https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5549-7021
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Abstract
In this paper I conduct a comparative analysis of three Chinese experiments with participatory budgeting (PB), a democratic innovation that has circulated worldwide. Relying on a renewed typology of political representation and ethnographic fieldwork combined with official data collection in Chengdu, Sichuan and Wenling, Zhejiang over seven years, it investigates the expansion and practice of PB and analyzes the relationship between participation and representation. It asserts that in the Chinese context PB cannot be simply reduced to empowering civil society against established representatives or becoming an instrument of legitimization for established elites. In the three investigated cases—which are not representative of Chinese local politics—PB does contribute to opening the decision-making process to formerly excluded participants, who are nonetheless not exactly ordinary citizens but rather local elites and “super residents” bridging the gap between established elites and residents.
Acknowledgments
Special thanks are due to Virginie Dutoya and Stéphanie Tawa Lama Rewal for their special contribution to the genesis of this article. I would also like to thank the blind reviewers, Anna Shpakovskaïa, Thomas Heberer and Yu Jianxing for their insightful and constructive remarks.
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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Frakt, “Mao’s concept of representation”; Manion, Information for Autocrats; Heberer and Shpakovskaya, “The Digital Turn in Political Representation”; Frenkiel and Shpakovskaya, “The Evolution of Representative Claim-making.”
2 Sintomer et al. Participatory budgeting in Europe; Sintomer et al. Participatory budgeting worldwide.
3 Baiocchi and Ganuza “Participatory Budgeting as If Emancipation Mattered”; Shah, “Participatory Budgeting.”
4 Avritzer, “New Public Spheres in Brazil”; Baiocchi, Militants and Citizen; Santos, “Participatory Budgeting in Porto Alegre.”; Wampler, A Guide to Participatory Budgeting; Wampler, Participatory Budgeting in Brazil; See note 2 above.
5 Sintomer et al., “Participatory Budgeting in Europe.”; He, “Civic Engagement Through Participatory.”
6 Avritzer, The two faces of institutional innovation; Baiocchi & Ganuza, “Participatory Budgeting as if Emancipation Mattered”; Cabannes & Lipietz, "Revisiting the Democratic Promise of participatory"; Wampler, "Participatory Budgeting.”
7 Houtzager & Gurza Lavalle, "Participatory Governance and the Challenge.”
8 Fischer, "Participatory Governance,”18; Bherer et al., "The Promise for Democratic Deepening"; Baiocchi and Ganuza, “Participatory Budgeting as if Emancipation Mattered.”
9 Frenkiel & Tawa Lama Rewal, “The Redistribution of Representation.”
10 Frenkiel & Tawa Lama Rewal.
11 Pitkin, The Concept of Representation, 209.
12 Sintomer, “The Meaning of Representation.”
13 Bourdieu, Language et Pouvoir Symbolique; Gaxie, Le cens caché; Sintomer, “The Meaning of Representation,” in reference to Manin, Le gouvernement représentatif.
14 Madison, Federalist 10.
15 Sieyès, Dire de l’Abbé Sieyès.
16 Saward, “The Representative Claim.”
17 Saward, “The Representative Claim”; Disch, ‘‘Toward A Mobilization Conception.”
18 Nasstrom, “Where is the Representative Turn Going?” 507.
19 Mu and Chen, “Democratic Consultation”; Li, “The Xinhe Experiment and a Glimpse”; Fishkin et al., “Deliberative Democracy in an Unlikely Place”; He, “Civic Engagement through Participatory Budgeting”; He and Thogersen, “Giving the People a Voice?”; He, “Deliberative Participatory Budgeting” and Ye, “No Money, no Representation.”
20 Ming, “Participatory Budgeting, Rural Public Services and Pilot Local Democracy Reform.”
21 Li, “The Development of Participatory Budgeting”; He, “Participatory Budgeting in China”; Yan and Xin, “Participatory Policy-Making Under Authoritarianism”; Ma, “The Dilemma of Developing Financial Accountability.”
22 Ma, “The Dilemma of Developing Financial Accountability without Election.”
23 Cai and Yuan, “Promoting the Openness of Village Affairs”; Feng, “Reflection on the Openness of Village Account.”
24 Organic laws of 1987 and 1998 define the organization of village committees of 3 to 7 members elected according to universal suffrage every three years. The local congress and the electoral committee are the two other compulsory village institutions.
25 Li, “Zhongguo canyushi yusuan”; Han, He and Yang, "Making Democracy Practicable in China"; Yan and Xin, “Participatory policy-making under authoritarianism”
26 Li, “The Development of Participatory Budgeting”.
27 Gao, “Democratic Consultation Gathered People,” 30.
28 Document No 35, 12 June 2001.
29 Sun, Contemporary Chinese Democratic Consultation, 118
30 The first open budget discussion took place in Wenqiao township in 2003 and Songmen township also opened its government budget in 2005. These kentanhui have been from then on irregular and manipulated by local governments, who rejected their binding nature. Lei, China’s governance model.
31 Deliberative polling consists in recruiting a scientific random sample of the public and providing them with a first questionnaire and balanced briefing materials. On the day of face-to-face deliberation, participants engage in small and large group sessions to deliberate over policy alternatives, after which they are provided with a final questionnaire, which allows to identify informed public opinion on complex issues through discussion. Currently, there are more than 100 deliberative polling exercises in 28 countries. Fishkin et al., “Deliberative Democracy in an Unlikely Place.”
