How do authoritarian stales foster civil society growth while keeping unruly organizations in line? This governance dilemma dogs every state that attempts to modernize by permitting civil society to pluralize while minding its potential to stir up restive social forces. This dissertation's main finding is that the Chinese party state the world's largest and arguably the most resilient authoritarian regime-has engineered a flexible institution of state control in which the "rules of the game" arc created, disseminated, and enforced outside of institutionalized channels. This dissertation demonstrates how the coercive apparatus improvises in an erratic manner, unfettered by accountability mechanisms. The regime does not necessarily pull the levers of hard control mechanisms-the tanks, guns, and tear gas-whenever dissenters cross a line of political acceptability. Instead, in keeping with its decentralized political system and its tradition of experimental policy-making, the Chinese state continually remakes the rules of the game which keeps potential rabble-rousers on their toes. Although the regulatory skeleton of state corporatism remains intact, flexible repression is the informal institution-the set of rules and procedures-that structures state-civil society interactions. Specifically, this institution is made up of three key practices: a) decentralization b) ad-hoc deployment c) mixed control strategies. These three practices manifest in two concrete strategies used to govern aboveground and underground civil society: fragmented coercion and controlled competition. Flexible repression enables the Chinese party-state to exploit the advantages of a flourishing third sector while curtailing its threatening potential. Through participant observation, interviews, and comparative case studies of aboveground and underground independent labor organizations, this dissertation accomplishes three goals. First, it identifies the within-country variation in state control strategies over civil society, which includes the above-ground sector as well as the underground sector of ostensibly banned organizations. Secondly, it traces the patterns of interactions between the state and civil society, generating hypotheses about the mechanisms of change. Finally, it identifies new concepts relevant for studying organized contention in authoritarian regime.. .... Overall, this dissertation contributes to the study of authoritarian state control and civil society contention, with an emphasis on the nexus between the two.

This dissertation addresses the question “how disasters change state-society relations under authoritarian rule?” Specifically, I investigate how space and social capital were created after major earthquakes and the relationships between local governments and civil society organizations (CSOs). Based on four years of interviews conducted with government officials and CSO leaders and two rounds of surveys in 126 villages in rural Sichuan province, utilizing experiments, focus groups, and interviews, I argue that social capital and space for CSOs were created after major earthquakes. Adding to the literature of consultative authoritarianism and graduated control, I demonstrate that within the newly created space, local governments use a deliberate differentiation strategy towards different CSOs. Such differentiation is more driven by the state’s interest to extract productivity and outsource responsibility for public goods provision by regime-supporting CSOs, and less dictated by the state’s need to acquire information from regime-challenging CSOs with collective action potential. Such approach contributes to the authoritarian resilience in China. Despite the interference from the state from above, the newly created space also faces challenges from the private sphere with individual citizens being skeptical of the CSO sector due to limited interactions, mismatch of criteria, institutional constraints, and lack of civility. I then draw from the qualitative data and construct a dynamic framework of state-society relations under an authoritarian state after disasters by starting from co-operational, complementary, competitive, and confrontational relations, and end up in either co-optation or confrontation in the long run. Finally, I trace the development of the newly drafted charity law and the foreign NGO law. I argue that the state-organized legalization process would first allow the state to use the “zone of indifference” to get to know the new developments in the public sphere. Then, through a process of toleration, participation, initiation, replication, and bifurcation, the state manages to extract productivity from, and outsource responsibility to, the regime-supporting players, and drive out the regime challenging ones. The laws, made through this process, is also vulnerable to state intervention at any time, and therefore, prevents China from having a meaningful civil society. / 2020-02-22T00:00:00Z

This thesis explores one particular facet of contemporary state-society relationship in China, i.e. state-student relationship. By arguing against the popular observation that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) retreated from Chinese universities as a way of winning students’ support, this thesis claims that the party-state has adopted a “bird cage” strategy in post-Tiananmen university governance. That is to say, the party-state has not only re-established and strengthened its control institutions in universities, but at same time expanded its zone of tolerance and created new outlets for students’ political enthusiasm and participation. A four-city, seven-university field survey was conducted, the result of which supports the view that the CCP’s post-Tiananmen governance strategy has been effective. Respondents agree that party’s governing institutions are resilient and play important roles in students’ life. They also seem to be in agreement with, at least as the survey results indicate, important political ideas promoted by the party-state.

