to play an important role in hindering or helping the development of collaborative governance.

Civil society and Public sphere

The developmental state literature highlights the nature of the relationship between state and society. However, it also highlights the problem where a society is dominated by the overriding objective of economic development with not much tools to address other issues. In the words of a township official: “we’re losing balance!” (shiqu pingheng). I already discussed the concept of civil society earlier and I want to explore it a little deeper for the purpose of this study. To put it in a non-evaluative way, civil society can be understood as a social space

46 between state and society. I do not use civil society in a way that commonly associated with opposing the state (Ho 2001, Ding 1994). In this study, I assumed a less than well-defined institutional environment for civil society in China. In other words, there is no consensus on what civil society should look like in China. In this section, I discuss the concepts of civil society and public sphere and its role in China’s society and collaborative governance and review recent studies in environmental governance regarding policy implementation and participation.

A simple way to define public sphere is a space where there is no predefined way of doing things and thus need to rely on civility to interact with strangers (McVeigh 1998, Madsen

1993, Pye 1999). Civil society as a conceptual lens for this study describes the space between the state (officialdom) and private society (composed of individuals and kinship systems). See

Appendix 2.2 for illustration. Until recently often overlooked in political analyses, civil society is just as important as democracy (voting rights) and constitutional rights for explaining political thought in the modern world. Civil society is important because it provides a space in which individuals are protected from the problematic aspects of state and family life; in this space they can form and join organizations not connected to officialdom. The boundary between private and public sectors in so-called East Asian countries is usually blurred intentionally by both state and society, a development that Euro-American political thinking would find questionable (McVeigh

2002). This blurring of state and society will influence how terms like private capture, corporatism, private property, cooptation is understood and practiced, and more importantly, how individual conceptualizes their relations with the state (e.g. subjects, citizens). A concern of this study is the changing state-society relations that enables or constrains the development of collaborative governance.

Figure 2.3 The relation between public and private in Euro-American societies (left) and

Japanese society (right). Source: McVeigh 1998.

The conception of civil society that is developing in China would be challenging to understand in the traditional sense of citizen autonomy and free association of individuals, especially without considering meritocratic forms of political participation5, perception of legitimacy, ownership, notions of fairness and accountability (Perry 2008, 2011, Pia 2015,

McVeigh 1998, Jennings 2008, Wang 2005, Tsai 2007, Pils 2006, 2014). China’s current development of civil society is often led by urban elites, and its development is considered inhibited by the state in the short term. Civil society in China thus requires reconceptualization and attention to its internal politics (Mcilwaine 1998).

One of the legacies of the so-called East Asian developmental state, where states that were late to industrialize take a leading role and authoritarian approach to economic

5 The imperial examinations were a civil service examination system in Imperial China to select candidates for the state bureaucracy since 14th century. (see Unger and Chan 1995 regarding the legacy of imperial exam.)

48 development, is a strongly bureaucratized society, and a less developed civic sector that has the ability to form consensus through mechanisms outside state and market (MeVeigh 1998). In other words, state-society relations, is sometimes seen as corporatism6 (Unger and Chan 1995).

A key element in differentiating corporatism from collaborative governance is that the former focusses on the interests of a consolidated ruling power, while the later focusses on those of the public with a less rigid legal and bureaucratic structure (Hsieh 2012). For example, an organization could preemptively select its cooperative participants including state and non-state actors and exclude others that do not have access to the collaborative or decision-making process.

Advocates for decentralization recognized that whilst these previously authoritarian regimes provided strong leadership in economic growth and protection of labor from foreign corporate exploitation, they performed poorly in responding to internal social demands such as environmental protection, anti-corruption enforcement and crisis management (McVeigh 2002,

Pieke 2004). In short, analysis separating state and society as two entities may fail to address how the state maintained its legitimacy during decentralization, and subsequently fail to understand the motivations of institutional Zhange, as pointed out by many political economists and political anthropologists (Whiting 2001, Tsai 2007, Wang 2005, Pieke 2004).

If a society has a weakly developed public sphere, then conventional institution analysis

(purely deductive) will be a less useful tool to understand that society. Many researchers (Epstein

2018) focus on studying institutional Zhange to understand human adaptation to environmental

6 Corporatism can mean different things in the literature of political science, and its definitions are not discussed here. In the section on development state, I differentiate developmental state from corporatist state.

49 change without realizing that the space in which these institutions, relationships, and collective interests is applied, negotiated, formed is actually poorly maintained, if not non-existent. In other words, the public sphere is taken for granted. How do people operate and collaborate with each other when the space to openly debate and deliberate issues is small or underdeveloped? In

China, it depends on the specific period and particular policy issue (Ding 1994, Smith 2009).

If a researcher’s goal is to find solutions to problems through “institution design”

(Epstein 2018), then an important part that is often missing from this scholarship is how people perceive and apply the “rules” in reality. Collective action in the absence of a single powerful leader is organized through rule of law or power, or more specifically: legitimacy. Government institutions and authorities belongs in this category. In early post-reform China, as in many other countries with weak institutions (i.e. low legitimacy), the concept of “moral economy” (Scott

1976) is often used to describe how society adapt to socio-environmental risks. Some societies and communities may have agreed code of conduct for the public sphere while some may rely on private relations to resolve conflicts. Tsai (2003) characterized the use of morality and informal norms within a community by citizens to get government officials to provide them with roads, schools, and other public services in China “Accountability without democracy”. Grinspoon

(2002) provide a detailed account comparing how two rural communities in Sichuan province in early post-reform China used both formal and informal ways to resolve land-based conflict when authorities and institutions were not functioning properly. Her research was useful in identifying different leadership styles in addressing local land-based conflicts.

50 Moral discipline does constitute one important aspect of the public sphere and have played great role in mediating conflict and maintain social coherence. Pia (2015) documented how local communities and officials in Yunnan province adapt to modern water management schemes implemented by the government through their moral commitment to natural resource governance. However, morality could also be used by authorities and individuals to rationalize civil society out of existence such as the use of “shame” to compel individuals to follow certain rules and silence disputes; or at the official level, equating the state with common good (Pye

1999, McVeigh 1998). Moreover, what happens when a group of outsiders come into the community? What are the roles of public institutions in this situation?

Back to the idea of utilizing civility to interact with strangers. A good example is following the general rules of driving in the streets. (In 2013 when I visited Shanxi capital city people were crossing streets in large sum as if there were no traffic lights. In 2017, traffic improved a lot, but it is still a relatively dangerous place for outsiders). When a public sphere is well maintained, public policy-makers are more likely to use indirect influence on actors through regulation as opposed to policy that aim at affecting people directly (McVeigh 1998). When a public sphere is ill-maintained, authorities are more likely to rely on familial, economic entities, or state-centered types of rules to induce change. The following section provide some examples of the later.

The government in China is increasingly relying on “small group” constitute of officials from different levels of government to coordinate policy implementation and using technological and market-based solutions to address environmental issues (Zhang 2013, Kostka and Mol

51 2013). It is debatable whether these approaches would be more effective or increase participation in authoritarian China (Beeson 2010, Balme and Tang 2014, Bluhdorn 2013, Bohmelt 2014, Liu et al 2012, Shahar 2014, Wang 2010, Zhang et al 2013, Li and Lang 2010, Hsu 2012), but the small group approach could be a way the state core (central government) directly guide or direct how policy is implemented at the local level (re-centralization). This has the potential to reduce needed participation from other policy makers or stakeholders despite its intention to reduce bureaucratic gridlock (English 2006, Cleaver 2002). This approach appeared in contradiction with recent policy-makers’ attempt to re-structure the government and its function from costly top down direct management to focus more on supervision (Zhang 2015) (i.e. using a top down approach to facilitate decentralized decision-making)

More importantly, the level of enforcement and duration of a specific policy implementation is highly selective based on current local party leaders’ preference and priority, not by legal institutions or market mechanisms (Smith 2009, Mao 2020). This “uneven implementation” is an openly recognized phenomenon in both rural and urban China, and more salient in inland China (Gobel 2011, Obrien and Li 1999). This means citizens may also selectively respond to what they perceived as more legitimate policy goals among others.

This point to a bifurcation of the way problems are being resolved in China: official and nonofficial. For example, many receipts of business transactions are issued not immediately after each exZhange but calculated or negotiated afterwards and the convenience of technology made this even easier to achieve. In short, there is an official policy as stated on policy documents and

52 a nonofficial approach to actually implement policy. This has implications for government accountability.

In sum, the dichotomization of official and non-official is less apparent in societies with robust civil society (McVeigh 1998). The lack of strong sense of civility may enhances the top down nature of vertical administration and I assume a reliance on capable individuals to work across official and nonofficial boundaries to implement policy. Regardless of official or nonofficial, different stakeholders may share similar views on certain topics while diverged on others in any policy context (Anahi 2016). However, how they decide to articulate their agenda could be dependent upon whether it is official or non-official. This has important implications for policy implementation, deliberation process and how the public sphere is formed.

Before exploring the ideas that shape and legitimize China’s rural governance, I address the local government’s role in environmental change by drawing from research in environmental studies, geography, sociology, and political science that informed my research approach. While these does not always draw direct links for this study, it does help identify research gap and help to ground the use of more general concepts (e.g. access, assets, social capital, coping strategies) and theories in the context of rural China.

Local Government and Natural Resource Management

I summarize in this section several studies in rural China that illustrate the complexity of strategies adopted by both officials and villagers in adapting to socio-environmental change.

53 Rogers (2014) provided an in-depth case study applying the sustainable livelihood framework in understanding vulnerability and climate risk on the hilly regions on the Loess Plateau (semi- arid), China, with specific focus on the role of rural county government in mediating and structuring exposure and risks exposed to villagers. She concluded that although county government played a key role in influencing the vulnerability between different villages by mediating households’ access to assets and activities, and by shaping their coping and adaptive strategies through specialization in apple production, the county government itself had limited capacity to respond to powerful structural forces that shaped this particular type of vulnerability.

Her study also highlighted the institutional environment in which local government in inland

China operates, which resulted in low fiscal capacity and autonomy for drought management in places like Yunnan (Li, Gupta and Van Dijk 2013). Specifically, Mao (2018) provided a historical account of the connection between fiscal reform and environmental (mis)management through cash-cropping in rural Gansu province, which highlighted the role of local officials.

Robinson and others (2017) used the social-ecological system framework to examine grassland management in Inner Mongolia and argued that market integration have decoupled formerly tight local social ecological links. His study is useful in pointing out how volatile policy landscape suppresses incentives for conservation. Tilt (2004) study on perceptions of pollution in local communities articulated the role of development imperative in affecting actors in different position within the political economy to perceive pollution differently and discussed briefly the role of civil society in environmental issues. Li (2017)’s study highlighted the role of migration and remittance in influencing farmers’ traditional knowledge and future agriculture strategies in

Yunnan, China. Zinda et al (2016) highlighted the flexibility of the Returning Farmland to Forest

54 Program by comparing villagers’ and local leaders’ land use strategy as they Zhanged through time in Yunnan. This study is useful in pointing out the compromise between the logic of development and environmental sustainability by local actors.

The review of these studies highlighted a few points relevant to this study: 1) There is no coherent methodology, some are small scale studies done by anthropologist, 2) local government is not often conceptualize as a central factor in the field of rural livelihood analysis, except for

Rogers (2014), and environmental studies that focus on institutional change, 3) it is clear that bureaucratic motivations and discretion and villagers access’ to livelihood assets, and policy longevity varies significantly between locality.

Research in political science and specifically the field of policy implementation appeared to move to a more qualitative approach and called for more attention to policy implementors at different levels of the government in the US (Sandfort and Moulton 2015) and in China

(Newland 2016). Newland (2016) invoked the concept of “street level bureaucrats” By Lipsky

(1969) and suggested different ways to study the provision of public goods in China by distinguishing between public goods and public spending, focusing on county-level rather than exclusively on villages, and pay more attention to how public goods are being used not just to how officials provide them. Her suggestions provided insights into local social dynamics that informed this study, which I will discuss later. McVeigh (1998) used ethnographic approach to study the Japanese government, although focus on the “bureaucratic ethos” and not specific government entities or institutions, provide reference for understanding how humans adapt

(rationalize) by linking individual to the state. Guo (2014) compared two counties in China

55 implementing the Returning Farmland to Forest Program and found that local learning agents

(i.e. local bureaucrats) played an important role in inducing learning and institutional Zhanges.

In sum, from a historical perspective, poverty in the Loess plateau is particularly tragic because it appears to be partly policy-induced (Lardy 1983, 129). Emphasis on grain production at the expense of traditional oilseed crops, animal husbandry, and forestry has contributed to farmer immiseration. In post-reform China, dryland degradation and management has continued to evolve, often with a cycle of change in patterns every 10 years. This is a reflection of the social-environmental change China is going through.

Addressing State power

In this dissertation, I do not focus on quantifying or qualifying state influence on society.

I explore this issue to provide a foundational groundwork to understand power dynamics in

China. Without addressing state power, it may be difficult to understand local dynamics. Here I discuss its heuristic usage to ground the concept for this research. By proposing the local government as an important actor in environmental issues, I need to narrow my analytical focus on specific state structure without losing the big picture. The state is formal political institutions, power centers, and legal systems. More importantly, the state is also informal institutions in the form of “unquestioned assumptions, sub-structural knowledge, bureaucratized subjectivity, deep ideology” and a “repertoire of activities and institutions” (McVeigh 2006, 83). Gramsci (1971) recognized the state as inclusive of political society plus civil society. In a more qualitative sense, the socio-politicized atmosphere of a state could be described in terms of “state-ness”

56 (McVeigh 2006). In this sense, all process and properties of state projects and society could carry different degrees of state-ness. In short, it is a matter of degree. An individual could have high degrees of state-ness because he or she is super-patriotic.

Combining with the perspectives described above, I integrated suggestions from literatures of collaborative governance, political ecology, and anthropology of state, which all emphasize the importance of scale, system context, and the connection between macro and micro level to study collaborative governance and state-society relations. The key is to pay attention to what an agency, ministry, etc. actually does vis-à-vis local level actors, how it functions, how it interacts with other actors. In addition, because we recognize institutions could be quasi- private/public (Tilt 2015), the degree of “state-ness” is a useful theoretical prop for understanding institutions and actors that usually belong in the private sectors.

Before I go further on, I discuss how I use the term “public” and “private” as it related to state and the public sphere for this study. The state-society relations are important to my study because of how the term "cooperation" and "collaboration" between public and private is being used in the US and China. Policy-makers in China as well as those within the international development circle often call for “International cooperation” in the fields such as science and technology in an innocuous way. I use "public sphere" to indicate a more "authentic" collaboration when social actors engage in forming relationships that is less driven by "private interests" or “state agenda”. The problem seems to be, private interests in China, as in many countries, often overlap with "public interests" or “public value”. Nevertheless, it is a matter of degree. At the micro level, if a person formed a relationship with strangers without injecting too

57 much state agenda, I would consider it a relationship based on civility inspired by private interests (i.e. individual, families) and public values (non-state organizations, social organizations, associations). The relationship is formed based on individual’s private capacity and public value with little influence from state as compared to relationships that are highly influenced by state, i.e. the person can only present himself in the capacity of state-actor majority of the time with little individual interests. Finally, it is beyond the scope of this study to examine the institutional environment that currently regulate social organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGO) in China, but the idea of “state-ness” could be used to describe these organizations in terms of how they are being supervised or managed by the state, or how individuals in the organization is driven by state agenda.

2.6 Conclusion

The purpose of this chapter is to establish an outlook on current research in collaborative governance, introduce key concepts and how it is used in this study. The choice of these concepts was made based on evidence from preliminary fieldtrip and literature review. Additional literature review in the field of political ecology, sociology, anthropology and political science aims to help provide relevant analysis and identify research gap for this study. This chapter contextualize collaborative governance from a historical and cultural perspective. The next chapter discuss how I integrate a qualitative approach and targeted empirical evidence to operationalize the theoretical framework, with a unit of analysis focusing on county government and stakeholders.

58 Chapter 3 Research Design and Methods

3.1 Introduction

A qualitative case study approach was considered appropriate due to the focus on the phenomenon of collaborative governance is rare in rural China and the unknowns involved in the context and local social dynamics. As the previous chapter established, while there is a variety of research on environmental issues in China, there is little research that considers the role of local government in policy implementation in rural areas, even less that consider collaborative governance. The purpose of this chapter is to explain the reasoning behind, and specific methods used, to investigate the case of Shilou county. Detail is provided on the selection of fieldwork sites, how data were collected in the field and from secondary sources, and how that data was analyzed. Before turning to details, the practical limitations for a study of this nature need to be addressed, as there remain significant constraints on conducting extended fieldwork in rural

China, constraints that had shaped the research design and methods in various ways.

3.2 Case Study Approach

I conducted two one-month-long preliminary scoping trips in the summer of 2013 and

2014. These trips allowed me to 1) understand the scope and costs of the Returning Farmland to

Forest Program and its relevance for rural development and ecology in both Shanxi and Gansu province, 2) established contacts and interviewed with local NGOs in Shanxi province and researchers at Lanzhou University, Gansu province, 3) visit villagers in Gansu province, 4) observe urbanization process and impacts. Most importantly, I decided to focus on Shanxi

59 province as study site based on my observation and evaluation of the cost and access of doing research in Shanxi as compared to Gansu during these trips.

An important aspect of the case study is how much of it is grounded in the local context, the history, the political institution and socio-economic process that is based in an actual place.

In the process of doing fieldwork, I spent time seeking different cases of collaborative governance that involve different type of actors such as universities, private sectors, rural communities and local government. This thesis eventually settles on one example of local collaborative governance that showed sign of continue development. Specifically, during the early phase of research design, I focus on the principles of a collaboration that 1) set aside specific funding and personnel for the management of collaboration, 2) has been operating beyond 3 years, and 3) a collaboration that located in rural areas on the Loess Plateau, 4) a collaboration that had establish working relations beyond “sharing information”, 5) that involved non-state actors. In Shanxi province, there were three potential cases, but the one in Shilou county was selected because of the completion of data collected to illustrate a case. Key actors were active in the case and the situation and region (Loess Plateau) present a variety of environmental concerns, composition of stakeholders and geographic features, thus leading to a series of actions that provide potential to make comparison. For example, the initiation process, the local dynamics and the barriers they face (i.e. funding). Overall, I spent six months in Shanxi province with eighty percent of the time in Shilou county.

Study Site and Rationale

60 Shanxi Province is a representative province for SLCP in arid regions of China due to its location on the Loess Plateau, and its position between the more developed coastal provinces and the less developed inland provinces (Figure 4). Shanxi is environmentally not suitable for productive agriculture because of the dry climate and lack of flat plains. Shanxi is one of the earliest industrial development zones during the reform period (post-1970) due to its abundant fossil fuel and mineral resources and therefore suffer and benefit from the concentration of coal, aluminum, defense industry and various chemical engineering plants. Shanxi produces a quarter of China’s coal, which accounts for 60% of the provinces GDP, and is second to its neighbor Inner

Mongolia as the largest coal production center in China. The coal industry is known for its collusion and corruption. Despite being located only 250 miles west of the capital city Beijing,

Shanxi is ranked 23rd in per capita GDP among 31 provincial level jurisdictions in China as of

2014 [Shanxi: $5,708; Beijing city: $16,278]. The Loess Plateau covers 640,000 square kilometers, an area 2.5 times the size of UK. From the eastern part of Loess Plateau, climate transitioned from semi-arid to arid to the inner west. The Loess Plateau has a typical continental monsoon climate, where winters are cold and dry, and summers (June to September) have the most rainfall during a typical year, from 400 to 600 mm. Shanxi Province had collaborated with the World Bank, Japanese and German international aid agencies in the early 2000s on afforestation projects (SFA, 2013), which equipped the province with experiences working in a collaborative context at international level on environment governance.

Figure 3.1 Study site Shilou county on the Topography Map of Shanxi Province. (Elevation Color code: orange > 3000 m – green = 0 m).

Figure 3.2. Shanxi province administrative map. Shilou county is located in Luliang prefectural city’s jurisdiction (light green). Taiyuan city is the capital city.

Research Questions:

1. How do state-society relations shape collaborative governance, and why?

a. How has decentralization shaped villagers and local officials’ conception of their

role in environment governance?

b. How do various institutional motivations shape patterns of governance and how are

these differences reconciled at the county and village level?

2. How do local officials respond to reforestation policy, and why?

63 a. What is the nature and extent of deliberation in the context of local policy

implementation?

b. How do villagers mobilize to access participation in policy making or not?

c. How has reforestation policy shaped local conception and practices of collaborative

governance?

3. How does collaborative governance work or not in rural China, and why?

Case Initial Assumptions

1. Villages in less developed (lower income, less knowledge, remote area) regions have

fewer economic options, resources, and knowledge for participation in governmental

programs. Initially, they may possess less autonomy to negotiate their participation in

SLCP.

2. Deliberation may not be an integral process in initial implementation. Deliberation has

positive effect on collaboration outcomes when trust level is initially low. [In countries

where deliberation is part of the process, the effect may be different]

3. Deliberation has positive effect on collaboration outcomes when the level of knowledge

among participants is initially contested or incomplete.

4. Strong collaborative governance at the county level may increase or decrease village

autonomy in reforestation participation, depending on the collaborative dynamics.

5. Corporate autonomy is prioritized over citizen autonomy from the county government’s

perspective.

64 6. Deliberation, trust, and knowledge could affect the outcome of collaborative governance

and could change system context.

Doing fieldwork in rural China

Before conducting fieldwork, I consulted local Chinese researchers how to best approach rural China (I reflect on ethical considerations later) and the best approach seems to be to try as many approaches as possible. This means the usual approach by foreign researcher (Hansen

2006) and Chinese scholars, which is to go through the introduction of a top-down political network was attempted but failed. I could not find any contact like that for Shanxi province, which reflected somewhat about their less developed higher education status. However, it was also a relief for me to forego the formal institutional affiliation route as it was time-consuming.

A professor in Beijing agreed to let me use his name to indicate local affiliation if needed.

However, as times go on, it was clear that building relations was more important than affiliation.

As many researchers had noted (Hansen 2006), official affiliation does not necessary means access because local gatekeepers hold the final key and an “official” approach may undermine the research quality by making interviewees felt pressured. Of course, it could also have the opposite effect where the interviewee decides to be honest about his or her criticism in expectation that I as a researcher could bring back useful information to top level officials to help resolve local issues; or in expectation that I could lobby NGO to come and invest in their projects. Therefore, my strategy was to enter the filed as a powerless student without official introduction. Of course, I am not completely powerless and in Shilou county I was mainly associated with the NGO unless I specified what my research project is. I explored as many

65 routes as possible through contacts in the US and Shanxi province NGOs and started the snowballing process.

In addition to Shilou county, I briefly visited a few other counties (Heshun, Yangqu, Yuci district, Liulin, Zhongyang, Changzhi city), interview officials and individual households (pig farmers who had contract to plant apple orchards) and traveled between urban and rural areas, while temporarily lived in a dorm of a factory and an airbnb. Through these experiences and observing people’s lives in different places, it allowed me to get a better understanding of state- society dynamic from things like getting receipts for business purpose, policy implementation, to air pollution, corruption, poverty alleviation and electric cars issues in Shanxi province.

The aim to get multiple perspectives on the same issue in addition to those from Shilou county is a case study strategy to contextualize what interviewees proffered and what was observed. I was able to determine Shilou county’s poverty status in terms of fiscal capacity through information from other counties about their county level investment in forestry.

Interviewees may also exaggerate or under-report if they were recalling memories associated with specific term I used such as “investigation” (diaoyan) as compared to “social observation”

(A professor from Shanxi suggested I used this term) when I introduce my purpose for interview.

The former is a term used by the Chinese state when they send investigators to interview individuals and households about their social and economic lives, especially in rural areas. I stopped using that term eventually. In any case, double-check or cross-check the data or situations reported by interviewees, especially related to reforestation or conflicts was always

66 useful to gain a broader perspective. In the field it is better to avoid the tendency to romanticize local residents and take what they say at face value (Flick 2014).

My original plan involved observing “meetings” in formal and informal contexts.

However, in reality, it would require more than a few months to do that. Nevertheless, I was able to observe four types of interactions in formal settings that is not directly related to the collaborative governance in Shilou county and Changzhi city: 1) Top-down briefing by county officials with other officials, 2) Top-down briefing by Prefectural-level officials with villagers

(Changzhi city) 3) Agriculture bureau internal meetings, 4) county level meeting with NGO. In informal settings in the county bureaucracy, there were no obvious pattern but was network- oriented and agenda-based. Informal meeting at Shanxi Agriculture University to discuss outreach opportunities with NGO. All these interactions shed light on local social dynamics between local officials and villagers.

Despite a case study approach, which originally involved two counties (Heshun and

Shilou county), I did not limit myself to these sites because of my desire to collect contextual data from the wider society and make as many contacts as possible. This compromise my ability to stay in-depth in one place. Eventually, Heshun county, which located 2.5 hours east of capital city of Shanxi province, and a part of Taihang Mountain, was not consider a case but an important reference case for NGO-county government relations. It was beyond the scope of this research to chase an entire collaborative governance that is completely new with the key NGO located in Beijing. But it was also a good reference point for fiscal capacity of county government and the role of forestry among other more lucrative alternatives that Heshun county

67 is investing in. Eastern Shanxi province is till part of the Loess Plateau, but it is mainly rock- based mountain, which were not suitable for specialized crop such as oilseed. However, it has about 150 mm more annual rainfall compared to western Shanxi province, which made reforestation much easier in terms of labor and water requirements. The site was also important because I had long-term relation with the township official who introduced me to the case and facilitated my visit with multiple officials related to forestry, wildlife protection, and poverty alleviation while sharing many personal experiences. With that stated, I discuss some of the limitations of this research.

Some of the challenges for extended fieldwork in China are common to research in other places: costs, cross cultural communication and finding appropriate local sponsor (Rogers 2014).

I speak fluent Mandarin, but the local dialect, Jin dialect (mostly used in rural areas) of the case study area meant translation assistance was necessary, which I did not have time and resource to find nor have access to. Shanxi province has at least four divergent accents of the Jin dialect because it is segregated by rivers and mountainous areas into east (more rain) and west, and plain regions in the southwest (Figure 3.1). There was one interview from the failed case field site where I was accompanied by a local contact who translated part of the interview for me.

Although it was an ad hoc process, it provided a different perspective on the interviews. Two thirds into my stay in the field, I was encouraged by local contacts to find local high school students to help me with dialect, but considering the conservative local culture, I was more concerned about gaining parental approval and I want to focus on my ability to cultivate direct relations with potential interviewer than on finding someone who were reliable and had flexible schedules. The key is most of my interviewees in Shilou county spoke mandarin with a light

68 accent (it is much easier to understand), which also meant longer interview time. I found notebook particularly useful when I do not understand the word and ask the interviewee to write it down. There was one villager from another county who did not talk to me at all but wrote down everything in a neat way on paper to answer my questions. The other target group of actors in the case study were staff and members of a small size (26 members) philanthropy organization based in Hong-Kong. They are more accessible through online communication and they provided my initial connection with the case study area. However, the most important issue of doing fieldwork in rural China is gaining access to field sites, a process that involves continual relationship-building.

The question of access is particularly important for a study that seeks to interview local government officials and villagers in a poor remote area. As many have noted (Hansen 2006), short-term visits to collect data from local officials typically result in poor quality data that reflects official discourse and little else, whereas opportunities for longer-term visits to collect richer data is usually facilitated through local contacts who enable access to field sites and to interviews (Rogers 2014). Researchers are often “encouraged” by local officials to leave aside certain villages and focus on more developed or model villages, townships or afforestation sites

(Rogers 2014, Hansen 2006). This observation re-enforces some of my experience as I was introduced to model forestry and agriculture site and capable officials was readily facilitated by the county official, while access to villagers was discouraged and ignored in Shilou county. I was encouraged by local residents met through different channels to explore the villages myself towards the end of fieldwork, but I did not pursue this path because I did not want to jeopardize my relations with my key official contact. As times go by, I realized I was being a little paranoid

69 since his other consideration was finding people that could give me professional information and a woman official to look after me since I was seen as a young student studying abroad, a status associated me with power and warrant some sympathy that they may felt obligate to accommodate.

Shilou county is a relatively social coherent community compared to other localities I visited. It was not uncommon for people to jump into my discussion with an interviewee because he or she is curious when I was in the office of forestry bureau or township government. This type of community openness is network-dependent. Informal networks within the community and the county bureaucracy is important for policy implementation, as observed. Overall, people were fairly open upon first meeting them. For the whole time I was in the county, I ate lunch with officials almost every day because they all go home for lunch during lunch break. At the township level, which located in more rural areas, lunch was provided for everybody in a public space. I could walk from the agriculture bureau to the two forestry officials’ home in the county center in less than 30 minutes. The circumstances of my case study allowed me to gain access to an established village leader and was not shy (for a lack of a better word right now) about establishing relations with outsiders. I was able to interview a few local villagers and village level cadres through his facilitation. A few others in the category of villagers were also informally interviewed during my free time in the county.

3.3 Data Collection and Analysis

Secondary Data Collection

70 Secondary data in this study include both official information and non-official information. They are used for two purposes: providing geographical, historical and social economic information to contextualize primary data and doing analysis. This include news, reports, plans, statistics, yearbooks, maps, budgets, contracts, that is created for bureaucratic and communication purposes. My focus was on documents related to reforestation, government working report, and guidelines for internal government workings. I collected these in person and online through local officials, and through government websites. Chinese government has been making efforts to digitize public information at the central and provincial government level, but county government data on county websites are often incomplete and lack standard, contingent upon financial capacity. Researchers I interviewed also provided me with academic-oriented publications that focus on reforestation policy and empirical studies of community-based participatory natural resource management. Think tank-based studies was collected mostly after fieldwork. I found local government’s working report (descriptive) the most useful in understanding local policy concerns, current development and the level of officials involved. I used both township and county level documents for analysis.

The limitation for secondary data is availability and reliability. Local statistics are usually not freely available and presented for the purpose of upper level government inspection.

However, these data could still be good reference if the researcher has certain contextual knowledge at the local level, which could be obtained through long-term fieldwork. For example, reforestation quota reported after 2016 reflect poverty alleviation quota, rather than the actual reforestation target or needs. As Cai (2000) have noted, the manipulation of official statistics by local officials is a relatively common practice in China, which was also reflected in my case

71 study area in terms of tree survival rates reporting. Statistics for county level and above are much more available through online official databases nowadays and it could be useful for general contextual data for comparative purposes. County government data are usually incomplete or need to be updated and different level of officials or different bureaus can have different versions of the same data. Lowest level official data (i.e. Township) is usually more accurate because it is usually directly collected by township officials for reporting purpose. Most of the secondary data collected for this study are used as evidence of policy implementation, background and historical reference, and policy practice and context at the local level. In short, while the conditions in which data was collected remain imperfect, all efforts have been made to collect rich qualitative data in diverse locations (including those outside case study area).

Primary Data Collection

I do not have sufficient data to do a thorough study on a particular government organization. Most of my time were spent with county agriculture and forestry bureau officials.

However, through participant observation and interviews, I gained an understanding of the county government’s relation with local communities. With the principles in mind, I observe the policy implementation networks exist in forestry and agriculture bureaus. At the village level, local social cohesion and resource allocation were evaluated to provide the context for general rural governance. In addition, geographic context, resource endowments, and institutional goals may drive incentives for collaborative governance and is the aim of both interviews and participant observation.

72 Shadowing as method

A Chinese researcher who study farmer sociology suggested that I tag along with key informants to gain a better understanding of the rural socio-environmental landscape. I followed the suggestion and had the opportunity to shadow people around during their work as they interact with others. I discuss the advantage the type of knowledge gained in short-term fieldwork (6 months) and its potential in collecting data in rural China as compared to less target- oriented participant observation or interview. The term ‘shadowing’ implies invisibility during the process, but in reality, the researcher is visible and may participate in the activity being observed. The question of unobtrusiveness of the shadowing researcher had been challenged by recent scholars (Gill 2011, Ferguson 2016, Quinlan 2008). The ethical concerns of researcher being intrusive is depending on how participants perceive the research process. In this case, shadowing was not more intrusive than conducting interviews because it is more compatible with participants’ schedule and work pattern. In rural areas, the work pattern is chaotic and less formal. From the perspective of local official, having another person like me that is mostly observing joining his or her working process is not more troublesome compared to being interviewed in a county office with no control over the process. I think some of them were actually glad someone is interested in what they were doing. Table 3.1 provide the information of participants I shadowed. All names of participant described in this dissertation are pseudonyms.

The validity of the type of knowledge shadowing gained is dependent on the process and the multiple sources of evidence used to triangulate that knowledge (Patton 1990). Without

73 understanding the local institutions that influence decision-making, “objective” evidence could be difficult to interpret. For example, reported information on policy outcomes can be treated as evidence of dissimulation if the researcher can identify it. This knowledge is usually accessible when the researcher had been exposed to multiple social contexts that shed light on the inter- subjectivity that produced the information. In short, shadowing allows me to gather a multifaceted picture of the local administration, and villagers from the private sector’s perspective, and thus increase the validity of the study.

