The Price of Losing Autonomy
Assessing the Economic Impact of County-to-District Mergers in China
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6405271 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jianzi He (0000-0001-7234-3182, The Institute for Global Public Policy, Fudan University, Shanghai, China, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 60 |
| Issue | 6 |
| Pages | 1839-1870 |
| Publication date | 2024-11-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Urban Affairs Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1078-0874 • E-ISSN: 1552-8332 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/10780874241242696 |
| OpenAlex | W4393313521 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
| References cited | 39 |
Amalgamations in democratic settings often result in disadvantages for small and peripheral units, as their political power diminishes in the merged jurisdictions. This article extends the discussion to China by assessing the economic outcomes of county-level units after their conversion into districts directly controlled by city authorities. Leveraging a large county-year panel dataset and employing an advanced causal effect estimator, my analysis reveals a generally less optimistic outlook for these county-turned districts following the mergers. The negative impacts are initially evident in microeconomic indicators, especially in resident deposits, and later materialize in the long-term trajectories of macroeconomic indicators. Furthermore, heterogeneous analysis and a comparative case study in Hangzhou city link the problem to the loss of administrative autonomy. Notably, the negative impacts are less likely to manifest in county-turned districts that are under provincial protection and therefore maintain a certain degree of administrative autonomy after the mergers
Autonomy · Business · China · Economic impact analysis · Economics · Political science · China's Socioeconomic Reforms and Governance · Qualitative Comparative Analysis Research · Social Policy and Reform Studies
The Size of Nations
Difference-in-differences with variation in treatment timing
Difference-in-Differences with multiple time periods
The Impact of Municipal Mergers on Local Public Spending
City of districts” as state project
The Multilevel Politics of County-to-District Mergers in China
Inter-Governmental Vertical Competition in China’s Urbanization Process
Is there anybody out there?” Political implications of a territorial integration
Top-down” local government mergers
Inter-regional barriers and economic growth
Spatiotemporal effects of administrative division adjustment on urban expansion in China
The effects of amalgamations on voter turnout
The economic impact of city–county consolidations
A Pure Theory of Local Expenditures
Territorial reforms in Europe
The value of transition periods
The Fiscal Impact of County-to-Urban District Conversion in China
From a Majority to a Minority
Urban Fault Lines
To Be Central or Peripheral? What Matters for Political Representation in Amalgamated Municipalities
The Democratic Costs of Size
Effects of municipal mergers on voter turnout
Political Representation and Geographical Bias in Amalgamated Local Governments
Voter turnout and municipal amalgamations—evidence from Denmark
If territorial fragmentation is a problem, is amalgamation a solution? – Ten years later
A Practical Guide to Counterfactual Estimators for Causal Inference with Time‐Series Cross‐Sectional Data
Juking the Stats? Authoritarian Information Problems in China
The Effects of Local Government Consolidation on Turnout
Geographical Research
Jurisdiction Size and Local Government Policy Expenditure
Nested Analysis as a Mixed-Method Strategy for Comparative Research
Jurisdiction Size and Local Democracy
| Unique citing works | 4 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 4 |
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 4 |