This book examines the role of institutions in China's recent large-scale economic, social and political transformation. The book argues that, although the importance of institutions in China's rapid economic growth and social development over the past 30 years is widely acknowledged, exactly how institutions affect changes in particular national and historical settings is less well understood. Unlike existing literature, it offers perspectives from a variety of disciplines - including law, economics, politics, international relations and communication studies - to consider whether institutions form, evolve and change differently according to their historical or cultural environments and if their utilitarian functions can, and should be, observed, identified and measured in different ways.

1. Introduction: Institutional Analysis and China's Transformation: Issues and Concepts - Xiaoming Huang 2. China and International Institutions - Harry Harding 3. Institution Formation, Imitation and Borrowing: Zhongguancun as a Case Study on Mechanisms of Institutional Change - Sheng Hong 4. Science and Technology Institutions and Performance in China: The Semi-Conductor Industry - Keun Lee and Wang Rui 5. Power, Rights and Interests: A Law and Economic Analysis of Urban Housing Demolition and Relocation in China - Yujun Feng 6. China's Road to a Rechtsstaat: Rule of Law, Constitutional Democracy and Institutional Change - Li Weisen 7. China's Evolving Institutional Exclusion: The Hukou System and Its Transformation - Fei-ling Wang 8. China's Changing Hukou System: Institutional Objectives, Formal Arrangements and Informal Practices - Jason Young 9. State Capacity, Democratic Principles and Constitutional Order: Modern State-building in Post-Totalitarian Society - Qiang Li 10. Institutional Accumulation and Gradual Substitution: The Dynamics of Developmental Democracy in China - Dingping Guo 11. Propaganda vs. Promotion: The Political Economy of CCTV - Yong He 12. Village Elections and the Institutionalization of Legitimate Authority - C S Bryan Ho 13. Conclusion: The Institutional Dynamics of China's Transformation: What We Have Learnt? - Xiaoming Huang