Table 3.1. Shadowing that involved interactions between the participants shadowed and other stakeholders at county, township and village level. No. Participant Affiliation Time Date Shadowed Length 1 Official County Agriculture Bureau Half a day Oct. 24th 2017 2 G Pig drug sales rep A day Dec. 26th 2017 3 G Pig drug sales rep Two days Jan. 17-18th 2018 4 G Pig drug sales rep Three days Jan. 23-25th 2018 5 H Independent ag salesman Half a day Jan. 30th 2018 6 Official County Agriculture Bureau A day May 29th 2018 7 Official County poverty alleviation A day May 31st 2018 8 Official Township A forestry center A day June 4th 2018 9 Official Township B forestry center A day June 6th 2018

Community dynamics

Shadowing was used out of the consideration to engage with local community in their community setting (e.g. when they are inspecting the crop, making business exZhange), reduce obtrusiveness of the researcher, and for balancing the effort needed from both the participant and researcher to achieve research goals. Despite the hassle of ‘having someone tag around with you

74 everywhere you go, having your work day become completely transparent, someone slowing you down as you go about your daily routine, and risking the possibility of being judged in your role at work’ (Ferguson 2016), the people I shadowed (officials) appeared to be at ease to share their work life with me. Unlike interview, the time commitment was longer, but the participant was much more in control of time. There were also more time and opportunity for reactive observation and conversation with the participant.

Without prior interviews and other forms of engagement with participants in the field, shadowing would be less effective and meaningful. I did not ‘go in cold’, as in go shadowing without prior knowledge of and engagement with the field, as advised by McDonald (2005).

Only one participant I shadowed were a person I had not interviewed before. Nevertheless, I had no control of who I will be seeing or what I will be doing during the process. During the shadowing process, participants may ask me about the extent of my current knowledge on reforestation, what I learned from other participants, and my perspectives on non-research- related topics. These conversations provide opportunities for me to discuss what I learned so far, much like a discussion session. Because conducting interviews would less likely to allow time for this type of interaction, it was valuable to evaluate my understanding of the data while in the field.

Shadowing focused on social dynamics also helped support place-based research. All the officials I shadowed were in the same county administration, while the two agriculture businessmen worked in two other counties. I was able to use my ‘discussion’ sessions to compare policy implementation approaches in different townships and identify power dynamics.

In Shilou county, the distance between county, township, and village centers range from 20

75 minutes to an hour and a half drive apart. This makes place-based sensibilities obvious when I observed how officials enact their role differently when they are in different places.

Public and Private

A predominantly formal engagement between researcher and participant is less likely to build trust and legitimacy. In China, as in many other countries, social relations are formed through both formal and informal relations. Being “professional” all the time without connecting with the private and informal institutions of the local community could be counter-productive to a qualitative research process. My experience also suggests that in addition to formal affiliations that support a researcher’s legitimacy, trust is often created through interactions in informal contexts such as social gatherings. In this sense, shadowing in rural China was suitable for increasing participation, building legitimacy and trust because it creates opportunity for the researcher to engage with participant’s public and personal life.

During this process, the researcher is being examined by the participant at the same time the participant is being observed. There are times I need to present myself and have conversations with other officials in the room, and there are times I am actively asking other participants questions as if I am conducting interviews. There are times I was invited to join social gatherings. For the researcher, shadowing can provide a platform to be exposed to different social contexts, and acquire deeper knowledge of 1) participants’ role within the community power hierarchy by observing their interactions with others, and 2) how a researcher should behave depending on the participant being shadowed and the social context encountered.

For example, I encountered a prefectural party official who appeared to question my presence in

76 the county. Another moment of learning is when the businessman told me not to talk with the officer standing at the entrance of another county’s forestry building. These encounters shed light on the place-based social norms that is difficult to notice if I focus only on observing without participation.

Open-ended Interviews

It is important to note that preliminary fieldtrips also influenced my choice of focusing on county government the units of analysis. Local Chinese researchers told me that county has become the policy implementation center at the local level, a level that central government have limiting ability to control or assist. This mean county government is the de facto power center and gatekeeper at the local level. This has informed the way I asked interview questions regarding the differential performance of reforestation policy implementation, which is useful in identifying motivations and constraints of the county government. On the other hand, due to the need to identify motivations to engage in collaborative governance, I also focus on stakeholders as unit of analysis, which may not center on county level officials but those at the village or township level.

I conducted interviews with forestry and agriculture officials, and people in Shilou county who directly participate in the collaborative governance, and forestry and local officials in other counties, and those who have ties with local NGOs in Shanxi province. Opportunistic and snowballing interviews were used. Single rounds of interviews were conducted with people from counties, experts (university researchers) and provincial officials. Repeated interviews were

77 conducted based on my experience with the first interview. If I established a good connection or found useful insights, I would initiate a second interview, or if I have time. I was able to gain additional information after I left the field because I establish long term relation with some local officials who were willing to share their experiences. Smart phone makes this type of exchange easier.

To comment on policy implementation is politically sensitive. I usually start with asking reforestation or agriculture development and share my extent of knowledge. Open-ended question is preferred and let the interviewees talk as a way to find out unknown ideas. For example, a township official in Shilou county volunteered to show me around, which is why I was able to gain a more in-depth understanding of township’s role in the county and their working situations in relation to county government.

Village leaders paly an intermediary role between the state and the people. “Village leaders have an interest both in serving the state and in living as part of the people” (Zhang 2015,

94). I visited the key village leader in my case study multiple times to learn about how policies have been translated into practice at the village level and his experience in rural governance.

Because the key village leader was willing to help me with my research, he received me in his home, and I was able to form relations with his family members.

The NGO (Green Action Charity Foundation) that initiated the reforestation project had two other projects in Guandong province, and three in Shanxi (with one eventually stopped). The other active project in Shanxi province is located in Taiyuan city’s jurisdiction and was managed

78 under a 50-years contract with the local township under Wasteland Auction Policy. I interviewed

two individuals from that project to gain a broader perspective on reforestation concerns and

NGO dynamics. I also interviewed local villagers at the failed project site. That project provides

a reference point for this study, which I discuss in Chapter 6. Table 3.3 summarize interviewees’

information and their institutional affiliations at different level of the government.

Table 3.2 Key informants’ affiliation, number code and interview times.

Admin level; Affiliation No. Code Key informants Interview times Provincial 4 1 Deputy Director, Shanxi Forestry Research Institute 3 2 RFFP office, Shanxi Forestry Planning Department 1 3 RFFP office, Shanxi Forestry Planning Department 1 32 Tieqiao mountain natural protection department, Shanxi 1 Forestry Department 55 Professor, Shanxi Agriculture University 1 County 16 4 Officer, Forestry Bureau, Shilou 3 5 Officer, Shilou Forestry Bureau 3 6 Ex-Director, Shilou Forestry Bureau 1 7 Manager, Shilou Agriculture Bureau 2 8 Director, Shilou Agriculture Bureau 1 9 Deputy Director, Development and Reform Committee, 1 Shilou County 10 Leader engineer, Shilou Forestry Bureau 2 11 Deputy Director, Shilou Animal Husbandry Bureau 1 12 Technician, Shilou Agriculture Bureau 2 13 Officer, Shilou Agriculture Bureau 1 14 Forestry bureau, Zhongyang County 1 15 Officer 1, Forestry Bureau, Heshun County 1 48 Officer 2, Forestry Bureau, Heshun County 1 16 Forestry Bureau, Zhang-chi city, 1, field trip 17 Fan, Ex-Township mayor, Heshun County 5, field trip 35 President, Heshun county hospital 2, field trip

79 Township and 15 18 Director, Forestry station, Hehe township, Shilou Long term, village field trip 19 Deputy mayor, Xiaoyi township, Shilou 1, fieldtrip 20 Ex-mayor, Qiaojiayuan township, Shilou 2 21 Village secretary, Si village, Longtai administrative Long term village, Shilou 22 Village secretary, Nango village, Shilou 1 38 Village cadre, Xiaojiata village, Shilou 1 33 Pig farmer 1, Yuqi city, Shanxi 1 50 Pig farmer 2 1 51 Pig and chicken farmer 3 1 52 Pig farmer 4 1 34 Manager, wasteland auction project, Yanqu county 1 44 Villager, Si village 2 45 Villager, Cow, coal, 1 47 Officer, Mafang township, Heshun county 1 54 Villager, chef 1 Focus group, Yuqi city, Shanxi Focus group Business 2 23 Independent Fertilizer salesman 3, Shadow 24 Animal Drug, Corporate Shadow Researchers 7 25 PhD, Chinese Science Academy 1 26 Professor, Shanxi University 1 41 Professor, Beijing University 1 42 Professor, Beijing Forestry University 1 43 Researcher, State Forestry Administration’s National 1 Forest Economics and Development Research Center 49 Professor, Chinese Science Academy 1 53 Professor, Renmin University 1 NGO 10 27 Executive, Green Action Charity Foundation Long term 28 Deputy Director, GACF Long term 29 Member, GACF Long term 30 Mrs. L, Founding member, GACF 1 31 L, Founding member, GACF 1 36 Chinese Felid Conservation Alliance (CFCA), Beijing 1 37 Director, Alashan Foundation, Shanxi office 1 39 Volunteer 1, CFCA 1 40 Volunteer 2, CFCA 1 46 Staff, Evergreen Non-Government Organization, Shanxi 1 Total 55

General Interview Questions for both villagers and officials:

1. Have you participated in the implementation of the Returning Farmland to Forest

Program in the past 5-10 years?

2. What is the most important change in the program, and why?

3. What is your motivation for participating in these events?

4. Were those events beneficial to you?

5. In what ways do these events benefit you?

6. What is the most significant change in the past 20 years?

7. Did the program achieve its goals?

Data Analysis

The objective is to find interpretative account of the evolution of governance patterns.

The information collected from interviews, archival research and participant observation will be used to provide a descriptive narrative of the history, process, dynamics and outcomes of rural governance. Following theories and empirical findings within collaborative governance literature

(Emerson et al. 2011 and Watson and Foster-Fishman 2013), a simple cognitive guide was developed to help with data analysis.

• Knowledge: o strong: understanding of program process, know-how of administrative process; incorporation of multiple source of knowledge • Trust:

81 o institutional/interpersonal trust; o trust in leadership, mutual accountability, o trust in policy, and trust in information/knowledge • Finance/resources: o Strong: sources of financial resources, access to budgeting decision • Autonomy: o individual veto power; village veto power; corporate vs. citizen autonomy o motivation; perception of access to decision making o institution-defined legitimacy of decision content and rules are contested or not o alternative choice • Leadership: o Strong: Identity of leadership, capacity of conflict resolution, capacity to leverage resource, motivate others • Deliberation: institutional and informal deliberation at village and county level; o Strong: access to decision making during deliberation; o consistency/incorporation of formal and informal deliberation o participation in defining goals and problems o Conflict resolution - How differences were dealt with formally or informally, or perceived confidence that difference were managed fairly; or suppressed • Empowerment: o Increased range of resources that less-advantaged participants can legitimately exchange; o increased opportunity to incorporate less-advantaged participants’ resource into exchange o increased participation in defining goals and problems o able to contribute to defining problem, able to access/provide resource

Desired Governance outcomes: o consensus achieved, implemented, sustained

82 o Collective capacity to manage and resolve issues improved, in what way o Intended institutional change achieved o Empowerment achieved o In/efficiency of resource usage (i.e. time, money and human resources and why)

State-society relations change indicator: • Institution and logic of ownership changed: o can the target itself be negotiated? [Hypothesis: management logic has changed, but not ownership] o participants’ social learning evidence • Dis/Empowerment: social boundary of exchange changes (as defined above)

3.4 Conclusion

This chapter described my case study approach, focus and methods. The research design had evolved in the process and is shaped by both external and internal factors. My data collection for the local government is limited to those most relevant to reforestation and agriculture, which

I assumed is most directly related to villagers as a frequent institutional contact point. I made effort to connect different scales from provincial to village level and use other counties to provide context. The limitations of doing research in rural China is addressed. My data collection period, mainly from 2017-2018, is also the peak period for poverty alleviation policy implementation, which was reflected in my analysis.

83 Chapter 4 Rural Development Challenges

4.1 Introduction

The evolving institutional environment since the 1970s in China and how it impacts grassroot level rural development and reforestation is discussed to provide context for the emergence of collaborative governance. An understanding of the land tenure system, fiscal and ecological environment is important for appreciating the condition and reality local government operate in and how these situations may present support and challenges for participation in collaborative governance. This chapter first introduces the physical environment of the case study area, the Loess Plateau region and how the institutional environment affects Shilou county’s current development. The fiscal reforms and its implications for rural development is introduced to further shed light on the situaions faced by rural county government. The

Returning Farmland to Forestry Program is then discussed because it represents a more concerted effort by the central government to support rural development and reforestation as well as a policy that triggered different levels of local participation and responses.

4.2 Rural livelihoods in Shanxi province, Loess Plateau

This section introduces the patterns of livelihood on the Loess Plateau, the location of my case study, from an integrative approach that includes spatial, historical, ecological and cultural dimensions. I present how local government and villagers in this region view their environmental resources in the context of reform and rural development. Shanxi Province is a representative province for RFFP implementation in arid regions of China due to its location on the eastern

84 edge of the Loess Plateau, and its position between the more developed coastal provinces and the less developed inland provinces. Shanxi is environmentally not as suitable for productive agriculture as compared it humid southern counterparts because of the dry climate, erosion-prone landscape and lack of flat plains (Figure 4.1). Shanxi is one of the earliest industrial development zones during the reform period (post-1970) due to its abundant mineral resources, and therefore suffers and benefits from the concentration of coal, aluminum, steel, and various chemical engineering plants. Shanxi produces a quarter of China’s coal, which accounts for 60% of the province’s GDP, and is second to its neighbor, Inner Mongolia, as the largest coal production area in China. Despite being located only 250 miles west of the capital city Beijing, Shanxi is ranked 23rd in per capita GDP among 31 provincial level jurisdictions in China as of 2014

(National State Statistics 2015).

Shilou

85 Figure 4.1 Shanxi province vegetation map and Shilou county’s location.

The Loess Plateau region, where agriculture began to flourish around AD 100, is located in north-central China and is situated between the lower elevation North China Plain to the east and the higher Tibetan Plateau to the west. It covers 640,000 square kilometers, an area 2.5 times the size of the United Kingdom. It stretches along the upper and middle reaches of the Yellow

River, covering most of Shanxi (山西) province, extending west to northern Shaanxi (陝西) and parts of Gansu, Ningxia, and Qinghai provinces (Figure 6)

The desertification7 (land degradation) of the Loess Plateau is not a contemporary issue that started several decades ago, but a process that had occurred for more than a few thousand years. The word “loess” in Chinese is literally yellow soil. It is a type of wind-blown soil (silt) that has been deposited in the region since the early Pleistocene. Loess is soft enough to carve, but strong enough to stand as sturdy walls. On the Loess Plateau, more than half of the residents built cave-like dwellings in thick loess cliffs that are cool in summer and warm in the winter.

However, as poverty alleviation, urbanization, and modernization continued to grow, many residents have moved to the more urbanized areas within the locality or re-modeled their housing into semi-cave and semi brick-based fronted housing in Shilou county. Loess could form from 10 m to 300 m deep and is highly susceptible to water and wind erosion when vegetation cover is

7 Desertification is a catch-all term for land degradation in water-scarce parts of the world, not the literal expansion of deserts. The UNCCD states that desertification means “land degradation in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas resulting from various factors, including climatic variations and human activities”. McSweeney, Robert. World Economic Forum 2019.

86 removed. Loess soil is very fertile when watered but long-term deforestation process since the

Western Zhou dynasty (1050 – 770 BC) had since gradually eroded nutrients and prevented the accumulation of organic matter on the top soil. Forest was cut for fuel wood, building material, and the expansion of cultivated land. By the time of Han dynasty (206 BC – 220 AD), the name

‘Yellow River’ was first recorded as a result of soil erosion causing color change of the river

(Nawata 2008). The Yellow River on average still washes up to 1.6 billion tons of sediment downstream every year (Williams 2010).

The characteristics of loess soil helped form the steeply hilled landscape with gullies of various scales, which is a result of both human and natural activity. From the eastern part of the

Plateau, climate transitions from semi-arid to arid in the inner west. The region experiences typical continental monsoon climate, where winters are cold and dry, and low annual precipitation ranging from 300 mm to 700 mm concentrated in summers (July to September).

These intensive rain events are the major cause of soil erosion on site and downstream flooding, which affected long term agriculture productivity as well as the livelihoods of 40 million people upstream and 200 million down the river valley. Irrigation agriculture is risky and inappropriate for the region thus most farmers rely on rainfed agriculture and animal husbandry as the main livelihood. Many erosion and flooding control measures had been deployed throughout history, but the efforts had sometimes been offset by poverty. In recent decades, it has been accentuated by inappropriate agricultural policies emphasizing grain monoculture, grazing, deforestation, mining, road and railway construction, and urban development (Hershkovitz 1993:333). Figure

4.2 shows the gradual deforestation process on the Loess Plateau.

Figure 4.2 Forest coverage change (shaded areas) on the Loess Plateau from BC 700 (top-left), AD 100 (top-right), AD 800 (bottom-left), to AD 1800 (bottom-right). Deforestation was caused by war, tomb-building by emperors, the expansion of agriculture and so on. Source: Nawata (2008) Desertification and its combating measures in Loess Plateau, China.

Topography is an important factor influencing the region’s agro-ecosystems. Forest, grassland and farmland are scattered in valley and gullies according to the level of steepness and the location within the drainage basin. There are in general three categories of land, each with its particular type of crop rotation and erosion pattern. The first includes both ‘terrace-land’(titian 梯

田) and ‘tableland’ (taidi 台地) at the upper slopes of a gully. Terrace-land is an older type of terraced land with 4-5 m width created during the period of Cultural Revolution (1969 – 1970s).

Table-land refers to terraced land with 7-11 m width created in the early 1980s and those created

88 under the Returning Farmland to Forest Program (RFFP) after 1999. The second one is ‘sloped- land’ (坡地), which includes those lands located near the ridge of the mountains and those at the edge of a valley. These areas usually have steeper slopes and are used for grazing and planting non-cash crops such as millet. Arable land in steeper areas had been largely converted to ‘forest- land8’(lindi 林地) under RFFP while areas with moderate gradient were converted to tableland.

The third category is land located at the valley floors which has been gradually converted to

‘dam-land’(badi 壩地) by building earthen check dams to contain runoff and flooding since the

1970s. Dam-land usually has better productivity because water and the nutrients in the soil washed down from the upper slopes are captured inside the gully rather than lost through runoff and drainage. Farmers usually plant maize and sorghum on dam-land or use these valley floors for grazing where dam-land is not built. Cultivated land on dam-land has been increasing since agriculture mechanization increased after the 1980s. Livelihood patterns on the Loess Plateau are based on these agro-ecological zones (see Table 4.1) The local saying “guang zhong bo shou” which translates as “vast sowing, meagre harvest” (Interview with officials and villagers, 2017), represents parts of local farmers’ and officials’ perception of their land.

Table 4.1. Farmland categories based on historical agro-ecological zones on the Loess Plateau. Farmland types Agro-ecological Characteristics Land use pattern

Table-land, Located at the upper slopes of a gully, Used for planting maize, terrace-land flattened terraced land by labor or wheat, sorghum, proso millet, machine foxtail millet and more Sloped-land Located near the ridge of the mountains Used for grazing and planting and at the edge of a valley with steepest non-cash crops such as millet slope, most susceptible to erosion

89 Dam-land Located at the valley floors, most fertile Used for grazing, planting maize and sorghum Flat land Contiguous flat area, easier for irrigation Grain, cash crops, specialty crop

Local governments see the short growing season (April to September), steep slopes and drought-prone nature of the Loess Plateau as a barrier to economic growth. Land-based resources were difficult to manage due to its location in remote mountainous areas and steep slopes. This landscape is fragile and fragmented for both livelihood and afforestation because lower productivity and economy of scale compared to other regions in the country. Local officials looked for new ways to utilize land that were previously under-utilized. For those regions on the

Loess Plateau without large areas of flatland or mineral-mining potentials, selling or leasing use- rights of barren hills, or non-farming land, was the best way to support rural development.

Forest Cover, Bare Land and Wasteland

Barren hills are also called “wasteland”, a policy term used to categorize many areas that could be otherwise described as recovering forests, marginal land, old fields, abandoned hills or pastures. However, it does not necessarily mean these areas are really degraded, as scientists had argued (Shi 2002, Yeh 2009). The term usually indicates the land is the least productive from the perspective of officials. To understand local officials’ perception of the value of ‘barren hills’, we need to look into the forestry reform which started in the 1980s.

90 Forestry reform followed the same principles as rural land reform, namely, the household responsibility system. Mountain and forest land were initially distributed to farmers through the

“forest contracted household responsibility system (Rozelle et al. 2000). The impacts from the agricultural sector also occurred under the experiment of this system. For example, unclear ownership, use-rights, limited transfer rights, and management responsibilities between households, collective forest, villages, townships and county governments. If the land was designated as forestland, rural households were not permitted to use it for other purposes such as the cultivation of food crops, except for fruit trees (Miao and West 2004). Mountainous areas on the Loess Plateau differ from other regions because they were used mostly for firewood collection and grazing before the logging and herding ban in 2004. Thus, the focus of resource management was the maintenance of grazing areas, not the production of timber-based resources.

In comparison, in southwest China, forested and mountainous areas had more profitable usage including planting timber and fruit trees for future harvest (Trac et al. 2007).

The definition of forest has implications for the diverse landscape across rural China. The official category “forestland” (lindi) used in the national statistics encompasses (1) forested land,

(2) prospective forest areas, (3) designated forestland yet to achieve the minimum requirement of a forest (Miao and West 2004). The minimum requirement for classification as forest area is 20% canopy coverage (Trac et al. 2013). Furthermore, the national statistics include bamboo forests, orchards, and shelterbelts, none of which occur regularly in other nations’ forest data. The amount of land in each forest category was determined by extrapolating data from aerial photos and nationwide ground plot surveys. After the introduction of Returning Farmland to Forest

Program (RFFP) in 2000, areas enrolled under the program could be classified as forestland but

91 in reality, may not have been converted from their original farm use (Miao and West 2004), or may originally belonged to native grassland (Yu et al. 2018).

In sum, the reforestation on Loess Plateau faced significant challenges due to 1) a large sum of sloped lands, which increase the cost of planting and maintenance; 2) the lack of clear strategic planning about the long-term use of grassland for grazing purposes and the ambiguity between forestland and orchards (Interview with local officials, 2018). In the next section, I focus on rural reforms and Shilou county’s specific situation under the larger socio-economic changes.

4.3 The Impacts of Rural and Fiscal Reform

Immediately following China’s reform and opening up in 1978, a number of policy changes, specifically de-collectivization, reviving family farming, and the relaxation of the state monopoly on grain procurement prices led to a series of experimentation on organization of agriculture production across the country. The reform introduced a change in the basic unit of agricultural production, from collective-based back to family-based. Table 4.2 show the change in unit of organization and its corresponding terms used pre-reform. Communes were made up of brigades, and brigades were made up of production teams. From 1978 to 1981, small group responsibility system was implemented, and household responsibility system was introduced in

1985. Each region started these reform process at different time and in 1985 the government officially changed the communes to townships and the brigades to villages. Even though production team was no longer in use, many locals still used the term team and team leaders (dui zhang) to describe them.

92 Rural party cadres still have today a significant role in shaping current land use decisions through structural changes in agriculture and rural life. Many village leaders still tapped into the social network that was built during the period of communist rule to manage village affairs such as labor allocation and income-distribution. The lowest level of the state government is township. Administrative village, villagers’ small group, are part of the local institution, the so called collective. The communist party have organization at the village level called Party Branch

Committee, which employ local villagers as village level party secretary and vice secretary. The

Village Self-govern Committee, which often consisted of previous team leaders, and the Party

Branch Committee co-govern village affairs and are both part of the political organization of the state (Grinspoon 2002). The five-level hierarchical structure of the Chinese government is illustrated in Figure 1. What Figure 1 does not show is the parallel communist party organization

(or branch) at each level of government, ministries, and bureaus. Administrative village may contain one to five natural village that spread out around its neighboring areas. Village committee is located in administrative village, which usually encompass 3-4 natural villages in

Shilou county. The home village of village leaders usually have more power and resources compared to other natural villages (Newland 2016).

Table 4.2 Change of units of organization in rural China.

1958-1978 communist rule 1978- present Commune (Gongshe) Township Brigade (Dadui) Administrative Village Production team (Shengchandui) Work group or small group

Figure 4.3. The structure of government in China forming five level of vertical hierarchy: central, provincial, prefectural, county and township level.

The experimentation soon led to the nation-wide adoption of the Household

Responsibility System in 1984, marking the end of rural commune system since the 1950s as the central institution for rural life. The administrative function of the old production brigade such as social affairs turned into the responsibility of village committees. Higher level administrative functions of the commune became the work of local governments, mainly counties and prefectures (Hershkovitz 1993).

By 1982, 90 per cent of rural households had contracts over individual plots of land with the old production teams and ultimately, the state (Powell 1992). The state increased the length of lease period from 15 years to 30 years by 1992 to address concerns over a return to income redistribution, while land ownership was retained by the collective (i.e. team and village). In the case of land contracted for development projects such as fruit growing, forestry work, the

94 development of barren hills and wasteland, the contract period could be extended up to 50 years

(Powell:25). Farmers now had more freedom to make decisions about how best to allocate their labor and manage their land, though they were still required to meet state grain procurement quotas (up until 1985), pay agriculture tax (up until 2004), and fulfill obligations such as collective investment contributions9. After meeting the quota, farmers could cultivate their choice of crops and profit from their sale.

Even though land use right was returned to households, land tenure remains a major source of uncertainty for farmers and local officials for the next few decades. Land remains collectively owned, in practice at the administrative village10 level. The relationship between the collective and household was altered as household became less constrained by collective. The ability of collective to maintain control varies greatly among rural China. Nevertheless, household’s decision regarding land use, especially leasing, remains a collective matter for the village management committee, at least on paper. Due to the experimental nature of land reform and the need to adapt to the rapidly changing market conditions after opening up, contracts are not legally respected, sometime by the authorities, sometimes by the people (Grinspoon 2002).

As of 2018, a third wave of rural collective ownership reform was underway in the attempt to increase oversight and make rural collective resources (land, productive assets, dept capital)

9 For example, when the communes were dismantled, the "labor accumulation" obligation of commune members was eliminated, and they were no longer required to contribute mandatory labor to infrastructural projects. In poorer inland regions, local governments did not have enough revenue to hire workers and take on the responsibility of infrastructure projects and maintenance such as irrigation systems (Hershkovitz 1993). 10 Administrative village usually encompass 1-4 natural villages. The concept of administrative village in China is rather different from the natural village imageries in western peasant and agrarian transition studies. The home village of village leaders usually have more power and resources compared to other natural villages (Newland 2016).

95 more accessible to current market environment (Wu 2009). The ambiguity surrounding land ownership and use rights and poor enforcement reduced the power of village over land use decisions and the resulting land-based conflict were common throughout China (Ho 2001). Ho

(2001) showed that the ambiguity surrounding property rights reduced state capacity at the grassroot level.

The first impact of land tenure reform is the weakening of the collective system had manifested in coastal provinces, where farmers demanded the division of all communal property such as wells and water channels and the removal of any element of collective control (Powell

1992). As the collective gradually lost absolute control of land to private producers and local governments, their ability to collect funds and organize rural labor also declined. This outcome has critical implications for rural development, as state investment (both central and local) in agriculture continue to decrease.

The second consideration of land reform is even allocation of land among households.

Agricultural land was graded according to its quality – soil fertility, irrigation conditions, accessibility from the village and so forth - and each household was assigned a variety of graded pieces of land according to the number of people in the household (Powell 1992:19). To ensure an egalitarian distribution, team leaders would distribute pieces of land that would add up to equal land productivity among households. This process led to dispersed farmland for each household which was inconvenient for mechanized cultivation, irrigation and management

(Powell 1992). These methods of allocation did not consider non-labor factors such as differentials between investment costs, relative productivity rates, and household ability. Land

96 distribution between villages and townships operated differently than those within villages.

Natural boundaries such as mountains, hills, rivers as well as cultivation history were key part of land distribution between villages and townships, which did not necessary ensure equality.

Household land use decisions were affected by these rules.

1994 Fiscal Reform

In search of the deeper cause of inadequate public goods provision in the environmental sector, it is imperative to look into the impact of fiscal reform on financing and organization of environmental management (Hershkovitz 1993). The changing structure of the fiscal system created significant barriers for inland local government to meet expenditure responsibilities. The positive side is that it seemed to release the entrepreneurial spirit of local officials (sub-central government). Local government may force internal working units such as forestry bureau to generate their own funds to sustain their function (Shirk 1993). The impact of fiscal reform on the economic development has been well-documented at both national and sub-national level

(provincial) in terms of wealth distribution and agriculture production, especially in the economics and political science literature (Oi and Walder 1999). However, the impact of fiscal reform on the functions of local environmental governance has received less attention by social scientists until more recently (Mao 2018, Ran 2013). Most of the research approach environmental issues from an institutionalist point of view, focusing on institutional arrangements or management options that could led to most efficient and effective policy results

(Yeh 2015). There have been various cycles of decentralization and recentralization since the

97 1980s as the central government has sought to negotiate its fiscal relations with local governments (Rogers 2014).

In the early period of reform era, mid to late-1980s, fiscal decentralization created an environment where local governments took advantage of the expansion in autonomy to extract their own revenue, especially extra-budgetary revenue from local enterprises and land-based development while the central government gradually became reliant on local governments for transfer. The goal was to promote local economic development and increase compliance from local governments to fulfill responsibilities in delivering public services (Wong 2009). This created a strong incentive for local officials in poor areas to invest in revenue-producing enterprises rather than other growth-oriented activities (e.g. education) because these areas had less off-budget resources compared to rich regions (Rozelle 1998). The reform did boost economic growth in many regions, but it also brought about many unintended outcomes that caused concern including declining central government revenue, weakening macroeconomic management and oversight, and rising regional disparities (Shen et al. 2014).

The next section discusses in detail the process and impact of tax reform and how it led rural cadre and officials at county, and village level to find resources in the market or utilize their collective land to provide income through forestry projects (Grinspoon 1996). In chapter 6,

Shilou county government engage with collaborative governance from external donors to support their development goals is one of the key examples.

Tax Reform and local government

To regain control of fiscal power, the central government introduced the recentralizing tax assignment system (fenshuizhi, or tax-sharing) and significantly reduced the tax base for local governments in 1994. Since then, local governments had to cover the continue increase in expenditure, decreasing subsidy and investment by the central government while their revenue proportion declined by more than 30 percent of total government revenue (Shen et al. 2014). In addition, within the local governments (all sub-national governments), the distribution of responsibility was not clearly institutionalized, and the boundary of the intergovernmental fiscal system was vague and difficult to account for. This result in upper level governments having too much discretion over lower level fiscal function without adjusting to corresponding responsibilities. Lower level governments (county and township) came to bear the most responsibilities in delivering core public services including education and health care without adequate fiscal resources (Li 2005). In short, pubic services and expenditure were over- decentralized while revenue collection was centralized and established mechanisms to ensure national minimum services standards were absent.

Following the tax-sharing reform, Rural Tax and Fee Reform (shuifei gaige or tax-for fee reform) was implemented in 2002-2004 to relieve farmers of some of their tax burdens. It entailed eliminating fees and surcharges (santi wutong) that were used for village and township affairs (e.g. education, infrastructure, military, health care, staffing) and streamlining local revenue collection into a single agricultural tax. It was a response to both the increased fiscal stress that was transported downward to farmers by local governments and the surplus of grain.

Then in 2004, the agricultural tax was completely removed, ending the long-time burdens for

99 farmers (Kennedy 2007). This further reduce the revenue base for villages and townships

(collectives), especially in agricultural counties, who faced greater revenue losses than those counties who are engaged with township and village enterprises and those able to attract external investment to recover from revenue decline (Gobel 2011).

To reduce local governments’ growing fiscal stress and alleviate the widening regional disparities, the central government established a fiscal transfer system in 1994. Central- provincial fiscal transfers became the dominant source of revenues for local governments, accounting for 67 percent of provincial, 57 percent of prefectural and 66 percent of county and lower level expenditures in 2003 (Qiao and Shah 2006). There are three major types of fiscal transfer: tax return (a percentage of tax revenue over a 1993 base), financial capacity subsidies

(intended to reduce gaps between expenditure and fiscal capacity at county level) and specific- purpose transfers (Zhuanxiang Zhuanyi Zhifu, also called earmarked grants). Specific-purpose transfers, which make up about 30 percent of all fiscal transfers, are criticized for being anti- equalizing because they often require matching funds (peitao zijin) from local governments and are also considered to be subject to the political influence and bargaining power of government leaders (Rogers 2014:70, Huang and Chen 2012). There is evidence that the fiscal transfer system has aggravated inequality in fiscal capacity at the county level, particularly for agricultural counties who are unable to raise matching funds (Heng 2008). Studies also suggest that a large amount (more than 40 percent) of specific purpose funds were diverted away from service provision during the implementation process by local governments (Duan and Zhan

2009).

100 The fiscal transfer system has had various impacts on future policy design and the governing patterns of local governments. The fiscal transfer system has gradually converted

China’s fiscal system into a transfer system that channels central government funds to local governments (Ahlers and Schubert 2015). Zhou (2012) called this pattern “governing the state through programs” (xiangmu zhiquo). These transfers play a crucial role in the finance of counties in Shanxi province, sustaining more than 50 percent of their expenditures since 2001

(Budgetary Division of the Ministry of Finance, 1999-2007). Duan and Zhan (2009) found that local (county and township) officials in Shanxi province preferred to apply for specific-purpose funds and invest them in construction related projects. Such preference is more obvious in rural areas, where public services like education and health care were already poor before the reform.

