Books

06.20.17

Shadow Banking and the Rise of Capitalism in China

Andrew Collier
This book is about the growth of shadow banking in China and the rise of China’s free markets. Shadow Banking refers to capital that is distributed outside the formal banking system, including everything from Mom and Pop lending shops to online credit to giant state owned banks called Trusts. They have grown from a fraction of the economy 10 years ago to nearly half of all China’s annual 25 trillion renminbi (U.S.$4.1 trillion) in lending in the economy today.Shadow Banks are a new aspect of capitalism in China—barely regulated, highly risky, yet tolerated by Beijing. They have been permitted to flourish because many companies cannot get access to formal bank loans. It is the Wild West of banking in China. If we define capitalism as economic activity controlled by the private sector, then Shadow Banking is still in a hybrid stage, a halfway house between the state and the private economic. But it is precisely this divide that makes Shadow Banking important to the rise of capitalism. How Beijing handles this large free market will say a lot about how the country’s economy will grow—will free markets be granted greater leeway? —Palgrave Macmillan{chop}

Conversation

06.14.17

Do Street Protests Work in China?

Mara Hvistendahl, Benjamin L. Read & more
A rare street protest broke out in China’s biggest city and commercial capital on Saturday night, June 10, when residents of Shanghai marched against new housing rules that some residents claimed have caused the value of their property to plummet...

Hundreds Protest in Shanghai over Ban on Selling Converted Flats

Daniel Ren, Sandy Li
South China Morning Post
Rare demonstration came after city authorities barred owners from selling apartments converted from office or commercial space.

Unswayed by Extraordinary Public Outcry, China Executes Nail Gun Killer

Simon Denyer
Washington Post
China sends messsage that ordinary people can’t take the law into their own hands, and the Communist Party is simply not going be swayed by a public outcry.

China Homeowners Live in Legal Limbo

James Areddy and Esther Feng
Wall Street Journal
Wenzhou case underscores uncertainty over land leases in country where government owns all the land.

Sinica Podcast

01.26.15

Inside the Property Revolution

Jeremy Goldkorn & Luigi Tomba from Sinica Podcast
Luigi Tomba, expert on municipal government in China, fellow at the Australian Centre on China and the World, and author of the book The Government Next Door: Neighborhood Politics in Urban China, is this week's Sinica Podcast guest. Since 2005...

The Perils of Private Enterprise: There Was Blood

Economist
A visitor to Jingbian county in northern Shaanxi province finds at its heart a thriving oil town in the grip of a state-owned company, Shaanxi Yanchang Petroleum. Yanchang’s building, 12 storeys high, towers over the low-slung town. The company is...

What’s Driving China’s Real Estate Rally?

Patrick Chovanec
Patrick Chovanec: An American Perspective from China
Yesterday, I began an investigation into the potential causes behind the latest bump in China’s property sales numbers, and whether they portend a genuine turn-around in the nation’s real estate market.  I noted that five basic theories to...

Reports

10.15.07

Securing Land Rights for Chinese Farmers

Zhu Keliang and Roy Prosterman
Cato Institute
Despite China's significant economic growth, most of the 700 million farmers that make up about 56% of the total population still lack secure and marketable land rights that would allow them to make long-term investment in land in order to...