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Embedded in the epoch of globalization, initiatives of governmental reforms among countries are intertwined, especially when these countries seek to gain wider experience from their counterparts' suggestible pathways. However, scholars are inclined to oversimplify their analytical frameworks when conducting comparative research on administrative reforms. This paper intends to interpret and analyze such simplification of comparative studies which might result in the continuing promotion of a failing approach or the aimless transplantation of other countries' reform experience and theories, the phenomenon not uncommon in studies of China's administrative practices. This paper reveals an overlooked context, namely, that the adaptation of international theories of institutional reform has not achieved the intended goals in China's case. Through our analysis, we aim to use China's example to highlight the need to consider its social and cultural context in adapting Western administrative theories, and to suggest how scholars can better advise the government in the process of administrative reforms.

China's five‐yearly governmental restructuring has always taken place in lockstep with the Communist Party of China National Congress. Moreover, the theme of every administrative reform in the past three decades has complied with that of theoretical research by foreign scholars during the same period. The Chinese government draws lessons from theories of foreign public administration to explore ways to reform its practices. By means of evaluating the gains and losses of the Chinese government in the abovementioned process, this article points out that theories of Western public administration meet local challenges while contributing to China's reform practices. Through their analyses, we use China's practices as examples to highlight the balance between local concerns and global views and to suggest how scholars can better advise governments in the process of administrative reforms in other developing countries.

Corruption plagues both developed and developing countries. It is a serious obstacle to China's development that is too perilous to ignore. However, conducting research on corruption, which is characterised as being the most secretive type of behaviour, is particularly difficult. Applying the vector autoregressive model (VAR) to consecutive 36-month data, the authors analyse empirically the corruption status quo and its impact in China. The authors discover short-term negative impacts of the current anti-corruption campaign in China on the economic growth of its state-owned industries, while any positive effects, e.g. improved quality of economic growth, cannot be demonstrated. The objective data used reduce significantly the confusion surrounding traditional (anti-)corruption studies, which have relied heavily on survey data or subjective evaluation. (China/GIGA)