These projects can potentially generate direct and instant economic benefits for local treasury, which could demonstrate effectively the “achievements” of local officials and increase their chance of promotion. Another reason that local officials favor projects that recover cost immediately is the tendency of granting agencies to delay payment, especially for specific- purpose funds. In these cases, local governments have to either borrow from other sources or go in debt. Construction-based projects are much more flexible in fund management compared to administration and service goods provision including education, health care and social security, where funds go directly to responsible agencies. By 2008, upper level (county fiscal transfers) investments in public goods (e.g. construction, salaries) in rural villages across China rose from an average of 350 yuan (US$50) in 1997 to nearly 1000 yuan (US$150) per capita. In the same time, village share of public goods investment had continued to decline to about one-thirds of total investments (Oi et al. 2012).

101 Even though the 1994 tax-sharing system reduced local governments’ fiscal capacity

(mainly at provincial level), local governments in poorer rural regions were already in a disadvantaged position to finance their own expenditure prior to the fiscal reform. In the process of local government reform, township governments were said to be ‘hollowed out’, meaning they no longer held control of their own revenue and are subject to ‘endless inspections’ by upper level governments (Smith 2010, Oi et al. 2012). Nevertheless, in rural areas, township governments are the frontline interface between state and citizens and their role in policy implementation are debatable. For poor and marginal areas, the decentralization of the fiscal system posed serious pressure on local government to pursue budget balancing funds from both public and private sources. Local authorities often did not have the resource to cover the cost of basic monitoring even though there were increased responsibility in natural resource management. In poor rural regions, the main sources of officials’ extra income were the grants attached to specific projects such as road and bridge construction, irrigation facilities, forestry and agriculture related work (Duan and Zhan 2011). In this context, local leaders frequently gave resource control rights to the agencies responsible for protecting resources. The local leaders are then encouraged to use those rights to generate income for staff salaries and other expenses

(Rozelle et al. 2000). County and township governments stretched the limits on discretionary decision-making and action in the gray area engendered in the reform process (Oi and Walder

1999:224).

Since 1995, in addition to fiscal control, the central state also gradually implemented administrative reform and fiscal oversight policies at the village and township level to improve state’s command over local fiscal and political resources (Oi et al. 2012). Local officials were

102 constrained by the central government through the cadre promotion and target responsibility systems (mubiao zerenzhi) which placed evaluation emphasis on economic growth (e.g. GDP per capita) and political stability. Combining a hierarchical party-state structure with an uneven economic development over the past decades, the fiscal reform contributed to the growing inequality and fiscal dependency in poorer rural regions (Shen et al. 2014, Duan and Zhan 2009).

2003 Rural Land Contracting Law

The introduction of the Rural Land Contracting Law in 2003 had significant impact on local development and how farmers perceived the development strategy of the state. Prior to

2003, rural households were not formally allowed to sub-lease their use-rights (only collectives could), nor were their use rights formally protected. Village officials usually have the power to reallocate land property due to ongoing demographic changes (Wang et al. 2011). This reform legalized farmers’ right to lease and subcontract their land use right and encourage the consolidation of farmland in pursuit of economies of scale. Leasing of land was already quite prevalent in coastal provinces before the law was introduced, but inland provinces had lagged behind in this respect (Naughton 2007). From the central government’s perspective, this law supported the continue market-oriented specialization of the agriculture sector. The Law attempted to address the rapidly changing market conditions through stabilizing land tenure, which was undermining economic productivity and social stability (Powell 1992). Lastly, the law was a signal to rural farmers that the demand of rural labor in secondary and tertiary sectors were still growing and out-migration of labor was encouraged as a development strategy of the state. It is again important to note that in coastal areas, investment in agriculture specialization such as

103 oilseeds, fruits, vegetables, and animal husbandry primarily comes from local governments, whereas in poorer central and western areas, these developments are reliant on fiscal transfers and financial subsidies from the central government (Gobel 2011).

In summary, market-based economic reforms have created opportunities to experiment with multiple forms of land tenure and management arrangements in the 1980s. Farmers were encouraged to produce for the market - local, regional, national, even international- rather than primarily for local subsistence or state procurement while local governments were forced to focus on cost-recovery and economy self-sufficiency (Hershkovitz 1993). The shift from subsistence farming to specialization in cash crops was supported by the continue out-migration of rural labor and subsequent land transfer policies. Rural land reform was a constant source of uncertainty for farmers and local government as new reforms continue to alter de facto property rights regime. The result is a general reluctance to make long term investments in property by both farmers and local governments. As more rural people moved into urban centers for job opportunities in secondary and tertiary sectors, they either lease their land to more productive households or private businesses. Enrolling land in public programs designed by the state such as forestry and animal husbandry became another option for farmers. In the next section, I focus on changes in the fiscal environment and how fiscal decentralization and recentralization affected local public goods and service provision.

In the next section, I introduce the Returning Farmland to Forest Program (RFFP) to link the larger institutional environment with reforestation. Because of the fiscal constraints faced by

104 the local governments and land tenure insecurity, the incentives to participate in RFFP was greatly reduced. The implementation process of RFFP is discussed in Chapter 5 in more detail.

4.4 The Returning Farmland to Forest Program

China’s Returning Farmland to Forest Program (RFFP) is the world’s largest afforestation-based Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) program, having retired and afforested over 24 million ha, involving 32 million rural households, and an investment of more than US$42 billion (up until 2013) (Bennett et al. 2014). Also known as “Grain-for-Green” or

“Returning-Farmland-to-Forest Program”, it was initiated following severe drought in the

Yellow River Basin in 1997 and flooding in the Yangtze River Basin and northeast China in

1998. Targeted to return cropland on steep slopes to forest or grassland and increase income for poor rural households, RFFP has been applied to 25 out of 31 provinces and autonomous regions in China and has stimulated various degrees of local and international dialogue and collaboration that would not have otherwise taken place (Bennett 2008). Between 1999-2008, RFFP accounts for 57.6% of all financial investments in national forestry programs in China (Ishida 2010).

In addition to forestry agencies, provincial and county governments may prioritize implementation of the program to different extents depend on their development strategies, financial capacity, and human resources (Zhang 2013). Program subsidies are paid for 8 years if households decided to plant “ecological forests” (timber crops), for 5 years for “economic forests” (orchard crops or trees with medicinal value) and for 2 years if grasses are planted.

During the implementation between 1999–2003, the government stipulated annual subsidies of

105 cash (~US$45), grain (2250 kg/ha in the Yangtze River Basin and 1500 kg/ha in the Yellow

River Basin) and a one-time seedling subsidy (RMB 750/ha, or in-kind) for planting and maintaining trees on their retired land (SFA, 2003). Please see Appendix 2 for example of trees on slopes.

Due to the size of the program; the inherent tension between the competing goals of improving rural livelihoods and restoring ecosystems, the land tenure reform and urbanization, there have been controversies involving in the implementation process and discrepancies regarding the effectiveness of its ecological outcomes. These tensions led to multiple revisions of the policy by the central government, including the designation of proper tree species for afforestation, the adjustment of the ratio between ecological and economic forests, the designation of the third category “dual-function forests” for compensation, the institutionalization of several local implementation models, and a temporary halt on expansion of farmland conversion in 2007 due to concern over food security (Bennett 2008, Zhang 2013). In the past few years, the goal of achieving “Eco-Civilization” was prioritized by the central government, and RFFP is thus being re-emphasized among policy makers in China.

RFFP operates through a mix of command-and-control and incentive-based measures

(Bennett et al. 2014). However, the de facto implementation of the program, such as the degree of autonomy granted to households over the various dimensions of program decision-making, often varies significantly by locale (Table 3; Bennett, 2008; Gao, 2004; Ge et al., 2004; Gong &

Xu, 2004; Li et al., 2004; Shen et al., 2004; Zhao, 2004). In an older study, RFFP was found to

106 be the third most common project being implemented at the village level, after road and bridge construction and irrigation work (Zhang et al., 2006).

Researchers (Bennett et al. 2014) have found that the local implementation regime- e.g. the degree of prior consultation with participants and regular monitoring - has a strong positive effect on reported survivorship of trees planted. The inclusion of consultation in determining which type of trees to plant and which plots to retire, however, is contingent upon financial support of local government and their capacity to mobilize participants to invest resources into land management. On the other hand, surveys and case studies of RFFP have consistently identified insufficient technical support as a key constraint to achieving program goals (Bennett,

2008; Grosjean & Kontoleon, 2009). Debates on sustainability of the program outcomes have focused on the re-cultivation of afforested land by farmers once subsidies discontinue (Uchida et al. 2007, Zinda et al. 2017, Bennett 2008).

In 2016, the Central Office of Agriculture Reform and State Forestry Administration stipulated 9 billion RMB (1.3 billion USD) for retiring 151 thousand hectares around the country. In the same year, through targeting poor households, the new round of RFFP emphasize the economic benefits and improvement of the effectiveness and efficiency of the program. The implementation, motivation, and priority section were aggregated based on interviews with officials at Shanxi province forestry agency and Shilou county forestry bureau. RFFP was temporarily suspended between 2010 and 2016 due to concern for shortage of grain supply that proved to be false. (Yeh 2015) Areas with survival rate lower than 40% is considered “failed” site (Interview with officials, 2018). Fiscal transfer had become tied with reforestation programs

107 since RFFP started in 2000, but in 2016 fiscal transfer become tied with poverty alleviation policy. Reforestation quota is assigned according to targeted poverty alleviation goals in counties to provide cash income for farmers.

In 2017, Shanxi province was scheduled to afforest 108,800 ha of land under RFFP, targeting the poorest households in its province. Local RFFP implementation regimes in Shanxi province were depended on local governments’ ability to provide funding for establishing quality nurseries, availability of and selection of land and tree species. The village committee was responsible for the quota allocation and enrollment application, the township government for monitoring, and county government for setting the subsidy rate for labor and seedling costs, providing seedlings, setting up contract, and conduct survey to determine target land areas

(Zhang 2013, Trac et al. 2007, Trac et al. 2013). However, as discussed later in Chapter 5, the adoption of RFFP and maintenance were largely dis-organized and lack the necessary funding and personnel for enforcement, which led to low survival rate and poor tree growth. The evolution of RFFP highlighted the often-ignored reality of local natural environment and the local governments’ capacity, which varies significantly across China.

Rural Poverty Alleviation

Farmers in many areas appeared to feel exploited to support urbanization and national economic growth. These sentiments were also affected by the ineffectiveness of policy implementation in the last three decades by the local governments. Even though the central government continued to reform rural tax system and land tenure and increased off-farm

108 livelihood opportunities continued to grow post-1978, poor rural areas did not eventually “catch up” as expected (Ravallion and Jalan 1999).

In 1986, the central government started an area-based development strategy in the forms of grants and loans to targeted counties. Provincial government also designated additional counties to receive provincial support (Rozelle et al.1998). The strategy focuses on economic development through public investments (e.g. county-run enterprises, agriculture specialization, forestry work). Therefore, it is the local governments which were managing these loans and grants, not individual households. As of 2010, there were 592 counties (out of a total of 2000) identified as nationally designated “poverty counties” compared to only 300 counties in 1986 as the eligibility standards of poverty continued to change. (Park, Wang and Wu 2002, Huang

1999).

In the 1990s, the use of the phrase “Three Rural Problems” (sannong wenti or the three agricultural problems) among policy-makers and the introduction of the ‘New Socialist

Countryside’ in 2006 signaled that the central government was re-focusing on rural development

(Ahlers and Schubert 2009). This new policy initiative denoted a new category for fiscal reporting and aimed at promoting agriculture modernization and rural infrastructure improvement (Rogers 2014). It contained a series of rural development policies including health insurance, minimum living standard security scheme, pension system, resettlement programs and grain-related subsidies for farmers and rural residents (See Table 4.3). These rural development strategies and poverty alleviation initiative were increasingly integrated with administration regulation. The Cadre in Residence policy that started in the mid 1990s (Oi et al. 2012), for

109 example, assigned party cadres in township and county governments to visit or stay in poor villages for up to three years to support policy implementation.

Table 4.3. National policies that directly affect farmers’ livelihood. The year introduced could be different based on locality. National Policies Year introduced Agriculture tax abolition 2003 Tax for fee reform 2002 Rural Land Contracting Law 2003 Returning Farmland to Forest Program 2000 Grain subsidy (6 USD/mu) 2004 Farmland subsidy (4.6 USD/mu) 2000 Seed subsidy (6 USD) 2000

In 2015-2016, “precision” poverty alleviation was introduced as a crucial ideology that guided all policies related to rural farmers. The goal is to bring all nationally-designated poverty counties in China out of poverty by 2020. This area-based approach to poverty alleviation has several issues, especially when considered in conjunction with the fiscal transfer system (Rogers

2014). The hard target is to increase annual income for citizens who are located in poor households through multiple government subsidies not limited to those targeted for poverty alleviation. However, there appeared to be resistance to removing poor county status even if counties are no longer poor (Interview with officials, 2018). Some scholars have also shown the drawbacks of these programs in supporting conservation programs (Zhang 2012, Yeh 2015). In addition, the fiscal reform increased the reliance on fiscal transfers for government expenditure, which encouraged the use of program-based development as means for poverty alleviation in many parts of rural China. In Shilou county, reforestation programs have become party of the poverty alleviation strategy, which is discussed in Chapter 5.

110 In sum, these rural development policies gave rural farmers a sense of empowerment coming directly from the central government and in some places created a source of tension between farmers and local governments (Interview with officials, 2017), which resulted in barriers for collaborative governance.

Collaborative governance emerged out of the process of decentralization when state capacity at the grassroot level is weak. With the waxing and waning of state power through the reform process, the emergence and formation of different sectors in the larger society are increasingly playing a larger role in both private and public sphere. The reform and open policy set the parameters for land use decisions in terms of scope and depth while the following fiscal reforms were characterized by many scholars as ad hoc and uncoordinated (Wong 2000). The situation is also recognized by local party and goverment leaders in China, who described the change in direction from “luan” (disorder) to “zhi” (govern) in the ecology of politics (zhengzhi shengtai) to sustain and improve development (Shanxi Publicity Department of the Communist

Party 2017). As Hershkovitz (1993) argued, sustainable land use does not only depend on adequate financing, but also require extensive social resources including organization and leadership, institutional support, research, dissemination of information, policy, and legislation.

4.5 Shilou County in Context

Shilou county is located at the southwest corner of Luliang prefecture in western

Shanxi province. This region is in the middle ridge of the Luliang mountain, hence the name. In

Shilou county, 67% of the land is sloped land above 25 degrees. Shilou county represents a

111 typical gullied landscape in the hilly region of the Loess Plateau. This region has a semi-arid continental climate, with a mean annual temperature of approximately 9.8 °C and a mean annual rainfall of 461 mm. The altitude of the county ranges from 1032 to 1361 m, and the landscape is highly fragmented. Rainy season is concentrated during June to September and the potential annual evaporation is approximately 1,850 mm. Table 4.4 document basic information of Shilou county. Annual precipitation is around 400 mm, which was right on the nationally designated standard for growing trees. Regions with annual rainfall below 400 mm are considered not suitable for planting trees. In 2016, the population of Shiou was 118,700, composed of 492 natural villages, 134 administrative villages and 9 townships (Linquan, Locun, Yide, Caojiayuan,

Xiaosuan, Longjiao, Hehe, Qianshan, Peigo). Linquan township is the county center, which denotes a built-up urban area (See Figure 4.4). Linquan is where my case study village is located.

Table 4.4 Basic statistics of Shilou county. Source: 2016 Shilou Reforestation policy)

Basic information Annual Precipitation 392.5 mm – 461mm Average temperature 9.8°C Frostless days per year 216 days Average Elevation 1032 to 1361 m Administrative units 9 townships, 134 administrative villages, 492 natural villages Climate Temperate Monsoon Climate Sloped Land >25 degree 67%

112

Figure 4.4. Shilou county administrative map.

As mentioned before, Shilou county is one of the ten “deep poverty” counties in Shanxi province and one of China’s nationally designated poverty counties (Shilou policy doc. 2016).

There are 5 other nationally designated poverty counties in Luliang prefecture and Shilou county is the only one that have no access to coal or other readily developed industrialization resource like aluminum. Land is the main natural capital and terraced land has been increasing due to the availability of large machinery for construction. Dam-land (large scale terraced land between gullies) range from 20 to 100 and more meters wide and gradually going uphill and is one of the main areas where small machinery can come in to level the land.

The current land development model in Shilou county and in neighboring counties is

“Dam-land Economy” (See Figure 5) as promoted by the Luliang prefectural government

(County working report 2016). The approach is to designate one household as the main management unit and develop the dam-land according preference. Development options include fish pond, chicken farm, tourism and so on (Interview with forestry officials). Dam-land is

113 considered the most fertile land due to accumulation of water from uphill and can double the production output (Interview with local resident, 2017) and its ability to produce economies of scale. Due to the lack of flatland, greenhouse is also not common in Shilou county. Newly terraced dam-land (see Figure 4.5) for projects contracted with external businesses. Dam-land is the most fertile land with double production output due to the accumulation of water from uphill.

Dam-land and terraced land had been increasing because of machinery and their potential for agriculture development, hence arable land had been increasing.

Figure 4.5 Dam-land as a management and development unit.

The most cited concern about land tenure insecurity is whether the central government would renew the ownership and management right embedded in the Household Responsibility

System after 50 years since 1979 (Oi 2012). This concern has been addressed as the central government is not planning any major land redistribution but continue to focus on privatization in rural areas. The impact of continued privatization could result in more secure land tenure for farmers (Newland 2016). However, privatization also meant the continue dismantle of the

114 collective land managed by village committees (Wu 2009). In Shilou county, urbanization is the main source of current land use change, followed by the increase of farmland created by terracing (Interview with local officials, 2018). Figure 4.6 shows Shilou county’s land expropriation standard based on regional development strategy. Compensation rate varied by year and could result in tension among villagers and the local governments. Forestry projects was one way to add value and stability to land resources compared to fallow and were encouraged by the county government due policy pressure to utilize land rather than let it naturally restore. The role of forestry in Shilou county is discussed in Chapter 5.

Figure 4.6. Shilou county land expropriation valuation standard based on regions. 2012 version. Dark yellow: Red dates region: compensation rate per mu: 25; Green: Development region: compensation rate per mu: 27; Orange: Industrialized region: compensation rate per mu: 24; Light Yellow: Rolling hill region: compensation rate per mu: 26.

Fiscal position

115 Shilou county have similar challenges facing other inland rural governments, the lack of stable revenue source. Most importantly, and most identified by Shilou county’s local resident regarding their position within the political economy is their understanding of their lack of industry(qiye) compared to neighboring counties that belonged in the same category of poverty.

This situation, from Shilou county’s perspective, means they have fewer revenue source and development options compared to other counties. However, as discussed later, the situation also led the county government to re-brand their county as “eco-county” and their agriculture as

“clean”. Figure 4.7 and 4.8 show Shilou county’s fiscal position and the distribution of production sectors as compared to neighboring counties within Luliang prefecture.

2015 Fiscal Position of Counties in Luliang Prefecture (10,000 RMB) 350000

300000

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0 t y y i c t ty t in in u an n g u Y g ri n n n L -l Lo L a an o o n t u u u u i- Sh Y K a a is o o o Li h - o i Y D C C C S g g ia X n i i g g n n J e h u n n a o F -S h e i F Zh Li -S h X en C ao W Ji

Revenue Expenditure

Figure 4.7. The fiscal position of Shi-Lou county compared to other counties in Luliang prefecture in 2015. Source: Shanxi Province Statistics online. (1 USD = 6.47 RMB)

116 2017 Gross Domestic Production and distribution among three sectors in Luliang Prefecture (10,000 RMB) 5000000 4500000

4000000

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ct ty y ty y y ty ty y y y ty y i n t n t nt t nt t n t tr n n un n un n u n is u u ou u u ou u u u Co o o o o o o o o o D i C C C C C C C C C i C C hi u g g n n u n n g u Y g S h n in Li -li o a a n o n i- S e X u -L L h a K o a L - h i i -S Y ia Y n C L h g g ao X n e o S n n Ji e W ia a o F J F Zh

GDP Primary Sector Secondary Sector Tertiary Sector

Figure 4.8. The distribution of GDP across three sectors of economy across counties in Luliang prefecture. Source: Shanxi Province Statistics online.

Tax reform had created uncertainty for lower level governments in terms of how they provide and invest pubic goods and service. For example, Village committee used to provide funding to build their own schools and public health clinics. Oi (2012) showed how investment from village had gradually decreased and nearly 75% of these funds now come from township level or above. The reduced capacity at the village level to provide funding limited their ability to participate in rural governance and development. In Shilou county and my case study site, villagers need to apply for funding from county government for public infrastructure and reforestation funds including hiring labor and for maintenance.

117 After the abolition of the agriculture tax in 2003 and the introduction of RFFP, between

30-50% of farmers in Shilou county migrate to other regions for off-farm work. Goat herding, thus grazing, also decreased after RFFP. According to local officials, it was not until 2013, when the economy was not faring as great as it was that farmers started to come back to Shilou county.

In 2009, National RFFP Continued Industry Dry-Fruit Economic Tree program (DET, 干果經濟

林) was introduced by the central government to utilize the rest of the funding from RFFP

(Interview officials). While RFFP was targeting marginal farmland and waste land and encouraging off-farm labor, the DET is mainly an economic development program to increase income. Dry-Fruit program in Shilou county focused on walnuts and red dates and each household had about 20 mu*. Unlike RFFP, walnuts and red dates had a more equal distribution among households and is less dependent on slope or marginality as a criterion for planting. Table

4.5 show how orchards as a type of land use had grown significantly due to the introduction of the “Dry-Fruit Economic Tree” program by the central government for mountainous regions and the distribution of arable land within the county. The definitions of forestland and grassland are ambiguous and sometimes used interchangeably depending on policy purposes (Shilou county land use change report, 2010). Flatland is concentrated in the county center, Linquan township.

Table 4.5 Land use change (Hectare) in Shilou county. Orchards and forestland increased significantly in 2009. Note: Total land area decreased in this county land use change report from 2010.

118 Land use type 1996 2009 Arable land 47753.53 27535.02 Orchard 199.62 17188.03 Forest land 24866.23 35766.69 Grassland 78525.5 79488.19 Transportation 501.99 1165.45 Water facilities 1799.33 2275.45 Others 17195.27 6963 Townships and Industry 2784.49 3109.63 Total 173625.96 173491.46

The basic structure of precision poverty alleviation is to have every official, bureau, university unit, government organization, state-run corporation, and other public entities responsible for poverty alleviation for a few households, villages, depending on individual ranks within the bureaucracy (Shilou county government work report 2016). The high priority and politically significance policy had increased local officials’ work load (Interview with officials,

2017). A township official reported that he did not went home from office for two months after the poverty alleviation quota was assigned in mid-March, a time when annual policy quota was assigned by central and provincial government. In 2016, each administrative village are allocated reforestation quota based on the number of poverty-households and available land resource.

Table 4.6 provide an example of the extent of household enrollment under RFFP accumulated overtime since 2000. As shown, due to the uneven distribution of flat and sloped land, and poverty households, only four out of 32 administrative villages participated in RFFP in Linquan township compared to Hehe township, where all households participated in RFFP.

Table 4.6 The extent of land conversions under the RFFP in Hehe and Linquan townships, Shilou county in 2018. Source: Interview with forestry official. Lowest Average Highest

119 Hehe Township (13 admin villages) 30 mu 50 mu 252 mu (Largest forest quota, with 2nd most sloped land in county) Linquan Township (32 admin villages) 0 mu <10 mu 20-30 mu (county center, least sloped land)

Livelihoods and Public Services

Diversification is the main strategy to increase productivity, income and adaptability to socio-environmental change in Shilou county. Due to topography constraints and the lack of labor, intensification is focused on input from fertilizer, pesticide, and quality seeds. Dam-land and terraced land is currently the main way to improve agriculture extensification in terms of available farmland area. Migration for off-farm work is also common during off-season and continued to be an important source of income (see Table 4.7 for example). Off farm work within the county includes building houses, roads, infrastructures and so on. Online marketing is increasingly become a useful tool to sell agricultural products. Intercropping had been prevalent since the focus on forestry in the 1990s. Fruit trees such as red dates take 5-7 years to mature and farmers usually plant crops underneath and in-between trees. Specialty crop such as sweet potato is fairly new and still depend largely on market demand (Interview with official, 2018). Table 4.8 provide an overview of current income sources in Shilou county as of 2018. Most projects that require investment in facilities such as pig farms require loans or were otherwise subsidized by the government. Each household may adopt a mix of different income sources based on preference and capacity. Subsidy usually come from central, provincial or prefectural government, not county itself. Most subsidy is channeled through an administrative village rather

120 than directly to households. Figure 4.9 show the common way of storing corn and the promotion of pen-raising instead of grazing in order to support reforestation.

Table 4.7 Hehe Township 2016 labor statistics. Hehe township had the largest reforestation quota in Shilou county and about average population density in Shilou county. Hehe On-farm Off-farm Township Total Outside of Outside of Outside of Population township, county, within Shanxi within county province province 3675 2481 1,194 643 36 191

Table 4.8 Income source diversification observed based on interviews, fieldtrips and poverty alleviation working reports in in Shilou county. Income source government subsidy, market

Grain crops (corn, millet, sorghum, beans…) Organic millet project subsidy Orchards (Walnut and Red dates) Central and Provincial subsidy Medicinal plants (Mushroom included here) Co-op: 5 households Specialty crops: sweet potato, oilseed, Co-op vegetable, quinoa Salary (government or other) Business in village, township or county Honey (Flowers of locust tree or red dates) Private contract Returning Farmland to Forest Program Central and provincial subsidy Off-farm hired work Peak in winter, 30-43 USD/day On-farm hired work Remittances Donkey farm Prefectural project Chicken farm Central government in collaboration with private sector project. Rabbit farm (small scale, no facility) Pig farm Prefectural private project Mink Poverty alleviation project

121

Figure 4.9. Corn storage (left) and pen-raising (right).

The Shilou county government advocate agricultural products with the brand “distant from pollution”, “natural” and “real” green food (Shilou county policy report 2017) despite observed increase usage of pesticide. It is not that villagers don’t appreciate the improvement in environmental quality such as reduced soil erosion. As recalled by villagers, trees were more spread out (lower density) and accessible for firewood purposes during the 1980s. Nowadays hill tops and sloped areas are either developed as farmland (including orchards) or used for RFFP.

“Small basin areas” was the older term used to describe small scale watershed unit center around dam-land. The dam-lands used to be managed by voluntary households (Hershkovitz 1993) who had interests in investing in agriculture and forestry but now these areas are integrated into larger landscape management by the county forestry bureau. As commented by a local forestry official:

“All the areas that cannot be cultivated will be planted with trees!” Trees in other counties were cut down as housing materials to support the coal industry during 1980s, but not in Shilou county. “Villagers in other counties did help protect the trees, since it is impossible for government to do it on their own, but it is not out of a consideration for sustainable ecosystem”

(Interview with official, 2018). In addition, it appeared that children’s education and marriage are the main concern for both villagers and officials. In rural China, preparing a house and

122 sometimes a car as well for their son’s marriage is the most important investment for parents.

There is only one high school in Shilou county, and the boarding school issue could be seen in

Shilou. For example, a forestry official served as a guardian for his relative’s daughter who lived in another township to attend school here.

Governance Challenges

It is the lack of accountability and institution instability and other source of livelihood concerns that is causing grievance, not land degradation. It is fair to conclude that when people lament about the failure of past forestry projects (Interviews with fertilizer salesman and local residents), they are mostly venting their grievance about the bureaucratic political system, lack of accountability, unsettled land use disputes, rather than the actual impact of reforestation policies on the environment or livelihoods. When there is conflict among villagers that cannot be solved through village committee, it appeared that officials in general do not have enough legitimacy from the law to do much about it and would prefer to avoid confrontation with villagers. This kind of situation led people to complain that “the government do nothing” (wu zhuo wei), a phrase often heard in Shilou county and other places in Shanxi province. The Communist Party was also conducting “party discipline” (a tool used by Party leaders to improve accountability) in

2017, which meant officials could be vulnerable to villagers’ complaints. This appeared to have increased the tension between villagers and officials.

There are two policies that currently affect Shilou county’s incentive structure, in addition to the fiscal reform described earlier. First, the abolition of using GDP as the main

123 evaluation criteria for cadre and official’s performance in “ecologically fragile region” in 2013

(Interview with officials, 2018). Shilou county is located along east side of the Yellow River, which had been designated and re-zoned as National Ecological Fragile Region, which was prohibited from certain development (Interview with official, 2018). This policy changed the focus of cadre evaluation from economic performance to poverty alleviation and the preservation of natural and cultural resources (Caizhengjiandu 2014). The second is the change from paying income tax to value-added tax for business entities in 2016, which was described as decreasing revenue source for the government (Shilou county government work report 2017). In sum, these policies pushed Shilou county government’s development strategy to a focus on “eco-poverty alleviation”. In 2016, Shilou county is recognized as a “Forestry eco-county” (linye shengtaixian) by the provincial government due to its large amount of reforestation quota and forestland. This shift in development strategy provided legitimacy for Shilou county government and local officials to focus more on improving livelihood benefits obtained through forestry and agriculture such as eco-tourism (see Table 4.9 for examples). Because of the introduction of precision poverty alleviation in 2015, the Returning Farmland to Forest Program was incorporated into a comprehensive poverty alleviation program as one of the key sources of policy subsidies (See Figure 4.10). Individual households were the benefits receiving units although it was unclear who in the household would benefit directly from these subsides. The administrative village committee was the main governing bodies responsible for allocating poverty alleviation quotas while the township governments were responsible for planning and implementation (Interview with village leader and official, 2018).

Table 4.9. Shilou county’s “Twelve poverty alleviation actions.” Source: Poverty Alleviation Poster 2018.

124 Poverty Alleviation Actions 1. Diversification a. Red dates b. Grain. c. Animal husbandry d. Mushroom. E. Medicinal plants F. Sweet potatoes G. Fruits, vegetables, Pagoda tree, pepper, Mulberry 2. Resettlement 3. Dam-land Economy (Goyu jingji) 4. Reforestation and management 5. Chicken project 6. Renewable energy (electricity and biogas) 7. Infrastructure 8. Tourism 9. Online marketing 10. Education and health care 11. Occupation transfer 12. Comprehensive Scheme (Dodi)

Figure 4.10 Precision poverty alleviation (started in 2015) poster on the wall of a villager’s home for the purpose of inspection by officials. Top row information including name, age and number of people in household. The left column lists all activities this household is involved in related to poverty alleviation including RFFP (2520 yuan), specialty crop (325 yuan). The right column lists all relevant “Farmer-benefit policies” including Grain subsidy (1301 yuan), housing improvement (2017:11157.75 yuan), education poverty alleviation (2000 yuan), New

125 Cooperative Medical Scheme (health insurance) (900 yuan), poverty coal (200 yuan). *1 USD = 6.47 yuan (2020)

4.6 Conclusion

This chapter described the physical environment that is the foundation of local livelihoods on the Loess Plateau and the institutional environment in terms of fiscal reform, tax reform to provide context for the condition for local collaborative governance. The lack of financial and infrastructural resources for public services and environmental management made coordination among government sectors necessary. While the RFFP prompted interactions among local government and villagers and provided resources for local implementation, the policy was eventually modified to provide more flexibility for local government to incorporate local resources and adapt to local ecology. The lack of mechanisms to improve accountability for the provision of public goods and services appeared to decrease citizens and villagers’ confidence on local governments’ governance capacity. These institutional and ecological challenges were the potential drivers and barriers for collaborative governance. In the next chapter, conflicting policy incentives and reforestation policy implementation patterns are discussed to provide context for local collaborative governance.

126 Chapter 5 Reforestation Implementation Context and Challenges

To properly assess the phenomenon and the nature of collaborative governance in the

Chinese context, it is useful to examine how the government and local communities coordinate with each other and how policy was implemented. In this chapter, I assess the evolving and often conflicting national policies that have contributed to current reforestation challenges and fragmented local implementation. Through examining the process of reforestation policy implementation, the linkages between multilevel and cross-sector governance and the incentives and barriers for collaborative governance could be better understood.

5.1 Reforestation Policy Context and Challenges

Reforestation policies since the 1950s had been largely unsuccessful due to lack of resources, knowledge, competing and conflicting policies mandated by the central government.

Agriculture tax abolition and grain subsidy in the early 2000s provide disincentive for farmers to engage in tree planting. Poverty alleviation, like many other things in China, has become a target fulfillment exercise (Mao 2018). Even though flexibility in policy implementation has been lauded as a positive feature of the decentralization process (Zinda et al. Xu et al. 2010), it also creates loopholes. For example, national regulations contain strongly worded statements prohibiting grazing in forested areas. At the same time, the regulations did not have enough legitimacy from provincial and central government for local officials to strictly enforce it and rely heavily on bureaucratic discretion. The grazing ban also do not come with any funding from the government but only provided subsidy for pen-grazing. As discussed in Chapter 4, poverty

127 alleviation policy has brought political pressure and incentive that shifted the priorities of local government. In mountainous region like Shilou county, the shift towards using poverty alleviation as performance evaluation criterion for local officials create the condition for using environmental restoration as means of economic development in a resource scarce context. Table

5.1 show reforestation programs that is currently active in Shanxi province (except for Wasteland

Auction Policy). The implementation of these programs depend on local capacity, ecology, and leadership and may differ in the exact years they were introduced at the county level.

Table 5.1 National environmental programs relevant to Shanxi province.

National and regional programs Year introduced Wasteland Auction Policy 1980s -2000s Grazing ban and pen-raising 1990s- Returning Farmland to Forest Program (RFFP) 1999- Logging ban 2000 - Natural Forest Protection Program 2000 - Three-North Shelterbelt Program 1978 -

On the Loess Plateau, one of the most obvious impact of RFFP was its conflict with the livestock-herding community. Starting in 2006, the Shanxi provincial government sharply curtailed herding practices in all mountainous regions under the grazing ban. The grazing ban was imposed along with the re-zoning of natural forest protection area. Prior to this province- wide grazing ban, some of the prefectural and county government had already initiated their own grazing ban since RFFP started in 2000. Although the intention of the grazing-ban was to help incentivize and support the enforcement of RFFP, it quickly become a sore issue between forest landowners, forestry officials and herders (County Policy document 2013, Interview with

128 officials 2017, 2018). The provincial government and many sub-provincial governments recognized the conflict and the enforcement of grazing ban is largely dependent on local social and economic conditions. Some farmers have been forced to sell livestock, rent grazing, build feed lot, graze illegally in protected forest or mountains or even cross, provincial or international boundaries in search of grazing areas (Ward and Chaudry 2001, Interview, 2018). Local governments have responded by providing resources for farmers to build dry lot and shift to other types of animal husbandry (Policy, 2013). At the national level, Returning Farmland to

Forest Program covered more than 15% of all reforested areas. Local governmental and private initiatives amount to about 60% (State Forestry Agency 2017).

Local policy implementation network

Township level dynamic was observed during two fieldtrips in Shilou county and another in He-shun county and interviews. It is fair to conclude that bureaucratic discretion at township level is still an important factor in policy implementation in rural areas where township centers located at least an hour away from the county government. Each township may have different level of support from the county government to implement policy and some might prefer to work independently of county government if their relationship were stable enough. The argument of

“Hollow State” in rural China by Smith (2010) does not apply well in Shilou county. It is true that township now have less autonomy due to fiscal reform, but they are still important for policy implementation, depending on individual agency, both formal and informal network within the county. In short, township officials are the real frontline workers and social capital is still key in policy implementation in Shilou county. Shilou county’s bureaus and county level functions are

129 largely operated through informal networks within the bureaucracy and the society in the county as a whole.

Reforestation Implementation Challenges

The purpose of this section is to identify key institutional changes associated with

Returning Farmland to Forest Program and reforestation that are crucial for implementation considerations on the Loess Plateau. Many of the issues are pertinent to the policy design and

RFFP’s role in rural development. An overview of the program is described in chapter four. The

Loess Plateau is located in the transition zone between agricultural to pastoral farming. The long- term development of grassland ecosystem and the communities that depend on it for livelihood should be taken into consideration with ecosystem restoration that reforestation is trying to achieve. Currently, the selection of farmland and bare land for RFFP was based on easing management cost and the forests were mostly orchards. The fundamental nature of the socio- ecological system is not yet determined by policy makers (Artati et al. 2017, Zheng and Zhang

2006). As local governments continue to focus on commercializing forestland, a landscape approach to the management would be difficult. Reforestation policies also did not factor in the different disturbance regimes different ecosystem may face and hence make long term management difficult.

In northern China and specifically the arid and semi-arid regions, reforestation efforts are challenging because of limiting water resources, steep and fragmented slopes. From 1949-1980s, tree survival rate in northwest China was less than 10% (Hong 2013). From the 1980s to 1990s,

130 due to technology change and increase in capital and resources invested in forestry, survival rate increased to around 25%. With the introduction of grazing ban and logging ban at the end of

1990s, as well as the designation of forest protection areas, survival rate continues to increase

(Shanxi Forestry Research Institute Runoff Forestry Techniques, Interview, 2017). In the 2000s, the survival rate in arid and semi-arid regions has been between 20%~30% during a bad year and at about 50% during a good year. Farmers usually need to do replacement planting 2 ~3 times or even 5 ~6 times to ensure tree seedlings survive. Moreover, in drought-prone areas, watering and weeding are necessary for survival in the first few years. In addition to climate, wildlife and livestock grazing could account up to 30%-50% of seedling damage. Therefore, the cost of reforestation is higher than other regions due to constant replacement planting and insufficient government subsidy for acquiring seedlings (Zhang 2013).

To improve survival rate, the Shanxi government has increased its investment in maintenance, seedling quality improvement, and irrigation and planting technology (Interview with official, 2017, Shanxi Forestry Research Institute Tech, 2013). The other issue stems from the duration of the compensation scheme. For conversion of sloping and deserted croplands to grassland the timescale was 2 years (before 2014), for ecological tree it was 8 years, and for economic trees it was 5 years. In arid and semi-arid regions, economic trees such as fruit trees or walnut tree need more than 5 years to bear fruit. This problem has been addressed through the improvement of water conservation technologies over the years. Due to the need for long-term management for reforested areas, the duration of compensation and the sustainability of the policy has always been a source of uncertainty for both farmers and local officials (Zhang 2013,

Bennet et al. 2011).

131

Local Reforestation Implementation Capacity

In addition to reforestation programs initiated by the national government, Shanxi provincial level reforestation endeavors included international collaborations between international agencies such as the World Bank, the German and Japanese aid agencies or philanthropy organizations in the 1980s and 1990s (JICA 2008, WB 2007). These programs focused on erosion reduction, livelihood transition measures, and community-based participatory natural resource management. In addition, in Shanxi province, due to the large coal production industry complex, the government has imposed tax rates based on coal extraction and coal industry related deforestation (Zhang 2013, Interview with official, 2018). These tax revenues were meant to provide financial capital for future reforestation.

To compensate for farmers’ lost income as a result of participating in reforestation and to assist farmers pursue alternative activities, the central and local governments started multiple development projects in 2008. Projects such as irrigation systems, intensifying agricultural production through high-yield crops, plastic mulch film, diversifying rural energy sources with bio-gas, wind power and solar power, animal breeding and husbandry, organic farming, and promoting non-wood forest products are common in rural areas (Holloway 2007, Yin and Zhao

2012, County Policy document 2017). In some areas that were assessed to be ecologically sensitive and unsuitable for economic activity, the program implemented ‘ecological migration’ programs, relocating people to new areas and provide compensation, and cropland, and/or training for new employment (Rogers 2018, Gao 2009). These activities usually involve the

132 planning and coordination of county forestry bureau, land resources bureau, finance bureau, agriculture bureau, and township governments and forest station (Artati et al. 2017). In addition to county bureaus and township governments, Shanxi provincial government, forestry agency, and county governments may prioritize implementation of reforestation program to different extents depend on their development strategies, financial capacity, and human resources (Zhang

2013).

Maintenance and Village Capacity

One of the common challenges of reforestation across rural China is the lack of resource and training for the maintenance of trees after they are planted. For RFFP, maintenance of retired farmland is the responsibility of the individual farmer but for bare land and wasteland reforestation, the responsibility is less clear because farmers have little incentive to maintain trees on bare land due to its remoteness and steep slope. Reforestation on wasteland could be done by either contracted professional reforestation companies or village individuals or collectives themselves. Village households and village council in poor regions usually do not have the resource and capital to invest in long-term maintenance of forestland, which includes wildfire suppression, patrolling for logging ban and grazing ban, weeding, and replacement planting. Due to the lack of unified rules and a management system in the early years of the program, most farmers did not do much on forest maintenance nor did local officials establish any proper monitor system. It was not until 2013 that the central and provincial government provided corresponding funding for maintenance and provide institutional support for co-ops and households to reforest and manage for both farmland and wasteland (Zhang 2013).

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The other part of maintenance is the redistribution of resources gained from or to be used for reforestation. The product of reforestation is a type of public good produced through using private asset – farmers’ land or the village collective’s land. The agriculture land reform separated ownership, use right, and management right, which inevitably created many confusions in the process of RFFP implementation and decrease villagers’ willingness to participate. Village leaders thus play an important role in allocation of land and balancing various interest in participating RFFP.

In summary, RFFP is a multi-layered program that has been adapted to fit different local development needs since it was first implemented in 1999. The program is inter-connected with many other national and sub-national development policies and successful outcome hinged on the smooth implementation of these policies. The implementation challenges for provincial and local governments include the increase in complexities in administration work and outreach, cross-agency coordination, public-private collaborations, and financial expenses.

Institutional Context and Challenges

To understand how decentralization affects reforestation practices, it is important to look at land tenure change and how land rights was allocated since the reforms. Insecure and poorly regulated property right has long been cited as one of the main reasons why households are unwilling to participate in reforestation programs (Xu et al. 2010, Bennet 2008). While these programs include payments and incentives to landowners for planting and maintaining forest

134 cover, the programs were widely criticized for lacking proper consultation with farmers as wells poor enforcement and inadequate compensation (Xu et al. 2010, Bennet 2008). These issues were gradually being addressed although limitation exists (Artati et al. 2017). In rural areas, forested landscape is owned by state or collectives with collectives owning over 80% of all ownership. Administrative villages which usually comprised of a number of natural villages, function as the legal owners of collective forests in most of rural China. Following the land tenure reforms in the early 1980s, user rights on collectively owned land were gradually being re-distributed to individual households. After the Rural Land Contracting Law passed in 2002, further steps were taken in 2008 to allow for the trade of agricultural land rights, which was a much-anticipated policy for rural residents.

Following agriculture reform, forestry reform had become a key part of the foundation of reforestation programs and natural resource management. Participants of Wasteland Auction and

RFFP could apply for forestland or wasteland certificates over lands that were considered barren and unproductive, lands converted from cropland and reclassified as forestland, or lands reassigned from state or collective forest holdings (Xu and Jiang 2010, Bennett et al. 2011).

These forestland certificates were critical to improve land tenure security and lower the incentives for farmers to convert forested areas back to farmland. However, some of the distribution processes also created conflicts and confusions for farmers and local officials because of reforestation failure, especially in the early stages of RFFP in the 2000s (Zhang

2013).

The Wasteland Auction Policy: Multiple Sectors Failure

135

Wasteland Auction was developed in the 1990s by the central and local governments premised on the idea that reforestation can be advanced profitably by working with and among private sectors. The Wasteland Auction policy represent an attempt by the central government to utilize private resources and decentralization for reforestation purposes. However, due to the lack of coordination between different sectors of government and the private initiatives, the lack of resource and management mechanisms, the policy failed. The tenure reform is meant to provide incentive to farmers and private sector to invest in land development and manage land more sustainably. Land tenure is also the foundation of land management. Under the current regulation, village collectives have the option of reallocating land rights to individual households, private contractors, or maintain collective management either at the level of a few households (so-called “cluster”) or at village level. In addition to these choices, households and village committee could also decide to ‘auction’ or sell the use rights of their lands. It is generally understood that, since the reforms, private contract and collective management usually provide more direct benefits for village leadership and village councils (Xu and Jiang 2008).

Wasteland Auction was an innovation that had mobilized the private sector for reforestation in the 1990s and the 2000s. Policy-makers reasoned that entrepreneurs with the necessary capital would buy the rights to waste mountains and plant tree farms on them, stimulating the rural economy and conserving the soil. Although the leases involved maximum

50-year contract period for wasteland, not outright transfer of ownership, local leaders and farmers used “buying and selling” to describe these transactions (Grinspoon 2002). Wasteland areas includes unproductive, marginal, or deserted farmland. The decentralization of public

136 goods provisions and economic development put pressures on local governments to incentivize trading of land use rights, especially wastelands and marginal lands. Wasteland Auction was particularly suitable for Loess Plateau because of the fragmented landscape in conjunction with lower population density and the need to achieve economy of scale. The outcome of Wasteland

Auction depended largely on the individuals or corporations who bought the use right. There was no effective monitor system in place by the government and more than 80% of the wasteland auctioned did not successfully achieved the goal of reforestation due to lack of maintenance and improper planting methods (Interview, 2018). Wasteland Auction was part of the second round of land tenure reform and the central government had ended its subsidy for Wasteland Auction in the early 2010s. Wasteland Auction is an example of a combination of policy innovation with poor supporting government resource and corresponding institutions for implementation.

RFFP a reforestation policy that focus specifically on farmland and the farming community in rural areas. RFFP utilized the same principle of reforestation aiming at mitigating erosion and land degradation but with rural development in consideration. Land tenure play a critical role because only farmland of individual household could participate while land owned by village council is not allowed to join RFFP. The process of land reform and the resulting land allocation were prone to create conflicts due to multiple re-allocation process or the lack of it as a response to changing socio-economic conditions. For example, if certain land areas are considered better managed by outside contract, village council may decide to re-allocate land area to maximize contract area (Interview, Wang et al. 2011). Therefore, a farmers’ own land area could change up to 3 times or more during the process.

137 In sum, flexibilities in policy implementation make room for different approach towards reforestation but it also compromises environmental goals. Wasteland Auction represent a decentralization logic that focus on the utilization of private resource and market forces for public gains, which continue to serve as a desirable option for development projects. When land tenure is considered, the uncertainty involved in reforestation increased for farmers. The next section looks at reforestation challenges that has evolved with policy changes. These challenges are the ones that are persistent and difficult to resolve through simple fix but require a change in institution design as well as identifying the larger goal of reforestation.

5.3 Forestry in Shilou county

Prior to the implementation of RFFP, the Shilou county and township governments actively promoted planting red dates as part of a broader strategy to develop the rural economy.

The red dates plantation started in the early 1990s. Many farmers planted more than half of their farmland with red dates, especially those living within about 10 kilometers from the yellow river.

The micro climate along the yellow river were particularly suited for red date production.

According to forestry officials, the red dates were not planted with reforestation or mitigating erosion in mind but focus on providing income source and economic development. County officials strategize to focus on a single marketable product, a common practice in remote mountainous regions in western Shanxi province11.

11 Zhongyang, Liulin, Xing, and Lin counties are located along the yellow river within the jurisdiction of Luliang prefecture. These four counties all specialized in growing red date to a different degree. There are a few counties in western Shanxi province that specialize in apple and pears, but these types of fruits require significant amount of water irrigation which need more capital input than planting dry-fruit such as walnut, red date and apricot.

138

Shilou County had one of the highest red date productions per capita in the country and red date became their signature commercial product in the early 2000s. Red dates farmers were considered “wealthy” by locals during this period. After 2008 red date’s production rate started to decline due to the interdecadal shift in rainy season which coincides with the fruit bearing season and rotted the fruit (late August to September). In addition, many red date orchards started to lose vigor or die when they caught the Jujube Witches’ Broom Disease in 2015, which further decreased their productivity. Farmers in the region usually lack the capital, knowledge and technology to take care of the trees when the disease hit. There were not enough quality improvement options, marketing and supply chain management for the business to continue

(Interview village leader and official). Moreover, after agriculture tax abolition and RFFP, rural residents were less likely to commit to being fulltime professional farmers, which was considered impractical considering the much more lucrative alternatives in off-farm hired work.

As a result, these declining red date orchards were eventually integrated into the Dry-fruit

Program after 2008 and are now being designed to transition into medicinal plant-based agroforestry by the county forestry bureau.

The Returning Farmland to Forest Program (RFFP) could be divided into three phases according to the implementation trajectory by Shilou Forestry Bureau. Phase one, from 2000 to

2009, was more experimental and focused on wasteland. The second phase, from 2009 to 2014, incorporated Dry-Fruit Economic tree programs. Phase three, from 2016 to present day, Dry-

Fruit improvement program replaced most Dry-Fruit Economic Tree programs and is merged with poverty alleviation quota and goals. At the national level, from 2009-2013, RFFP was

139 suspended out of concern for grain shortage (Yeh 2015). The suspension meant that no

additional farmland quota is scheduled while wasteland may still be reforested. Table 5.1 showed

the trajectory of policy implementation and the type of trees species used in Shilou county.

Table 5.2 Shilou county government’s forestry projects. On average government forestry projects could provide 15% to 50% of villagers’ income. (Source: Interview and seceondary data) 1990s 2000-2008 2009-2015 2016- County and Farmland w/in 10 Walnuts planted in Red dates die off; township km from river to the 1990s enroll in plant medicinal government the west plant red RFFP, requested by plants as new initiatives dates, two farmers project townships in the east plant walnuts 2000 RFFP: Black Total: 14,133 ha Plum, Medicinal marginal locust, RFFP suspended*; in plants farmland Arborvitae, 2014 second phase started in Shanxi 2000 RFFP: Red pine, Total: 31,600 ha Red pine, wasteland Arborvitae, 50% failed. Arborvitae

2009 Dry- Focused on planting Dry-fruit Fruit program walnuts, red dates improvement were secondary program 2016 Poverty No limitations on alleviation tree species associated with RFFP

Price, disease, Good price Too much moisture Low price for red weather, for both red during red dates dates and walnut, management dates and fruiting season; but walnut fare walnuts 2015: Red dates better; Medicinal Broom disease; lack plants price better of management

140 *RFFP suspension meant that no additional farmland is allowed to convert to forestland, it does not mean that subsidy from the government stopped.

The first round of RFFP focused on “ecological forest” while the second round (post-

2014) focused on “economic forest” such as walnut, red dates, plum and medicinal plants. Shilou forestry bureau officials focused on reforesting all of the uncultivated land, also known as

“wasteland” or bare land under RFFP in the early 2000s. This resulted in large amount of reforested wasteland as farmland still plays important role for rural income and agriculture tax was not yet abolished. Forestry bureau governments stipulate that for each unit of farmland reforested, an equal or greater area of uncultivated land must also be reforested. The rate of retired cropland to reforested wasteland in Shilou range from 1:2, 1:3 to 1:4 mu, depending on village land conditions and availability.

In addition, previous experiences in planting trees led to a Zhange from planting a mixture of conifers and broad leaf tree species to a mixture of broad leaf trees and shrubs. As poverty alleviation policy is scheduled to end in 2020, the next phase will focus on improve management and quality of orchards and forestland. (Interview forestry officials).

The National Dry-fruit Economic Forest program (干果經濟林) was introduced in 2009 to support additional tree-planting on farmlands. The Dry-fruit program was funded by the left- over funds budgeted for Returning Farmland to Forest Program. Shilou county’s Dry-fruit program focused on planting walnut and red dates. This Dry-Fruit program is now one of the poverty alleviations supporting programs. In 2016, after most walnut trees planted in 2009 had

141 started bear fruit, the central government introduced the “Dry-fruit quality improvement program” to support the improvement of fruit trees and provide income for farmers.

Forestry officials seized the opportunity to utilize the subsidy that mainly come from the central government since Shilou county had no available funds to develop its own forestry project. Walnut tree was selected due to its relatively good market price in early 2000s. For farmers who lived on the eastern region of Shilou county, officials encouraged planting walnut as the main commercial tree species while intercropping with other non-commercial trees such as

Black locust and Chinese Arborvitae. Armenian Plums were also briefly experimented as an option for commercial trees, but it did not become the main species. However, walnut tree’s price gradually decreased from 7.8 USD in 2003 to 1.8 USD per kg in 2018 as a result of over- production in rural areas around the country (Interview with official, 2018). Farmers and officials in forestry bureau are again trying to find the next marketable product.

Farmers’ main income source continued to come from agriculture rather than forestry.

Farmers grow different crops in the understory including millet, maize, wheat, and sorghum to support their livelihood. Intercropping was always allowed in Shilou county as local officials did not consider this a violation of reforestation practice or affecting the quality of tree growth like other counties. In fact, intercropping of this kind had proven to be supporting tree productivity due to weeding and provision of additional nutrients. Under RFFP, the two main approach to reforestation was 1) transforming farmland into orchards or agroforestry, and 2) afforest bare land in the gullies or on steep slopes with Arborvitae and red pine trees (See Figure 5.1 and 5.2).

142 Preparation of bard land and farmland for planting require labor and appropriate planting methods. Until about 2008, very little preparation of the ground before planting was done, other than clearing away any scrub or weeds. In general, soil pit planting was the custom way. The effect of ground preparation help improves seedling establishment. Nowadays, ploughing of the ground at close intervals (see Figure 5.2) to create ridges and furrows at different angles had proven to be effective for reducing runoff, an important feature of the so-called “runoff forestry” in north China (Interview with official, 2017). Seedling quality was another key factor in improving survival rate. In Shilou, because of the lack of financial capital on the part of the county government, most seedlings were bare-root seedlings, which were considered of lower quality than potted seedlings. Nevertheless, in general, the quality of seedlings improved over the years.

By 2016, Shilou county had the largest RFFP area in Shanxi province. This reflected the relatively low population density and the lack of alternative production activities in the area. The success rate (survival rate and retention of survivals) of these reforestation efforts were about

50% mainly due to insufficient investment in maintenance and management efforts on the part of both local government and villagers who participated (Interview with official, 2018). Failure of reforestation was defined as less than 40% survival rate over the course of one to five years.

There is no direct evidence that villagers were involuntarily joining the RFFP. However, based on observation and interviews, people who do not want to participate can opt out, otherwise they see no need to reject officials planned reforestation as it was reasonable, and the subsidy usually constitute less than 20% of their annual income. If there are more marginal

143 sloped land within a household, it is more likely that villager would consider convert those land to RFFP. Shiloh county 2008 land use report suggested agricultural production from both grain and cash crop amount to 54.74%, forestry amount to 17.31%, animal husbandry amount to

26.79%.

Figure 5.1 Flatter upland area is planted with Red dates, walnuts or other economic tree species. Sloped areas are categorized as wasteland or bare land and are designated to plant with Black locust and Arborvitae according to the RFFP.

Figure 5.2 Preparing land for planting by weeding and ploughing farmland according to the elevation line in order to reduce runoff.

144

As discussed earlier, in 2009, county government converted large swath of flat and sloped farmland into walnut orchard under central and provincial government’s “Dry-fruit

Economic Forests” program for arid mountain regions. This has become Shilou Forestry bureau’s main project, while RFFP and Natural Forestland Protection program are of secondary importance. Remote villages with lower population density and large landholdings would have higher income source from forestry. Residents saw it as a fair opportunity to earn some addition income and in reality, there were not many alternatives. Some of the residents were not aware how much land they had enrolled in RFFP since they may not pay attention or take care of it as their main livelihood such as maize or other cash crop. Table 5.2 and 5.3 show Shilou county forestry bureau’s cost estimates for walnut and red date management and the official maintenance approach based on age of trees and quality.

The selection of land for RFFP were based on principles of motivation and marginal land.

For villagers who decided not to utilize their farmland for other purposes (“lazy” in the words of villagers), their land was given priority. Planting trees is seen as underutilization of land and do not provide as much income as grain. For villagers who have land located in marginal remote and steep areas, those land were also given priority. While farmers appreciated receiving cash subsidies, they saw little reason to tend the trees due to poor enforcement of inspection.

According to village leader Zhang, plantation maintenance was initially designated to outside villagers, which means plantation in village A would be maintained by residents in village B or

C. This arrangement was not practical, and officials only focused on controlling forest fire and ignored tree damages caused by human disturbance or animal grazing.

145

Table 5.3 Shilou county Walnut and Red date Economic Forest Cost Estimates. Source: Shilou forestry bureau. Categories Cost (yuan) per area (mu) Seedling No data Tilt 80-100 Fertilizer 80-100 White Paint* 40 Watering 40 Cultivate 60 Disease prevention 40-180 Weeding 60-160 Pruning 60-240 Labor No data Grafting 200 Pulling 160-200 *White paint is painted on tree trunks to reflect sunlight and heat as a way to improve survival.

Table 5.4 Shilou County 2015 Walnut maintenance categories. The categories for Low quality and No management are for a “Quality Improvement” subsidy that is aimed at improving tree quality and poverty alleviation (including hired labor). Source: Shilou forestry bureau. Saplings 4-10 10-30 >30 Low No Total (<3 yrs) years old years old years old Quality management area area Area 76810 97033 53338 9360 67012 186569 241071 (Mu)

From 2009-2015, among other changes, central authorities reduced fiscal commitments and scale down plans for further retirement of farmland and suspended RFFP. Subsidies rate was reduced from 180 to 90 yuan per mu per year for farmland in the north, which greatly reduced incentives to plant ecological trees. Official statements indicated a shift from expanding the program to consolidating existing plantations (SFA 2007). In 2006, agriculture tax was fully

146 abolished, and several farmers-oriented subsidies was initiated including Grain subsidy in 2005 and Farming purchase subsidy in 2006 (See Chapter 4 Table 4.). These agriculture-based subsidies provided disincentives for farmers to invest in growing trees. In this context, Shilou

Forestry officials focused on developing medicinal plant production for the newly planned reforestation quotas. The medicinal plantation production on the dying red dates orchards mentioned earlier was not included here.

In response to farmers’ request, existing “economic trees”, specifically walnut trees, were allowed to be enrolled in RFFP. As a result, some of the low survival rate areas previously planted were incorporated into RFFP from 2008-2015 (Table 5.1) to increase income. In 2016,

Forestry bureau focused entirely on commercial or economic tree species for farmland and wasteland. Shrub and tree species that provide medicinal benefits and non-wood forest products are increasingly popular among local officials for intercropping. This was because unlike in the first round when planting 80% ecological trees (e.g. Black locust) were still mandated, there were more consensus on the value of commercial trees among different levels of government.

This “soft” reforestation logic allowing commercial forests was not formally stipulated until

2014. In 2014, the central government lifted restrictions on the quotas of all tree species for

RFFP and Shanxi Forestry Agency encourage local governments to plant economic tree species.

The logic-change in the policy allow for more flexibility in local implementation and design, even though the focus of inspection criteria was still survival rate and hectares retired.

To support shifting labor off-farm or adopting alternative livelihood activities, central government started to provide subsidy for several types of development initiatives in 2008

147 including promoting decentralized energy technologies; developing new productive sectors to raise incomes and encourage migration to towns; implementing “ecological migration,” the resettlement of people living under especially harsh environmental conditions; and promoting enclosed livestock husbandry while forbidding grazing in forests. The result of these initiatives varies widely across provinces, counties, townships and even villages. The pursue of these development initiatives were dependent on Shilou county government’s available resources.

Local residents in Shilou had commented that Shilou county government had ‘a tendency to follow central government policy rather than developing county’s own project’. (Interview

2017).

Viewing subsidies as a relatively stable source of development fund that had lower risk

(in terms of low entry input, creating conflict and risk) compared to other capital-intensive development alternatives or improving existing services, many local governments vied for reforestation quotas, frequently authorizing large areas before plans had been approved (Xu and

Ca 2002). In addition to the not having other development sectors other than agriculture, reforestation is also a less risky choice for Shilou government because it is part of the national reforestation policies that the central government continue to increase investment in (SFA2017).

Since 2016, Shilou forestry officials switched the focus towards restructuring existing deserted red date orchards where trees were losing vigor. Medicinal plants continue to be the focus and the objective was planting Forsythia (Forsythia suspensa) in old red date orchards. At this point, most wasteland in the county had been reforested albeit with variable outcomes.

According to interviews, wasteland with low survival and retention rate (<40%) had been re-

148 enrolled to RFFP every 3-5 years. Since the 2000s, the reforested marginal farmlands at the household level gradually increased and became more contiguous. The current overall size of the reforested areas allowed for economies of scale and larger environmental impact to regional micro-climate. More than 70% of farming households in the county had parts of their land enrolled in RFFP and Dry-fruit program. The main “hard” policy design was to include poverty households into reforestation quotas and members in those households into reforestation co-ops; and compensation will take place on a 5-year schedule pending on inspection. In short, forestry officials have learned many experiences about planting techniques, sourcing and growing quality seedlings and maintenance since 2000 and have been able to design a more comprehensive landscape approach to land management.

Reforestation Maintenance

In 2013, because of the poverty alleviation policy, the Shanxi Department of Forestry started their own poverty alleviation funds in 2014 as this was a high priority policy. Due to the lack of maintenance enforcement on the part of both village committees and local governments, many forest stewards in Shilou county were paid mainly for poverty alleviation purpose without ensuring work being done (Interview with village leader 2018). The survival and retention rate of reforestation on wasteland remain around 50-70%12 in the 2010s. Reforestation’s maintenance on farmland remained the responsibility of individual households, which was more difficult for quality control (Interview with official, 2013). However, maintenance on wasteland was the

12 Shilou official statement reports 95% of retention rate for all land enrolled in RFFP in 2016. However, interviews often yield different results.

149 responsibility of village committees. When tree die, village committees were required to report to the county government and apply for re-plant fund. Village committees were also in charge of arranging and hiring labor to do maintenance work. The lack of a unified maintenance regulation and disarticulation between provincial, county, and village level government on how to enforce the program made maintenance difficult and lead to the mis-management of maintenance funding.

Eco- poverty alleviation: Co-optation of Reforestation by Poverty alleviation

Shanxi province government has been using reforestation as the main policy tool for poverty alleviation13. This section describe how Shanxi government tailored their poverty alleviation strategy according to local ecology and reforestation policy. The first part describes the origins of the current poverty-alleviation reforestation co-ops and the full adoption of economic trees as development strategy. The second part discusses the informal institution of replacement planting and the effects of these policy change on local implementation.

The Party General secretary Xi of the CCP initiated “precision poverty alleviation” in

2016 with the goal of bringing about 70 million people who are qualified as poverty individuals above the poverty line by 2020. To achieve this goal, which is based on hard targets designated

13 Shanxi province is not part of the key pioneer experimental sites (located in Gansu, Sichuan, Shaanxi provinces) designated by central government’s RFFP office nor is it part of the Western Region Development Policy (Hong 2013). Shanxi’s reforestation policy, therefore, do not serve those purposes.

150 each year, governments in rural areas tallied different institutional arrangement and sources of financial support they could access and incorporate them into poverty alleviation policy.

Starting in 2017, the Shanxi forestry agency allow the incorporation of areas reforested after 2007 as well as failed reforestation areas into new rounds of reforestation quotas for the coming year. The logic of repurposing old and failed reforestation areas for new policy targets appeared to be both contradicting and supporting the goal of the policy. To support local forestry bureaus meeting the reforestation targets, incorporating previously reforested areas that did not meet requirement into new reforestation plans seemed to make sense. However, when consider in conjunction with the fact that the amount of land areas that do not meet requirement every year is 30% to 50%, this policy raises questions about the quality of reforestation itself and the accountability of management. This new policy appeared to be designed in service of poverty alleviation rather than reforestation (Interview with officials 2017).

Although the Returning Farmland to Forest Program was originally established for environmental restoration purposes, the program’s goals were later expanded to explicitly target poverty alleviation and rural development (Artati et al. 2017). After 2014, RFFP in Shanxi province has become synonymous with poverty alleviation and budget for RFFP is often planned according to the needs to fulfil poverty alleviation targets (Interview, 2017). In 2015, the central government decided to expand the targets of RFFP (targets in terms of area). In 2016, the central government stipulated the requirements and targets of ‘precision poverty alleviation’ and provided supporting grants for its implementation (Rogers 2018). Poverty alleviation policy provide subsidies for targeted poor households to plant trees and allowance. Anticipating the

151 advent of this policy, the Shanxi RFFP office provided corresponding funding for reforestation and allowance to targeted households for the first time. The majority of the households have the ability to decide what tree species to plant in their plots although the advice of the forestry bureau was often followed.

To maximize the effect of reforestation on poverty alleviation policy, Shanxi government began to allow previously under-reforested areas to be enrolled in RFFP in 2017. Allowing enrollment of under-reforested areas within the last 10 years is a specific local adaptation of national policy on the part of Shanxi government. After 2008, most of the cropland in Shanxi that fit the criterion of land type and slope had been enrolled in RFFP. Local governments’ reforestation efforts after 2008 was focused on wasteland reforestation and replacement planting on previously failed areas. Failed areas could be a result of poor planting, lack of maintenance, wildlife damage, disease, flooding, drought or wildfire. Slope and land type were not the main selection criterion for this new phase of reforestation. There are three types of land that could now enroll in RFFP: 1) forestland that were planted within the last 10 years that did not meet

RFFP’s requirements in terms of land type or slope, 2) forestland destroyed by wildfire, 4) land reforested within the last 10 years through private contract. This decision allows farmers to receive poverty alleviation subsidy and local government to continue increase RFFP target areas

(Interview 9, 2018). On average, the amount of areas that need replacement planting is between

30% ~ 50% of all the reforested areas annually. This new institutional change was designed to allow local governments to continue increase their reforestation targets even though most of the farmland suitable for RFFP had been enrolled (Interview with official, 2018). This officially condoned flexibility is a strategy designed to meet the demand of poverty alleviation policy and

152 empower local officials’ capability to arbitrate resource division (Xu et al. 2010, Trac et al.

2013). This policy illustrated how local governance is entangled with a cycle of failed reforestation and reliance on reforestation subsidies.

To continue to have funding to support poverty alleviation, Shanxi provincial forestry agency decided to officially modify the policy and allow previously (within 10 years) failed reforested areas including farmland and bareland that did not achieve survival rate criteria, to be re-enrolled to RFFP and receive new benefits (2017). The objective of the modification appeared to come from a shared understanding among different levels of sub-national government of the high priority of the poverty alleviation policy and the reforestation condition on the ground. In addition, about 50 reforestation co-ops was formed within Shilou county based on Shanxi provincial forestry agency’s mandate for poverty alleviation (SFA 2018). These co-ops are meant to be composed mainly of individuals from poverty-household.

Throughout the three phases of RFFP implementation and local adaptation, Shilou forestry officials tried to balance between policy environmental goals and socio-economic demands. Many of these adaptations were developed with multiple considerations in mind. For example, allowing existing fruit trees to be designated as new commercial trees in order to allow farmers to pass inspection and meet program criterion. At the same time, maximizing participation from household could support meeting poverty alleviation targets, as reforestation was an important category for providing poverty-related subsidy (TABLE). As market price continues to fluctuate, officials responded by changing and exploring new marketable product and aim to develop a “green” economy for the county. Shilou county continue to have no

153 funding from county finance bureau to support these reforestation efforts and rely solely on provincial and central government subsidies and poverty-related fiscal transfer from central government14 (Shilou forest budget 2018).

