Stick rather than carrot
The impact of imbalance of rewards and punishments on the inaction of Chinese grassroots civil servants
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 17832571 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Qi Zeng (0000-0003-4882-5530, Zhongkai University of Agriculture and Engineering), Zhihui Duan (Renmin University of China), Bingyan Zhu, Chunyang Zhang (0000-0002-0178-5458, Capital University of Economics and Business, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Publication date | 2026-04-03 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2662-9992 • E-ISSN: 2662-9992 |
| Publisher | Palgrave Macmillan (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1057/s41599-026-07152-9 |
| OpenAlex | W7149197370 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 74 |
Grassroots civil servants’ (GCSs) inaction has emerged as a critical challenge demanding immediate attention in China’s public administration. This study examines how the imbalance of rewards and punishments (IRP), characterized by reward omission and non-contingent punishment, contributes to GCS inaction. To this end, a three-wave questionnaire survey was conducted among 329 Chinese GCSs, with each wave separated by a 1-month interval. Through moderated mediation analysis and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), the results demonstrate that IRP positively affects GCS inaction via a parallel mediating mechanism involving work alienation and risk perception. Moreover, public service motivation (PSM) negatively moderates the entire mediating process. The fsQCA findings further reveal three distinct antecedent configurations associated with GCS inaction: (1) the presence of non-contingent punishment coupled with the absence of PSM; (2) the coexistence of non-contingent punishment and work alienation at higher position levels; and (3) the paradoxical combination of work alienation and PSM at higher position levels. The results of the three configurations further confirm that high IRP (especially non-contingent punishment), high work alienation and low PSM (except for configuration 3) are the core coupling factors that trigger the inaction of GCSs. These insights provide valuable policy implications for tackling and mitigating inaction among GCSs, emphasizing the critical need to develop effective reward and incentive mechanisms and to refine the accountability and risk management systems for civil servants
Civil servants · Grassroots · China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance · Chinese history and philosophy · Occupational and Professional Licensing Regulation
Redesigning Social Inquiry
Building Theory and Empirical Evidence about Public Service Motivation
Reciprocal relationships between job resources, personal resources, and work engagement
Uncertainty During Organizational Change
The Darker and Brighter Sides of Human Existence
Loss Aversion in Riskless Choice
Prospect Theory
The Influence of Culture, Community, and the Nested‐Self in the Stress Process
Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Determination in Human Behavior
Responsibility For Disciplining Civil Servants
Birth influences future
Anti-corruption campaign in China
Lay Theories and Intergroup Relations
China’s Bureaucratic Slack
Self‐determination theory and work motivation
Sword of Damocles hanging over grassroots cadres in China
The Effects of Work Alienation and Policy Alienation on Behavior of Public Employees
What’s Measured Is What Matters
The Motivational Bases of Public Service
Measuring Public Service Motivation
The Price of Probity
Why do we punish? Deterrence and just deserts as motives for punishment
The CCP, Campaign Governance and Covid-19
Availability
The Norm of Reciprocity
A Model of Neutralization Techniques
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |