China's political economy, the quest for development since 1949. Oxford University Press, 1987, 418 pp.

The China boom and its discontents

“…The central government not only set the priorities, but carried them out administratively by distributing materials and finance to, and ordering output from, the various enterprises (Riskin 1987). However, it was unable to provide the organising principles for a non-bureaucratic socialism that could survive the great prestige of its founder and unite the Chinese people.…”

“…However, it was unable to provide the organising principles for a non-bureaucratic socialism that could survive the great prestige of its founder and unite the Chinese people. Instead, it gave rise in the end to a violent and repressive episode in which heady idealism degenerated into warfare between dogmas and factions (Riskin 1987).…”

China's Industrial Policy, Strategic Emerging Industries and Space Law

“…For industrial policy studies in the earlier phases of China's economic spatial planning, Naughton (1988) examines an early form of industrial policy before the need to calve it from holistic state economic plans after reform and opening. The treatment of Riskin (1987) of the institutional political economy of the heavy industrialisation period from 1949 to the eve of reform also demonstrates the industrial policy function within the first incarnation of China's Leninist bureaucratic administration. Contemporary domestic theoretical justification for the transition's blend of state investment and export-oriented development has recently been packaged as 'new structural economics' by Justin Lin Yifu and surrounding academics in the centre of the policy-making process in China (Ju et al 2013;Lin et al 1995) Throughout the decade of the 2000s, there was widespread speculation that China would follow a similar pattern to the industrial development trajectories of Japan, Korea and Taiwan during their industrial policy-driven catch-up industrialisation periods, using industrial policy as a crutch to leverage itself into Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development per capita income rates before conforming to the global trade regime (Johnson 1982;Wade 2004;Chang 2002;Suehiro 2008).…”

The China Boom and its Discontents

“…Within this group, a pre-eminent leader often has the highest decision-making power in the realm of the state, the Party and the military. The precise role of the pre-eminent leader has varied considerably over time, but the core tasks have included personnel appointments at the highest levels, enunciation of ideological principles and-usually after extensive discussion with colleagues-identification of the primary tasks confronting the nation (Riskin 1987). Mao Zedong was the pre-eminent leader until 1976 and, after a brief interregnum, Deng Xiaoping from 1978 till 1990.…”