Local government in rural Shanxi province had initiated multiple endeavors aimed at restoring the ecosystem and improving household productivity since the 1980s. Some villagers planted trees through their own initiative and was not compensated by the government at all.

With the advent of RFFP and other national reforestation programs, the demand for reforestation labor increased. Some households who participated in the program formed professional reforestation companies and bid for reforestation projects around the region. Reforestation companies is the main reforestation mechanisms other than individual household management and these companies would become part of poverty alleviation strategy used in rural Shanxi, which is explored below. Figure 5.3 show the implementation of forest maintenance program through hiring reforestation co-ops with poverty alleviation households and individuals.

14 Prefectural government plays a small role in reforestation in Shanxi province since it does not provide funding and is not relevant for budgeting purpose. Prefectural government act as inspector and data aggregation center.

154

Figure 5.3 The designated maintenance areas for each forest stewards (red tags) in Hehe township, Shilou county.

Professional Reforestation co-op

With the growing demand for reforestation and the abolishment of most agriculture taxes in 2006, villagers who participated in RFFP started to form professional reforestation companies to bid for reforestation contracts or landscaping jobs with individual households and local governments around the Lu-Liang region. These companies may acquire seedlings from local government or set up nursery themselves. As the reforestation companies grow, they were able to contract larger reforestation engineering projects such as the Three North Shelterbelt Program in the northern part of Shanxi province (Interview 5). During the first two phases of RFFP from

2000 to 2014, these professional reforestation companies were active throughout western part of

Shanxi province. Shilou county had 14 reforestation companies with each company employed up to 50 people. Most of these professional companies comes from poorer counties and they supply reforestation expertise and labor to counties where local economy depends on mining. As RFFP comes to the end of second round in 2014, most rural wasteland and cropland qualified for RFFP

155 has been enrolled and the demand for professional reforestation companies decreased. These professional reforestation companies have increased the quality and productivity of reforestation efforts (Interview 2018, Zhang 2013).

On the Loess Plateau, cropland and forestland are fragmented which makes large scale forestry management difficult. Collaboration through village council serve to reduce management expenses and increase farmers’ willingness to participate in the program because they can participate in the distribution of financial benefits (Grinspoon 2002). With the dwindling active labor in rural areas and the lack of capital and mechanized tools, village collective management tends to be the default option for many farmers (Xu and Jiang 2010,

Zhang 2013, Interview, 2018).

With the advent of precision poverty alleviation policy in 2016, these professional reforestation companies become a resource for the local government as officials seek to find ways to increase farmers’ income (Zhang 2013, Interview 9, 2018). In 2016, with the expansion of new reforestation areas and poverty alleviation policy, Shanxi Forestry Agency and government made reforestation co-op their main priority. Each targeted county is required to form co-op based on reforestation tasks and the amount of targeted poverty alleviation population. Each reforestation co-op is to be comprised of at least 60% to 80% of poverty- alleviation population and each reforestation contract with the co-op is supposed to last three years. There are usually 20-30 people per co-op and the co-op’s responsibility includes tree- planting, monitor and maintenance. The distribution of surplus and earnings from reforestation should be at a 4:6 ratio (Shanxi Forestry doc., 2018). After three years, management

156 responsibilities return to the individual household enrolled in the RFFP. Most importantly, the contract is negotiated privately with local governments unlike the open bidding process the reforestation companies went through. The professional reforestation companies are not allowed to compete with these co-ops directly although some of the reforestation companies could serve as consultant and managers for the newly formed co-ops. Local forestry bureaus are responsible for the evaluation and selection of co-ops according to their performance (Interview 2017). In

2018, Shanxi Forestry Agency and provincial government stipulate the “projectization” of all poverty alleviation work along with the guiding role of party officials (Shanxi Forestry doc,

2018) in poverty alleviation. The co-ops were required to have one of their upper management positions occupy by local cadres. These interventions could support and hinder the productivity of farmers’ working relations with local officials and the outcome of reforestation.

In short, local government’s effort in implementing policy shape how villagers respond to the policy goal. When villagers perceive a lack of accountability on the part of local officials, they may be less motivated to participate nor confident about the prospects of the development of the policy. Historically, Wasteland Auction from the 1990s was perceived as an example of failed (overall) attempt at reforestation and a legacy of campaign style mobilization without proper management arrangement and supporting resources. Returning Farmland to Forest

Program initially was also perceived by farmers as ineffective due to poor implementation, monitoring, planting and maintenance resources. Provincial government also realize local government like Shilou county did not have enough human and financial resources to implement the policy and condoned the poor performance. On the other hand, many poverty-oriented policies* that came out during the same period as RFFP reduced villagers’ incentive to

157 participate in reforestation because it rendered the subsidies irrelevant to maintaining tree cover.

Finally, implementation relies on local actors’ ability to balance between minimizing land-based conflicts, achieving environmental goals and meeting socio-economic demands.

Accountability is not just an issue contributing to sour relations between villagers and officials. Within the government bureaucracy, accountability is often a source of discontent and cynicism among officials as well. Some officials may point fingers at those who did not show up at work without proper reason and wonder why they still got paid. For township officials, it is not uncommon to work until midnight or even spend many nights at their township offices

(which usually have beds in their office) when the reforestation plan is being drawn up after quotas were being assigned in March. Travelling from county capital to township or village offices take about an hour. I once witnessed the whole township bureaucracy having a meeting on poverty alleviation until 9pm. Township is the lowest level of the government and are often in charge One official could be the leader or part of the leadership cohort responsible for multiple projects such as solar electricity and animal husbandry and at the same time be responsible for overseeing the poverty alleviation efforts for a village.

Grazing Ban in Shilou county: Uneven Enforcement

In order to fully stop grazing within forestland, local forestry station (township level) mangers15 also responded differently depending on their skills, connection with forestry bureau.

15In Shilou county, each township forestry station has one to two mangers and some stations do not have manger and are substitute by other officials or cadres in the same rank.

158 Since grazing ban is still a “soft” policy, meaning it is not strictly enforced with officially condoned flexibility, local officials use their discretion to achieve their goals. In Hehe township,

Shilou county, township cadres and officials rely on their own authority and authority from forestry bureau, without help from county government, to enforce grazing ban. In 2018, up to a hundred farmers with herds of goats sold their goats and about five farmers turned to pen-raising while a few farmers went to neighboring counties for grazing. Moreover, officials in Hehe township used their own authority to withhold subsidies from farmers who grazed their goats. In contrast, Yi township faced charges by farmers who were attacked by enforcement officers in

2014 and lost their legitimacy to enforce grazing ban since. The implementation of reforestation created conflicts and tensions between local officials and farmers and local leadership and capacity played a role in determining the outcome.

In sum, the Hehe township forestry officers were able to disband more than a hundred goat herds within its borders and implement their own local adaptations of the grazing ban with the support and collaboration of township government and party cadres. In Yi township, the forestry station manager was forced to resign due to a dispute with villager. The township government did not have any other available officer to fil the role and they asked the deputy mayor to informally subsume his role. The two examples demonstrated how local institution and leadership at the township level played crucial role in policy implementation.

Reforestation for Development: Receiving Fiscal Transfer

159 This section describes why Shilou county prioritized forestry policy as a development pathway for meeting both national conservation interests and local economic development needs.

The local economy structure of Shilou county was mostly similar to that of the region along the

Yellow River, which is based on agriculture. Among the total population of 119,000, some

98,000 engage in agriculture. Off-farm income accounts for 20% to 80% of average villagers who engage with agriculture. It is common for farmers to work on farming-related activities

(including reforestation) only one-third of the year while working off-farm for the rest of the year (Interview with villager, 2018). Income from forestry ranges from 15% to 50% of villager’s annual revenue. More than 54% of the land has been designated for reforestation while farmland account for 20% and animal husbandry account for 12% of the land. Among the 32,853 hectares of arable farmland, 16,280 hectares of them are sloped land above 25 degrees, which account for

49.6% of all farmland. Table 1 show how orchard and forestland had doubled from 1996 to

2009. Many of these orchards and forestland were reclassified or re-zoned under RFFP from grassland and croplands (Shilou Land Use Change Report 2010). Currently, about 70% of households are enrolled in RFFP. The Forestry Bureau reported 500 forest rangers was hired in

2018 and 50 reforestation co-ops are in operation.

One of the main differences between counties with sufficient tax revenue and those that do not is the availability of coal. Figure 3 depicts the distribution of GDP across the three economic sectors. Shilou county is one of the few that do not have coal mining industry. Shanxi province holds a rich reserve of coal and most of them are available for mining. Counties that have coal mining industry are much more able to provide their own funding to implement policy including reforestation (Interview with locals 2017). In Shilou county, the coal remained

160 unmined due to the depth of the reserve. Shilou county government and leaders took advantage of not having a coal industry and branded the county as “green” and their agricultural products such as dates, walnuts and grains as “green food”. Due to the mountainous topography and climate, agriculture focused on maize and specialty crops. In short, local economy in this region depends largely on coal and subsistence agriculture. When discussing about the development trajectory of Shilou county, a township forestry station manager commented:

“Our county lack a strong economy, not very developed. Therefore, our government devote all their efforts into this [forestry] business. For other counties, they might have industry or other development path and therefore they don’t value RFFP as much since it does not provide as much support financially. Shilou is an agriculture county, we don’t have mineral resources nor any light industry or other corporation. Under this circumstance, the choice is to develop agriculture. For agriculture development, the main support comes from public investment by the government. That is why when RFFP started in 2000 and all the way to the end of first phase in

2005, Shilou government was the county with most reforestation areas in the province. The government could not find other development path and thus they seize the opportunity that comes from this national policy.” (Interview, 2018)

It is not uncommon for provinces located in the inner west to focus on RFFP as a priority development path. Western provincial governments usually lack financial resources for local economic development (Zhang 2013:87). These provinces would strategically target specific national policies with earmarked grants or fiscal transfer funds to improve the stability of their tax revenue and source of subsidy. A former township mayor also reflected on Shilou county’s

161 specific focus on forestry: “The county had to jockey for reforestation quotas. If it were counties with coal, they would not care about the money.” (Interview, 2018).

Recognizing the ecology that local economy is based on, the Luliang prefectural government also support the development of forest sector. Since the Wasteland Auction, Lu-

Liang officials had been promoting forestry as a development strategy for the region. By citing an annual investment on reforestation of over 1.2 billion yuan (USD) for the 13th five-year plan between 2016-2020, a prefectural city official proclaimed that “to increase greenness is to increase income” and point to the need to improve “Ecological poverty alleviation” (Po 2017). In

Shilou county, the term “ecological poverty alleviation” represent a development strategy and a status for the county (Interview 2018).

Regarding the future of development path of Shilou county, the township forestry station manager commented: “Low population density combined with fragmented landscape is another reason why local farmer are not willing to invest in other business that might entail more risk.

Considering the amount of land each household have to manage and the fact that many people had migrate to urban areas for off-farm work, the county government is not looking for other development path.” (Interview, 2018) Although agriculture is the main income source for most of the local residents, mass production is not a good choice due to constant drought and fragmented landscape. Walnuts and Jujube has been the main economic trees in Shilou but for the past decade the rainfall patterns had shifted. As a result, wet season came one month earlier than usual and damage the red dates before it could be properly harvested. Mechanized farming tools and greenhouse not particularly suitable for the hilly landscape. In recent years, the bottom

162 of gullies had been utilized more for farming cash crops due to its easier accessibility for bulldozer to come in and level the field (Interview, 2017). In short, Shilou county is poised to focus on specialty agriculture and it would depend on the farmers and local government to figure out what approach would be best to support each other in the process.

Barriers for local implementation

This section summarizes findings from local officials regarding factors affecting successful implementation and the problems hindering long term sustainability of the policy. The interviewees described three major categories of factors that impacted their ability to implement reforestation policies: 1) top-down implementation that lack consultation, 2) conflicting policies,

3) lack of appropriate human resources. These factors should be considered due to the role they may play in facilitating and impeding both policy implementation and successful collaborative governance.

Conflicting Policy Goals

The 2006 Farmer’s Benefit policy that focus on providing direct subsidy for planting maize, millet, and wheat is regarded by local officials as ineffective. Similar to RFFP, the Farmer’s

Benefit Policy had become a synonym of poverty alleviation. Although it raised awareness towards rural development and poor farmers, the policy has unintended consequences. As a township official lamented: “These policies are reducing farmers’ incentive to work on their land. In a way, it seems like the government had invested so much on agriculture to benefit

163 farmers. But in reality, for places that rely on agriculture, for rural residents that own at least 1 to

2 hectares of land, they are supposed to work and labor, not just receive benefits and not work.

Farmers are becoming reliant on these benefits and even proud of being poor. It is terrible and scary if land and labor cannot do what it is supposed to do.” (Interview 17, 2018)

In addition to the impact on farming community, the policy also undermined reforestation endeavors. “The Farmers’ Benefit Policy is contradictory to reforestation. You subsidize farmers to farm then farmers will not consider reforestation.” (Shanxi RFFP office, 2018) Conflicting goals reduce the effectiveness of policy and the affect the long-term development of rural society. The village and local state relations are at risk due to improper policy design and the overall institutional structure.

Non-professional doing professional work

The lack of appropriate human resources for policy implementation is an institutional challenge. The current Shilou county forestry bureau had 34 employees with support from other bureaus when needed (Interview with official 2018). This situation made policy implementation highly rely on the individual ability and political skills of frontline workers, specifically township officials. In Shilou county, forestry station is located at township level and serve as the frontline unit for county forestry bureau. Each forestry station has 1-3 officers, depending on availability and organization.

164 Forestry is a labor intensive and time-consuming work. Without appropriate technicians and enough supporting staff, the workload could be un-manageable and thus work unfinished.

Under the current political climate, which emphasize discipline and stability, forestry station managers are facing more than just technical challenges but the adjustment of their priorities.

Without sufficient human resources, many frontline officials may play multiple roles they are not trained to play. The demand of policy implementation requires officials to learn about the science of reforestation, environmental law, business management, agriculture development, and outreach. A retired township mayor commented: “We are nonprofessionals doing professional work”. (Interview with official 2017) Lacking effective oversight and inspection, many rural development policies were treated as empty promises. As a result, credibility and accountability became a constant source of conflict between villagers and local officials. Combining the previous two implementation challenges with the lack of human resources, these policies exposed local state’s insufficient ability to monitor the situation in a constant and effective manner.

Discussion

In short, conflicting policy goals as well as the intuitional and socio-economic conditions created dis-incentives for villagers to participate in reforestation and made implementation difficult. From the perspective of local residents and officials, management in terms of protecting forests and enforcing grazing ban were not properly enforced because of the lack of funding, management skills, and personnel, and that trees were not the priority of farmers’ livelihood strategies. The Wasteland Auction Policy failed to achieve its intended objective because there

165 was no supportive mechanisms and institutions and relied mainly on the private sector, which rarely invest their resources in rural remote areas. Despite the effort to diversify planting schemes, without sufficient funding and long-term planning according to the external market environment, local agriculture and forestry officials were struggling to achieve policy goals. As evidenced in many policy and county government working reports (Shilou County Government working report 2016), the political pressure to report successful reforestation often meant the reporting of the action of planting trees, rather than the long-term ecosystem outcomes. The focus on target fulfilment on the part of the local government and the forestry bureau in terms of survival rate (%), forest cover (%), and areas reforested (mu or hectare) created an implementation pattern that paid less attention to the quality of reforestation. It was not until

2016 when poverty alleviation policy incorporated seedling provision, land preparation, reforestation co-ops, and maintenance into a three to five years program that more effort were devoted towards maintenance.

In this context, villagers had low motivation to invest in reforestation in terms of time, labor or funding. A village leader commented on the poverty alleviation policy: “People (lao bai zing) do not recognize (ren) the authorities anymore. You give them too much but made too little effort to manage.” (Interview, 2018) Reforestation is an important development strategy for local economic development although the outcome remains poor because survival rate on wasteland were still lower than the target goal of 90% (Interview with official, 2017). Without administrative and technical support from the local government and management support from the village committee or local authorities, reforestation is likely to fail.

166 5.4 Conclusion

Reforestation policy implementation faces significant challenges in terms of local governments’ resources and management capacity. Nevertheless, reforestation had gained increased legitimacy as the central government continued to invest and improve upon the policy design and its implementation. The lack of natural resources and fiscal reform contributed to

Shilou county government’s decision to prioritize forestry as a development goal. However, the lack of a concerted effort to coordinate between forestry bureau and village committee and the lack of efforts devoted to management capacity were barriers to successful reforestation.

Scientific uncertainty regarding the long-term development of grassland and forested landscape was also why the forestry governance system lacks a unified approach towards reforestation but focused on target fulfilment. The policy implementation process and its corresponding local adaptations by the local government constituted the broader context of collaborative governance.

In the next chapter, the case study of collaboration is described in response to these specific challenges.

167 Chapter 6 The Case of Shilou Reforestation Partnership

6.1 Introduction

The case study is a reforestation project that took place in Si village, Shilou County from

2005 to present day. The key actors include county officials, village leader and NGO members, and with all three sectors simultaneously leading the effort. To examine how collaborative governance is initiated and sustained in Shilou county, the collaborative governance framework is used to identify key drivers and describe the collaboration dynamics, actions, and outcomes.

The case is divided into three phases as the collaborative governance regime cycles through the iterative process of leadership and trust-building actions in the face of limited deliberation.

Finally, I discuss the performance of and the factors supporting and hindering the collaboration to understand how the collaborative governance regime was sustained.

6.2 Case Overview

In this section, I provide a summarized account of the development of collaborative governance in Shilou county. I present this in a chronological order and highlight key actors’ role in sustaining collaborative governance. Based on interviews, participant observation and secondary data, I analyze participants’ understanding of their role and their perception of reforestation in relation to rural development. The outcome of the overall collaboration is the enhanced organization capacity, increased trust, and the increase in decision-making power of

168 key actors. To begin, I start with introducing key actors and their motivations to initiate and participate in the collaboration.

Case Illustration: Shilou Reforestation Partnership

The creation of the Shilou Reforestation Partnership was the result of both the initiation of the non-governmental organization (NGO) Green Action Charity Foundation (GACF) and the ex-deputy director of Shanxi Province Forestry Research Institute Kuang. Recognizing the need for poverty alleviation and reforestation in Shanxi province, GACF consulted Kuang in search of a reforestation location. Kuang suggested both Yang and Shilou county as possible sites. The reforestation project in Yang county started in 2004 and was terminated in 2011. There were many reasons why the project in Yangqu failed. Based on interviews and observations with stakeholders, I concluded it failed due to the lack of shared motivation, poor reforestation results, insufficient capacity to resolve barriers, communication and deliberation challenges among key actors, and a general erosion of trust. This experience of failure was critical and become a barrier for future collaboration because it decreased GACF’s trust with rural residents. In contrast, the reforestation project in Shilou county started in 2005 and was sustained until present day. The official way people in Shilou county referred to this project is the GACF reforestation project

(Shanxi Soil and Water Conservation Science and Technology Journal 2015) while GACF called it the Shanxi plantation site due to their multiple reforestation and poverty alleviation projects in

China. To be consistent, I have chosen to refer to the collaboration as Shilou Reforestation

Partnership (SRP).

169 GACF in Hong Kong was founded in 2005 with a mission to support poverty alleviation through conserving rural environment. Specifically, GACF’s reforestation focus on the development of an engineering design and soil amendment to improve water conservation.

GACF’s theory of change to reduce rural poverty, as stated on their website, is to conserve the environment as opposed to direct financial assistance. SRP is located in western Shanxi province

(Figure 6.1) and was initiated through Kuang, who introduced GACF to Shilou county. Shilou county government officials were very responsive to the idea of collaboration with GACF on reforestation and coordinated with Shilou county forestry bureau to begin the implementation of the project. The ex-director of Shilou forestry bureau introduced GACF to Si village as a potential site for reforestation. The active and organized response on the part of Shilou county as a whole was the first step of trust building.

Figure 6.1. Study site is located in Shilou County (red shade), Luliang prefecture (yellow),

Shanxi province, China.

Multi-level leadership was present since the very beginning. Shilou county government has designated a county representative Mr. Su to provide administrative support and a forestry bureau officer Han to be in charge of reforestation related affairs. Village leader Zhang from the

170 Si village agreed to participate and be in charge of land rental agreements and village affairs.

Zhang was 50 years old and was a trustworthy local leader with credibility with both the government and the local community. GACF executive was 45 years old and a physician in

Hong Kong. Forestry officer Han was 28 years old at the time and was motivated to improve rural development and governance. He took initiative to connect local needs with GACF resources including student scholarship in the first few years of the SRP. The active response by officer Han in affairs like this helped built trust with GACF. Table 6.1 illustrated the key actors and their responsibilities in the collaboration.

Table 6.1 Key actors and their respective affiliation, roles, and responsibilities.

Administrative unit Key actors Official responsibilities and roles

Shilou county government Su Administrative support

Shilou forestry bureau Han Liaison, coordinator, tree-planting

Si Village Zhang Village leader, village and land affairs

Green Action Charity Foundation Leo Executive

SRP is divided into three phases (Table 6.2) that reflected different challenges emerged through the collaboration process. The structure and nature of this collaborative governance case is discerned through a time frame that demonstrated the iterative process of collaboration. The first phase from 2005-2011 is initiation, which focused intensively on tree-planting and trust- building. The second from 2012-2015 is adaptation, which shifted the collaboration focus to management concerns addressing different views on the cost and benefit of the reforestation, as well as the consolidation of reforestation success. From 2016 to 2019 is maturity, which means

171 that trust among key participants has increased and they were comfortable to address other concerns of rural development to broaden the impact of SRP. SRP is currently still operating as of the time of this dissertation writing even though I ended the third phase in 2019 for the purpose of this thesis.

In the first phase (2005-2011), SRP progressed through the stages of initiation and consultation, which included dividing responsibilities, forming consensus, and gaining trust through a series of actions taken by key actors. Village leader Zhang consulted with villagers who may be willing to participate and rent out their land for reforestation experiment. From 2005-2011, 28 out of 60 households participated and rented out a total of 674 mu (45 hectares) marginal farmland for 30 years at the rate of 938 USD/ha/yr; 1870 mu (125 hectares) of bare land for 50 years at the rate of 19 USD/ha/yr. During this phase, GACF focused intensely on the technical dimension of the reforestation method. Resource and energy were devoted to resolve issues such as selecting appropriate tree species and securing donations. Tree survival was the key indicator for success and GACF visit Shilou county twice a year to inspect the result of tree-planting, bring volunteers to support outreach and resolve emerging issues. This period was a process of gaining legitimacy through reforestation implementation.

Table 6.2 The three phases of Shanxi Reforestation Partnership.

Phase Timeline Description

Initiation 2005-2011 Recruitment, Tree-planting, Trust building

Adaptation 2012-2015 Maintenance, conflict mitigation

Maturity 2016-2019 Increased participation

172

External institutional environment, including agriculture diversification, technology change and national grain subsidy, serve to discourage villagers’ participation in reforestation. The situation created challenges in 2008 as villagers sought to reverse their participation in the reforestation. Nevertheless, because of the support from county government and village leader, reforestation collaboration was able to continue. In 2011, villagers suspected Zhang had taken bribe from GACF and Zhang initiated a public meeting to resolve the concerns.

In the second phase (2012-2015), SRP consolidated reforestation progress as survival rate continued to stay in a satisfactory range for GACF. As concerns regarding tree maintenance and villagers’ unsatisfaction with rental agreement continued to surface, the village leader and forestry officer raised these issues to GACF. Even though basic trust and internal legitimacy has been established among actors of SRP, the responsibility and organization of forest maintenance still fell solely on the shoulders of village leader and forestry officer. GACF and the local actors in Shilou county apparently had different understanding and expectations of their roles in the collaboration. In 2013, village leader Zhang proposed to invest in and arrange a shared formal tree maintenance agreement. Nevertheless, there were no consensus on this issue until 2017.

During this period, GACF was concerned about gaining external legitimacy through scientific assessment. Through networking, they found a research group in Beijing, and helped conducted preliminary research on the impact of SRP reforestation approach to soil physical qualities. The collaboration continued to bring more external funders and interested individuals and parties through the networks of GACF. Village leader Zhang hosted one of the scientist for

173 over a year and Shilou county government supported many of these endeavors through the coordination of officer Han. Nevertheless, there was a deficit in communication because there was no structured interaction during the twice a year annual visit, which usually lasted about two days.

During the third phase (2016 to 2019), village leader were able to gain more weight in decision making. The management concern was resolved as ex-director from the county forestry bureau also raised the issue to GACF. In 2017, GACF finally agreed to support management through Zhang’s arrangement and hire local residents to manage the forest. The collaboration was moving towards more outreach across different public concerns including agriculture, science, and rural development.

In 2016, villagers proposed to invest in village level public goods that directly benefit villagers through the new gained legitimacy within the SRP collaboration. Shilou county government also decided to invest in water irrigation infrastructure as a way to show their participation in the collaboration. In 2018, village leader tapped into the expanding SRP network and acquire resources to plant a new specialty cash crop: Djulis (Chinopodium formusanum or

Red Quinoa). Forestry Officer Han continued to be the liaison between Shilou county government and GACF even though he was promoted to the county organization department due to his management and organization skills.

Because of the general poor results of reforestation programs in Shilou county, villagers may be less likely to see GACF’s project as different from other government sponsored

174 reforestation programs. Nevertheless, SRP’s reforestation had significantly different outcome than other locally implemented reforestation because of the high survival rate and the visible greenish feature as compared to the surrounding landscape. As officer Han commented “The effect of the reforestation outcome was obviously different. This was because there were people in place to carry out the work.”. Officer Han was aware of the lack of proper management practice for reforestation. Table 6.3 provide an overview of the perspective on reforestation in relation to rural development of different stakeholders. Many of the views had been discussed in chapter 4 and 5 and here GACF’s perspective is incorporated to provide reference. GACF’s approach to rural development stemmed from their theory of change that paid less attention to local institution and ecology. Their approach to reforestation was tailored to local ecology

(broadly defined) but their understanding of the relationship between rural development and ecology was different from local knowledge.

Table 6.3 Participants’ perception of reforestation in relation to rural development.

Loess Plateau Reforestation Villagers Relatively unproductive Good for the environment but poor compared to other regions implementation

Local officials Relatively unproductive Alternatives to agriculture, target compared to other regions fulfilment, and the development of green economy GACF Rural development is hindered The foundation for better by ineffective conservation agriculture production

175 In sum, SRP developed from a reforestation-focused collaboration to expand its capacity to produce results that benefit multiple stakeholders within Shilou county. The collaboration was sustained through active participation and commitment of local leaders and key actors and their ability to communicate, deliberate, and resolve tensions emerged through the collaborative process. Key actors understand the importance of sharing capacity and trust building since the very beginning. The details of the collaboration is further elaborated after a brief description of the system context and the drivers of the collaboration. The following section describes the system context of the case study.

The System Context: Reforestation for Development

As discussed in chapter 5, efforts to reforest and afforest rural landscape often encounter challenges of sustaining the transient success to long term ecological restoration due to implementation deficit, lack of management resources or other prioritized economic development demands (Morton and William 2010). At the global level, climate change and land degradation has brought issues of reforestation to the forefront of environmental governance.

Reducing carbon emissions through land conservation practices and environment protection has been on the agenda of the United Nation, the World Bank and many international, national and domestic environmental agencies and organizations. These agendas for environmental change are integrated with China’s decentralization process and development policies. For example, the concept of ‘Ecological Civilization’ was officially incorporated into the constitution in 2002

(Hansen et al. 2018), which provided increased legitimacy to environmental issues.

176 Since the early 1990s, Shanxi provincial government has been engaging in partnership with the public, private, and the civic sector to advance environmental and natural resource management at the international and domestic levels (Wang and Sun 2013). For example, the

Loess Plateau Watershed Rehabilitation Project in Shanxi province (World Bank Project

Performance Report, 2007) These partnerships were driven by Chinese government’s desire to modernize the nation-state and to increase the capacity of government officials and residents to develop future development and resource management policies through working with experts from developed countries. These partnerships allowed local officials at provincial, county and village level that lack expertise in developing and implementing conservation-based development programs to exchange information, experience and resources with foreign professionals. For example, World Bank, development and aid agencies from Germany and

Japan had participated in various projects aimed at improving both environmental conservation and livelihood for rural communities in Shanxi province. Smaller NGOs had also worked with local governments to provide resources to improve and support the provision of public goods.

In terms of policy framework regulating and structuring reforestation, the Returning

Farmland to Forest Program (RFFP) started in 1999 provided an overarching mandate and methods for rural residents to engage in reforestation. RFFP provided financial incentives for local government to invest in reforestation and improve villagers’ livelihood. In 2013, Party

Chairman Xi Jingping initiated the poverty alleviation policy and raised the priority of poverty- related policies to the nation’s highest level. Xi made a time-bound goal to end poverty in China

177 by 2020 and RFFP had since been co-opted by poverty alleviation policy16. This had implications for the Shilou county because Shilou is one of the nationally designated poverty counties. For example, ‘Ecological poverty alleviation’ has become an official strategy to support rural development. Since about 2015, Shilou county government had declared Shilou as a ‘Ecological poverty alleviation’ county.

The semi-arid climate, hilly landscape and remoteness of rural Shanxi province are challenging for GACF in terms of both reforestation and transportation costs. As noted in chapter

5, degraded land on the Loess Plateau is difficult to restore because of the economic cost and human and animal damages caused by grazing or other reasons. The remoteness increases the cost and time to transport both human and tree-planting materials. Nevertheless, the resource conditions of Shilou county was one of the main reasons GACF decided to work with them: a poor county that may benefit from their support for rural development.

The fourth important system context is the history of conflict and prior failures to address issues. There were no prior working relations and conflict between Shilou county government, village committee and GACF. However, GACF’s prior working experiences with villagers in

Guangdong province and Yang county was what mattered in this case. Many of these conflicts resulted from rural land tenure issues, lack of shared motivation, and the lack of capabilities of participants to resolve conflicts. GACF had another reforestation site in Lo Village but GACF

16 When the Chinese government uses the term “poverty”, it means severe rural poverty rather than urban privation. The definition of poverty is based on income (the poverty line is set at 4,000 yuan ($590) per person per year), provision of basic food and clothing, access to basic medical services, education, and housing (Rogers 2014).

178 members did not felt the project was going well due to local villagers’ low level of participation and potential conflicts. As of 2010, the working relations between GACF and Lo Village had deteriorated due to on-going land right issues and conflicts within the village regarding how to distribute the funding for their reforestation efforts (Interviews with stakeholders, 2018). The survival rate of about 9,000 tree seedlings planted on 6.6 ha of land in Lo Village since 2005 decreased from 70% to 50% as of 2010 (GACF annual report). In 2011, GACF terminated the contract, returned reforested lands to village committee and ended their reforestation work with

Lo Village but remained informal relations with the villagers (Interview with Leo, 2018).

These experiences prompted GACF leaders to seek assistance from local governments to communicate with villagers for future project and avoid working with villagers on their own.

GACF attempted to find a new site and consulted with the Yang county government. The Yang county government welcomed GACF but their willingness to participate decreased after finding out GACF’s reforestation were not as “big” as expected. According to GACF executive Leo, the

Yang government was expecting more funding. These prior failures to address issues has contributed to tensions among key actors in the SRP collaboration and added challenges to build trust during the process. GACF executive Leo17 described his concern stemming from this experience: ‘The villagers could be very selfish. We try not to get involved in local financial matters.’ (Interview, 2014)

The fifth one is socio-economic and cultural characteristics. There are two main communities involved in this case study: the urban-based GACF and the rural community in

17 All names of participants used in this dissertation are pseudonyms.

179 Shilou county. As an NGO based in Hong Kong, the language18 and cultural differences added another layer of challenge for collaboration with local communities. Both villagers and county officials belong to the same socio-economic fabric and therefore have common interests to resolve local issues. GACF, whose main goal is reforestation, lacked the capacity and legitimacy to address village affairs.

The system context has illustrated the conditions under which the demand for reforestation and the challenges of cross boundary collaboration developed. However, without the presence of drivers, collaboration is unlikely to form let alone sustain. Here I discuss the extent to which four drivers contributed to initiating the collaborative governance regime in

Shilou County.

The Drivers and Formation of Shanxi Reforestation Partnership

The Collaborative Governance Framework identified four drivers that help initiate the formation of a CGR. All drivers were present in this case. As described in chapter 4 and 5,

Shilou, a rural agriculture-based county government lacked the necessary financial and management resources to implement rural development policies. Public goods provision and policy implementation in China had been uncertain both financially and politically due to the decentralization process. Prior policy failures such as the Wasteland Auction Policy created a

18 Hong Kong citizens speaks mostly Cantonese (formally called Yue) while residents in rural Shanxi province speaks Mandarin with a regionally unique accent (also called Jin dialect). In this case study, all key actors communicate in Mandarin and key actors from Shilou county would speak using a less accent-heavy Mandarin closer to the standard Beijing accent for communication.

180 condition where local governments are pressed to achieve the objectives regardless of available resources for monitoring and management and corresponding supporting regulations. For semi- arid regions, tree seedlings survival is lower than the national average due to climate and lower productivity. Ex-deputy leader of the Shanxi Forestry Research Institute Kuang commented:

‘Despite technological improvements in the form of better-quality seedlings and water conservation techniques, there are still many challenges to increase tree survival rate.’

