New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013. xv, 217 pp. (Tables, figures.) C$91.95, cloth. ISBN 978-1-107-02131-0.
This is an outstanding study, highly recommended for a wide variety of audiences. For China scholars, the book provides valuable and original primary data on various kinds of social organizations within the PRC; for specialists in comparative politics, it sheds new light on the persistence of authoritarian rule and the role of civil society; for students of social movements, it lays out a clear, useful and novel framework for understanding “opportunity structures”; for new researchers, it includes a detailed discussion of data collection and research methodology; and for practitioners, it reveals important and often counter-intuitive information regarding the specific and nuanced ways in which foreign funding can have both good and ill effects. The book is a pleasure to read, from start to finish. It is carefully researched, exceptionally well-organized, convincingly argued, and written in clear and engaging prose.
Hildebrandt investigates the ways in which Chinese NGOs adapt to changing political, economic and personal opportunities, focusing on NGOs involved in environmental protection, HIV/AIDs prevention, and gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgender rights. He blends qualitative and quantitative data and methods, drawing on eighty in-depth interviews with NGO leaders in Beijing, Yunnan and Sichuan (conducted in 2007–2008); a thorough and well-thought through web-based survey; and official news stories. Rather than focusing on one type of NGO per chapter, the book is divided into three thematic sections: one on political opportunities, one on economic opportunities, and one on personal opportunities. The three types of NGOs are compared within each section.
Hildebrandt consciously chooses NGOs focused on these issue areas because they are “profiles in success”; by and large, they have avoided repression and effectively adapted to the opportunity structures within which they operate. Through these case studies, Hildebrandt uncovers how social groups can succeed even within China’s authoritarian political system. However, he also emphasizes that the adaptations that these groups must make in order to persist undermine their ability to thrive in the long-term. Moreover, he finds that the limited success of these groups actually serves to strengthen the authoritarian political system, not to weaken or change it. In this sense, Hildebrandt challenges predominant understandings of the role of civil society in fomenting democratic political change.
The book’s first section, on political opportunities, looks at how ever-changing policy decisions and government institutions at the central and local levels shape the behaviour of Chinese NGOs. The main adaptive response to China’s political opportunity structure is to be “self-limiting”; these groups do not question or challenge the boundaries imposed on them by the state, but rather accept these as givens, and do what they can to succeed within these restrictions. Perhaps the most important and surprising finding in this section is that these NGO leaders express a remarkably positive attitude toward both central and local governments. Moreover, when a group does come into conflict with the state, NGO leaders almost universally blame the organization (and more specifically, the organization’s leader), and not the state. A further implication of this mentality is that when a group is repressed, instead of rallying around it in sympathy, other groups distance themselves from it, and fault the group’s leader for engaging in unwise behaviour that is seen as having elicited the negative state action.
Another interesting finding in this section concerns the Chinese government’s official registration system for social organizations, which on paper all such groups are expected to follow. Somewhat surprisingly, NGO leaders report no perceived relationship between registering and having good relations with the government. To the contrary, both local government leaders and NGO leaders sometimes believe that it is more advantageous to not become registered. Because a lack of official recognition allows these groups to exist “under the radar,” it can give both group leaders and local officials more flexibility in their actions.
The second section of the book, on economic opportunity structures, is perhaps the most intriguing and novel; although most studies of social movements emphasize political opportunities, Hildebrandt stresses that for the groups in this study, economic concerns far outweigh political concerns. Simply put, social groups need money in order to succeed, and money is in exceedingly short supply. Because domestic charity giving is almost non-existent in China (in part, Hildebrandt suggests, due to unsupportive tax codes), the NGOs in Hildebrandt’s study rely largely on international organizations for funding. These organizations have their own goals and requirements, and Chinese NGOs wanting their money have no choice but to abide by them. This, then, constricts the ability of NGOs to pursue their own self-defined aims, and to do so in the way that they deem most effective.
The third section of the book, on personal opportunities, is also innovative and illuminating. Across issue areas, personalistic patron-client relations (wherein a particular government official acts as the former and a particular group leader acts as the latter) characterize virtually all successful groups. The more “deeply embedded” a group leader’s relationship with a particular leader, the more potential success and protection the group may enjoy in the short-term. But in the long run, such relationships are very vulnerable and idiosyncratic, and are not sustainable. This feature of NGOs also explains why, when a group comes into conflict with the government, it is not seen as a failure of the political system, but rather as an interpersonal dispute.
Although the groups studied in this volume were chosen due to their demonstrated success, Hildebrandt concludes that their long-term future is “bleak.” They show little prospect of becoming institutionalized, or of working with one another. Moreover, they appear to be quite content with—and indeed may prefer—the authoritarian political status quo. Further, to the extent that these NGOs actually do solve China’s pressing social problems, they may strengthen the regime’s legitimacy.
Teresa Wright
California State University, Long Beach, USA
pp. 573-575