This thesis explores one particular facet of contemporary state-society relationship in China, i.e. state-student relationship. By arguing against the popular observation that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) retreated from Chinese universities as a way of winning students’ support, this thesis claims that the party-state has adopted a “bird cage” strategy in post-Tiananmen university governance. That is to say, the party-state has not only re-established and strengthened its control institutions in universities, but at same time expanded its zone of tolerance and created new outlets for students’ political enthusiasm and participation. A four-city, seven-university field survey was conducted, the result of which supports the view that the CCP’s post-Tiananmen governance strategy has been effective. Respondents agree that party’s governing institutions are resilient and play important roles in students’ life. They also seem to be in agreement with, at least as the survey results indicate, important political ideas promoted by the party-state.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Dept. of Art, Stanford University. / Bibliography: leaves 291-311.

Dans le nord-ouest du Yunnan, la préfecture autonome tibétaine de Diqing est le lieu de définition d'une identité tibétaine consensuelle et attrayante, par laquelle les autorités politiques prêtent aux populations locales un souci pour l'environnement naturel. Les représentations qu'elles véhiculent font écho et mobilisent les représentations occidentales sur les Tibétains, dont l'imagerie de Shangri-La et l'identification du bouddhisme tibétain à l'écologie. Depuis 2006, cela est mis en scène dans le parc national de Pudacuo, qui est le premier parc national de Chine. Bien qu'élaboré avec le concours d'une organisation non gouvernementale conservationniste états-unienne, ce lieu a en fait peu à voir avec la protection de l'environnement naturel et vise le tourisme de masse. La voie alternative de développement qu'il propose aux agriculteurs éleveurs locaux est bien accueillie puisqu'elle les ouvre sur de nouveaux horizons, dont la possession d'une culture au goût du jour, l'accès à la société de consommation et l'ouverture sur le monde extérieur. / In Northwestern Yunnan, Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture is the place of definition of a consensual and attractive Tibetan identity, by which political authorities give local people a concern for the natural environment. The representations they carry echo and mobilize Western representations of the Tibetan people, which include the Shangri-La imagery and the identification of Tibetan Buddhism with ecology. Since 2006, it is staged in Pudacuo National Park, which is the first national park in China. Although it was elaborated with the help of a United-States conservationist non-governmental organization, this place has in fact little to do with the protection of the natural environment and aims to grow mass tourism. The alternative development it offers to local farmers is welcome as it opens new horizons, including the possession of a contemporary culture, access to the consumer society and the opening to the outside world.

The Internet was initially seen as a metaphor for democracy itself. However, commercialisation, incorporation into existing hierarchies and patterns of daily life and state control and surveillance appear to have undermined these utopian dreams. The vast majority of online activity now takes place in a handful of commercially owned spaces, whose business model rests on the collection and monetisation of user data. However, the upsurge of political action in the Middle East and North Africa in 2010 and 2011, which many argued was facilitated by social media, raised the question of whether these commercial platforms that characterise the contemporary Internet might provide better venues for political speech than previous types of online spaces, particularly in authoritarian states. This thesis addresses the question of how the commercialisation of online spaces affects their ability to provide a venue for political speech in different political systems through a mixed-methods comparison of the U.S. and China. The findings of this thesis support the hypotheses drawn from existing literature: commercialisation is negative for political speech but it is less negative, even potentially positive, in authoritarian systems. However, this research uncovers a surprising explanation for this finding. The greater positivity of commercialisation for political speech in authoritarian systems seems to occur not despite the government but because of it. The Chinese state's active stance in monitoring, encouraging and crafting ideas about political speech has resisted its negative repositioning as a commercial product. In contrast, in the U.S., online political speech has been left to the market that sells back the dream of an online public sphere to users as part of its commercial model. There is still hope that the Internet can provide a venue for political speech but power, particularly over the construction of what it means to be a political speaker in modern society, needs to be taken back from the market.

