Showing papers in "China: An International Journal in 2010"

China's Health Diplomacy in Africa

Abstract: How does health fit into a country's diplomatic strategies? While traditionally relegated to the realm of humanitarian outreach, states are increasingly willing to use support for healthcare as an important element in their diplomatic arsenal. This represents a significant change in how governments conceptualise health. Health is moving from being auxiliary or an afterthought to a more central location. Governments seek to use health diplomacy to extend both their hard and soft power. This shift towards emphasising health diplomacy is perhaps most striking when we evaluate the burgeoning relationship between the People's Republic of China and Africa. China's support for African healthcare systems has ebbed and flowed over the past 50 years, but it has come to assume a prominent place just as the government has sought to increase its political influence, economic footprint and access to natural resources throughout the continent. Providing healthcare resources not only helps China gain favourable trading terms and access to necessary resources, but also supports the government's attempts to portray itself as a good international citizen. It is this combination of hard and soft power--economic and ideological benefits--that marks a significant change in China's health diplomacy strategies. Defining Health Diplomacy Health diplomacy is not necessarily a new concept, but its use and application have shifted in recent years. Historically, health diplomacy focused on international collaboration to protect human and commercial interests against the spread of particular infectious diseases. It was less of a tool of encouraging closer relations among nations and more of a way to prevent commercial interruptions. The mere threat of bubonic plague or cholera was enough to close ports or impose quarantine measures, both of which impeded the exchange of goods and people. In 1851, diplomats and physicians from 11 European countries met in Paris at the first International Sanitary Conference. They sought to create a uniform quarantine policy that would simultaneously prevent any interruptions of trade. This first conference failed to produce any agreements due to disagreements over disease etiology, but it did help set the stage for future international health diplomacy efforts. (1) Over the next 50 years, an additional ten international sanitary conferences took place and eventually led to the creation of international standards for quarantine and disease control measures. (2) In its more contemporary usage, health diplomacy is "political activity that meets the dual goals of improving health while maintaining and strengthening international relations". (3) Others have described it as "mechanisms to manage the health risks that spill into and out of every country". (4) This approach moves beyond an explicit focus on particular illnesses and instead accentuates how various manifestations of ill health can have negative consequences for the international community. For example, the World Health Organization's Commission on Macroeconomics and Health calls on donor states to increase their foreign aid budgets to 0.7 per cent of gross national product, strengthen the effectiveness of international health programmes like the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria, and ensure that the poor in developing countries have access to necessary pharmaceuticals. Doing so, the Commission argued, will stimulate economic growth in developing countries. (5) Health, in this way, is viewed as a tool for promoting economic growth instead of being merely an economic impediment. It becomes a crucial component of broad-based economic and social development, integrated into larger strategies. China, Africa, and Health Diplomacy in History Modern Chinese diplomatic involvement in Africa goes back to the 1950s. During these initial interactions, China sought to frame its relationships with African governments and anti-colonial movements as a counterweight to the perceived hegemonies of both the United States and the Soviet Union. …

Environmental Issues and Policy Priorities in China: A Content Analysis of Government Documents

Abstract: Not all environmental issues get the same level of policy attention because of the limited capacity of the political and administrative system to consider all issues simultaneously. This article explores the priority attached to different environmental issues in China through a content analysis of 1,564 government documents during the 1999 to 2008 period. The analysis focuses on four issues, namely pollution types, high-polluting industrial sectors, environmental policy instruments and the implementation of international environmental treaties. The empirical results provide useful insights into changing policy priorities in the area of environmental protection so as to gain a better understanding of the roles of environmental regulation in China.

The Impact of China's Market Reforms on the Health of Chinese Citizens: Examining Two Puzzles

Abstract: China's post-1978 market reforms were accompanied by a drastic decline in the coverage of the Chinese population by medical insurance as well as by sharp increases in charges for medical treatments, tests, and prescriptions. Since the 1990s, these trends have produced widespread condemnation of the current Chinese medical care system for being too costly and unequal. This article attempts to answer two questions: 1) Why did changes in the healthcare system precipitated by market reforms not lead to the kind of deterioration in the health of Chinese citizens that market reforms produced in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union? 2) In view of the increased inequalities in access to, and insurance coverage for, medical care since 1978, and particularly the growing rural-urban gap, why do Chinese villagers and migrants rate their current health better than do urban citizens?

