Suchergebnisse

China's gross domestic product (GDP) in 2019 grew by 6.1% in the face of rising global uncertainties and underperforming structural reforms. Productivity growth had also slowed down, and this is associated with resource misallocation at the micro level. In 2019, the Chinese government had introduced various policies to promote productivity and to support the new economy. These policies have yet to make substantial changes, and local governments are lacking the incentives and capacity to implement structural reforms.

The European Constitutional Treaty (ECT) was presented by its drafters as an explicit constitution for the European Union (EU 25). We argue that considered as the European economic constitution its provisions do not sufficiently allow for the possibility of cooperative collective decision (leading to convergence in welfare) in a more than ever numerous and heterogeneous EU. Our essential argument in this respect regards the implications of the structurally different economic performances and incentives of small and large countries under the European economic constitution. Finally, since the present European trade-off between "integrity" and "efficiency" appears sub-optimal, we present two original ways of achieving potentially better ones in the EU, through a "Great compromise" or "Economic constitution(s)," expressing a preference for the latter.

The European Constitutional Treaty (ECT) was presented by its drafters as an explicit constitution for the European Union (EU 25). We argue that considered as the European economic constitution its provisions do not sufficiently allow for the possibility of cooperative collective decision (leading to convergence in welfare) in a more than ever numerous and heterogeneous EU. Our essential argument in this respect regards the implications of the structurally different economic performances and incentives of small and large countries under the European economic constitution. Finally, since the present European trade-off between "integrity" and "efficiency" appears sub-optimal, we present two original ways of achieving potentially better ones in the EU, through a "Great compromise" or "Economic constitution(s)," expressing a preference for the latter.

Abstract: Contrary to the widely-held belief that the term "political structural reform" was introduced in the early 1980s, in fact, the term was coined by the Chinese leadership only in the mid-1980s. Before then, the senior Chinese party-state leaders used various terms to denote the reform process in the party-state decision-making machinery and apparatus, such as superstructural reform, party-state leadership reform, and perfecting the socialist political system. Moreover, China's political structural reform in the 1980s embraced five dimensions, namely democratizing the party-state apparatus and process; arranging for a smooth leadership succession; streamlining and rationalizing the party-state bureaucracy; strengthening the National People's Congress; and liberalizing intellectual life. The sociopolitical consequences of the reform were tremendous, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) being transformed from a country of totalistic communist-party control into an authoritarian state with an embyronic civil society. Despite the sweeping reform, the "four cardinal principles" enunciated by Deng Xiaoping in 1979 served as an structural constraint on political structural reform.