Lan Xue

A historical perspective of China's innovation system reform: a case study

Abstract 1995 marked the 10th anniversary of the structural reforms on Chinas innovation system, which started in 1985 when ‘the Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on the structural reform of the science and technology system’ was passed [ CCCPC, 1985 ]. These reforms are now at the crossroads, making this an appropriate juncture to review what led to these reforms, what they have achieved, and the prospect for their future. This review is organized as follows: the rest of this introduction will focus on the motivation of this paper, followed by a brief account of the neoclassical economic framework for the analysis of R&D and its limitations. The third section of the paper will provide an overview of Chinas pre-reform innovation system, identifying its deficiencies and constraints. Section four will discuss in detail the major reforms and their impacts on Chinas innovation system from 1985 to 1995. Finally, the last section concludes the paper with a focus on unresolved issues facing Chinas innovation system reforms and prospect for their future.

Process innovation in small firms: Case studies on CNC machine tools

Abstract This paper reports the results of a study on the implementation of process innovations, and the benefits thereof, in a sample of small metalworking firms in a mid-Atlantic region of the US. No firm experienced serious organizational or technical problems in making substantial investments in CNC technologies and implementing them effectively. One reason for this discrepancy may be that the firms that were interviewed have had prior experience with CNC. The most compelling reason for introducing process innovations was the pressure exerted by large sophisticated customers with whom the interviewed firms have had long-term relationships. The implication is that government policies aiming at assisting small manufacturers to modernize should not overlook the strong ‘pull’ effect of the markets targeted by these manufacturers.

Domestic reform and global integration: public administration reform in China over the last 30 years

This article tries to depict China’s public administration reform as an interactive process between two major themes, domestic reform and global integration. The development and implementation of public administration reforms in China from 1978 to 2008 are reviewed. The driving forces shaping the process of public administration reform in China are analyzed, using a territorial locus (domestic/international) – policy dimension (supply-side/demand-side) analytical framework. Our analysis suggests that the public administration reforms over the past few decades have demonstrated the Chinese government’s intention to advance the government’s transition from an economic-centered state to a people-oriented one. While much progress has been made, there are many issues that remain to be resolved by the new generation of leadership in China. Points for practitioners This article aims to contribute to the discussion about the process of China’s public administration reform over the past three decades since late 1978 – the reform-and-open up years. In China’s public administration reform, the transition of the economic system from a planned economy to a socialist market economy has become the most important driving force, which is coupled with the transformation from a public administration system based on personal will and charisma to one that is increasingly based on rule of law. At the same time, the influence of other countries has also played an important role in today’s globalized environment. China has learned a great deal from international experiences in public administration reform. The entry into the WTO has also provided a strong impetus for China to integrate with global public administrative practice. So, China’s public administration system has always actively engaged in a transformative process characterized by domestic reform and global integration.

Environmental governance for China: Major recommendations of a Task Force

Abstract For 15 years the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED) has given advice to the Chinese government on various aspects of environmental conservation. In 2004, the Council established a Task Force on Environmental Governance, consisting of six international and six Chinese experts. On the basis of a thorough comparative evaluation of the structures, processes and outcomes of the environmental policies in China, the US, Japan and the EU, in November 2006 the Task Force presented its report consisting of 25 major recommendations, which are documented here in a condensed version.

The evolution of China's IPR system and its impact on the patenting behaviours and strategies of multinationals in China

This paper first reviews the evolution of Chinas IPR system with an emphasis on the patent system, which is mainly shaped by three forces including the transition to a market economy, the opening of the domestic market and the national initiatives for cultivating indigenous innovative capabilities. Then by using some unique data both at the national level and firm level, it analyses the patenting behaviours and strategies of foreign multinationals in China in comparison with local firms, which has yielded some interesting findings. First of all, the patent deployment of multinationals in China is mainly market-oriented and strategic. Although the negative perception of Chinas IPR system has led multinationals to act defensively, they have been able to adapt to the Chinese system and maximise their economic benefits, in addition to gaining competitive advantages. Also, while multinationals patenting in China has created some obstacles for local firms to catch-up, it has also forced some of them to find new ways to innovate and develop their own capabilities.

Multinational R&D in China: Differentiation and integration of global R&D networks

Based on case studies of multinational R&D centres in China, this paper views the central task of corporate R&D globalisation as: differentiating R&D units to take advantage of location-specific resources and integrating R&D efforts in multiple locations to achieve the whole corporation’s goals. Four differentiated R&D units are identified: the technology competence unit, the system competence unit, the assignment unit, and the support unit. These four units form a complete R&D system covering all stages of R&D life circle. Three main driving resources – technology strength, human capital, and the market – are investigated, as well as their relationships to different types of R&D. Control, communication, and external collaboration issues are also discussed for these four types of R&D units.