(Interview, 2018)

Interdependence is the next driver and was recognized by the main participants of SRP during initiation process of the collaboration and continues to play crucial role. As noted earlier,

GACF learned the critical role local authorities (e.g. government officials or power holders) could play in supporting or undermining the collaboration process and outcome from their experience working with other local communities. As noted in chapter 5, the Wasteland Auction

Policy and other mechanisms developed by local governments were premised on the idea that reforestation can be advanced profitably by working with and among private sectors. The Shilou county government might not be motivated by the similar logic but engaging with NGO as an alternative way of achieving rural development goals does appear to follow a broader institutional and developmental logic in China. Limited funds for implementation was a persistent driver for motivated local governments to engage with the private and non-profit sector to address various issues. This particularly holds true with science-intensive problems such as climate change mitigation and carbon sequestration, which demand an overwhelming level of resources. Reforestation is also a type of labor-intensive practice difficult to implement on fragmented landholdings, especially on hilly landscapes. Without an initiating leader within a

181 group or village, individual villager and household would face cumbersome management and administrative procedures. Local knowledge including information on seedling, market, and reforestation companies has proven to be important in this case as well.

Navigating rural communities in China requires some political and administrative expertise in local government and regulations that an NGO do not directly have. For example, land rights and ownership are important village affairs that requires understanding of local knowledge and norms. Land-based conflicts in rural China often require capable local actors to successfully resolve. In the case of SRP, the level of consensus-oriented decision-making observed and documented since 2005 showed that problems emerged during the collaboration process were resolved through actions carried out and participated by all actors, though with different degree of participation. In short, all actors in this case study made decisions to take risk to form the collaboration due to both uncertainty and interdependence.

Consequential incentives, the third driver, are present in the case and are directly related to issues associated with uncertainty. On the one hand, the RFFP was established in response to the flooding disaster in 1998. The goal was to reduce soil erosion in upland regions along the

Yellow River basin and thus reduce the probability of disastrous flooding. This is a good example of a triggering event creating opportunities for engagement among local government and local communities. To address both environmental degradation and poverty in rural mountainous regions, there is a need for more innovative solutions and policy designs. The

Shilou county government place high priority on reforestation as a development strategy to reduce uncertainty associated and produced by fiscal reform. In terms of financial capacity, the

182 Shilou county government has been operating on a long-term fiscal deficit where the ratio of expense to revenue was at 26:1 in 2015 (Shanxi province statistics 2015). Shilou county is also recognized by the provincial government as a nationally designated poverty county.

Finally, initiating leaders are present as the fourth critical driver for collaboration. This is the key driver and the cross-sector leadership in SRP and their individual expertise and skills have contributed greatly to the formation and sustainability of the collaboration. Multi-level leaders from the Shanxi Province Forestry Research Institute, the Shilou county government, the

Shilou foretry bureau, Si Village, and GACF enabled the formation of SRP. The organized response from the Shilou county government was a sign that they understand the uncertainties, interdependence, and consequential incentives involved in collaborating with GACF. According to the GACF executive Leo:

‘Shilou county was the only place that welcome our small organization. It was one of the places introduced by Deputy leader Kuang, Our members visited the site to confirm its suitability. The leader of local forestry bureau Ren was an old classmate of Kuang. Ren welcomed our organization to work there after learning that we are only a charity group, not a big corporation.’ (Interview 2018)

Key Actors in the SRP

183

Figure 6.2 Key actors in the case study. Shilou county government, forestry bureau,

village government and GACF are the main actors.

GACF is a fairly small charity group established in 2005 by a group of professionals in

Hong Kong. GACF has an official office space in Hong Kong, it has no paid staff, it includes 26 members. As of 2019, GACF had recruited more than an average of 100 volunteers every year.

The executive Leo has been responsible for all activities GACF conducted in both Guangdong and Shanxi since the beginning. Over the years, three key members (Leo, Tom, Lo) of the charity group became specifically attached to the reforestation project in Shilou county and they acted as consultants, decision-makers and advocates for the reforestation project. GACF visit the Shilou reforestation site at least twice a year to confirm tree survival and make further plans for budgeting, tree planting and outreach for the coming year.

GACF’s mission is to support and improve livelihood conditions for farmers in poor water-limited mountainous regions in China. They identified the barrier to rural development as land degradation and the lack of water resources for farming. Dr. Xie, who developed the tree-

184 planting method emphasized the crucial role of re-creating and reviving stream channels through reforestation instead of relying on digging well and large-scale water infrastructure such as dam.

To support rural development, the central government initiated a series of tax reform and provided farming subsidies, as discussed in chapter 4. However, GACF stated that these tax exemptions and subsidies have limited and even negative effects on farmers’ willingness to improve productivity and often led to conflicts due to improper resource allocation or the lack of institutional stability. The founding member, Dr. Xie, wrote:

“We cannot just donate money, send rice, and build schools for poor farmers. We need to start from improving the ecosystem of mountainous regions and provide opportunities for farmers to stand on their own two feet. …We can support other agriculture development after improving the environment first. In this way, poverty could be completely improved. …However, government must support these efforts through proper law enforcement and protect reforested areas otherwise it would be difficult to sustain the outcome.” (GACF 2006).

GACF had identified desertification and over-cultivation as the source of deforestation in rural China19. In addition to uneven resource allocation, GACF regards the failure of government’s approach to reforestation in the last few decades as a result of improper methodologies. Therefore, GACF’s main goal is to restore degraded landscape through improving the function of ecosystems. They believe that through the restoration of ecosystem

19 Many development activities are tied to land development in the producer sector, especially in the beginning of the reform era (1980s), hence over-cultivation can be a result of various reasons. Nevertheless, studies (Hong 2013, Mao 2016, Yeh 2011) had identified the role of policy incentives and implementation deficit in contributing to over cultivation and land degradation, which include pollution.

185 services, especially water provision and conservation, farming communities would be able to restore their interests in agriculture and thus improve rural development (GACF 2006). GACF executive Leo highlighted the difference of GACF’s reforestation method: “Our goal is not greening the landscape! We are cultivating water resources by improving soil quality. Our productivity is 1.5 times higher than those of standard government approach.” (Interview, 2018)

The second group of key actors, the County government and Forestry bureau partnered together and serve as government representatives. The key actor was county forestry bureau office manager Han, who eventually became indispensable to the project and serve as the liaison between GACF and Shilou county government. Han’s main authority came from the deputy county chief Su. Su was not involved in ground level organization but he represented support for the collaboration from the county government. Both Han and Su served as point of communication when needed. The county government was active and present throughout the collaboration process, which is explored in more detail later in the chapter.

Third, village leader Zhang managed all things related to village households and land use.

Zhang was responsible for identifying land holdings, setting the price of rent through consulting with potential participating farmers, acquiring land use certificates, allocating land-based resources from the government. Zhang was a local brigade leader during the planned economy era (pre-1978) and currently oversee the jurisdiction of Longtai administrative village, which includes 215 households in three natural villages (Longtai, Si and Duanzhuang). He served as the village secretary and was trusted and respected among local communities and considered well- educated among his peers. When GACF visited Shilou county, forestry officer Han invited

186 GACF to Si village for a site visit. After receiving confirmation from deputy county chief Su that the county government agreed to and supported the project, Si Village was selected as reforestation site. According to village leader Zhang, he and his village were selected to be part of the collaboration due to his previous working experience with the county forestry bureau. In

2003, County forestry bureau director Ren was appointed to assist with the development of Si

Village under the mandate of rural development policy. He and Zhang worked together to establish a reforestation demonstration site for the whole county on 13 hectares of the land in the village. This experience established Zhang as a trustworthy village leader and led to the current collaboration with GACF20. From the perspective of the villagers, this is a government-led collaboration and reforestation project.

All key actors were able to absorb on-going transaction costs from the beginning. For example, all field visit and informal meetings were held at village leader Zhang’s house located in the midst of the village as he has a room designated for public usage. Zhang is an outgoing and experienced local leader and would prefer to host the visits at his place as it is easier to manage and communicate reforestation affairs which he is in charge of. Zhang’s house is a traditional cave house on the Loess Plateau which includes a few neighboring cave houses and a small front yard. It is the closest and flexible location to reforestation sites in the villages he oversee and convenient and pleasant for receiving volunteers and members from GACF as it is less formal and open to the general public. When there is a need for formal and larger gatherings

20 County government allocate resources based on many considerations and may not necessary be fair. Si village is located in the county center and could be one of the reason it was chosen. The question of resource allocation by county government in resource scarce areas of rural China has been discussed elsewhere (Rogers 2014 and Newland 2016).

187 such as those with village representatives and participating village members, the meeting location would be at the local hotel meeting room or other public spaces, which are less accessible without prior arrangements with local officials.

6.3 The Initiation Phase: Multi-Level Leaders Initiation

The reforestation project is divided into three phases reflecting different types of challenges that emerged and a collaboration dynamic that shifted from low to higher trust among key actors. In the initiation phase, from 2005 to 2011, the main concerns for GACF were technical issues and performance in the form of tree survival rate. In the second phase from

2012-2015, as tree survival rate began to stabilize, villagers’ concerns related to the value of reforestation re-surfaced. These tensions were confronted and resolved mainly by village leader with the support from both county government and GACF. In the final phase, from 2016 to present, the long-term management of the forested land presented a new need for deliberation.

By 2017, all key actors were satisfied with the reforestation outcome and GACF directed their resources towards developing more outreach.

GACF partnered with the Shilou county government, village leader and forestry bureau to implement their reforestation approach on 22 ha of land in the spring of 2006. These lands were selected by village leader and villagers through their internal consultation. Similar to the

RFFP, farmers tend to rent out less productive, marginal or steep land that they may not want to farm anymore and less likely to rent out the most productive farmland, thus the areas were not necessarily contiguous. GACF signed contract with the Shilou forestry bureau and the forestry

188 bureau was responsible for tree-planting and related logistical arrangements. After seeing successful results in terms of proper survival rate (> 70%) GACF decided to continue their work.

According to officer Han the county forestry bureau invested some funding in the first year to replant as the survival rate was low.

In 2007, GACF signed contracts with villagers to rent villagers’ farmland for 30 years for

500 yuan per mu per year and bare land21 was rented at 10 yuan per mu per year for 50 years (1 ha =15 mu). The area designated for GACF reforestation gradually grew from 22 ha to more than

176 ha in 2013 as GACF expanded their operations year by year (Table 6.4) as funds became available. In 2016 and 2017, the budget was designated for maintenance, not tree-planting. These farmland and bare lands belonged to 28 households. Selection of appropriate land for reforestation was done through consultation with villagers by village leader. Most of land were chosen in consultation with village leader and villagers and it took a few years to reforest all the areas.

Over the course of 10 years, problems associated with reforestation emerged including local road construction projects that damaged the trees, finding soil amendment materials, and mitigating natural disasters such as rodent damage and wildfires. By 2015, all the areas were planted with tree seedlings with various survival rates ranging from 70% to 90%. GACF funded all the expenses related to reforestation and arrange both material and management with the local government and the village leader.

21 Bare land is also called ‘waste mountain’ or ‘wasteland’ (Huangshan, Huangdi).

189 Table 6.4 GACF and the Shilou county forestry bureau’s annual budget and reforestation area for comparison.

Shilou County Forestry Bureau 2018 budget: 16,757,400 yuan RFFP area: 50,000 mu GACF Budget New area Land type/ Replacement Reforestation/ (yuan) (mu) Total (mu) planting (mu or year seedling) 2007 500,000 250 120 farmland, 130 bare land 2008 750,000 385 85 farmland, 20,000 seedlings 300 bare land 2009 152,560* 170 N/A 8,000 seedlings 2010 N/A 450 N/A 2011 N/A N/A N/A 2012 1,150,000 874 1455 2013 500,000 300 bare 2126 2014 903,800 300 2426 2015 626,500 118 2544 32,000 seedlings 2016 80,000 0 2544 2017 80,000 0 2544 2018 100,000 50 2638 400 mu * New area indicates planned area for the coming year or season (2018 Total:176 hectares) * Data were limited due to limited available actors to document and communicate, ad hoc arrangements and lack of a standardized approach to document this information across key actors.

In the initiation phase, each of the three key actors played a critical role to sustain the collaboration. It is important to note that, except for the first year of the collaboration, during which two GACF members came and stayed for a few weeks, GACF only visited Shilou county two to three times a year and each visit was two to three days long. Technical issues were resolved through learning by doing fashion. Communication was highly dependent on all three actors’ skill to articulate concerns and resolve conflicts in a short amount of time.

Officer Han was in charge of all things related to tree-planting including selecting and procuring seedling, hiring labor, purchasing insurance, doing administrative work and

190 monitoring, which he then reported to GACF for budgeting purpose. The contract signed between forestry bureau stated only areas and the number of seedlings planted. Nevertheless, seedlings were not acquired until the year before planting depending on availability and sometimes there may not be sufficient available seedlings. Thus, tree-planting process was scheduled based on seedling availability. Weather is another factor that may delay the process of soil-pit digging because it is dangerous to be working on steep slopes during freezing temperatures.

In sum, officer Han was in charge of reforestation and village leader Zhang was in charge of land rental agreements. The village leader explained about one of the reasons why the collaboration was working: “Han and I divided our responsibilities clearly.” (Interview, 2018)

Village leader thought of the whole reforestation project brought in by GACF as something he could help with and contribute to. He recognized that the local government did not engage in this reforestation project for funding purposes. Nevertheless, the forested areas plant by GACF was significantly greener and lusher than the surrounding area, which made it a visible impact on the local landscape (Figure 6.3).

191

Figure 6.3 Reforestation areas funded by GACF. (Source: GACF)

High Per Unit Area Investment

In comparison to the GACF, the government’s reforestation approach has been less capital and resource intensive and implemented under policy mandate and with consideration of reforesting tens of millions of marginal lands and harvesting immediate financial return for farmers. As described in Chapter 5 on regional reforestation challenges, livelihood improvement is the priority of many local governments. Compared to the average local government, GACF’s approach requires much higher investment per area of farmland and bare land. Although GACF’s rented land area amount to about 0.01% of all the forestland managed by the Shilou Forestry

Bureau, GACF’s annual investment ranges from 1% to 6% of the forestry Bureau’s annual budget22 (Forestry Bureau 2018 budget, GACF annual report). Nevertheless, GACF was not looking to scale up the project.

22 Financial resource for reforestation is not considered the main benefit coming from the collaboration partly because Shilou county government had been in large fiscal deficit after

192

Interviews with forestry official Han and Shanxi Forestry Research Institute deputy director Kuang confirmed that one of the key reasons GACF was successful in improving survival rate was their high per unit area investment23. GACF believe the forest could take its

“natural” course once it is stabilized and they do not seek to expand the forested area but to focus on improving a single site to improve environmental quality. When asked about their knowledge on government’s reforestation policy, GACF vice director Tom noted: “We know about the

Returning Farmland to Forest Program before we started our work in Shanxi. I believe it works and takes a long, long time. I have read a report that it takes 200 years to recover one inch of top soil! We can’t wait!” (Interview, 2018)

Despite disapproval24 of compromising environmental values through planting economic tree species such as Walnuts, GACF reserved 20 mu of their rented farmland to plant only fruit tree for the benefits of local farmers at the suggestion of an expert from Beijing. According to

GACF executive Leo, the survival rate of these tree crops was good but with a slower growth rate due to tree species compared to non-fruit tree hardwood species. The result led GACF to continue prioritize using tree species with higher growth rate per year (height as measure).

GACF did not aim at the outset of the collaboration to spend too much on maintenance as they

1980s and most funding for reforestation comes from fiscal transfer from provincial and central government. Interview with officials and village leader also confirmed this conclusion. 23 The notion of ecological construction is not new in China and Forestry officials see this more as a technology advancement that comes with economic development. 24 According to interviews with local forestry officials who did not directly participated in GACF reforestation project, they regarded the reforestation approach used by GACF as too expensive and time-consuming. They recognized the focus on restoring ecosystem functions but said that there would be less to no economic benefits. As mentioned earlier, GACF regards government approach to reforestation as inefficient and ineffective.

193 expected the “nature to take its course” after the trees are planted. They also did not expect their project to be “big” due to geographical distance from Hong Kong and limited manpower and resources. Village leader Zhang has been mobilizing local residents in his village to protect the plantations since the beginning. However, GACF was not fully aware of these efforts.

During the initiation phase, GACF focused intensely on resolving tree-planting and - survival problems. GACF’s prior experience in Lo Village (the failed case) had taught them which tree species are the most suitable for the climate and appropriate for budgeting25 considering availability and transportation time. GACF developed a specific engineering procedure for tree-planting that requires more labor and material than the standard models used by the government in this region. Specifically, the design requires digging a 2-meter-long, 50 cm wide, and 50 cm deep soil pit, which is twice deeper and wider than standard pits used by the forestry bureau. Each pit is 1 m distant from each other in the same row along the slope while each row is 1.5 meter from each other. Each mu of land (666.7 m2) contains 150 soil pits. Soil preparation work includes weeding, adding three kg of rice husk and mixing it with the top soil dug out from the pit and refilling it into the pit to 40 cm high.

Soil preparation is usually done in the summer and seedlings planted in early October or next spring depending on the weather condition. After seedlings were planted, pine tree bark is added around the surface up to 2-3 cm. Soil pits are dug along a contour line with alternated gaps between rows (Figure 6.4 and 6.5). The alternation of the gaps is meant for catching runoff

25 Tree seedling price in 2009: Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia): 0.3 Yuan; Yellowhorn: 3 yuan; (Xanthoceras sorbifolium); Staghorn sumac (Rhus typhina L.): 4 yuan; Apricot (Armeniaca vulgaris L.) 2 yuan.

194 during rainy season. This method of planting has proven to be effective in keeping the survival rate of black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) above 70%, which is higher than government’s reforestation survival rate of 30% at the time (Yu et al. 2018, GACF report 2010, Interview

2017).

Figure 6.4. Soil pit example using GACF’s approach.

Figure 6.5 Site grading approach for farmland on hillslopes. Source: Han et al. 2018. For farmland, this triangle stacking grading is designed to reduce and catch runoff during rainy season. For bare land, the approach is slightly different with distance between soil pit wider or simply used the level ditch approach depending on topography.

195

Table 6.5 GACF planting arrangements designed according land types, slope and tree species. Source: GACF Area ID Land Planting Site Year Tree Species type Density/pit Grading 1 Bare land 3 per pit Triangle 2007 ROPS, ARSI, ULPU, POTR, TOSI 2,3,4,5 Farmland 3 per pit Triangle 2007 ROPS, SOJA, ULPU, ARSI, MOAL, ZIJU 6,8 Bare land 1 per meter Level 2008 ROPS, ULPU, TOSI 2 m between row ditch 7,9 Farmland 3 per pit Triangle 2008 ROPS, SOJA, PLOR, RHTY 11,13,14 Farmland 3 per pit Triangle 2009 ROPS, RHTY, ARSI 10,12 Bare land 74 pit per mu Triangle 2010 ROPS, ULPU, RHTY 2 per pit 21 Farmland 110 pit per mu Triangle 2011 ROPS, PLOR, ARSI, RHTY 2 per pit 22 Bare land 74 pit per mu Triangle 2011 ROPS, RHTY 2 per pit 18,19,20 Farmland 110 pit per mu Triangle 2012 ROPS, PLOR, ARSI 2 per pit 23-1 Bare land 74 pit per mu Triangle 2012 ROPS, ARSI, RHTY 2 per pit 23-2 Bare land 74 pit per mu Triangle 2013 ROPS, ARSI, RHTY 2 per pit *Total: 674 mu (45 hectares) farmland, 1870 mu (125 hectares) bare land *Tree species code are the first two letter of their Latin names. Black locust, (Robinia pseudoacacia); Siberian Apricot, (Armeniaca sibirica); Pagoda tree, (Sophora japonica); Staghorn Sumac, (Rhus typhina); Oriental thuja, (Platycladus orientalis); Siberian Elm, (Ulmus pumila); Chinese Mahogany, (Toona sinensis); Cottonwood, (Populus tremula); Mulberry, (Morus alba); Red Date, (Ziziphus jujube)

196 Emerging Leadership

Both Wen and Zhang actively participated in the collaboration and had the ability to induce collective learning by explaining, analyzing and framing the problems emerged. Officer

Han represented the formal point of contact for GACF and had access to government resources.

Han exercised his formal and informal authority to support GACF and GACF relied on him heavily. Village leader Zhang also asserted himself as a point of contact and represented a more direct way to engage with rural communities. Zhang’s inter-community ties were strong, and his network was not limited to Si Village. From the very beginning, officer Han was in charge of tree-planting and village leader was responsible for land rental agreement and as representative of villagers. Both of them were committed to coordinate and manage reforestation, though independently. According to Zhang:

“Han and I divide our responsibility well. I do not ask how much GACF pays him because it is not my responsibility. I only asked Han to hire our villagers to plant trees whenever possible. That’s the extent of my job. Thus, we worked well together after so many years. It’s not easy.” (Interview 2018)

Officer Han was skilled at building trust through his analytical skills, constant communication of tree planting conditions with GACF, sharing personal resources, and following through every detail. Tree planting density and tree species were the two main concerns during the first few years. The average density was 450 seedlings per mu compared to the forestry bureau’s 330 per mu it affected tree growth after trees started to compete for

197 sunshine in the 3rd or 4th year. The soil pit was initially designed to fit three seedlings, but the seedlings often fail to grow to average height and become “xiaolaoshu “ (little old tree) in the first few years and then form closed canopy earlier than usual at a lower height. By 2011, officer

Han officially advised GACF to reduce the planting density to two seedlings per soil pit, which greatly reduced costs. Due to the focus on improving soil quality, GACF preferred to use broadleaf deciduous species because the foliage cover these trees provide during winter could increase soil organic matter. However, local villagers and officials usually prefer conifers because they are more adaptable to water-limited environment due to less evapotranspiration.

Other factors affecting tree survival include rodents eating up the root system, competing understory vegetation, and weeds causing trees to die off. For example, in 2010, 25% of the new planted seedlings died due to root damage by rodent. Two of the local solutions proposed by forestry officials were using poison and diversifying tree species (GACF annual report 2010).

Village leader Zhang was skilled at building trust through sharing his own resources and engaging directly with everyone, demonstrating his role as the host and providing impartial treatment to his guests. He is also very resourceful in resolving issues come up during reforestation. For example, the unique design was using rice husk as soil amendment to improve water infiltration and increase soil organic matter while pine tree bark used as mulch to reduce surface transpiration. Zhang took initiative to procure rice husk and pine tree bark, materials that were not available in Shilou county. Zhang was a resourceful farmer and he found unwanted rice husk from a local brewery in the capital city, Taiyuan, and tree bark from Hohhot, a neighboring city in Inner Mongolia. Initially, GACF had to purchase rice husk from Henan province, which cost more than getting it from local business in Shanxi province. These technical problems and

198 their resolution were important for trust and social capital building. However, these actions were not documented by either forestry bureau or GACF. In short, there was no effort made to document agreements made or actions taken that may supported the collaboration in significant ways.

An important difference between Shilou forestry bureau and GACF’s approach to reforestation is the provision of subsidy directly to individual participating farmers. The RFFP provide farmers with direct cash subsidy. This contributed to farmers’ dis-satisfaction with

GACF’s reforestation as the external institutional environment continued to change including grain price. In addition, as mentioned in Chapter 5, there was no clear reforestation goal other than meeting annual targets on the part of both local governments and forestry bureau at county and provincial level. Table 6.6 summarized the difference between GACF and Shilou forestry bureau’s approach to reforestation and their relations with local institutions including subsidy for local farmers participated in RFFP.

Table 6.6 Comparison of Shilou Forestry Bureau and GACF reforestation approaches and expenses in 2017.

NGO Shilou Forestry Bureau Reforestation Farmland: 450 seedlings per mu Farmland: Dry-fruit trees 330 approach Bare land: 330 seedlings per mu seedlings per mu (with rice husk, tree bark for soil Bare land: 74 to 120 per mu amendment) Management Planting: 1900+ yuan per mu Planting: 200-800 yuan per mu and expense Maintenance: Ad hoc, ~100 yuan Maintenance: 6000-10300 yuan per per mu per year; directly hire forest steward per year, 800-1200 mu participating villagers as suggested bare land per steward, by village leader as of 2017

199 Site Weeding, triangulate pit, soil Weeding and level ditch preparation amendment (chicken manure as fertilizer was used briefly)

Seedling type Deciduous broad leaf species Dry-fruit trees, conifers, shrubs

Survival rate Black locust: above 70%, average Black locust 25.4%-70%, need 1-5 10% replacement planting times replacement planting* Subsidies for No direct subsidy to individual RFFP poverty alleviation subsides for farmers farmers economic and ecological trees for 5-8 years on farmland Objective Restore ecosystem productivity, Multipurpose: Mitigate soil erosion, particularly water conservation26. support poverty alleviation; focus on survival rate. No consensus within forestry agencies about the end goal • 15 mu = 1 hectare; 6.8 Chinese yuan = 1 US dollar (2020) *Each replacement planting means 1 year; 5 re-planting means it took 5 years to plant 1 tree Source: Shanxi Forestry Research Institute Runoff Ecological and Economic Forestry Techniques. Shilou Forestry Bureau 2015-2020 Economic Forest Plan. GACF annual reports.

Management Arrangements

Management has been a key issue since the beginning of the project and continued to create tension between village leader and GACF due to their different understanding of the role of maintenance. Differing expectations on ecosystem performance and its corresponding management institution were the root cause of this problem. In short, local institutions, norms and rules related to reforestation policies and village affairs indicated that village committee was responsible for tree maintenance.

26 According to research conducted by Dr. Yu and his team (Yu et al. 2018), the long-term impact of GACF’s reforestation on watershed level water resource conservation is unknown. GACF’s reforested areas is considered small scale in relation to total forestland managed by Shilou county.

200 Prior to 2017, there was no formal arrangement to cover for forest maintenance. The

GACF did not see a need to invest in maintenance as they saw it as the responsibility of the local government. Most activities related to forest maintenance such as enforcing grazing ban, wildfire control, rodent management, thinning, and road maintenance relied on village leader Zhang’s initiative to mobilize villagers. Wen and the county forestry bureau also relied on Zhang’s authority as village leader to enforce forest protection rules within his jurisdiction27 (Interview with official, 2018). As the trees grew into closed canopy, the need for management increases.

Zhang commented: ‘It is not an issue of education for villagers. Villagers won’t listen to your grand theory. It is about rules and accountability. Once villagers see that there is rule enforcement, they would understand the need and value of compliance.’ (Interview 2018)

The fact that there was no formal GACF annual report prior to 2012 reflects the ad hoc and contingent nature of small non-profit operation that acquire their funding mainly from donation. In addition, GACF rely on voluntary efforts and does not budget for administrative expense. GACF would compensate officer Wen based on his report of administrative expenses because he was responsible for tree-planting associated work and monitoring, the technical side of reforestation.

27 The need for management was constantly raised by village leader and it is related to the historical larger issue of reforestation policy and practices implemented by local governments. As described in chapter 5, lack of resource for maintenance and implementation deficit was one of the main reasons for low tree survival rate and retention rate. The two main objectives of maintenance are to reduce human disturbance such as animal grazing and fire and enforce replanting when tree dies. Maintenance of tree cover is not a high priority for farmers and after 2016, maintenance had been fully designated to reforestation co-ops as part of the poverty alleviation policy.

201 Village leader Zhang had brought up the issue of maintenance expenses as early as 2013.

However, maintenance was not a GACF’s priority and tree survival rate was the single most important focus for donation purposes. In the Shilou county, due to the much more cooperative partnership by all key actors since the very beginning of the collaboration, trust was built. As the trees grew mature and expansion of reforestation area stopped, the GACF started to pay more attention to maintenance. The GACF’s annual budget for reforestation decreased significantly after 2016 (see Table 6.4) because they wanted to observe the long-term tree survival as well as the retention rate. As a result, they did not put as much effort in outreach for donation.

In short, maintenance was an issue that resulted from lack of mutual understanding.

Nevertheless, raising the issue was a sign of commitment on the part of village leader Zhang.

Because funding was limited and a sensitive issue for GACF, Zhang were taking an important step to voice the need to invest in maintenance. However, the issue was not resolved until 2017 when GACF agreed to support the maintenance effort.

Gaining Internal Legitimacy: Demonstrate Success and Conflict resolution

In 2008, villagers voiced their concerns when they faced a series of new challenges and opportunities caused by price changes in the corn market and the improved corn seed quality, which greatly increased productivity. Similar to the situation faced by the RFFP, many villagers wanted to stop participating in reforestation due to concerns about only gaining environmental benefits but low or no financial benefit. In 2006, the average production was 250 kg per mu while the market price was at 0.8 yuan per kg. Under this premise, Zhang was able to convince

202 villagers that reforestation was a rewarding investment if the villagers deposited their rent revenue of 500 yuan per mu to the bank to earn an interest of 110 yuan per year per mu. In this vein, after the 30 years lease, the villagers would gain net profit of 80 yuan per year per mu. This situation changed in two years.

In 2008, because of the improvement of corn seed quality and chemical fertilizer, corn production rose to 500 kg per mu while the market price rose to 2 yuan per kg of corn. The net profit become 600 yuan per year per mu when using the same calculation. This vast change in productivity led villagers to think they were losing money. However, this situation mainly affected farmland, not bare land. Through Zhang’s explanation and credibility villagers were willing to continue the contract. Zhang focus his argument on future financial benefits derived from both reforestation and participating in on-going forestry policies as well as GACF’s good will. As Han commented on the issue of reforestation policy: “Land is always the biggest source of uncertainty.” (Interview, 2018) This comment was not about land quality or availability but more about land tenure and the external institutional environment that governs land.

GACF could not always assess the success of the reforestation in one field visit and in that case, they completed inspection during the second annual visit. GACF vice director Tom commented: “We assess the success of reforestation by inspecting survival rate, soil improvement, the return of natural birds, butterflies, and animals. Lastly our ultimate goal of improved water supply to the local villages.” (Interview, 2018)

203 In this first phase of collaboration from 2005 to 2011, tree-planting was the major concern for GACF. Village leader Zhang and forestry official Wen understand the need to demonstrate and communicate tree survival conditions and its environmental impact to GACF.

During annual visits in 2010, village leader Zhang identified a water source that appeared to be flowing more constantly after reforestation near the bottom of a gully near one of the plantations.

The water source was recognized by GACF as evidence of successful improvement of the ecosystem around their reforestation site. By 2014, the same water source28 had grown up to a small pond of the width of about 5 x 15 feet and with a depth of about 4-5 feet (GACF Annual

Report 2010).

In 2011, village leader Zhang hosted an assembly at a local hotel with village council representatives to expound on his relationship with GACF. Some villagers suspected that Zhang was taking additional money from GACF. To clarify the situation, Zhang invited Han and GACF members during their annual visit to join the assembly and explain to villages that he had no further financial relations with GACF. Zhang re-counted his position as a supporter of the reforestation:

“We should let the villagers understand clearly what is going on. You should also tell the truth. Ever since I became the village leader, I support all efforts that benefit the development of our village. I want to support GACF’s good will. They provide money, we provide labor. Leo

28 According to Shilou forestry officials, the water spring could be the result of a combination of the reforestation area and the neighboring forest reserve.

204 did not give me any money since the beginning, and I did not ask for any subsidy. The rent was

500 yuan per mu, and everyone got 500 yuan, not 490 yuan.’ (Interview 2018)

These contentions pointed to the need to build more shared motivation and consensus between GACF and villagers. In addition to the tension resulting from rental agreement, the main concern for village leader was different views on maintenance. In a deeply integrated ecological and social landscape like rural Shanxi province, historical understanding of the production and environmental values of the land is deeply rooted in villagers’ mind. For example, local residents believe that having unproductive lands, semi-arid climate, and fragmented landholdings were not cost-effective conditions for developing forestry. Farmers also see the forestland as part of the local agriculture landscape which is supposed to provide public value such as roads access between farmland and support grazing for herding communities. The main concerns for forest management therefore should be wildfire, which was often caused by burning crop residue and the accumulation of fuel. GACF however, considered the main forest disturbance coming from human activities and that forest management should focus on enforcing protection. For example, a more recent minor conflict in 2018 resulted from tree damages caused by road construction on

GACF’s plantation and terracing new farmland near the plantation. GACF considered this situation an evidence that villagers who were in charge of protecting forest were not doing their jobs. After consulting with village leader Zhang, he explained that minor dirt road construction across jurisdictions was a local adaptive measure to newly terraced farmland and that trees will be replanted.

205 The forestry bureau also designated human resources to help with monitoring site preparation and planting while village leader Zhang used his authority to ensure protection of the forested areas. This proved to be crucial for the continuation of reforestation work as GACF felt supported by local officials. The survival of the collaboration brings local government prestige and GACF is seen as brining advanced resources into this remote county. Financial resources from GACF were not the main incentive since it does not account for much within the budgeting system and does not contribute to the larger fiscal deficit Shilou county was facing (see Table 6.4 and Chapter 4). Leo from GACF recalled the critical events during their partnership with Shilou county: “The highly cooperative local partners in Shilou had given our first year of success when repeating the reforestation method of Dr. Xie there. Our foundation then continues to seek funding to expand our site.” (Interview 2018)

In short, through the active participation of both forestry bureau and village leader, and the support from county government, reforestation success was achieved and brought confidence to the key actors. The successful mitigation of conflicts also helped increased the legitimacy of the collaboration among villagers. However, there were no joint arrangement regarding the maintenance of plantation site in this first phase and GACF appeared to have different expectations about the role of management and who should be responsible for it. The issue of management arrangement will be the focus of the next phase of collaboration.

