A Service of Leibniz-Informationszentrum econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible. zbw for Economics Grünberg, Nis Doctoral Thesis The Party-state Order: Essays on China’s Political Organization and Political Economic Institutions PhD Series, No. 3.2018 Provided in Cooperation with: Copenhagen Business School (CBS) Suggested Citation: Grünberg, Nis (2018) : The Party-state Order: Essays on China’s Political Organization and Political Economic Institutions, PhD Series, No. 3.2018, ISBN 9788793579538, Copenhagen Business School (CBS), Frederiksberg, http://hdl.handle.net/10398/9596 This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/209052 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes. 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Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, If the documents have been made available under an Open gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ www.econstor.eu COPENHAGEN BUSINESS SCHOOL AND POLITICAL ECONOMIC INSTITUTIONS POLITICAL ORGANIZATION ON CHINA’S ORDER: ESSAYS THE PARTY-STATE KILEVEJ 14A, K.3.50 DK-2000 FREDERIKSBERG DANMARK WWW.CBS.DK ISSN 0906-6934 Print ISBN: 978-87-93579-52-1 Online ISBN: 978-87-93579-53-8 Nis Grünberg THE PARTY-STATE ORDER ESSAYS ON CHINA’S POLITICAL ORGANIZATION AND PO- LITICAL ECONOMIC INSTITUTIONS PhD School in Economics and Management PhD Series 03.2018 PhD Series 0 3 -2018 The Party-state order: Essays on China’s political organization and political economic institutions Nis Grünberg Supervisors: Kjeld Erik Brødsgaard Sarah Eaton PhD School in Economics and Management Copenhagen Business School and Sino-Danish-Center THE PARTY-STATE ORDER: EssaysNis Grünberg on China’s political organization and political economic institutions 1st edition 2018 PhD Series 04.2018 © Nis Grünberg ISSN 0906-6934 Print ISBN: 978-87-93579-52-1 Online ISBN: 978-87-93579-53-8 The PhD School in Economics and Management is an interdisciplinary research environment at Copenhagen Business School for PhD students working on theoretical and empirical themes related to the organisation and management of private, public and voluntary organizations. All rights reserved. No parts of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. For my grandfather, who taught me to ask questions Foreword: Needless to say, this project has been possible only because of the help, advice, and guidance of many people. It has been a real privilege to be allowed to dig into a subject for such an extended period of time, and with the support of many people and the resources offered by CBS and SDC. Many people have served as inspiration, as teachers, as guides, and many have given advice and tips without knowing. The most important ones, however, deserve credit here. First and foremost, Kjeld Erik Brødsgaard has been central for making this project possible, and his patient advice and inclusive style of guidance can hardly be over-appreciated. Jørgen Delman deserves my thanks for stirring my interest in Chinese politics, and opening my mind to the possibilities of a life in academia. Along the way, countless discussions with colleagues and friends have helped me develop my ideas. Among these, the many discussions and teaching sessions with Andreas Møller Mulvad have been a constant and inspiring source of theoretical insights, as well as one of my most important testing grounds for the development of arguments and concepts. The (too few) discussions and exchanges with Wendy Leutert and her inquisitive and well-structured mind have been a great inspiration, and a reminder to the importance of being thorough and attentive to details. I have also gained from the constructive advice from Sarah Eaton, Nis Høyrup and Ari Kokko, among many others. I thank my family for the unquestioned support of the odd and enigmatic life I chose (i.e. academia). My two brothers and sister for sharing their youth (and wine) with me. A big Cheers to my many good old friends, Müller, Janus, Christian, Iona, Elisabeth, Camilla, Jakob, Bjørn, Mau and all the others, who have put up with my coming and going for years now, always leaving the door open once “I’m back from China”. They are, after all, the reason I come back at all. Axi deserves special thanks for helping me through a dark time. I am very grateful for the support and daily collegiality at the Asia Research Centre and INT: Li Xin, Louise Lyngfeld Gorm Hansen, Kristina Kazuhara, Carsten Boyer Thøgersen, and all those who have part of the fruitful discussions, lunch table speculations on 3Chinese politics, and not least the always friendly atmosphere at ARC. SDC has been not only a financial support, but has also become a place for intellectual development and colleagues, and I am very grateful to be part of the ambitious project. Here, Lars Bo Kaspersen, has been an important source of inspiration, but also Duncan Wigan and Antje Vetterlein are to be thanked for integrating me in the SDC activities. Susanne Faurholdt, Pia Lyndgaard and Bente Ramovic need to be thanked, they have had a vital role in making this project float administratively. Finally, I am grateful for the financial support of The East Asiatic Company Foundation, Otto Mønsteds Fond, and the Sino-Danish Center. 4 Abstract: The present dissertation is a compilation of three individual papers, and an introduction chapter. While the introduction lays out the theoretic backdrop of the project as a whole, the papers represent interventions into three specific dimensions of China’s Party-state order: structural organizational issues, decision-making institutions, and political economic dynamics. These three dimensions are presented as aspects of the same political organizational order, a Party-state order assembled around the hegemony of the Communist Party of China’s (CPC), conceptualized in the introduction using a Gramsci-inspired theory of the state. Employing a historical institutional approach, the three papers engage with specific strands of literatures of China Studies in a conceptual and theoretic manner, while also contributing with empirical findings. They discuss the concept of Fragmented Authoritarianism (FA), the organization and institutionalization of Leading Small Groups, and the social embeddedness of state-owned enterprise (SOE). FA has been an influential concept to explain structural issues of China’s bureaucracy, and with China’s energy administration as example, I review its value as a theoretic notion today, 30 years after its inception. Discussing the growing importance of Leading Small Groups, the second paper addresses some of the institutional “fixes” to decision- making and policy coordination, which have evolved in response to structural fault-lines described in the FA paper. The third paper takes the dissertation into the political economic dimension of the Party-state order, providing a case study of how China National Petroleum Corporation, a central, state-owned and CPC led SOE, is organizationally rooted in its local operations, remaining institutionally embedded in local society through its legacy as a socialist work unit (danwei). Using Polanyi’s concept of embeddedness, the paper reveals how SOEs are split into two tiers each tasked with the respective objectives of economic development and political stability, and thus as Party-state organizations are used to flexibly support CPC hegemony. 5 6 Table of Contents: p. 3 Foreword p. 5 Abstract p. 7 Table of Contents p. 8 Abbreviations p. 9 Introduction: Conceptualizing China as Party-state order p. 50 Paper 1: Revisiting Fragmented Authoritarianism in China’s Central Energy Administration p. 80 Paper 2: The Rise of “Leading Small Group Governance”: Evidence of Fragmentation or Source of Resilience? p. 107 Paper 3: Learning From Daqing – Again: The Local Embeddedness of a National Champion p. 164 Concluding Remarks 7 Abbreviations: CNPC: China National Petroleum Corporation CNOOC: China National Offshore Oil Corporatino CPC: Communist Party of China DPA: Daqing Petroleum Administration FA: Fragmented Authoritarianism LSG: Leading Small Group LSGCDR: Leading Small Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reform MoE: Ministry of Energy MoF: Ministry of Finance NEA: National Energy Administration NEC: National Energy Commission NDRC: National Development and Reform Commission SASAC: State-owned Asset Supervision and Administration Commission SC: State Council SDPC: State Development and Planning Commission SERC: State Electricity Regulatory Commission SETC: