Decentralization brought the Chinese communist regime a complex web of conflicting national and local interests, particularly in the second half of 1990s. While facilitating a rapid economic growth for almost two decades, decentralization has resulted in local perversities such as massive smuggling and official corruption. The central government deployed repeated cycles of centralization-decentralization as an ad hoc solution in order to both activate local economy and regulate local perversity. By an examination of the central-Xiamen interaction on the Yuanhua case of 1999 through 2001, the documentary- and interview-based data revealed two predicaments of the elastic central scrutiny when the center relied on a rigorous anti-corruption campaign as an immediate surgery and official and...[ Read more ]

Decentralization brought the Chinese communist regime a complex web of conflicting national and local interests, particularly in the second half of 1990s. While facilitating a rapid economic growth for almost two decades, decentralization has resulted in local perversities such as massive smuggling and official corruption. The central government deployed repeated cycles of centralization-decentralization as an ad hoc solution in order to both activate local economy and regulate local perversity. By an examination of the central-Xiamen interaction on the Yuanhua case of 1999 through 2001, the documentary- and interview-based data revealed two predicaments of the elastic central scrutiny when the center relied on a rigorous anti-corruption campaign as an immediate surgery and official and legal reforms as the long-term institutional therapy. First, prolonged toleration to smuggling and corruption but a battle-like crackdown resulted in discontent among Xiamen locals. Second, the Yuanhua case showed the central government lacked a credible commitment to its current vision of "governing the country according to law" (yifa zhiguo). Both consequences undermined Xiamen locals' as well as the general public's recognition and cooperation to the center's long-term visions and policies because the ordinary people indeed decide whether their government deserves authority according to the consistence of the government's words and deeds.