6.4 Phase Two: Collaboration in the Face of Limited Deliberation

206 In this section, I describe the communication and deliberation process in SRP and how key actors and other stakeholders used deliberation to resolve problems occurred during collaboration. Deliberation is different from communication in the sense that it focuses on defining problems, articulating concerns, clarification of responsibility, conflict resolution associated with the reforestation. Because of the lack of formal arrangement and a shared platform for deliberation, both the deliberation and communication process were ad hoc, informal and fragmented. The deliberation processes were divided into two level, one involved key leaders: village leader Zhang, officer Han, GACF executive Leo, although not necessary present at the same time. The second level involved villagers who participated in the reforestation. Village level matters was usually decentralized to village committee and villagers.

Village committee is embedded in local norms of rural governance. All actors relied on phone to communicate while email was used by officer Han and GACF. Village leader Zhang kept a notebook to document transactions at the village level. The twice a year annul visit by GACF has become a routine.

Leadership and Learning

The lack of a structured communication platform not only increased the chance of conflicts but also different understanding of the role of reforestation in rural development.

Speaking from the view of the three key participants, this section describes the perceptions of collaborative governance from different perspectives. Effective reforestation was key for GACF to justify their actions while the villagers and local officials were concerned about the legitimacy created through the fair redistribution of benefits.

207

After the initial success of reforestation, the collaboration faced several problems that needed immediate attention. First, it was clear that GACF wanted to avoid involvement with local institutions and politics. Second, both village leader Zhang and officer Han worked beyond their appointed duties and internalized reforestation costs that were not formally incorporated into the project. Deliberation occurred mostly when issue arose and once GACF left and returned to Hong Kong, local communities would resolve problems on their own. There was no formal agreement on how to resolve future problems related to reforestation, should they happen.

In the first phase from 2005 to 2011, the collaboration gradually stabilized. Officer Han and village leader Zhang had identified GACF’s expectations and reforestation targets of the collaboration and demonstrated their commitment and problem-solving skills. It was in the second phase from 2012 to 2015 that the village leader Zhang and officer Han started to focus more on maintenance and continued to work on fostering shared motivation as the policy context continued to change (e.g. poverty alleviation policy in 2015).

In the first phase, the communication between GACF, officer Han and village leader

Zhang focused on tree planting. All efforts were devoted to t re-plant seedlings and securing proper materials for reforestation for the following year. Zhang oversaw land rental agreements and maintenance. Officer Han was in charge of coordinating tree-planting and reported material and labor expenses on an ad hoc approach. In other words, both Han and Zhang were de facto managers for this reforestation project in addition to their formal duties as forestry bureau officer and village leader. GACF provided monthly allowances of about 500 yuan for officer Han in the

208 first year because GACF considered him as doing coordination work for the reforestation project.

Officer Han’s work may include travel, long distance calls, administrative work, arrangement with professional reforestation co-op or company, insurance, monitor, seedlings provision. The amount of work involved that was not institutionalized were vast.

In the second phase, officer Han demonstrated his ability to engage with diverse stakeholders individually and collectively. He played an additional role of guiding and explaining to GACF members and volunteers during the annual visit to check tree survival conditions. Village head Zhang, on the other hand, was skilled at connecting with people and treated GACF with hospitality by providing food and his house as a gathering venue. These informal interactions were important for building trust and as a collective learning space.

Nevertheless, these interactions were mainly informal and agenda-setting process was absence.

Deliberation with key actors

Communication and deliberation among key actors were maintained through both formal and informal communications (email, phone calls, annual visits) with a few formal meetings with the forestry bureau. During annual visits, informal discussions among village leaders, GACF members, local residents and officials occurred during downtime, travel, midday meal, and outreach events. Even though these interactions were informal by nature, the key actors (village leader, GACF members, local officials) used the time to discuss topics they considered important or raise concerns about issues that needed to be resolved. Over the course of the collaboration, none of these communication and deliberation process were institutionalized.

209

Each stakeholder documented information differently according to their priorities and perspectives. The Shilou county kept public records of the existence of the formal contract- signing events between GACF and the forestry bureau in the local state media. To document and publicize the success of the reforestation project, the county government published a story in a local academic journal detailing the methods and village leaders’ participation and reforestation outcomes. The GACF also documented and publicized their reforestation success for donation and outreach purposes in their annual reports, publications, and websites. On the GACF website, there were more details regarding the processes, people, and tasks involved in reforestation implementation in Shilou county. Village leader Zhang had a notebook that documented transactions and expenses. However, there was no common and consistent record keeping for deliberation processes or tree-planting details across the three key actors and institutions. Formal tree-planting contracts and land rental agreements were the only formalized documentation that was shared among participants. Interactions with local villagers were not documented by GACF and they often described these processes as “discussion” and only recorded issues directly related to tree-planting in their annual reports. Village affairs were decentralized and the local government did not keep record of village assemblies. Informal deliberation discussion was the main form of decision-making in the collaboration. Both village leader Zhang and forestry official Wen would coordinate relevant officials and villagers to meet during the annual visit.

Growing Leadership and limited Deliberation

210 Leadership skills were key to address issues that emerged from the collaboration. The reason these deliberation processes were considered important to the success of reforestation was due to the quality of the leadership, not the quality or frequency of meetings, which both were highly dependent on the amount of action items on the agenda during annual field visits. Based on interviews and participant observation, both forestry official Han and Village leader Zhang were able to articulate their role, explain villagers’ position and interests, frame crucial issues and local reforestation practices clearly to GACF members in a short amount of time during informal discussion. Officer Han has the advantage of using email to communicate while village leader Zhang relied on phone calls and texting, and annual face-to-face meetings.

The discussions aimed at reaching consensus on key issues although immediate mutual understanding between locals and GACF was not always easy. However, there may not always have been enough time to discuss issues and inspect all the reforestation sites during the two- days annual visits. When there was not enough time, which was often the case, discussion would focus on key concerns such as tree-planting. The travel time from Hong Kong to Shilou could take up to a whole day, especially when there is traffic on the road. The road from Shanxi’s capital city Taiyuan to Shilou county was fully constructed after 2009, which shortened the travel time from 6 to 4 hours. GACF’s members were the ones setting the agenda most of the time because they often brought outreach opportunities while local actors adapt and respond to it, a common way of doing things with outsiders in rural China. GACF relied heavily on both Han and Zhang for hosting and coordinating annual field visit. The only few occasions when village leader initiated a formal gathering was in 2011 to communicate his role and relations with GACF

211 to villagers. Reforestation issues that could be resolved without GACF were mostly resolved

without through the efforts of Han and Zhang.

Table 6.7 documented the communication and deliberation mechanisms occurred during

data collection. Most of the process were arranged as issues arose and no time or resource were

designated for shared agenda-setting or for discussion of issues. The three key actors

communicate in a fragmented fashion and thus information and knowledge were not

communicated completely and thoroughly. Table 6.8 documented important decision-making

process and outcome of the SRP. The processes were fairly open to the community within the

village but due to limited time frame during annual visit, not all could attend. Decision-making

outcomes were determined fairly quickly based on the availability of financial resources and the

knowledge of key actors.

Table 6.7 Mechanisms created during process of engagement for the Shilou Reforestation Partnership (SRP).

Description Who participate When Process Note Informal Informal in the sense Open to all, most Anytime, Restricted by Each key actor uses Discussions that it is not formally of the time key anywhere available time and their own approach documented, but it is actors participate during field reliant on GACF to raise concerns or the default way of visit and agenda, deliberate on issues communication follow up accessible, using phone flexible and or email fragmented Forestry Meeting organized for Restricted to Designated Structured, formal Existing mechanism bureau important proposals or GACF members time during process, build and practice in meeting signing agreements and affiliated annual visits trust and social county governance officials but or ad hoc capital flexible

212 Village Assembly organized by Open to all, Designated Reliant on Existing mechanism Assembly village leader for all mainly key actors time during leadership skills and practice in issues requiring and village annual visit and existing village governance consensus or collective representatives or ad hoc relationships, action build social capital Other Meeting organized for Restricted to Designated Structured, formal Existing mechanism formal important proposals or GACF members time during process, build and practice meetings signing agreements and affiliated annual visits trust and social officials but or ad hoc capital flexible

Table 6.8 Major deliberation, participants, and issue raised based on documents, interviews and participant observation. Date Deliberation type and issue raised Participants 2008 Forestry Bureau meeting: discuss reforestation details NGO, F. Bureau 2009 Forestry Bureau meeting: new reforestation contract, future NGO, F. educational, public health collaborations Bureau 2010 Forestry Bureau meeting: new reforestation contract NGO, F. Bureau Informal discussion: village leader proposed to build a NGO, VH concrete road along one of the reforestation sites 2011 Village Assembly for establishing village leader credibility All

Informal discussion: GACF asked the contracted All reforestation team to replace trees damage by construction of gas pipes 2012 Informal discussion: Forestry official mentioned the All opportunity to enroll in RFFP to increase benefits for farmers 2014 Informal discussion: Villagers suggested small water All infrastructure to harvest water from stream Informal discussion: Reforestation management concerns All and expenses Informal discussion: Villagers suggested to apply and enroll All in government reforestation policy to acquire subsidy

213 2016 Informal discussion: Villagers consulted with village leader All to asked for support to build a bridge 2017 Informal discussion: Village leader continue to emphasize All the importance of maintenance and management Informal discussion: Village leader proposed to install All exercise equipment for senior residents 2018 Village representatives’ assembly for management payment All Informal discussion: clarification of responsibility of All replacing trees damaged by dirt road construction *Documentation or memories of activities prior to 2008 are limited *It is assumed that informal discussion happened every year and reforestation logistics had always been the priority and hence is not categorized as “issues raised” and documented here. Participation in informal discussions was ad hoc and flexible therefore if any key actor was not present it did not mean they were intentionally excluded and follow up discussion may occur. These deliberations occurred due to the need to engage with GACF. Communication occurred between villagers, village leader, officers were not documented here.

In 2013, Han and Zhang both voiced their concern about the need to address villagers’ concerns and tree maintenance during GACF’s annual visit. When trees had grown up and formed a closed canopy, the need for maintenance increased. Han explained to GACF during the

2013 annual visit: “It is good enough that villagers have not destroyed the plantations. Fire prevention is crucial during spring. We had two fires at the reforestation site already. We had to call the forestry bureau to come help put it out. Once the tree grows up, the risk of fire increases.” (Open discussion 2013) Officer Han also commented on the complaints coming from villagers:

“You have to understand that villagers do not see this as beneficial to them as the price of land keep on increasing. Compared to GACF, the government’s reforestation policy provided even more compensation for villagers. They felt relatively deprived (xinli bupingheng) when they see other villagers were able to gain a lot by doing alternatives.” (open discussion, 2013)

214

As explained by officer Han, local lands had been expropriating by government to build road and other infrastructures, benefiting some farmers by large sums of compensations. The situation was a manifestation of the larger socio-economic change such as the continued increase in living expenses that had contributed to this sense of relative deprivation among some rural residents. Village leader Zhang showed a similar sentiment regarding their work with GACF:

“GACF came here twice a year and we also worked very hard to help them manage the forest. Then we re-plant every year. When seedlings died, we re-plant. When trees were not enough, we re-plant. The management is in place. That’s why the trees grow so fast. Since 2006,

I worked with them for over six years and I never asked for any financial support. Reforestation is three parts reforestation and seven parts management.’ (open discussion, 2013)

Why did Han and Zhang mention this issue in 2013 and not earlier? The ultimate goal of

SRP was aligned with GACF’s mission of supporting rural development through reforestation and to form a collaborative relationship with the county government. In the process, mutual trust was built, and the concerns of the locals became more evident overtime. Han was a patient facilitator and he noted: “It would take time for GACF to understand and they do need to be educated on certain things.” (Interview, 2013)

In 2014 villagers also raised concern about the possibility to enroll in the Returning

Farmland to Forest Program. The question of participating in RFFP had been raised by ex- director of the Shilou forestry bureau in 2008 and again by Kuang from Shanxi Forestry

215 Research Institute in 2012 (GACF annual report). Joining the RFFP pointed to a need for a formal deliberation process and the lack of communication between GACF and locals.

Government officials were more familiar with local institutions and were aware of directing benefits towards local farmers to improve shared motivation among villagers.

In addition to the reforestation project, Zhang demonstrated his leadership skills through other local projects (Interview with villagers, 2017). During a local conflict mediation process, together with his colleagues at the village committee Zhang acted as an arbitrator and witness for a conflict about installation of private utility pole. On the other hand, forestry official Han’s leadership skill was demonstrated by his commitment to the reforestation project, clear communication of relevant issues, and his ability to exercise formal and informal authority to coordinate and implement reforestation. Based on participant observation and interviews with other forestry and agriculture officials, Han had a good reputation within the county bureaucracy.

He understood the inner workings of the government and was perceived as smart and a responsible worker by Zhang.

Views on the Costs and Benefits of Reforestation

Villagers viewed land-based contracts as negotiable due to prior experience with land reform, poor policy implementation, officially condoned flexibility at the local level, and the adaptative management in response to the changing socio-economic environment. In 2010, based on a newly signed contract with villager in the same year, the rent for farmland had increased from 938 USD to 1260 USD/ha/yr. The villagers’ constant concern about gaining more value

216 from the reforestation was reflected by their request to increase the rent on their land in 2014. On behalf of villagers, officer Han asked GACF about the possibility of raising the rent during their annual visit. GACF did not want to change their contract with the farmers and was afraid that if they agreed to change it, it would open the door to other requests. GACF executive responded to this proposal: “It is the spirit of contract! Please honor it.” (open discussion, 2014) It was difficult for GACF to take into consideration the historical norm of policy changes and their corresponding local adaptations that shaped villagers’ understanding of land-based contract and reforestation. Local customs also allowed villagers to negotiate with each other on certain land right issues without government officials’ direct approval (Interview with villager, 2018).

Moreover, it was common for farmers to respond to market incentives by adjusting land use strategy.

The reforestation was funded by GACF, but it belonged to the villagers and was co- managed by both local forestry bureau and villagers. Here is where state-society relations and land tenure come into play. All land belongs to the Chinese state while villagers and local government contract use right and lease right from the state. According to village leader Zhang, the forest belonged to the villagers and the state as an asset. GACF viewed the reforestation project as beneficial to rural development and benefits both villagers and local government.

With no additional time to build consensus, the collaboration would prove to be difficult to move forward. Different views on the costs of reforestation were more evident in this phase because many of the costs were absorbed by village leader, villagers, and the county forestry bureau. These costs, which included the administration process, writing reports, coordinating and

217 monitoring reforestation, enforcing protection, were embedded in local institutional knowledge and showed that the locals had a more comprehensive perspective on local social and environmental issues.

Village leader Zhang and officer Han also understood the cost of potential conflict resulting from not recognizing villagers’ perspectives and the increased maintenance costs.

Zhang noted:

“Who is more reasonable? I think the villagers are more reasonable for not cutting off the trees. They respect the rules. This rental agreement is an unfair bargain with only 500 yuan per mu over 30 years. Even planting crops can be a more profitable option for farmers due to the agriculture subsidy. This means that villagers approve of this reforestation project and the

GACF is esteemed by villagers. If GACF did not appreciate and recognize our effort in protecting the forest, I could suggest Leo to hire a professional team to protect the forest instead of being managed by me.” (Interview 2018)

Even though there were mutual trust among key actors, the lack of a structured deliberation process had resulted in potential conflict. Adaption and actions needed to address these issues were delayed. In sum, different expectations about how to manage the land were revealed during the second phase. While survival rate was gradually stabilized, many issues regarding local community and forest maintenance appeared. In Table 6.9, I summarize the different perspectives on local ecology and their corresponding management institutions based on interviews and participant observation. The perspectives from the scientific community were based on interviews with Chinese researchers and represent an on-going debate about the

218 function of reforestation and long-term management approaches based on these understandings.

In short, there is currently no consensus on the long-term goal of reforestation.

Table 6.9 Stakeholders’ different understanding of social ecological system will make room for different management institutions, forest values, uses, species, and economies.

Local ecology Management (Mgmt) needs GACF Forest as foundation for sustainable Mgmt’s objective is to protect agriculture and should be treated as a forest and water resource from reserve. human disturbances. Villagers Forest fire was less frequent before Mgmt is needed to protect the reforestation policy and logging ban. forest from fire and human disturbances. Forest is part of the local agriculture landscape and is supposed to provide public Professional reforestation co- value such as road between farmland and ops were formed due to increase grazing. in reforestation demand and lack of alternatives. The land is unproductive so there is no need to invest in forestry. Government Mgmt benefits villagers through accountability drives or undermines shared subsidy. motivation for reforestation. County and Reforestation as means for development and Not enough resource for township provision of public good, a form of green maintenance and developing government economy. alternatives for villagers.

Scientific Concerns with long term landscape functions Manage for proper integration community related to grassland and forestland and and co-existence of social and corresponding disturbance regimes. ecological systems

6.5 Phase Three: Enhanced Capacity and Increased Participation

Maintenance has been an important but neglected part of government-initiated reforestation. GACF saw maintenance as the responsibility of the villagers and the local

219 government. GACF did not recognize the value of forest maintenance even though both officer

Han and village leader Zhang raised the issue many times. The villagers appeared to treat the reforestation project as a government sponsored project and did not necessarily take full ownership in terms of management for the reforested landscape. It is reasonable to conclude from both the language change and shift of budget usage in GACF annual reports, and the interviews that the shift in GACF priority started in 2015. The GACF’s 2015 annual report stated: “Three parts tree-planting and Seven parts maintenance. The current reforestation priority is management and protection. We hope trees could continue to grow under protection”.

Zhang and Han both played critical roles in deliberating and communicating with GACF about local concerns. However, the message was not picked up by GACF until the ex-forestry bureau director Ren, mentioned the need to improve maintenance and management to GACF.

This is another sign that GACF placed less value on key actors with less political authority. In

2017, GACF finally agreed to village leader Zhang’s suggestion to establish a formal arrangement to hire villagers as forest stewards to patrol and manage the plantations. GACF expressed that they do not wish to be the direct ‘employer’ for villagers due to lack of knowledge on local institutions, time and resource for management, and of trust to work with villagers directly. Zhang assumed the role of coordinator and employer and hired 20 local villagers taking turns over the next two year to manage the plantation. This level of compensation was slightly lower than local standards (2000 yuan per year per person), each person was in charge of about

53 hectares of plantation and worked in units of three persons, as arranged by Zhang. This arrangement was a sign of increased trust between GACF, village leader and villagers.

220 Broadening Impacts: Education, Public Health and Infrastructure

As discussed in section 6.3, GACF prioritized reforestation as a way to improve rural development. They left management to local government and village leaders. GACF spent more of their time and resources on outreach including networking and attracting potential collaborators in agriculture and rural development; student and young professionals’ engagement among mainland China, Hong Kong, and across international borders. These outreach events helped social capital and increased the opportunity for more collaboration and development.

However, how these outreach events benefitted local villagers involved in the collaboration was difficult to assess in the short term. As evidenced by multiple non-reforestation projects initiated during the collaboration, villagers and local officials often prefer direct financial support including funding existing local projects such as water resource infrastructure and road construction (GACF annual reports). These projects also provided additional tangible outcome for local officials to include in their performance evaluation29.

Since 2005, outreach events have served as an additional platform to build trust and demonstrate leadership skills. Based on discussions and documentations of NGO activities, it is reasonable to conclude that GACF was founded by members who had good public relations and social networks in their respective professional societies. Since the beginning of the collaboration, GACF had been keen on making their work in rural Shanxi known to the public through media and outreach with schools, universities, industries, and other non-profit

29 As mentioned in Chapter 4, the Cadre Responsibility System is crucial in shaping individual official’s motivation and career trajectory.

221 organizations. Through their endeavors in outreach in Hong Kong and mainland China, GACF attracted supporters, volunteers and donors from different walks of life. Many of these interested individuals or parties joined the annual field visit and eventually made these annual field visit an outreach opportunity itself. This is one of the main reasons why there were rarely enough time for deliberation or meetings with local villagers and officials.

In Table 6.10, I summarize the outreach and non-reforestation projects implemented jointly by GACF and Shilou county government. The list of projects could be categorized into education, public health, and public infrastructure. These projects were represented what local leaders considered useful for rural development. After Tax-for-fee reform in the 1990s, village committees’ fiscal autonomy decreased and become more reliant on county government

(Newland 2016). At this point in their collaboration, village leader Zhang and GACF shared the same goal of improving the livelihood conditions of rural communities and Zhang considered

GACF as a legitimate alternative source to create public values for the reforestation project. The building of the bridge in the Si Village in 2017 and the park in 2019 can be seen as the increased participation on the part of villagers, village leader, and the county government in SRP.

Table 6.10 Non-reforestation projects and outreach initiated by key actors in SRP.

Date Outreach and non-reforestation projects Note 2007 Scholarship for 14 middle school students Education 2008 Water resource bureau built a small dam near reforestation site Public good Forestry bureau set up a reforestation site opposite GACF’s to Reforestation enhance water conservation impact 2010 Water pipe infrastructure for a household Public good Scholarship for 7 local university students Education Visit Shilou county elderly care center and orphanage that was Initiated by county in construction government

222 2012 GACF supported Han and village leaders (including village Education Wang in Taiyuan) to attend the 4th annual Community- Supported Agriculture conference in Beijing Shilou Secondary school visit and gave a lecture on global Education warming to about two hundred students 2013 “The New Rural development” Seminar by professor from Education Renmin University with local cadre and officials. Shilou Hospital visit; Walk-in clinic, basic physical Public health examination and seminar with villagers by medical profession volunteers (tested blood sugar -pressure, urine) 2014- Researchers from Beijing surveyed the study site and collected Not funded by 18 data; set up weather station, published papers GACF 2016 Organic Farming seminar with villagers by a Beijing NGO Education A Bridge (partially funded by the Shilou government) Public good 2017 TV crew visit for shooting documentary during annual visit Not funded by GACF 2018 GACF built a well for village near reforestation site Public good Shilou county government funded a water infrastructure near Public good the village to store water County government women’s Federation and public health Public health officials meeting 2019 Set up official “Rural Scholarship” with Shilou Education Education department Agriculture marketing seminar and presentations on GACF Education history and environment protection, yellow river management for local occupational school students *1 USD = 6.83 yuan (2020)

223

Figure 6.6. The bridge was funded by both GACF and county government. The goal was to reduce time and labor spent on going down and up the hills to the reforestation sites.

For example, in 2013 GACF invited a retired rural development expert and professor from Renmin University in Beijing to visit Shilou to give a presentation on “The New Rural

Development” to local officials.30 GACF also brought their working experience in Guangdong province to Shilou county through their medical professionals and volunteers. In the same year

2013, volunteers provided free physical examination and medical consultation to local villagers during annual visit. During this third phase, GACF encourage farmers to improve and invest in agriculture development and modernization. In 2016, GACF invited an NGO from Beijing specializing in organic agriculture to conduct a seminar to some farmers. As Dr. Tom from

GACF said:

30 Table 8 only listed outreach events and non-reforestation projects occurred in Shilou county and not those that happened in Hong Kong or elsewhere.

224 “The purpose of that meeting was to explain to the villagers that through reforestation, the environment will gradually restore, and water will increase. Farmers will be able to plant high value cash crop without the need for irrigation. For example, vegetables. Their income will be more than two times higher! Farmers will only focus on short term benefits. It is useless to tell them reforestation can restore the environment.” (Interview, 2018)

GACF had been interested in finding scientific support to establish credibility for their reforestation model. They reached out to the research community and eventually found a team

(Yu et al. 2018) in Beijing who was willing to conduct research in Shilou county. The research outcome provided legitimacy and support for GACF’s endeavor in promoting the application of their reforestation approach in other regions. GACF executive mentioned his concern about finding younger generation to continue their work in rural China in the future. As one of the reasons they make an effort to reach more education leaders, students and young professionals.

In the third phase, villagers appeared more comfortable to participate in decision-making.

In addition to the request to build a bridge in 2016, Zhang proposed his plan to build a park as a public good for local elderly villagers and consult GACF for funding. His goal was to provide other forms of benefits for the villagers in addition to the improvement of the local environment.

He again mentioned the opportunity cost of planting trees compared to maize as a source of discontent among villagers. Zhang also talked about how villagers were willing to accept the benefits coming from forest maintenance even though the compensation were not comparable to average payment for maintenance. He acknowledged that being farmers in poor and unproductive region help villagers are able to see the value of a small project like reforestation.

225 In addition, villagers, mostly older people, were able to accept the benefits regardless the amount considering the lack of alternatives. It is important to note that villages in rural China vary significantly in their capacity to respond to collaboration like the SRP. Investing time and resources in SRP were significant, as compared to the failed case in Lo Village mentioned earlier in this Chapter. Active participation on the part of both Shilou county government, forestry bureau, and village leader were key for the sustainment of SRP.

In short, SRP started from reforestation but grew to an enhanced capacity for broader participation and collaboration. These non-reforestation projects were platforms for outreach, trust building, and resource exchange among county government, forestry bureau, water resource bureau, education bureau and more. The outreach events brought potential collaboration opportunities, information exchange and attract more volunteers, donors, and patrons from different sectors.

Decentralized Leadership: Triadic Decision-Making

Han and Zhang worked beyond their appointed formal duties. They invested additional time and effort to build trust and created a friendly working environment for GACF. Official Han was the liaison and coordinator for most of the above-mentioned projects and events (e.g. meeting location, hotel arrangement, host) while village leader Zhang coordinated with villagers and hosted all annual visits including a researcher who conducted experiments for the reforestation. Through these events, the key actors demonstrate commitment and resourcefulness, which led to increased trust. The Shilou county government also demonstrated

226 their support for SRP through direct interactions with GACF members. One of the most common and customary ways to show support was through hosting simple public dinners during annual visits. These occasions served as a part of local business function, ritual, and as channel for local villagers and officials to engage with GACF. In short, key actors built personal relations and trust through the collaboration over the years. These informal events are one of the foundations of trustful relations among key actors.

The space for deliberation did not improve substantially overtime. The deliberation process was still fragmented and ad hoc in nature in the third phase. The lack of deliberation was the result of limiting financial resource and time, cultural difference, and the differing views on cost and benefits of reforestation. However, the village leader Zhang and officer Han built a trustful relationship with GACF through their leadership skills and enabled a trusting attitude towards villagers. Han was essential as a liaison for GACF and the Shilou county government.

GACF relied on Han and trusted him. In this case, village leader created an avenue for villagers and himself to participate in decision-making and take credits for the success of the collaboration.

Conclusion: Value-added Reforestation

As discussed earlier, SRP grew to broaden its impact on local community through education, public health services and public infrastructure investment. The Shilou county government built a small water tank in 2018 to improve water conservation capacity. The latest rental agreement was signed in 2019 with a villager renting out 8 mu of his farmland for

227 reforestation. The shared value has become clearer over time, and the key actors have been willing to do more than their fair share to make the collaboration successful. In 2019, GACF and villagers agreed to reforest another 3 ha of land using GACF’s method. Officer Han used to be responsible for acquiring seedlings but after 2018 GACF agreed to purchase seedlings directly from village leader Zhang. This was a sign of increased trust between villagers and GACF as the reforestation efforts transitioning into a new phase.

Officer Han was promoted to the County civil affairs bureau in 2013 and further promoted as the deputy director of the county organization department in 2017 due to his leadership skills while continued to work on the reforestation project. The rental agreement with the villagers will not end until 2036 and only then the forested land will return back to local villagers. For the time between now to 2036, GACF is ultimately in the driving seat as local villagers had not taken full ownership of the forest and do not have the resource to manage reforestation on their own.

6.6 Is the Shilou Reforestation Partnership an Example of Collaborative Governance?

This is a unique case study in rural China in which legitimate leaders shared their capacity to build trust, create public value and sustain the collaboration under extreme circumstances. Based on observations in rural China, SRP is also a rare case where village level participants were organized to respond and participate in collaboration. Without adequate knowledge on rural China, it would be easy to assume villagers’ agency in participation was weak or diminished. Nevertheless, the sustained participation of more than 28 village households

228 in SRP was not insignificant. Compared to the failed case in Lo Village, the shared capacity in

Shilou county demonstrated one way to overcome similar barriers to collaboration. The development of SRP collaboration described above shifted from a focus on technical issues, to management and social issues, to broader policy related concerns. SRP was a cross-sector collaboration (i.e. county government, village and the NGO) as all key actors relied on each other to achieve target goals and resolve conflicts. The collaborative process demonstrated a cycle of growing leadership by all key actors as they continued to work for their individual objectives. The organizational capacity grew to include more stakeholders such as the Shilou

County Water Resource Bureau as well as local villagers who did not directly participated in

SRP. The sustained interactions among key actors reflects both the active role of local government and the dynamics of rural communities.

The findings in SRP resonated with literature where key leaders and participants took initiative to absorb collaboration costs that may not be otherwise compensated, especially in the beginning of the collaboration (Ansell and Gash 2008). Officer Han took up responsibility as the manager and tied his job performance with the larger County wide governance and rural development goals. Village leader was an established leader who took initiative to advocate for the benefit of the villagers while working across boundary to ensure the success of the collaboration. GACF executive and its members also used their personal resources to network and increase the external legitimacy of SRP reforestation.

SRP also showed how individual rationalize their actions as part of a wider effort for rural development and their contribution to their local community. The case study is also a

229 product of the post-reform institution changes in which individuals and public entities bear the cost normally externalize in a society that have a well-defined institution structure. It is not common in rural China for county officials to invest time and energy into building relationship with an external NGO and actively participate in the development of the collaboration. Most local government may prefer “transaction” type collaboration that could bring in a larger sum of funding while reducing obligation and involvement in management and responsibility. Local governments may also prefer projects such as technology transfer and cash-crop agriculture.

Multiple leadership within the Shilou county and GACF appeared to be the initial driving force for SRP. Local reforestation knowledge and resources support throughout the collaborative process. Officer Han and village leader Zhang’s appointed role was not a limiting factor considering Han was office manager at the Shilou forestry bureau and Zhang was a village leader. The most important skill was the ability to work across boundaries. They showed commitment to constantly engage with people in different contexts, communicate with people from different professions, and act impartially and inclusive when making decisions to resolve problems. They also understand the importance of deliberation although the process is fragmented and ad hoc. Nevertheless, deliberation quality is good because deliberation did achieve its goal and was open towards the public. They were both present and active during annual visits and engaged constantly with GACG managers and volunteers. In short, they were driven by a vision beyond reforestation and appeared to saw the potential of further collaboration, learning, and exchange of resources.

230 Based on observation, the local officials in Shilou appeared to have a more collective commitment to address local socio-economic concerns. The horizontal relations among local officials show more signs of collaboration than competition. The local officials were interested in career advancement, but it seemed that promotion beyond county level is not their priority.

Officials leveraged horizontal relations with other officials to achieve their goals rather than act on their own. GACG recalled that the conditions in their two other reforestation sites in

Guangdong province were not as cooperative because they had to negotiate multiple times with local officials regarding tree management and water resource protection. The situation in Shilou was the opposite. The village leader was in charge of forest management and was actively lobbying to co-establish formal maintenance mechanisms to sustainably manage the forest. The county forestry bureau was in charge of tree-planting and actively sought to solve problems arose during the process. In short, as discussed in Chapter 4, the lack of financial, physical

(infrastructure), and human capital were barriers and consequential incentives for collaborative governance for Shilou county government. However, the collaborative leadership in Shilou showed that the government leaders understand these barriers and had the capacity to overcome them.

GACF does not focus on directly improve household level livelihood, which is the focus of many other NGOs that have a social service component. In this case, GACF relied heavily on local government and village leader to deliberate with villagers. However, this approach made sense when NGO want to avoid entanglement with local politics. Land ownership is the most important factor for reforestation in this case and for issues that involve land tenure. In short, two of the common reasons an NGO avoid working directly with the local government is the lack of

231 interdependence and potential bureaucratic interference. The relationship between NGO and local government could be of interest for future research and is discussed in Chapter 7.

In sum, SRP is a unique case of multi-level leadership and benefits for all. Through sharing capacity and trust building, participants gradually gained trust and legitimacy in the decision-making process. As a result, participation by key actors increased overtime and their concerns about reforestation and fair-share of benefits were addressed. This result can be contrasted with the failed case where local leaders were not able to overcome similar barriers.

The key actors participated beyond their official capacity and invested in trust building. The county government had a collaborative mind-set and the key actors were able to work across boundaries, which is a testament of skills under the relatively lack of trust between local government and villagers (see Chapter 4). Following this reasoning, in the next section, I identify specific factors effecting the success and the weakness of SRP.

6.7 Performance

To evaluate the SRP collaboration, I used the integrative approach that look at both process performance and output and outcome performance (Emerson and Nabatchi 2015). To delineate different levels of concerns, I examine the performance from the perspective of individual participants (i.e. key actors), the SRP collaboration as a whole, and target goals.

Process performance is defined as: ‘the level of functioning of collaboration dynamics that emerges from the combined interactions of principled engagement, shared motivation, and the

232 capacity for joint action’. Collaboration productivity performance is defined as: ‘the actions (or outputs) of the Collaborative Governance Regime and the resulting outcomes.

Table 6.11 Evaluation of the case of Shilou using process and productivity (outcome) from the perspective of the case as a whole, and respective key actors. Process Productivity The Case of Key leaders reduced the cost of Successful reforestation, conflict mediation, Shilou sustaining the collaboration local public good provision overall through building trust and fostering shared motivation. Officer Han The NGO needed to be Target goal was achieved because there were educated on certain things. people carried out the work. I think GACF is satisfied with my work. Village It is an honorable project, but The reforestation benefits the landscape and leader without mutual understanding had substantial result. I get to know a lot of Zhang it is difficult to help them. people, but I also made a lot of effort. Villagers in my village have higher “suzhi” and are more civilized than other villages.