Facts About and Impacts of FDI on China and the World Economy

Abstract: This paper provides a comprehensive review of foreign direct investment in China over the last three decades. It reviews the growth, sources and distribution of FDI in China and analyses factors determining FDI inflows. It summarises the contributions of FDI to the Chinese economy in terms of economic growth, total factor productivity, exports and technology progress. Finally, the paper discusses potential impacts of FDI in China on the rest of the world in terms of FDI-competing countries and FDI source countries.

"To Walk Out": Rural Parents' Views on Education

Abstract: Each time that I boarded the second of two public long-distance buses that I took to my research site, I noticed how few seats were left unoccupied. The bus filled quickly with individuals and families carrying and transporting supplies and food from the city back to their villages. Overflowing sacks of clothes, cases of alcohol and other household goods were stowed in the overhead baskets, seats and on people's laps. As the bus meandered along the road, passing small squat buildings and giving way to open land, fellow bus riders asked me where I was going. When I told them that I was going to Shao Xingwen Primary School (SXW), my fellow bus riders would ask if I was a teacher. I would explain that I was not a teacher, but a researcher interested in understanding rural family life and children's schooling. They could not understand my interest in rural life. My fellow bus riders were not the only ones bewildered by my interest in interviewing and studying the life of rural residents; most of my participants, teachers, and county officials often raised the same questions. I usually responded by saying that we know a lot about urban residents, but do not know that much about the lives of rural residents. My answers, however, never seemed to be satisfactory. Rural residents told me that urban families would not only have more to say than rural families, but were more worthy of study. Rural parents found it odd that I choose to live in a rural area when they felt that most rural residents simply wanted to leave rural life for an urban lifestyle. "To Walk Out" During one of my first chats with Mr Zhan, the district education leader, he told me that rural parents have one thought, and that is to have their children "walk out" of the rural areas. Mr Zhan explained to me that after the agricultural production brigades were dissolved, many rural parents participated in basic agricultural training. (1) He believed that this training stimulated parental interest in learning and encouraged parents to have high educational expectations for their children to exit the rural areas. (2) Mr Zhan's words resonated with findings from other studies in rural China, where parents desire social mobility for their children. (3) Past studies have found that rural parents hope their children will leave the countryside (4) and that education will help improve their children's future by helping them secure employment outside of the village. (5) In this paper, using qualitative in-depth interviews and participant observation of rural parents in one rural community, I explore the relationship between rural parents' views on education and their desire for their children "to walk out" (zou chu qu) of rural areas and to go to more developed areas (cities). I draw on Fong's cultural model of modernisation to understand how rural parents understand the role of education for their children's future within China's recent economic, cultural, and social changes. (6) I found that rural parents have developed their own model of modernisation that includes highly valuing education for their children's future, reflecting rural parents' internalisation of China's current modernisation efforts including policy discourse, along with their own life experiences. Rural residents considered their own quality of life lacking compared to what they believed was the good quality of life of urban residents. They explained to me that rural conditions were less developed and that their work and living conditions were "bitter" (ku). (7) The rural parents with whom I worked did not want their children to "eat bitterness" (chi ku) and they viewed getting an education and living in the cities as not only signs of success, but necessary for survival. Rural parents often invoked the adage of "hoping one's child becomes a dragon or phoenix" (8) (wang zi cheng long/ wang nu cheng feng) when they spoke of their reasons for supporting their children's education. …

Health Reform and De Facto Federalism in China

Abstract: Understanding China as a de facto federalism can generate explanations and recommendations concerning the path of China's health reform. The first section reviews how de facto federalism drove the historical development of the problems plaguing China's health system. The next section shows how certain features of the current reform plan, namely, the plan's ambivalence between government and market approaches and its lack of strong centralisation, can be explained by de facto federalism. The third section uses the hypothesis of de facto federalism to generate two courses of action — one cautionary; the other, aspirational — that could be considered for the future. The consequences for the health sector of under-articulated federalism are clarified and point to the need for discursive reasoned elaboration, as opposed to political bargaining alone, in federalism.

Population Policy and Eugenic Theory: Implications of China's Ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

Abstract: The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) is the first new human rights treaty of the 21st century. China was an early supporter of the CRPD and became East Asia's first State Party in 2008. This article discusses how the CRPD protects the rights of persons with disabilities to life, marriage and procreation, and analyses China's population policy, which continues to reflect eugenic theories. As China did not file any reservations, it is now obligated to reform laws and policies that conflict with the CRPD.