32 He, “Participatory Budgeting in China.”
33 He, “Deliberative Participatory Budgeting.”
34 Ye, “No Money, no Representation.”
35 Zeguo’s land revenue is high thanks to its developed economy and resulting prosperous land markets (land transfers and rentals).
36 Fewsmith, “Taizhou Area Explores Ways.”
37 Our investigation is under process and in this paper we only focus on village councils.
38 At the prefectural level, the Chengdu Coordinated Urban-Rural Development Commission (CCURDC) is charged with coordinating the planning and development efforts of the prefecture, district, and county-level city commissions and bureaus dealing with urban planning, land management, urban and rural construction, agricultural development, transportation, water, environmental protection, human resources, health, education, and finance. These, in turn, coordinate planning at the town, village, street, office, and community levels.
39 For instance, in 2011, peri-urban areas received 70% of the Chengdu’s total fiscal expenditures, while the nearby suburbs and the inner city respectively received 20% and 10% (Ye et al 2013). Resources are distributed according to a differentiated tier system. In first-tier (wealthy) areas, projects are funded by the local government. In second-tier areas like Pengzhou, the Chengdu government funds 50% and the local government pays the rest while in third-tier areas, Chengdu funds 70% of the total bill.
40 This amount has increased every year. It amounted to 47,500USD in 2011 and 50,000USD (with a maximum of 85,000USD) in 2012 (See note 20 above). More recently, allocated budgets have hovered between 400,000RMB and 800,000RMB (58,500USD-115,000USD).
41 See note 20 above. It is all the more significant as the rural per capita annual disposable income in Chengdu still amounted to 18,605RMB (2,715USD) in 2016.
42 Cabannes and Ming, “Participatory Budgeting at Scale.”
43 The United Front work department is a CCP agency created during the civil war and reestablished under Deng Xiaoping which is in charge of managing relations with the non-Communist Party elite (including the eight minor parties, individuals and organizations holding social, commercial, or academic influence, or who represent important interest groups) both inside and outside China. Its role is currently being redefined but there are still branches at all administrative levels to guarantee CCP oversight over groups that are not directly associated with the Party and government.
44 For the sake of brevity, the modus operandi of cunmin yishihui (village meetings) only is described. The council procedure supposedly now also applies to jumin yishihui as well. Besides, since the PB is based on Chengdu prefecture funding given to villagers to bridge the gap with urbanites and since budget issues differ considerably and are likely more controlled by cadres in much wealthier urban communities, the practice must diverge from the village one and needs further investigation.
45 While local officials tend to put forward the improvement of the ‘quality’ (suzhi) of participants, scholars like He Baogang highlight the questioning of the deliberative polling process and the gradual limitations to ordinary citizen participation. He, “Deliberative participatory budgeting”
46 See note 33 above .
47 Fewsmith, The Logics and Limits of Political Reform.
48 Given the current national trend for the Party to decide for everything, further institutionalization now seems hardly plausible.
49 Collins and Chan, “State Capacity Building in China.”
50 All sections of society are supposed to be consulted on major issues before and during policy-making processes. Consultative democracy has held greater sway since 2012 to justify the Party’s (traditional) claim to represent the whole of the Chinese people. To represent such a diverse and large population, which the Party started to officially recognize with Jiang Zemin’s theory of “the three represents,” it must not only organize consultation of the eight authorized non-communist parties (especially thanks to institutions such as the United Front), diverse political, economic, academic elites but also the common people (laobaixing or qunzhong, the masses). Frenkiel and Shpakovskaya, “The Evolution of Representative Claim-Making.”
51 Interview with Party cadres conducted in Wenling in 2014.
52 In Nanchang, Jiangxi province and Haikou, Hainan province, the participation of all residents is on the contrary actively sought.
53 Interview with local cadre, Chengdu, July 2016.
54 See note 7 above.
55 Manin, Principles of Representative Government.
56 The handpicking of skilled and cooperative residents in neighbourhood committtees is also described in Read, Roots of the state.
57 See note 12 above.
58 Ming, "Large-scale participatory budgeting in Chengdu"
59 See note 33 above.
60 Arnstein, “A Ladder of Citizen Participation.”
61 Arendt, The human condition; Arendt, On revolution; Habermas, The structural transformation of the public sphere; Habermas, Between Facts and Norms; Carl Cassegard "Contestation and bracketing"
62 See note 9 above
63 See note 33 above
64 Dickson "Cooptation and corporatism in China"; Zhuang Meixi, “Social Accountability under Authoritarianism”
65 In January 2020, I could however observe that elite migrants had been invited to take part in the discussions and formed the first small group, which was the only group deliberating in Mandarin and not in the local dialect. Their remarks and conclusions were also shared during the plenary session.
66 Village committees are elected and have executive power to handle village affairs. In places like Chengdu where the village council, also translated as « village representative assembly » is institutionalized and regularly convened, oversight and horizontal accountability of elected village leaders improve significantly.
67 Lily Tsai Accountability without Democracy; O’Brien and Han “Path to Democracy?”; Read, Roots of the State.
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Emilie Frenkiel
Emilie Frenkiel is an Associate Professor in Political Science at Université Paris-Est Creteil, France. She is the author of Conditional Democracy, the Intellectual Debate on Political Reform in China, 2015, ECPR press. Her research interests include political representation, deliberation, political reform and participatory innovations in China. She is a member of the editorial board of social science journals La Vie des Idées and Books & Ideas.