New York: Columbia University Press, 2018. 250 pp. US$52.00, cloth. ISBN 978-9-6299-68274.
Over the past ten years, Sebastian Heilmann has developed a useful approach to understanding China’s post-1978 economic and political success that is centred on the argument that a distinctive style of governance has given the regime an unusual degree of resilience and adaptability. Red Swan brings together revised versions of seven of his previously published articles, all of which are squarely focused on describing the governance model that Heilmann sees in China. While there is naturally a degree of repetition across chapters, the book is more than simply the sum of its parts, as it provides an in-depth and comprehensive argument about how unorthodox modes of governance have facilitated China’s rise.
The brief introduction sets out the approach taken and main points that are developed further in subsequent chapters. Heilmann puts aside traditional models of political systems (authoritarian, one-party, democratic, etc.), and instead draws on analytical approaches found in the field of policy studies, focusing on the “political and administrative methodologies” used in policy subsystems. His concern is with “the typical mechanisms that bring otherwise cumbersome bureaucracies and static constitutional rules to life” (3). One set of mechanisms emerged during the Maoist era around what Heilmann calls a “guerilla-style policy-making” approach that facilitates constant and rapid adaptation to changes. A second set forms “a special methodology for policy experimentation” (3) that opens up a wide range of opportunities for action in what might otherwise be a slow-moving highly bureaucratic system. A well-developed system for development planning is highlighted as a third key aspect of China’s governance approach. The fourth and final methodology singled out by Heilmann is the system of evaluating officials on the basis of political priorities and specific performance targets. In sum, Heilmann argues that “in the Chinese political system decisions, policies, and plans cannot be regarded as a single, distinct, or formalized outcome but rather as a chain of statements, documents, and iterative rounds of implementation trials and governance” (14). Moreover, although this system has clear deficiencies and shortcomings, it has proven unexpectedly adaptable and versatile in many policy fields, accounting for a number of policy successes that have enabled China to maintain a successful developmental trajectory.
In chapter 1, Heilmann explains how China’s successful development confounds existing theories in political science and further elaborates on the concept of “guerilla-style policy-making.” The chapter argues that the roots of this style of governance lie in the revolutionary and Maoist periods: “China’s governance techniques are marked by a signature Maoist stamp that conceives of policy making as a process of ceaseless change, tension management, continual experimentation, and ad hoc adjustments” (21). The “guerilla mode of political leadership and policy making” rests on a set of shared understandings and techniques, and these are laid out clearly in this chapter. Most fundamentally, this mode is what Heilmann calls a “transformative policy style” geared towards generating continuous change.
The next three chapters delve into an examination of how the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has used policy experimentation as an engine of change and method of problem solving. Chapter 2 explores the historical origins of the reliance on decentralized experimentation, covering both the Republican and Maoist eras. Then chapter 3 presents a detailed analysis of “policy experimentation as a distinct mode of governance.” This extremely useful chapter elucidates three main tools of experimentation, explains the experiment-based policy cycle, and examines the impact of experimentation in a number of policy domains. While none of this breaks new ground in the field of Chinese politics, Heilmann provides an excellent primer on this area of Chinese governance while arguing that policy experimentation processes have been especially important in enabling effective adaptation and policy innovation. Heilmann also identifies lessons that other countries can learn from the policy experimentation methodology employed by the CCP. This section of the book concludes with an exploration in chapter 4 of how policy experimentation is combined with long-term policy prioritization, in a process identified as “foresighted tinkering”.
Chapters 5 and 6 focus in on the use of long-term policy prioritization, with a detailed analysis of “the reinvention of development planning in China.” Heilmann argues that despite the dismantling of the old planned economy, “the planning system remains one of the driving forces behind the priorities of the policy makers, adjusting the parameters and mandates of institutional authorities and shaping political relationships at all levels of the government” (148). With a wide variety of plans for different sectors and scales, the planning process is best thought of “as a recurrent cycle of cross-level, multi-year policy coordination rather than as an integrated, unitary planning system” (195). While Heilmann points out the various problems with planning in China, his analysis provides a useful window into how planning works and the role it has played in promoting adaptive policy processes.
In the epilogue, Heilmann offers his thoughts on how governance is changing under the leadership of Xi Jinping. He argues that China has undergone a transition to a “crisis mode” of governance, involving greater concentration of power and more centralized decision-making. This shift has made the political-economic system less resilient, less able to adapt to change, and ultimately more fragile. So while China’s success has made it stand out as a major “Red Swan” (highly improbable) challenge to conventional assumptions and models concerning political regimes and socioeconomic development, China may be moving away from the methodologies that has underpinned its success.
Heilmann’s book is full of insightful and thought-provoking analysis. It should prove useful to a wide range of scholars, especially those interested in understanding the specific approaches to policy making that helped China face and overcome daunting challenges as it emerged from Maoist-era dysfunction. Throughout the book, Heilmann raises the question of what other countries can learn from China’s style of governance. While cautioning that the mechanisms used in China have clear weaknesses in practice and that lessons cannot simply be transferred from one setting to another, Heilmann does see China’s experience as presenting a challenge both to other developing countries and to Western democracies. As he puts it, the Chinese governance system’s “capability to react and adapt in a flexible and agile manner to recurrent acute crises and to novel demands on government activities” (217) suggests that there are lessons to be learned even while accepting that “China’s authoritarian party-state is unacceptable and unsuitable as a model for democratic societies” (218).
Kenneth W. Foster
Concordia College, Moorhead, USA