Turning Points in China's AIDS Response

Abstract: China's AIDS response has evolved from one of denial and inaction to an aggressive and humanitarian policy based on international best practices. This article analyzes the events both internal and external that led to the policy shifts, highlighting key turning points in attitudes and action. A combination of domestic advocacy, international pressure, changing epidemic dynamics and fall-out from the SARS epidemic coaxed the government to greater transparency and deliberate action on prevention and treatment. However, a number of important challenges remain which will influence the ultimate success of China's much improved AIDS response.

From Decentralised Developmental State Towards Authoritarian Regulatory State: A Case Study on Drug Safety Regulation in China

Abstract: This paper attempts to answer three questions about the contemporary Chinese drug safety regulation system: why did the Chinese government reform its drug safety monitoring system and build a regulatory regime at the end of the 1990s? What obstacles will it face? What unique characteristics does it possess? Was it the collapse of the Interest Community of Government, Enterprise and Shiye Unit (ICGES) that fostered the rise of the regulatory regime in contemporary China's drug safety monitoring field? Three major structural obstacles threaten the building of a high-quality regulatory regime: problematic regulatory independence caused by decentralised developmentalism, an administration-reliant regulatory style and rent-seeking corruption brought about by the authoritarian political system. The author is inclined to characterise the current Chinese drug safety regulatory regime as an "authoritarian regulatory state" and argues that Chinese drug safety regulatory regime-building is still a work in progress.

A Chinese Way of Democratisation

Abstract: Democracy is regarded as a worthy value by most Chinese people including the top leadership, yet in the last two decades, it seems that no progress has been made towards a democratic China. (1) The majority of Chinese people seem content with the current regime. Defying the predictions of social and political theorists, the Communist Party of China (CPC) has not withered away, but instead has become more sophisticated in its management of the country. (2) Indeed, there is a trend both within and outside China that attributes China's phenomenal economic growth to the authoritarian nature of its government. (3) Compared with a democratic government, it is believed that an authoritarian government is able to mobilise large amounts of resources to tackle the most urgent bottlenecks of growth. Why has open demand for democratisation not accompanied economic development in China? Is China indeed creating an enduring form of authoritarianism that beats the conventional logic of political transformation? This article will attempt to provide answers to both questions. The answer to the first question has a lot to do with the CPC's growth-centred strategy adopted at the end of the 1970s when economic reforms began. With sustained economic growth and auxiliary expansion of civil liberties, this strategy has largely worked to divert people's demand for democracy. Along the way, the Party has transformed itself from a proletarian party to a party without a real political conviction, which substantially enlarges its political bases by attracting the newly emerged middle class and business elites. Recent literature also frequently cites these factors as causes for the delay of democratisation in China. (4) In particular, McNally and Wright emphasise the role played by the political "thick embeddedness" of private capital holders--that is, the strong and encompassing alliance between private capital holders and the current political regime--as an important cause for delayed democratisation in China. (5) In a similar vein, Dickson believes that the current Chinese political regime would survive in the form of "crony communism". (6) While we do not dispute the facts used by these writers to formulate their propositions, we interpret the move of the business elites as an incidental consequence of the CPC's ideological transformation to enlarge its political bases. In essence, the CPC still wants to maintain its disinterestedness vis-a-vis the society, that is, not to affiliate with any social group either by political conviction or by policy favours. The emergence of strong business elites is a natural development in a political system that lacks popular participation. The answer to the second question is likely to be a "no". The authoritarian elements of the government are distorting the economy and aggravating China's structural imbalance problems among which declining shares of residential income and high inflationary pressures are causing popular discontent. On the other hand, people have more freedom to develop diverse objectives. The political atmosphere has become more accommodating and the society more assertive. More significant but quieter changes are happening within the establishment. Many functions of the Party and the government have been institutionalised. These developments may not establish full democracy, but have laid solid social and political foundations for it. That is to say, economic progress is bringing political changes to China, albeit at a gradual and incremental pace. The next section discusses the formation of the CPC's growth-centred strategy and how it led to the expansion of civil liberty and deferred the demand for democratisation. This is followed by an exploration of the forces brought about by the growth-centred strategy that have put China on the path towards democratisation, and an explanation of China's path to democratisation from an international perspective. Why is Popular Demand for Democratisation Low in China? …

