Les ambiguïtés de la décentralisation : les mutations de l'Etat local, nouvel acteur du capitalisme chinois

This article focuses on the consequences of economic decentralization in China since the end of the seventies. We argue that far from involving a greater market transparency, the dismantling of central planning has in fact led to a growth in forms of local bureaucratic protectionism, and to a serious segmentation of China's economic space. The devolution of functions from State-level to that of local administration enables one to see the outlines of a corporate State in the process of becoming both entrepreneurial and predatory.