Using survey data of enterprises and entrepreneurs from Liuzhou, Guangxi, China, the determinants of political participation of private enterprises are studied. We find (1) entrepreneurs who are older or from larger older enterprises have a higher probability of becoming members of the People's Congress and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, while gender, education and household registration status do not significantly affect their political participation. (2) Entrepreneurs with membership in the Communist Party of China or other parties have a higher probability of entering politics. Compared with Communist Party members, those of other parties have a much higher probability of political participation. (3) Parental leadership identity increases entrepreneur probability of entering politics. Its effect is between that of Communist Party membership and other party membership. This paper provides evidence that Chinese entrepreneurs in private enterprises are translating their economic power, political identity, and household ackground into formal political power.

This paper argues that the conventional approach of data averaging is problematic for exploring the growth-inequality nexus. It introduces the polynomial inverse lag (PIL) framework so that the impacts of inequality on investment, education, and ultimately on growth can be measured at precisely defined time lags. Combining PIL with simultaneous systems of equations, we analyze the growth-inequality relationship in postreform China, finding that this relationship is nonlinear and is negative irrespective of time horizons. Journal of Comparative Economics 34 (4) (2006) 654-667. The World Institute for Development Economics Research, Katajanokanlaituri 6 B, Fin-00160, Helsinki, Finland; Fudan University, Shanghai 200433, People’s Republic of China.

本文基于现有的经济学文献分析了当代中国的发展道路。迄今为止，中国的经济改革基本上延续了改革之前的城乡分割、经济分权和关系型社会几个特征。这些政治和社会的结构在经济发展的早期对积累资本、促进激励和履行合约有一定的积极作用，但也带来了一些改革的代价，并集中表现为收入差距的扩大。收入差距的持续扩大不利于经济增长、削减贫困和提高社会流动性，这使得当代中国的经济持续增长和社会和谐发展面临着巨大的挑战。当改革的代价日益积累至其临界点时，中国需要通过渐进式的政治和社会结构的调整来应对自己所面临的种种挑战，如果这些调整能够维持经济持续增长和社会和谐发展，那么中国将可能形成一种独特的“大国发展模式”。

This paper explores the causes of industrial agglomeration in China using the provincial panel data during 1987-2001, focusing on the effects of economic opening. The determinants of industrial agglomeration are tested by controlling three types of factors, those of economic policies, economic geography and new economic geography, respectively. In summary, we find: (1) Economic opening, which is also related with geography and history encourages industrial agglomeration; (2) Large market size, effects of forward and backward linkage, high level of urbanization, better infrastructure and less involvement of local government tend to facilitate industrial concentration; (3) Costal regions have geographical advantage in attracting firms. These findings not only support the new economic geography theory from evidence within China, but also emphasize the important role that policies like economic opening might directly play in industrial agglomeration. The most important policy implication of this paper is that by quickening up the step of integrating into world economy and deregulating, even those less developed regions might accelerate industrial agglomeration and thus decrease regional disparity.