Dilemmas of Access to Healthcare in China

Abstract: Introduction China's compliance with international standards pertaining to human rights in health warrants particular attention, not only because of the global implications of China's handling of health issues such as SARS, HIV and avian flu, but also because of the effects on the well-being of the Chinese people. China has committed itself to compliance with international human rights standards on the right to the "highest attainable standard of physical and mental health". (1) Yet China's performance conflicted with factors largely unrelated to the normative consensus underlying human rights to health. Instead, questions of Institutional Capacity loom large in assessments of the potential for successful reforms in public access to healthcare. China's public health system has long been presented as a model for developing economies. While the "barefoot doctor" model of the Maoist period was heavily mythologised, the PRC did succeed in bringing basic levels of healthcare to an unprecedented number of people. However, the modernisation policies of the 1980s and the attendant social and political consequences of income disparities, declining public budgets and official corruption eroded significantly the standards of public healthcare. (2) Obstacles to public access to healthcare continue, born of market policies and accompanying costs of medicines, equipment and treatment. (3) The HIV and SARS crises revealed in stark detail the extent to which policies and practices on public health remain subject to imperatives of political expediency and suggest that the fundamental human right to health remains compromised. (4) Government efforts in the areas of health education and the prevention, reporting and treatment of disease involve individual members of society not merely as passive recipients of the exercise of government authority but as active stewards of their own physical well-being. Yet such involvement--as well as collaboration between public and private sectors--has been obstructed by abuses such as government censorship of information on public health conditions, (5) corruption (6) and popular stigmatisation of disease. (7) These dilemmas reflect the depth of operational challenges facing China's current effort to reform its healthcare delivery systems. China's capacity to remedy these problems will dictate to a significant extent the success of recent health policy reforms. China's New Health Care Reform Plan China's State Council passed a landmark Health Care Reform Plan in January 2009. This was the culmination of a policy process begun in 2006 that included extensive interagency consultation as well as public discussion. (8) The Plan builds on efforts to expand the system of rural cooperative medical service units begun in 2002 and expanded in 2003 following the SARS outbreak. Following a report by the State Council Development Research Centre in 2005 that criticised health sector reforms and noted the increase of patient contributions to medical fees from 20 per cent in 1978 to 52 per cent in 2005, the State Council established a joint working committee to draft a new health reform plan. Statistics from the Ministry of Health show that personal spending on medical services doubled from 21.2 per cent in 1980 to 45.2 per cent in 2007, while government funding dropped to 20.3 per cent from 36.2 per cent in 1980. (9) The healthcare plan is aimed in part at providing state subsidies for personal medical expenses. Comprehensive medical insurance was enacted for urban residents in 2007, and the rural cooperative system was expanded continuously between 2006 and 2008. In the fall of 2008, the draft Health Care Reform Plan was released for public debate. The plan was endorsed by the State Council in January 2009 (10) and taken up in Premier Wen Jiabao's Government Work Report to the Second Session of the 11th NPC in March. (11) The Plan was published for implementation in April. …

The Effects of China's Tourism Diplomacy and a "United Front"

Abstract: China's rapid economic development and improvement in living standards have led to a boom in its outbound tourism industry. In 2008, China's outbound tourism expenditure reached USD36.2 billion, ranking fifth in the world. Under the impact of the global economic crisis, outbound tourism is not only a source of revenue to other countries, but also a type of "gift" by China's leaders when they go abroad on official visits. While China is home to an enormous tourist market with high consumption potential, its authoritarian regime and state-owned travel agency have enabled it to exert control over the flow of outbound tourists. These two measures of control have become China's bargaining chip in diplomacy and the work of a "united front". Between 2008 and 2009, China put a damper on outbound travel to Macau and Kaohsiung, Taiwan, validating that its control over outbound tourism is both an economic boost and a threat to other countries.

Family Members' Informed Consent to Medical Treatment for Competent Patients in China