共黨國家雖為一黨專政，但在最高領導層常形成具有二元領導的意涵的集體領導。二元領導體制是有兩位行政領導人的體制；由於二元領導體制符合許多政治狀況的需要，全世界有四分之一以上的國家採取二元領導體制，其中多為半總統制。本文認為東歐後共國家普遍形成半總統制的原因，在於共黨統治時期採取二元領導，以使統治菁英的集體領導得以鞏固。在此二元領導體制下，黨書記通常主管黨務、軍事，總理主管行政、經濟。 本文的重點在於第三章第二、三節的分析。第二節首先從黨內權力制衡的需要分析，指出共黨國家在初期的強人政治或單一領導之後，制度的要求與交易上的精英集體的利益極大化，共同促成一種展現為國家與黨的領導人和行政領導人的分立的二元領導體制。其後從權力繼承制度化與幹部年輕化的重要性進行分析，指出共黨國家二元領導體制要走向成熟，必須破除領導職務終身制。 在第三章第三節，本文引入國際政治學結構現實主義的觀點，強調權力結構的「二元」穩定性，同時分析共黨國家領導層的職務分配可能性，將之區分為單一領導、典型二元領導、非典型二元領導、多元領導等類型，並以蘇聯與中國大陸的政治菁英的職務分配作為範例加以介紹，說明典型二元領導是共黨國家領導體制的趨勢。 在此分析之後，本文在第四章分析蘇聯的領導體制變化，在第五章分析中共的職務分配趨勢。本文結論認為，中共幹部年輕化的制度壓力，使中共現任軍委主席江澤民必須盡快退休，而依據本文對典型二元領導體制的建構與利弊分析，中共政治菁英的共識將是讓胡錦濤接任中央軍委主席職務。倘若中共政局果真如此發展，則中共的典型二元領導將進一步強化。此種趨勢的進一步發展，將使中共民主化後傾向於採取半總統制。

本文從中國精英政治的性別角度提出女性幹部遷調分析，並提供如何突破有關中國的政治體制內的女性棈英幹部被稱為“玻璃天花板”的資訊。本文意旨在專業鑑別女性幹部的特質或屬性，來找其可能的連結，如果有這些特質的話，如何在中國政治逐步制度化的範圍內，分析出這些特質和女性幹部的遷調速率之關係。 / This thesis is an analysis of mobility in Chinese elite politics from a gender perspective and provides information on the women who break the so-called “glass ceiling” within the Chinese political system. It aims specifically to identify the prevailing characteristics or attributes of female elite cadres to find possible links, if any, between these characteristics and their mobility rates, within the context of increasing institutionalization of Chinese politics.

對於比較政治領域，威權政體的「選舉」開放，是否真的會使公民出現自主性參與，一直是學界極為關注的命題。檢視當前中國城市基層選舉，可以發現，參與帶動的「有限政治改革」，其效果仍難以預料。因此，本研究主要探討，轉型中政權選舉的制度效應，會對選民個體的「政治功效意識」與政治行動帶來何種影響。我們並嘗試從政治功效意識的研究範疇，提出「防禦性」與「認同性」兩種概念分類，「防禦性」功效意識是由於選民的維權心態激發的投票參與意願，「認同性」效能感是由選舉動員浮現的群體認同投票意識。我們假設，個體同時經歷過「認同性」與「防禦性」兩種功效意識的形塑過程，但又受到個人的「政權支持」程度影響，不可能出現兩種功效意識同時上升的情形。而個別心態傾向會影響後續的政治行動，會有「退出」、「呼籲」、「忠誠」三種行動抉擇。「退出」是不再進場參與投票，「呼籲」走向過激的政治反抗，「忠誠」則是向黨國輸誠。 針對上述假定，本研究以上海2006、2009年兩次居委會換屆選舉為研究個案。根據作者田野調查發現，經過選後，防禦性功效意意識較高的選民，最終採取「抗議」的政治行動；認同性功效意識較高的選民，雖部分仍表態黨國「忠誠」，但多數參與者卻由於選舉過程無法滿足，浮現「失望」，呈現參與「退出」的情況。因此，「『高認同性』功效意識選民退出－『高防禦性』功效意識選民呼籲」，構成了社區基層選舉存在著普遍的「集體行動困境」，但值得注意的是，這種選舉失望走向從「退出」的行動選擇，卻也可能最終又走回「呼籲」的過激行動。就此觀之，中國的基層民主發展，或許會是面臨集體行動困境之後，走向突發轉折的非預期性後果。