The China Program at Shorenstein APARC had the privilege of hosting Jude Blanchette, the Freeman Chair in China Studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies​ (CSIS). The program, entitled "What’s ‘Communist’ about the Communist Party of China?," explored the goals and ideology of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as well as what they might mean for the future of China in the global community. Professor Jean Oi, William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics and director of the APARC China Program, moderated the event.

After the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, the goals of the CCP became less clear. As the country began to adopt market reforms in the 1980s and 1990s, CCP theorists were forced into contortions providing ideological justifications for policies that appeared overtly capitalist. Deng Xiaoping’s concept of “Socialism with Chinese characteristics” came to be seen as a theoretical fig leaf rather than a description of an egalitarian economic system, and by the 2000s, a consensus emerged that the CCP had completely abandoned any pretense of pursuing the Marxist vision it purported to hold. With the rise of Xi Jinping, however, the Party talks with renewed vigor about Marxism-Leninism and the goal of achieving actual, existing socialism. Has the CCP re-discovered communism?  In his talk, Blanchette discussed the abandoned and existing legacies of Mao Zedong, Marxism-Leninism, and the CCP’s vision of socialism. Watch now: 

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Introducing the new book, Lawrence H. Summers, president emeritus of Harvard University and the Charles W. Eliot University Professor at the Kennedy School, called the co-authors’ analysis of collaborative governance “micro microeconomics” that shows how particular tasks and particular commitments of resources, once decided on, are going to be best accomplished. This work, Summers noted, sheds light on situations involving both cooperation and competition — aspects that affect almost any complex problem yet are rarely considered by economists.

A key element of collaborative governance, noted Zeckhauser, is the sharing of discretion. Rather than contracting at one pole and complete laissez-faire at the opposite pole, in a collaborative governance process, the two parties involved play a role in determining what is produced and how it is produced. It is a process that calls on the best capabilities of both the private and public sectors and that grants each of them an element of control. Sometimes that process results in triumphs, sometimes in tragedies, and other times in outcomes that are “in-between.” The book analyses cases of this entire gamut. “We hope that this volume provides guidance on how the triumphs can become more common, the tragedies more scarce, and the in-between outcomes improved,” said Zeckhauser.

Collaborative Governance in the Time of COVID-19

The unfolding of the COVID-19 pandemic provides dramatic current illustrations of collaborative governance. The urgent need for an effective vaccine created the conditions for a successful partnership between the U.S. government and the pharmaceutical sector, with the former offering both regulatory processes and significant financing, the latter its innovation. Consider the Moderna vaccine, which, based on evidence from clinical trials, is over 90% effective at preventing laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 illness. The vaccine was created within less than a year using a new approach, based on Messenger RNA technology, by a company that had never before produced a commercial product. “This is a triumph of collaborative governance,” said Zeckhauser.

The vaccine distribution process in the United States, however, has proved to be challenging and chaotic. Zeckhauser contrasted this experience with China’s activation of technology giant Tencent, which is using its ubiquitous WeChat application to allow individuals to easily find where the vaccine is distributed and sign up for vaccination appointments. “There is probably a lesson here in the way these two outcomes came about. We hope that individuals in both China and the United States will examine the lessons in this volume to see how they can achieve outcomes for their citizens that produce public benefits more effectively.”

A Spectrum of Policy Domains

The book details how China and the United States grapple with the complexity of producing the goods and services they need to meet a broad array of public goals. Eggleston surveyed the five broad policy domains she and her co-authors examine in the book through detailed historical legacies and case studies of the application of collaborative governance in both countries.

These domains include the railroads that build the nation historically in both countries and China’s high-speed rail network; real estate's intricate tangle of public and private partnerships; hosting the Olympic Games and the experience of the public and private sectors in that endeavor in both countries; education provision; and state and market in population health and health care in both countries. The book spotlights the different ways in which both countries produce public goods and services in these broad policy domains.

East and West

Professor Yijia Jing of Fudan University, an expert on privatization, governance, and collaborative service delivery, participated in the discussion with the book co-authors and shared insights on public-private relationships in China. Collaborative governance in the country, he said, has undergone a gradual process of institutionalization. He observed that Chinese local governments apply different strategies in collaborating with private companies. For example, local governments like Guangdong and Shanghai partner in different ways with digital giants Tencent and Alibaba to build up their digital capacities — collaborations through which they have been learning how to balance their multiple roles as partners, policymakers, and market regulators.

Jing noted that China uses collaborative governance not only in domestic arenas but also in areas of international development, through entities such as the BRICS Development Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. China is also promoting collaborative governance as part of its Belt and Road initiative.