NGO They are highly cooperative, Successful reforestation with great survival members each of them is indispensable rate.

Process performance of the SRP collaboration is considered successful due to strong and cross-sector leadership that enable strong shared motivation among participants over time. As noted above, all four elements (mutual trust, mutual understanding, internal legitimacy, shared commitment) had grown stronger overtime and in each phase as key actors brought their concerns and respective objectives to the table (e.g. local public goods, reforestation, village development). They see the long-term benefits SRP could provide and their commitment re-

233 enforce each other’s commitment. As SRP output continued to develop, key actors invested more in the process and continued to exchange resources and information.

In this case, the driver Interdependence is especially critical for capacity for joint action.

Whether reforestation is the priority of the County government or not, management arrangements could not form without the cooperation of both local officials and villagers.

Principled Engagement is slightly weak in that identification of relevant information lack a formal communication channel that could be shared across sectors, which exposed the lack of institutional arrangements as a part of capacity for joint action in SRP. Nevertheless, multi-level leadership compensated for weak engagement (as conceptualized in the literature) as key actors were able to engage in open and inclusive discussion during annual visits. Strong shared motivation also helped mitigate the little time spent on deliberation.

From the perspective of individual participants and the respective organizations they represent, process performance of SRP is different. GACF considered local actors in Shilou government as highly responsive and active. When reflecting on forest management in the SRP collaborative, GACF executive Leo said that Shilou had less forest management issues compared to their work in Guangdong province because of better local government support from the very beginning. However, village leader Zhang and officer Han had less favorable assessment. The reason for this less pleasant experience with collaborative process could be traced back to the system context. The System Context showcased the role of legal framework (i.e. reforestation policies) and prior experiences (i.e. GACF’s failed effort in Lo village and local policy

234 implementation deficit) in shaping and constraining participants’ motivation and actions, which in turn led to the need for deliberation and examination of mutual understanding.

Village leader perceived his role as not merely a recipient and manager of the forest, but a public servant and entrepreneur. Because management and maintenance of individual village landholdings is not the responsibility of the government, a key fact that GACF did not understand until the third phase, village leader Zhang had to bear the cost and risk of forest management in the early phases. Reforestation policies implementation had provided a legal framework for local residents and officials that demarcate authority and responsibility. However, in the case of SRP, implementation responsibility was not clearly defined as both Officer Han and village leader Zhang demarcate their responsibilities internally and GACF did not participate in the process. It is likely that this is also one of the main reasons why GACF had to constantly negotiate with local officials in Guangdong province’s reforestation site since the local officials there also did not see management as their responsibility31.

Another important part of process performance is successful conflict resolution. During the initiation phase, all key actors played crucial roles to resolve technical problems despite the low level of deliberation. Mutual trust was built but deliberation was mostly one way. However, both Han and Zhang are experienced local leaders with ample knowledge on reforestation and rural governance. They utilized existing forestry resources and knowledge to support the

31 GACF executive Leo reasoned that the lack of commitment to forest management in Guangdong province is due to poor pay and benefits for government officials. However, there is no evidence that officials in Shilou get paid more than officials in other locality nor is there a way to find out if there were huge uneven distribution of resources in both localities, thus it is hard to treat lower pay as a cause.

235 implementation of GACF’s reforestation experiment and used leadership skills to resolve conflicts. Without their knowledge and collaboration skills, the reforestation project would have been much more chaotic, with much more uncertainty and challenges. They both reduced a significant amount of cost for SRP collaboration. Tom from GACF recalled what he learned from his experience in Wang and Shi village:

“Local village leader and support from local government are of vital importance for the success of the plantation. These two types of support are available in Shilou county: Mr Su, Han and village leader Zhang are the key people for the project. None of them were dispensable!

Deputy Chief of county Su’s support was very important. Without his support, officer Han would not be able to go all the way to help us. When villagers had complaint about us, we rely on Su to resolve the conflict. Without the support of the county government, township government, and villagers’ understanding and compliance, we would be in a much more difficult situation.”

(Interview, 2018).

As for Han, who had been promoted to one of the highest positions in the county bureaucracy, he considered his service met the demand of GACF and that GACF is satisfied with his work. Han and Zhang understood GACF’s theory of change using intensive reforestation practice to improve soil conservation and therefore provide water resource for agriculture development. However, GACF was less responsive to Zhang and Han’s concern about their role in maintaining “good relations” with local farmers. For village leader Zhang, it was frustrating that GACF “Didn’t ask why things were going well”. He stated:

236 “It would be ideal if we sat down and deliberate on a few agreements regarding management. It would be better if they asked about what went wrong or what went well. There was no discussion, thus it does not matter if you do well or do poorly. GACF did not fully understand the problem.” (Interview, 2018)

This meant that these very short visits from GACF did not result in deliberation that could address issues that concern Zhang. As an experienced local leader, Zhang envisioned a balanced approach to rural development that benefits his constituents. Despite all the challenges,

Zhang took away from this collaboration many positive things including the restored forested land, the experience participating in environmental organization’s outreach, the higher awareness of environmental quality among villagers (Interview with Zhang, 2018). In sum, all key actors shared an understanding of the social efficacy and the public values this collaboration created.

Productivity of the Case

This section starts from the evaluation of actions and outputs produced through SRP from the perspective of individual participants. The high tree survival rate in relatively short amount of time on drought-prone landscape is considered GACF’s main achievement. In 2014, GACF collaborated with a research group in Beijing to conduct scientific assessment of reforestation’s impact on soil and water quality. The soil quality at SRP’s reforestation site had improved compared to the trees planted by local government in the plantations nearby (Yu et al. 2018). At the same time, the researchers also raised questions about potential soil desiccation as informed by research in other massive reforested areas in semi-arid region on the Loess Plateau (Yu et al.

237 2018, Gao et al. 2014). Nevertheless, the scientific research is of great support to GACF’s reforestation practice. GACF’s continued expansion of reforestation areas was a result of successful environmental outcomes.

Compared to the failed case in Lo Village, village leader Zhang served as the main liaison between villagers and GACF and he made sure the benefits were fair (local norms of fairness) and distributed among participating villagers. Even though land rental agreement was not satisfactory among villagers, village leader, local officials and villagers found alternatives overtime to produce expected benefits. County government and villagers aim for water and road infrastructures that require legitimacy and financial capital to build. Through SRP collaboration, local actors gained legitimacy to participate in decision making process, albeit informally, and successfully lobbied for the output they desire. The county government and the villagers utilize their partnership with GACF and invest more in the village. Basic public infrastructure such as bridge, water storage system was built, scholarships were provided to local students and outreach was made every year. Moreover, from the perspective of rural communities, the NGO in general represent prestige and the notion of “progress” that is prevalent in the Chinese society. GACF members were driven by a sense of patriotic duty and a mission to support rural development and poverty alleviation. Shilou county was a place where resource was scarce, and access higher level leadership were not available. In this sense, GACF and the reforestation project represented an opportunity and alternative to the current development approach.

6.8 What Contributed or Hindered the Collaboration’s Productivity?

238 At the system context level, prior experience of NGO propelled them to seek collaboration with local government. RFFP and other forestry-related policy support the collaboration directly through access to seedlings and indirectly through providing legitimacy.

For example, Shilou county is located in one of the nationally designated fragile ecosystem protection zones because it is located along the yellow river. The legal frameworks also provided institutional support (forest certificate, subsidies, Shilou to become ‘ecology-county’), symbolic capital as reforestation is perceived as a positive activity for rural development. Cultural health manifest in terms of social cohesion and a relatively connected horizontal network within Shilou county, which appeared to support trust building, cross-bureau coordination, outreach and reduce conflict. Another policy framework impact is the accumulation of reforestation knowledge.

Reforestation is a national policy implemented throughout most of rural China. Therefore, tree- planting knowledge has been accumulated among local governments and rural areas for more than 20 years. This created a culture-rich environment that is favorable for GACF to work in because there is already existing local reforestation knowledge and resources to tap into without having to spend time searching for it. Moreover, policy frameworks (e.g. development and fiscal policies) led Shilou county to prioritize forestry as a development policy.

On the other hand, prior history of reforestation and more general policy implementation has created a norm of selective response to policy mandates from both villagers and local officials. While this has the potential to hinder collaborative productivity, in this case, Shilou county prioritize reforestation efforts, which greatly enhanced the success of collaboration and the agency and legitimacy of local officials to act on it. Again, leadership mitigated the potential negative impact of the legacy of policy implementation deficit.

239

Participants of SRP see the value of reforestation in different ways. GACF see reforestation as a foundation for farmers to cultivate the land sustainably and improve agriculture development without increase the cost of farming. The villagers see the forests as less than a conventional working landscape such as orchards but an asset with no immediate financial returns. The County Forestry bureau see reforestation as a collaborative opportunity with a prestigious charity organization as well as a support for local reforestation and poverty alleviation efforts. The reforestation output, namely, the forested landscape is visibly different than the rest of the rural landscape in Shilou county and all participants can see that.

Nevertheless, reforestation itself holds value in the age of globalization and China’s developmentalism (Johnson 1982), which were appreciated and recognized by all actors.

Prior history of conflict was an important factor influencing the trust level of GACF towards villagers. This indirectly lower GACF’s willingness to spend time and resource on consultation, deliberation, and planning with villagers. During a visit in 2009 to village Wang

(the failed case), GACF had difficulty engaging with local institution and politics, which is not easily understood by outsiders. The low level of deliberation in SRP reduces the productivity of this collaboration through low understanding of the villagers’ local needs. Based on observation during five visiting trips led by GACF between 2009 to 2018, the deliberation process with villagers’ representatives were ad hoc and unorganized. Effective communication and conflict resolution were a result of highly skilled leaders, Zhang and Han.

240 At the driver level, leadership played a critical role. GACF brings prestige and social capital into the collaboration. GACF help the local community access modernized scientific management and technology not easily accessible in this region. By constantly doing outreach with actors from distant places, GACF brings in both human and financial resources into the county including scientists, philanthropists, advocates and corporations. In 2010, the county government arranged for GACF to visit local orphanage and elderly care center that were in the process of construction. The county government was searching for potential funding and donation from GACF and their network to support the construction. As always, forestry official

Han was the one explaining local government’s suggestion and needs to GACF. Village leader

Zhang’s leadership skills created an inclusive platform that support villagers’ participation and legitimacy overtime. Local officials and villagers also recognized the endeavors made by GACF as commendable and admirable (GACF annual report 2015).

At the collaborative dynamics level, funding is a factor that hindered the collaboration’s productivity. Shilou County is a nationally designated poverty county, which meant Shilou government had long relied on national fiscal policy to support its expense. Although GACF provided funding for reforestation related operations, the money was not meant for subsidizing individual farmers directly but focused on labor and material expenses while controlling for project overhead expenses. They had limited available funds for maintenance as it was not

GACF’s priority. However, this arrangement exposed the important role of village leader as

Zhang had to balance different reforestation approaches while advocate for and allocate benefits for farmers.

241 The SRP case study illustrated the process of iterative cycling of collaborative dynamics and its relation to system context and drivers of collaboration. When compared to failed case and a less developed case in other regions of Shanxi province, this case showed that a supportive

County government and a socially cohesive local community could be very conducive to collaborative governance in the context of scarce resource. In other words, a fragmented community with low level of trust could hinder the development of collaborative governance.

Lastly, lack of alternatives for Shilou residents is a supportive reason for collaboration.

Located in remote mountainous area has increase the difficulty to access market and resources to modernize agriculture and less exposure to urbanization. Shilou county’s topography prevented the development of large-scale infrastructure-based agriculture and the use of machineries. Lack of alternatives could also be understood from the perspectives of being less able to attract business development opportunities due to geographical reasons.

GACF and the Shilou county government were not interested in or aware of the need to institutionalize this collaboration. The SRP collaboration was not registered on the record addition to outreach events and signing land rental contracts. Many of the forestry bureau officials that I interviewed stated that they did not learn about the collaboration until 2012. Mr.

Huo from the County Development and Reform committee commented on the SRP collaboration: “I don’t think there are any collaboration with outsider recorded in Shilou

County. Normally, it would be a company or corporation that registered under development portfolio, but we don’t have any of that right now. In the future, new investment in the county would all be documented.” (Interview 2018) As the Chinese state continue to increase oversight

242 over each sector of the government, future collaboration will face the need to increase their administrative cost.

The SRP collaboration had grew in organization size and broaden its network, which could further sustain the output and outcomes desired by each sector. Nevertheless, this case also raised the question of the interaction between leadership and principled engagement. With strong leadership from all sides, leadership does not necessary translate into better deliberation because the value of deliberation was not appreciated by all key actors. In the future, when more than two key actors who commit to the SRP collaboration were not able to participate, it could increase the need to deliberate again, as GACF had not change their approach to deliberation.

6.9 Conclusion

SRP is a case that represent a common collaboration challenge in rural poor areas of

China where local capacity and agency to participate is diminished and constrained by both the physical and institutional environment. SRP is also a case of cross-sector leadership sharing capacity and building trust to achieve collective goals. GACF was seeking support from local government to share risk and improve accountability. The organized response on the part of

Shilou county government demonstrated their awareness of the barriers to successful collaboration. The lack of structured interactions among key actors resulted in weak engagement process despite strong leadership. Prior failure to address issues was a significant barrier to build trust between GACF and local participants and manifested in the conflict between GACF’s concern about reforestation accountability and local institutional arrangement that relied on

243 village committee to manage tree maintenance. The evaluation of the case study show that key leaders agreed on the added-value of SRP in terms of increased social capital, successful reforestation outcome, and broadened impact in the local community. To connect SRP with findings from Chapter 4 and 5, I discuss the external and internal factors affecting the collaboration and the implications for theory, practice and research.

244 Chapter 7 General Discussion and Conclusion

7.1 Introduction

The findings from the case study showed collaborative governance characteristics that appeared to be specific to rural China and shared similar pattern with those observed in Western context. This chapter first use the Collaborative Governance Framework to analyze the case study and then respond to the three research questions listed in Chapter 2. The discussion focuses on both external and internal factors influencing collaborative governance regime and identify the key to overcome (or not) barriers produced by these factors. Finally, I examine my initial assumptions about how collaborative governance work in China, and summarize the implications for theory, research, and practice.

7.2 Case Analysis: Sharing Capacity through Collaboration and Trust

The case study demonstrated the importance of multilevel leadership in sustaining the collaboration and addressing emerging concerns. The external institutional environment and resource conditions played a critical role in influencing local decision-making to participate in the collaboration. Responses from local officials showed that remote agricultural-based county may be more likely to invest in reforestation. However, this context was not a sufficient motivation for participating in collaborative governance as the cost of active participation was high, as illustrated in the previous chapter. Nevertheless, prior failure and struggle to address issues in other GACF’s reforestation sites was resolved more effectively in this case study due to

245 trust among key actors and cross-sector leadership that support each other. The outcome was an enhanced capacity to bring about more actions and an added value reforestation that is shared by stakeholders. In sum, the case study illustrated how legitimate local leaders overcome these barriers through commitment, trust building and sharing capacity to help generate shared motivation and mediate conflict among stakeholders. In the next few sections, I discussed key findings from the dissertation using the Collaborative Governance Framework and how these results answered the three research questions described in Chapter 2.

7.2.1 Leadership, Sharing Capacity and Trust Building

The third research question is “How does collaborative governance work (or not) in rural

China, and why?” The case study in Shilou county demonstrated that success and sustainment of collaborative governance hinged on cross-sector leadership. The Shilou county government responded to the opportunity for collaborative governance with dedication and pro-active participation, as noted by the GACF executive. The county government appointed Han from the forestry bureau and Su from the county government specifically to support and implement the reforestation and decentralized power and decision-making capacity towards them. Village leader Zhang was in charge of village and land affairs but was not officially part of the county bureaucracy. These three key actors were part of an organized response by the county government, a new governance structure that share responsibility and capacity to implement the project. Due to the uncertainty and interdependence involved in initiating the collaboration and its subsequent development, the communication and deliberation occurred mainly among the three key actors and formed a stable triadic decision-making process. Although the interaction

246 between officer Han and village leader Zhange appeared to be less intense than those with GACF executive. This governance approach corresponds with literature’s finding that long term collaborations may depend more on consistent sponsors and champions who are embedded within different levels of the public bureaucracy (Agranoff 2012).

Shilou county government recognized the complexity and difficulties involved in reforestation implementation. In other words, they recognized the interdependence among different levels and bureaus within the county and the need for coordination. However, they also recognized the importance of institution flexibility, especially when working with an NGO like

GACF that located far away from the reforestation site and had relatively higher cultural differences. An organized response in the beginning from the Shilou county government was an important step to engender stakeholder trust. As the collaboration moved towards the second phase, the capacity of local leaders was crucial to balance between formal accountability and adapting to emerging issues that might require more time and resource. Village leader Zhang was the designated representative of the participating villagers and participated in the capacity of a legitimate leader. Village leader’s presence greatly reduced villagers’ likeliness to exit from the collaboration in the first and second phase. As illustrated in Chapter 6, key local actors shared their respective capacity to demonstrate early reforestation success to cultivate trust with both

GACF members and participating villagers. This shared motivation to make reforestation successful was key to initial trust building. In turn, trust enabled more exchange of information and values beyond individual’s knowledge based on existing institutions and re-enforced trust during the process (Thomson and Perry 2006).

247 This case study showed how key leaders re-enforce each other through commitment and taking actions to address emerging internal and external challenges and compensated for limited time for deliberation during the annul visits. The outcomes of these actions were the greater joint capacity to address more challenging issues including tree maintenance. All key actors were able to communicate in an honest and forthright manner, an important skill in a cross-cultural and resource-scarce context. However, great leadership skills were not enough to sustain the collaboration when the principled engagement process undermine participants capacity to achieve mutual understanding. In the next section, the challenge to address emerged issues is discussed.

7.2.2 Local Institution, Adaptation and Deliberation

The second research questions is “How do local officials respond to reforestation policies, and why?” In Chapter 5, the context and challenges of reforestation in Shanxi province and Shilou county show that local officials responded differently to these policies based on local ecology, available resources, and their own experiences implementing the policy. Poor policy implementation process such as lack of consulting, proper site selection, and monitoring has led to general lower participation by villagers. These local adaptations (or the lack of) to achieve policy goals constitute the external institutional environment of the collaboration. As described in Chapter 6, the communication and deliberation process were decentralized to the three key actors to provide institutional flexibility for the collaboration. While trust-building within the collaborative governance regime was successful, external challenges gradually become an important barrier for collaboration. Local institution, in other words, how local community and

248 the government implement reforestation policy, is a product of both local ecology and management capacity. The collaboration in Shilou is embedded within this institution environment because the nature of the reforestation is inseparable from the local social ecological system.

The County governments in poorer, rural areas tend to pursue economic development by concentrating investment and resources in the more developed and urbanized townships due to the fiscal constraints discussed earlier (Newland 2016, Rogers 2014). In particular, rural county governments in poorer rural areas were more likely to focus their development strategy on the

Returning Farmland to Forestry Program (Zhang 2013). The findings in Shilou county supported this observation. The gap between policy and implementation was also observed in Shilou county as seen from the lack of maintenance on the part of both forestry bureau and village committees. In Shilou, the lack of resources and funding in village committee and a consistent monitoring system on the part of local government was two observed reasons contributing to low level of maintenance and enforcement, which often leads to poor tree growth or no growth at all on bare lands.

Local officials appeared to rely on leveraging both personal and public resources to achieve their policy goals when operating in a resource-scarce context like Shilou, In Chapter 5, forestry and township officials varied in their ability to leverage resource to enforce grazing ban.

Some relied more on higher level authorities to provide support with various level of success; some coordinated within township level governing bodies to develop their own local adaptation

(e.g. withhold subsides from RFFP as penalty). This decentralized approach to policy

249 implementation could result in uneven enforcement. Similarly, in SRP, both officer Han and village leader Zhang had high autonomy to achieve their respective goal and they both leveraged their personal resources and authorities to support and co-manage the collaboration. In short, in the context of scarce-resource, interdependence appeared to be a more important driver for collaborative governance.

Since the beginning of the SRP, there was neither formal nor informal institutional arrangement for principled engagement. Despite initial collective learning through discovery, definition and deliberation, a joint agreement other than land rental and tree-planting contract was not produced. The two-tiered process of deliberation among key actors and among village leader and villagers was not the problem. The lack of structured interaction among key actors was the issue. Despite mutual trust, tree maintenance issue was not addressed and was mostly left to village leader and villagers. This situation reflects a similar pattern in the broader external institutional environment in which both the county forestry bureau and village committee lack personnel and resources to monitor and enforce the reforestation program.

The principled engagement process lacked adaptation over time. Shared motivation and capacity for joint action in this case study were strong in the beginning but both did not induce enough mutual understanding to generate action to support the engagement process. This may be a specific challenge to collaboration in rural China, where the norm of deliberation is relatively weak and sometimes hindered by a general lack of trust among state (government) and non-state

(villagers) actors. Guo (2014) pointed out the key role played by local learning agents in inducing institutional change in the context of exchange of international and cross-sectors norms.

250 In this case, local key actors (Han and Zhang) applied their skills to induce collective learning but this was not sufficient because GACF did not perceive a need for structured interaction that may support learning. Th SRP needed to adapt to address emergent problems such as rent negotiation and tree maintenance, which were both deliberated in an extremely informal way during annual visits. As a result, proper actions needed to address them were delayed.

The barrier to collaboration was resolved because of the trusting relations between key actors, supporting multilevel leadership, and village leader’s ability to deliberate in trying circumstances. Nevertheless, the tree maintenance issue could have been resolved earlier to minimize costs bore on other stakeholders.

7.2.3 Learning as Consequential Incentive

The first research question is “how do state-society relations affect collaborative governance?” This question could be answered in two ways. One is to understand how individuals relate themselves to the development goals of the national government. The second is to understand how the lack of a clear space between state and society influence individual’s behavior in the context of policy implementation and collaboration process. GACF represent an element of the development process that is not easily accessible in this region. GACF brought a different management approach (see Table 6.6), resources and social capital to the Shilou

Reforestation Partnership. GACF did not support rural development directly through subsidy or compensation for individual villagers like the Returning Farmland to Forest Program, which appeared to reduce participation incentive for villagers. Villagers benefited directly from SRP

251 through rent and hired labor and indirectly through the ownership of a value-added reforestation outcome shared by county government and GACF. Specifically, the success of this collaboration in terms of reforestation and partnership with the Shilou government allowed the collaboration to generate more impact including the synergy of social capital and the resources that can be leveraged through cross-sector collaboration. In this sense, county government, villagers, and

GACF indirectly participated in a larger development process of building a “Ecological

Civilization” and rural development. Each participant may interpret the development goals differently based on their position within the socio-environmental system and therefore relate to the SRP differently. In Chapter 6, I described reforestation policies as a system context level institutional framework that provided legitimacy for both the Shilou county government and the

SRP. The legitimacy coming from reforestation policies served as one of the ways the national government influence lower level governments and the nonprofit sector.

The challenge of addressing accountability during the second and third phase of SRP can be seen as a result of the lack of a well-defined civil society and public sphere. The semi-private and semi-public nature of public institutions can make clarifying individual and shared responsibilities difficult. This semi-public nature may also affect how individuals define and perceive what public values and interests means to them. The implicit imperative of development also contributed to the internalization of public sector goals into private initiatives.

In the case study, GACF’s reforestation project constitutes less than 0.01 % of the forested area Shilou forestry bureau currently managed. Gaining funding for reforestation was not the goal of Shilou county government because this collaboration was an experiment that

252 could result in failure. In the case of reforestation failure, GACF may terminate the collaboration. As demonstrated in Chapter 6, the method GACF proposed to plant trees has higher per unit cost and requires more time and labor. Despite the growing awareness at the national level to promote “eco-poverty alleviation” and forestry in general, this collaboration may serve as the starting point for more advanced endeavors in modernizing rural development.

In this sense, an important motivation to participate in this collaboration on the part of the Shilou government is to learn from and participate in GACF’s mission in a substantive way. It is reasonable to conclude that the Shilou county officials saw the possibility of generating opportunities for different forms of outcomes that aligned with key actors’ understanding of rural development through the collaboration.

Reforestation is a form of development imperative in China. According to interviews with Shilou forestry officials, reforestation is not only a target fulfilment exercise but a way to contribute to nation-building. In line with GACF’s mission to support rural development through reforestation, the development imperative fostered a shared motivation that help sustain and enhanced the capacity for joint action. For example, both Wen and Zhang learned and contributed to tree planting and maintenance through adjusting tree-planting density and attaining local resources for soil amendment. In sum, from the perspective of Shilou county officials, in addition to an outgrowth of social capital, learning to do things in a new way is part of the outcome of this collaboration.

Due to the absence of a developed civic society in China, GACF also represent a learning experience for local participating officials on the ways a non-governmental organization operate.

253 It is easy to assume that this collaboration serves as another example of what Teets (2013) called the new model of state-society relationship called “consultative authoritarianism”. As discussed in Chapter 2 about state-society relations, I do not treat China as a country as simply authoritarian and caution against these sweeping generalizations. Collaborative governance provides a framework to examine state-society relations in a more in-depth way to understand the context of specific interactions between state-actors and non-state actors. The assumption that the state is distant from society and that state equals national government is misleading.

Many scholars (Tilt 2004) had raised the importance of treating the state as multi-level actors in different levels of the Chinese government. In this dissertation, I follow McVeigh (1998)’s approach to see the state as the actions, policies, and processes that the state entities, such as the local government, do to citizens.

Finally, according to Zhang, villagers in his village were more civilized than others within the county because they did not cut off the trees and cooperate to implement tree maintenance. This sentiment reflects how Zhang, and probably many local officials, relate themselves to development and the national government’s goal of building an Eco-civilization.

Participating in collaborative governance, in this sense, is motivated by the desire to improve environmental sustainability and livelihood improvement in the context of modernization, despite different views on the cost and benefits of reforestation. This section concludes my analysis and I reflect on the important elements within the collaborative governance framework when applied to this case study in the next section.

7.3 Re-examine previous assumptions

254

In Chapter 3, I elaborated on my initial assumptions about what element within the collaborative governance framework could be key to sustaining collaboration in rural China.

Deliberation, knowledge and trust were the three elements I assumed would re-enforce each other to build a strong collaboration. The findings suggested that all three were important but not sufficient. Leadership, institutional arrangement, and internal legitimacy were three other critical components that emerged, sustained, weakened, and strengthened the collaboration. Institutional arrangement in the form of government designated sponsors was important for building trust and commitment with GACF, who preferred a more structured support from local government. The lack of institutional arrangement for principled engagement, however, created barriers for collaboration and resulted in economic and social capital cost.

My assumption about the role of deliberation was correct in that leadership capacity itself was not enough to overcome barriers when the collaboration faced more complex challenges emerged along the process. Deliberation was not valued by GACF in this case study, which resulted in delayed actions. On the other hand, my assumption about leadership was wrong because of how much more important it was in the formation and sustainment of the collaboration than I previously expected. The reason why leadership was important can be traced to the lack of trust between stakeholders before the initiation of the SRP and the complex institutional environment faced by local actors. To apply the lessons learned from the case study,

I discuss implications for both scholars and practitioners in the next section.

7.4 Implications for theory, research and practice

255

This case study demonstrated the importance of cross-sector leadership in sharing capacity in a resource scarce context. The local key leaders understand the importance of building trust and successfully established long term working and personal relationships with

GACF members. Although this case illustrated a rare combination of cross-sector leadership between county government, village level leadership, and a Hong Kong based NGO, the case nevertheless demonstrated the actions, practices, and strategies needed to support and sustain collaborative governance. In short, an initial organizational capacity in Shilou county government turned into a more horizontal relations and enhanced capacity among key actors over time. Village level capacity, in this case, is strong. In this case study, the strength of village level capacity increased over time and help achieve a village level organized capacity to participate in decision-making in a collaborative setting. Based on observation, the level of village capacity may also depend on local social coherence. Social coherence is not simply community socio-economic characteristics but more closely related to network theory (Provan and Lemaire, 2012). For collaborative governance to work, social coherence represents formal and informal relations between local government and villagers. Based on observations in rural

Shanxi province, sharing capacity, power and credit between participants may not be an easy task, especially between the government actors and villagers. In short, village level participation capacity may be an important component in collaborative governance in rural China.

Local officials are another key component for collaborative governance. The ability to coordinate within the county bureaucracy is important but so is the ability to work with outsiders.

Researcher (Newland 2016) had called attention to study how county level officials leveraged

256 resources to achieve development goals and improve policy implementation. For collaborative governance, there may be a great need to assess what kind of skills is needed for leadership in collaboration context. This case study had demonstrated one type of collaborative mindset embodied by officer Wen. His ability to build trust with outsiders, be impartial, analytical skills, and follow-through should not be taken for granted. As the Chinese government continued to shift towards a “service-oriented” government, local officials need to increase their capacity to work with villagers in a less top-down approach, which is not an easy task under the pressure to reach targets.

A greater focus on how to utilize local available capacity at different levels of the government can generate benefits shown in the case study, which include 1) improved quality of reforestation in terms of both survival rate and maintenance; 2) increased social capital with potential to increase resilience towards future social-environmental challenges; 3) increased legitimacy of all participating actors, especially for both local government and villagers; 4) increased learning and capacity among key actors; 5) improved accountability among all participating actors because of the re-enforcement of mutual understanding and commitment.

These above-mentioned outcomes are consistent with research on the design and implementation of collaborative governance (Bryson, Crosby and Stone 2015).

In the future, further research could focus on collecting data on participating farmers’ attitude and perception on the collaboration as it has changed over time. The second future research direction is the cultivation of potential village and other level leaders because the village leader Zhang passed away in 2019. The key actors in this case study have remained the same

257 since 2005 and they may not be able to contribute to the collaboration in the long term. Prior to

2019, both Han and Zhang still voluntarily work on the collaboration despite transitioned from their previous appointed positions. Officer Han had been promoted from the forestry bureau to county organization department in 2017 while Zhang had retired from the village committee in

2012. This situation represents an opportunity and challenge for the remaining key actors to develop strategies to cultivate future leaders. Thirdly, future research could focus on mapping how the forestry administrative system from the top ministry level to the township level function and coordinate with other government sectors, bureaus and villages. As this study had identified in Chapter 5, the lack of scientific consensus on the end goal of current reforestation programs on the Loess Plateau can affect the sustainability of reforestation outcomes in the public and private sector. An understanding of the forestry management system could help us identify the strengths and weaknesses in the current public management environment and support lower level forestry bureaus adapt to the increase need for coordination and collaboration with other government authorities and to achieve their mission.

Although key leaders were key to successful collaboration, as indicated in previous section about local institution and adaptation, there appeared to be a challenge to form a structured interaction among key actors. Collaborative governance is inherently challenging because of the need to remain flexible while coordinating across sectors. However, structured interaction is not impossible and is necessary to sustain collaboration. In this case of reforestation, budgeting time to determine simple agreement on forest maintenance can help induce collective learning on local institution and increase local participation. Understanding forest maintenance could help generate the momentum to set up a shared accountability system

258 to track progress of reforestation. This may require additional time and resources but can help build an example for future reforestation as the issue of maintenance is not an isolated challenge in Shilou county. The long-term success of collaboration can enhance the outcome and generate larger impact. Paying attention to the principled engagement process can increase the value of the outcome, address issues in a timely fashion, and avoid cost. In sum, establishing a structured communication channel could help reduce conflict and support deliberation; having a shared accountability system among sectors to track progress could help sustain cross-sector collaboration.

Finally, collaborative governance in rural China faced significant challenges due to the broader institutional constraints. For example, the lack of basic public infrastructure such as bridge, paved road, education and public health resources appeared to be of major concern for both the Shilou county government and villagers. Collaborative governance in this case provided an opportunity to address these issues but is limited in terms of its long-term capacity to benefit the wider rural communities. Policy changes and implementation such as poverty alleviation and subsidy provision also affected how local officials and villagers work with each other and the incentives to participate in collaborative governance and sharing resources. To provide a supportive and enabling environment for meaningful participation in governance by different actors, institutional changes such as a more qualitative approach to reach targets and quotas can improve policy outcomes and may reduce cost in terms of time and money.

7.5 Conclusion

259 Collaborative governance appeared different in forms and dynamics in rural China due to the system context, drivers, and the participation capacity of key actors. The way people exercise agency to participate in collaboration may appear differently and in different forms over time.

Institutional flexibility is important but structured support is also key to sustain long term collaboration. The findings of this dissertation indicate that the success and sustainment of the collaborative governance in Shilou hinged on cross-sector leadership. Through sharing capacity between different levels of the government and key leaders’ ability to build trust, participants gradually gained trust and legitimacy in the decision-making process. As a result, the capacity for joint action increased and participants’ concerns and conflict were addressed in an effective way. However, because of the lack of structured interactions among key actors, actions and adaptation to address emergent problems were delayed, causing the less powerful stakeholders to bear more cost in the process. Local key actors’ willingness and ability to induce collective learning were crucial for sustaining interactions and enabling institutional change. Nevertheless, the most significant challenge for the collaboration comes from the external institution environment, which key actors have little control over. The case study shows that collaborative governance opened up a shared space for cross-sector communication, sharing risk and resources, which allowed local legitimate leaders to apply their skills to generate larger impact.

The analysis also suggests that local actors’ desire to learn and work with an NGO with a mission to support rural development is a consequential incentive itself. Finally, in a resource- scarce context, interdependence is an important driver for collaborative governance.

This dissertation highlights the importance of cross-sector leadership, trust building, and the local institutions in sustaining collaborative governance in a resource scarce context. In

260 conclusion, one of the critical ways to improve societies’ resilience is to cultivate the capacity of cross-sector collaborative governance.

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