Contemporary Chinese Politics

329 Pages·2010·3.194 MB·English

by  Allen Carlson, Mary E. Gallagher, Kenneth G. Lieberthal, Melanie Manion

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Contemporary Chinese Politics
Contemporary Chinese Politics considers how new and diverse sources and
methods are changing the study of Chinese politics. Contributors spanning three
generations in China studies place their distinct qualitative and quantitative meth-
odological approaches in the framework of the discipline and point to challenges
or opportunities (or both) of adapting new sources and methods to the study of
contemporary China. How can we more effectively use new sources and methods
of data collection? How can we better integrate the study of Chinese politics
into the discipline of political science, to the betterment of both? How can we
more appropriately manage the logistical and ethical problems of doing political
research in the challenging Chinese environment? In addressing these questions,
this comprehensive methodological survey will be of immense interest to graduate
students heading into the field for the first time and experienced scholars looking
to keep abreast of the state of the art in the study of Chinese politics.
Allen Carlson is an associate professor in Cornell University’s Government
Department. He is the author of Unifying China, Integrating with the
World: Securing Chinese Sovereignty during the Reform Era (2005) and the
coeditor (with J. J. Suh and Peter Katzenstein) of Rethinking Security in East
Asia: Power, Identity and Efficiencies (2004). His articles have appeared in the
Journal of Contemporary China and Pacific Affairs.
Mary E. Gallagher is an associate professor of political science at the University
of Michigan and the director of the Center for Chinese Studies. She is also a
faculty associate at the Center for Comparative Political Studies at the Institute
for Social Research. She is the author of Contagious Capitalism: Globalization
and the Politics of Labor in China (2005), and her articles have appeared in
World Politics, Law and Society Review, Studies in Comparative International
Development, and Asian Survey.
Kenneth Lieberthal is a senior Fellow in Foreign Policy and in Global Economy
and Development and also is director of the John L. Thornton China Center at the
Brookings Institution. He has written and edited fifteen books and monographs,
most recently The U.S. Intelligence Community and Foreign Policy: Getting
Analysis Right (2009) and (with David Sandalow) Overcoming Obstacles to
US-China Cooperation on Climate Change (2009). He is also the author of
about seventy periodical articles and chapters in books and has published in the
New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Financial Times, South
China Morning Post, and numerous other newspapers.
Melanie Manion is a professor of political science and public affairs at the
University of Wisconsin–Madison. Her publications include Retirement of
Revolutionaries in China (1993) and Corruption by Design (2004). Her articles
have appeared in the American Political Science Review; Comparative Political
Studies; Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization; and China Quarterly.