Abstract: Introduction Informed consent to medical treatment is premised upon the ethical principle of personal autonomy. (1) Although the notion of informed consent originated from Western liberal culture, it has gradually become a popular doctrine adopted by many countries of the world, and China is no exception. (2) Chinese law not only established the rule of consent to medical treatment as early as 1982, but has also widely incorporated the rule of informed consent since the new century. (3) However, as the notion of informed consent was imported from the West into China, three questions are worthy of consideration. First, is there any difference between the Chinese rules of informed consent to medical treatment and its dominant theory accepted in Western society? Second, what is the rationale for the difference? Third, can the difference be justified given the value of informed consent in promoting patient autonomy? According to the prevailing theory and practice of informed consent in Western jurisdictions, a competent patient has an absolute right to make his own medical decisions and his family members have no right to interfere. However, the most prominent difference between Chinese laws of informed consent and Western ones is that although a patient is fully competent to make medical decisions, his family members have the right to make medical decisions on his behalf under Chinese law. It is even widely agreed in practice that family members' informed consent to medical treatment on behalf of a competent patient is more important than the patient's own. (4) This article opens with a review of the development of the Chinese regulations relevant to the family members' consent since the early 1980s. The next sections briefly describe the current practice regarding family members' consent and analyse the three main arguments of the proponents for the requirement of family members' consent. Part Four explores the real reasons underlying such a requirement and Part Five discusses its negative impact on patient rights. The conclusion provides a proposal for abandoning the requirement of family members' informed consent to medical treatment for competent patients, thus promoting full patient autonomy. Regulations Regarding Family Members' Consent The first piece of the national enactments pertinent to consent to medical treatment is Yiyuan gongzuo zhidu (the Working System of Hospitals) made by the Ministry of Health in 1982. (5) According to Rule 6 of the collateral rules titled Shixing shoushu de jixiang guize (the Rules of Performing Operation) set forth in Section 40 of the Working System of Hospitals, written consent with the signature of a family member or danwei (6) (work unit) of the patient, either competent or incompetent, is a prerequisite for surgery. 12 years later, the State Council promulgated Yiliao jigou guanli tiaoli (Regulations on Administration of Health Care Institutions) in 1994. Its Section 33 introduces the rule of "dual consent", namely, both the patient and his family member (7) or Guanxiren (the Related Party) (8) shall grant written consent with signature prior to medical intervention. When it is impossible to obtain the patient's decision, his family member or the related party's written consent with signature will be sufficient. In 1998, the Standing Committee of National People's Congress released Zhiyeyishi fa (the Practising Physicians Law), introducing the rule of "optional consent" under Section 26. It provides that physicians shall honestly disclose to a patient or his family member all the information about the disease unless the disclosure may have a negative influence upon the patient's health. In addition, experimental clinical treatment shall be performed only with the approval of the hospital and the consent of patients or their family members. It is worth noting that the Practicing Physicians Law expressly applies the requirement of optional consent to experimental clinical treatment, and keeps silent about whether this requirement is also applicable to non-experimental medical treatment. …

Market and Migrants: Redefining China's Urban Social Welfare System

Abstract: China's reforms left many redundant workers with no social guarantees. At the same time, with the "push-and-pull" of market forces, rural populations are moving in bulk to urban areas where they are devoid of state benefits but use urban amenities. When the traditional social protection is breaking down and the market is taking command, new contradictions are arising over the distribution of state resources, making a workable social support structure desirable. This paper analyses how social welfare benefits are distributed among urban and rural populations in the urban centres, what changes have taken place with the introduction of a market economy and the nature of evolving welfare programmes in China.

Administrative Monopoly, Market Economy and Social Justice: An Anatomy of the Taxi Monopoly in Beijing

Abstract: This article attempts to address the problem of administrative monopoly through a case study of the taxi monopoly in Beijing. The case reflects the conflict between building a market economy and working within the constraints of the old institutions, revealing that the biggest obstacle in contemporary China for building a market economy comes from administrative power or government interference with market operation. Only when administrative monopoly is eliminated will anti-monopoly actions against other monopolistic behaviour be justified and meaningful. A management model for resolving the Beijing taxi monopoly is proposed.

