The Political Development Cycle: The Right and the Left in People's Republic of China from 1953
American Economic Review
vol. 114,
no. 4, April 2024
(pp. 1107-39)
Abstract
We quantify the effects of the political development cycle—the fluctuations between the Left (Maoist) and the Right (pragmatist) development policies—on growth and structural transformation of China in 1953–1978. The left policies prioritized structural transformation toward nonagricultural production and consumption at the expense of agricultural development. The right policies prioritized agricultural consumption through slower structural transformation. The imperfect implementation of these policies led to large welfare costs of the political development cycle in a distorted economy undergoing a structural change.Citation
Cheremukhin, Anton, Mikhail Golosov, Sergei Guriev, and Aleh Tsyvinski. 2024. "The Political Development Cycle: The Right and the Left in People's Republic of China from 1953." American Economic Review, 114 (4): 1107-39. DOI: 10.1257/aer.20220249Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D72 Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
- N15 Economic History: Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations: Asia including Middle East
- N45 Economic History: Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation: Asia including Middle East
- N55 Economic History: Agriculture, Natural Resources, Environment, and Extractive Industries: Asia including Middle East
- O21 Planning Models; Planning Policy
- P21 Socialist Systems and Transitional Economies: Planning, Coordination, and Reform
- P24 Socialist Systems and Transitional Economies: National Income, Product, and Expenditure; Money; Inflation