Multinational R&D in China: From home-country-based to host-country-based

Current research on multinational R&D assumes that main R&D is based in the home country and views overseas R&D as additional to the home base. However, case studies in China have found that the base itself is also internationalized. Besides home-based-augmenting, home-based-exploiting, and home-based-replacing discussed in the literature, we have identified new types of host-based overseas R&D. Two of these are the host-based technology advancer, which focuses on original component innovation, and the host-based system owner, which focuses on system innovation. Both respond to local market opportunities. In addition, multinationals establish host-based local integrators to coordinate their R&D centers under different firm divisions. These findings suggest four topics for future research.

Innovation in China

Volume 11, Issue 1, April 2009 To celebrate the inclusion of Innovation: Management, Policy and Practice in Thomson Reuters Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), from 2007, the Editor-in-Chief, Professor Mark Dodgson, and Editorial Board Member, Professor Lan Xue, decided to write an Editorial on innovation in China. By illustrating the extent of China’s achievements in innovation, and its future challenges, the authors aim to highlight the continuing need for high-quality research into innovation around the world. Innovation: Management, Policy and Practice is dedicated to publishing research that explains the importance of innovation, and how public policies and business strategies can improve innovation performance for social and economic benefit.

Environmental Governance in China

This volume deals with an increasingly important topic in the administration of China— environmental governance. Written by scholars from academic organizations and state agencies in the Netherlands, America, England and Hong Kong, the 10 chapters in this volume present interesting and contradictory perspectives on this issue in relation to political modernization, market reform, the making of civil society and international dynamics of environmental governance. In paralleling with other scholarship on political reform since the beginning of the twenty-first century, Environmental Governance in China contributes to the systematic conceptualization of environmental governance, which is expected as an important pillar of Chinese political reform. The volume differs from previous studies in that it calls attention to the transition within the political system and to the reason why this transition has shaped new structures and agencies for nationalizing and supervising public environmental affairs. As part of the bureaucratic reform which began in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the establishment of agencies such as the State Environmental Protection Agency and National Environmental Protection Agency was in line with the rise of the ‘‘environmental state’’ and the expansion of its employment in the administrative system. The authors also argue that in the context of contemporary China, environmental protection is more politically provocative than it is technologically provocative. The rapidly changing socio-economic landscapes that have resulted from bureaucratic reform, such as the market-oriented reform in industrialization and public participation in environmental protection, for example, challenge the environmental management work within the state. The empirical evidence provided in different chapters of the volume is based on a large number of interviews and databases that support the authors’ reconceptualization of Chinese environmental governance over the past two decades. The volume starts with a provoking introduction (Chapter 1) that not only summarizes the main contents of the subsequent nine chapters but also provides a brief exploration of how to understand and conceptualize Chinese environmental governance. Mol and Carter stress that the transition from ‘‘environmental regulation’’ to ‘‘environmental governance’’ in China shows how the authoritarian state sustains itself through political modernization— partly loosening its control on marketization and domestic consumption while mandatorily closing the economically inefficient and environmentally unfriendly state factories. However, they hold the similar viewpoint on the ‘‘state failure pattern’’ that dominated Europe in the 1980s when the European states retreated from society during economic liberalization, and argue that such a retreat would lead to the unbalance of and inequality in environmental protection. Even though the administrative initiatives in authoritarian state prelude the strengthening of the Chinese state in each dimension, environmental degradation highlights post-reform failures of the Chinese state. The aim of Chapters 2 and 3 is to bring clarity to the concept of ‘‘state failure pattern’’. The authors discuss the inconsistency between the successful economic development and failure of environmental protection after the institutional reform. The author of Chapters 2 questions the effectiveness of market-oriented institutional reform that attempts to add transparency and rule of law to the operating of Chinese environmental agencies through a critique of modernization theories that predict unproblematic market growth. In Chapter 3, JOURNAL OF CHINESE GOVERNANCE, 2016 VOL. 1, NO. 1, 191–194The administrative enforcement of environmental laws plays an increasingly important role in environmental management in China. Many efforts have been made, one of which is the establishment of five regional enforcement centers throughout the country, in addition to the existing 4-level nation-wide environmental enforcement system. For this case study, a survey of 85 local enforcement institutions at three levels (provincial, city, and county) and 162 enterprises was conducted on: staffing, financial resources, equipment and technical support, instruments, enforcement outcomes, resistance, public involvement and economic incentives. From this survey it is concluded that progress has been made in overall environmental enforcement in China, that more attention has been given to local enforcement, and that improvement has been made in local environmental enforcement capacity. However, much more needs to be done on the issues of legal status, institutional arrangement, governance system, available resources, and the overall importance given to environmental enforcement.