Contemporary Chinese Politics
New Sources, Methods, and Field Strategies
Edited by
Allen CArlson
Cornell University
MAry e. GAllAGher
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Kenneth lieberthAl
Brookings Institution
MelAnie MAnion
University of Wisconsin–Madison
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
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São Paulo, Delhi, Dubai, Tokyo, Mexico City
Cambridge University Press
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Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521155762
© Cambridge University Press 2010
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without the written
permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2010
Printed in the United States of America
A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Contemporary Chinese politics : new sources, methods, and field
strategies / edited by Allen Carlson ... [et al.].
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-521-19783-0 – isbn 978-0-521-15576-2 (pbk.)
1. China – Politics and government – 2002– 2. China – Politics and
government – 2002– Methodology. 3. Political science –
Methodology. I. Carlson, Allen, 1968– II. Title.
jq1510.c68 2010
320.951–dc22 2010018862
isbn 978-0-521-19783-0 Hardback
isbn 978-0-521-15576-2 Paperback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or
accuracy of urls for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in
this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is,
or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
Contents
Tables and Figures page vii
Contributors ix
Abbreviations xi
Introduction 1
Allen Carlson, Mary E. Gallagher, and Melanie Manion
Part I Sources
1 State-Generated Data and Contentious Politics in China 15
Xi Chen
2 Why Archives? 33
Neil J. Diamant
3 The Central Committee, Past and Present: A Method
of Quantifying Elite Biographies 51
Victor Shih, Wei Shan, and Mingxing Liu
4 Experimental Methods and Psychological Measures
in the Study of Chinese Foreign Policy 69
Peter Hays Gries
5 Internet Resources and the Study of Chinese Foreign
Relations: Can Cyberspace Shed New Light on China’s
Approach to the World? 88
Allen Carlson and Hong Duan
6 Information Overload? Collecting, Managing, and Analyzing
Chinese Media Content 107
Daniela Stockmann
Part II Qualitative Methods
7 The Worm’s-Eye View: Using Ethnography to Illuminate
Labor Politics and Institutional Change in Contemporary China 129
Calvin Chen
v
vi Contents
8 More Than an Interview, Less Than Sedaka: Studying
Subtle and Hidden Politics with Site-Intensive Methods 145
Benjamin L. Read
9 Cases, Questions, and Comparison in Research
on Contemporary Chinese Politics 162
William Hurst
Part III Survey Methods
10 A Survey of Survey Research on Chinese Politics:
What Have We Learned? 181
Melanie Manion
11 Surveying Prospects for Political Change: Capturing Political
and Economic Variation in Empirical Research in China 200
Bruce J. Dickson
12 Using Clustered Spatial Data to Study Diffusion: The Case
of Legal Institutions in China 219
Pierre F. Landry
13 Measuring Change and Stability over a Decade in the
Beijing Area Study 236
Mingming Shen and Ming Yang, with Melanie Manion
14 Quantitative Research and Issues of Political
Sensitivity in Rural China 246
Lily L. Tsai
Reflections on the Evolution of the China Field
in Political Science 266
Kenneth Lieberthal
Glossary 279
References 283
Index 311
tables and Figures
tables
3.1 Tracking Chen Yun’s positions in the 1950s page 55
4.1 Structures of national identity: Pattern matrix loadings
for principal axis factor analysis with Promax rotation
for American and Chinese samples, 2009 79
4.2 Descriptive statistics: Correlations, significance levels,
means, standard deviations, and scale alphas and Ns
for 2009 Beijing sample (minimum N = 156) 81
6.1 Percentage of 100 samples falling within one and two
standard errors of the population mean in two newspapers 115
10.1 Probability sample surveys on Chinese politics resulting
in publications analyzing original datasets 186
10.2 Mainland partner institutions for probability sample surveys
on Chinese politics 191
11.1 The trade-off between goals of development among officials
and entrepreneurs 211
11.2 Perceived threats to stability among private entrepreneurs
and local officials 213
11.3 Distribution of private entrepreneurs in local people’s
congresses 214
11.4 Probit regression: Determinants of private entrepreneurs
in people’s congresses 216
12.1 Conditions for institutional diffusion 230
12.2 Impact of court adopters on the mean propensity
to go to court 231
12.3 Probit estimates of going to court in civil, economic, and
administrative cases 233
vii
viii Tables and Figures
13.1 Questions asked annually in the Beijing Area Study 239
13.2 Overview of sampling and survey implementation
in BAS first decade 243
13.3 Incomplete interviews due to unmet requirements
in BAS first decade 244
Figures
3.1 Average age and 25th and 75th percentile age of
Central Committee members, 1921–2006 61
3.2 Average birth year and 25th and 75th percentile birth
year of Central Committee members, 1921–2006 62
3.3 Percentage of Central Committee members with Long March
experience and the number of Long Marchers 63
3.4 Average education level of Central Committee
members, 1921–2006 64
3.5 The share of Central Committee members with common
experience with Hu Yaobang and Hua Guofeng, 1970–1990 66
4.1 International anxiety as a function of nation, domain,
and frame, 2006 samples 74
4.2 International pride as a function of nation and frame,
2006 samples 75
4.3 Final Beijing path model, 2009 sample 82
6.1 Percentage of Xinhua news articles among all articles
about the United States published in the People’s Daily,
September 2001–July 2002 118
12.1 The ILRC survey of China (2003–2004) 222
12.2 Example of a county map displaying township boundaries
and basic infrastructure overlaid to the Google Earth model,
with grids coded in KML displaying three TSUs in each
sampled township 224
12.3 Example of a spatial sampling unit (half-square minute)
drawn in a low-density rural area in western China 225
12.4 Example of spatial sampling units in an urban area 226
12.5 Impact of the combined presence of court adopters in the
community and the respondent’s level of trust in the courts
on the probability of adopting courts as a dispute resolution
venue in a civil case 234