Two Chinese Commentators on the Slow Progress towards a Law on Religions

Abstract: 2010: The Legal Context In 1956, Liu Shaoqi, then President of China, said in his report to the National Congress of the Communist Party of China that the establishment of a complete legal system had become an absolute necessity. (1) But priorities quickly changed for the Party, and establishing a legal system was soon openly criticised by Premier Zhou Enlai. The work of establishing a legal system was not begun until after the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. But it was not until more recent times that Jiang Zemin promised that China would have a complete legal system by 2010. (2) In March this year, the Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, Wu Bangguo, promised that the work would be complete in 2010. (3) However, even the basic framework is unlikely to be in place by the end of 2010, much less a fully complete legal system. This is particularly evident in the area of law relating to religion. In any country, it would be difficult to prepare and pass appropriate comprehensive laws, but in China, there are special difficulties which will be examined in this short paper. Part of this effort to establish a legal system has been the movement towards a more constitutional form of government. A key step was the establishment of the Legislation Law in 2000. (4) According to the Legislation Law, future laws would be enacted according to a standardised process, and past laws would be brought into conformity with the Legislation Law. This process requires a hierarchy of laws: at the peak is the Constitution, then the laws passed by the National People's Congress, and under the authority of those laws, there is provision for national administrative regulations, and below these, local regulations. The State Council Information Office published a White Paper on 28 February 2008 entitled China's Efforts and Achievements in Promoting the Rule of Law. (5) The White Paper, composed of eight chapters and six appendices, "describes the Chinese people's protracted and unremitting struggles for democracy, freedom, equality and the building of a country under the rule of law". The document is well worth reading, for the insight it gives into the categories and assumptions of the Party in establishing legislation. Who should legislate for religion? The White Paper provides that: In accordance with the Legislation Law of the People's Republic of China, laws on the following affairs must be made exclusively by the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee: affairs involving state sovereignty, the formation, organisation as well as the functions and powers of state organs, the system of regional ethnic autonomy, the system of special administrative regions, the system of self-government of people at the grassroots level, criminal offences and their punishment, deprivation of citizens' political rights, mandatory measures and penalties involving restriction of the freedom of the person, expropriation of non-state-owned property, basic civil system, basic economic system and basic systems of finance, taxation, customs, banking and foreign trade, and systems of litigation and arbitration. But the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee have yet to legislate for the important question of religion, and to regulate the functions and powers of the state organs which control religion. This failure will be explained below. The White Paper also points to the Constitution as the legal safeguard of freedom of religious belief: The Constitution stipulates that citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of religious belief. No state organ, public organisation or individual may compel citizens to believe in or not believe in any religion; nor may they discriminate against citizens who believe in or do not believe in any religion. The state protects normal religious activities. …

Alternative Property Systems for China

Abstract: When Deng Xiaoping took over the leadership of the People's Republic of China in 1980, he changed the course of the nation. He replaced Mao Zedong's emphasis on equality with an emphasis on profits. Deng's favourite slogans included: "to get rich is glorious", "some will get rich before others" and "whatever makes profits is good for China". Deng, and the leaders who have followed Deng, have progressively moved China from a socialist system towards a capitalist system. During the post-Mao years, progressively longer leases have been offered to those who use land. However, as of June 2010, China had not completely embraced a capitalist property system. The current property system in China is complicated by the two categories used under Mao: a) the government "owned" the property of all state-owned enterprises (SOEs, most of urban China fits under this type of ownership); and b) the people in the Maoist communes (not the government) owned the property used by the communes. This is further complicated by the pockets of communal land in the midst of cities. When Deng changed the course of China, the government could legitimately sell the property of the SOEs. However, it could not legitimately sell the property of the communes. However, as the communes disintegrated, most local governments have redistributed the property of the communes in order to free up plots to sell or to handle demographic changes. By 1998, approximately 66 per cent of villages had experienced at least one redistribution of their farmland, and 25 per cent had experienced three or more redistributions. (1) Under current law, farmers cannot directly sell their land for non-farming purposes. However, local governments can forcefully take the land of farmers, paying the farmers a price based on the value of the crops they raised on that land in recent years (with an adjustment for the buildings on the land), and then the local government can sell that land to developers for a huge profit or to industries that will pay future taxes. This practice has lead to major unrest. Furthermore, between 1999 and 2002, more than half a million corruption cases were filed based on land takings and 3,800 government officials were placed under formal investigation. The national government of China passed the 2003 Rural Land Contracting Law (RLCL) in an attempt to restrict the taking of lands. (2) One recent study found that the selling of land taken from farmers was the single biggest source of revenue for village governments, comprising approximately 37 per cent of their total revenue. (3) Thus complicating China's land problem is the fact that many village governments are financially dependent on buying relatively cheap farmland and subsequently selling it for much higher prices (or for relatively low prices to industries that will pay future taxes). In the long run, however, this system cannot be maintained because there will come a time when the village governments cannot take any more land without making the remaining farms too small to be economically viable. The national leadership of China realises that to produce a harmonious society, this conflict between local governments and the users of local lands must be solved. Many western economists are encouraging China to give complete western-style property rights to agricultural lands. Theodore Panayotou summarises the major reason as follows: Property rights are a precondition for efficient use, trade, investment, conservation, and management of resources [such as land]. No one would economise on, pay for, invest in, or conserve a resource without an assurance that he has secure and exclusive rights over it, that he can recover his costs through use, lease, or sale, and that such rights will be enforced. (4) Klaus Deininger and Songqing Jin add: A legal system that protects contracts and property rights encourages investment and ensures effective use of scarce economic resources . …