A Call for Transparency

The Dragon, the Eagle, and the Private Sector helps decision-makers apply the principles of collaborative governance to effectively serve the public. The book's overarching conclusion is that transparency is the key to the legitimate growth of collaborative governance. In the United States, said Donahue, the principle of governmental transparency is widely accepted as a broad-spectrum accountability device. He recognized that he and his co-authors do not expect China to adopt the U.S. approach to transparency, but expressed their hope to see more transparency “with Chinese characteristics.” “It is crucial for China to embrace the transparency imperative because the evil twin of collaborative governance is cronyism or corruption,” Donahue argued.

In many countries and policy arenas, collaborative governance could effectively increase innovation but is not available because the populace is convinced that any interaction between the public and private sectors amounts to corruption on the part of elites against the public interest. The potential in China to create public value through interaction between its public and private sectors is enormous, concluded Donahue. ”It would be a shame to squander that.”

On February 24, 2021, the China Program at Shorenstein APARC hosted Dr. Thomas Wright, director of the Center on the United States and Europe and a senior fellow in the Project on International Order and Strategy at the Brookings Institution. Professor Jean Oi, William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics and director of the APARC China Program, moderated the event.

The program, entitled "U.S.-China Relations in the Biden Era," explored the future of US-China relations based on experience from past administrations. Under former President Trump, U.S. relations with China evolved into outright rivalry. In his talk, Dr. Wright discussed whether this rivalry will continue and evolve during a Biden administration by analyzing the roots of strategic competition between the two countries and various strands of thinking within the Biden team. According to Wright, the most likely outcome is that the competition between the two countries will evolve into a clash of governance systems and the emergence of two interdependent blocs where ideological differences become a significant driver of geopolitics. Cooperation is possible but it will be significantly shaped by conditions of rivalry. Watch now:

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Published in APARC’s in-house series, the book is the second volume resulting from APARC’s Stanford Asia-Pacific Research Innovation project. It collects the research findings of participants at the project’s third conference that was held in South Korea in June 2019.

James Liang, a research professor of economics at Peking University and a leading scholar of demographics and social studies, opened the event by situating the discussion about population structure in the context of the U.S.-China technology race. China is quickly catching up with the United States in the quality of its talent pool and the number of its labor resources. It will continue to outpace and surpass the United States in talent and innovation power in the next 10-20 years, Liang says.

China, however, is on a demographic cliff, facing severe population aging and low fertility rates. Its population of young workers aged 25-44 year-olds is projected to decline much faster and sooner than its overall population, leveling out against the labor and innovation gains the United States makes through the inflow of international talent into U.S. universities and entrepreneurial ventures. To sustain its long-term growth in labor quality and innovation, China will need higher birth rates and additional talent gains through migration, argues Liang.

James Feyrer’s book chapter examines the macroeconomic relationship between workforce demographics and aggregate productivity in Asia. Feyrer confirms that the high-income Asian nations like Japan and Korea, and even some middle-income countries of the region, will no longer enjoy a “demographic dividend” boosting aggregate productivity. However, he finds that the negative consequences of shifting to an older population structure may be less severe than previously projected, and even weakening with time. Feyrer believes this may be a result of improved food security and better overall health experienced by old cohorts in childhood, reinforcing the long-reaching impacts of healthcare on societal well-being.

Joon-Shik Park focused on the specific challenges facing Korean society, where birth rates have dropped severely. These historic declines continue to contribute to rising social and political unevenness across Korean society today. Initially seen most visibly in rural areas and smaller villages, Park’s now sees this unevenness affecting the dynamics of medium-sized towns and more urban areas as well. Korea and other aging societies must find viable solutions to address these issues if they are to prevent demographic divides from hobbling development and innovation, Park says.

Closing the book launch event, APARC Research scholar Kenji Kushida offers perspectives from rapidly aging Japan. where the challenges of shrinking and aging populations, rural-to-urban population distribution, and labor shortages spur advances in technology and innovation. Kushida documents this trend across multiple sectors.

He shows that drone technology has increased the productivity of short-staffed surveying firms, while AI-assisted industrial machines allow a broader range of laborers to work in manufacturing. Even in traditionally human-dominated environments like nursing homes, staff increasingly use robots to help improve the physical and mental well-being of elderly patients. Rather than strictly retarding growth, Kushida makes the case that demographic challenges serve as a catalyst for the development and implementation of new technologies.

As the research collected in Demographics and Innovation in the Asia-Pacific demonstrates, the challenges facing aging Asian societies are complex, but there is reason to look to the future with optimism. As the editors of the volume state in their introduction to the book, “Few concepts are as critical for sustained improvement in living standards as innovation.” New technologies and solutions will be foundational to addressing the challenges of the new demographic frontiers many societies are now approaching.