Policy evaluation in China's housing reform

Abstract

In socialist China, evaluation research is still a new term to the academic and more so to the public. There is no independent evaluation or evaluation research yet to stand on the objective ground for the benefits of people and society. However, evaluation is being carried on seriously and intensively in most of the social action programs, serving to justify the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) political initiatives. This paper attempts to examine evaluation activities in China. Choosing housing reform, the author traces evaluation procedures throughout that broad-scale social action program, and examines how evaluation functions in justifying the CCP's political initiatives and in harnessing governmental actions for better effects as well. In the end, the author explores the possibility of evaluation research becoming an academic field in the Chinese context with the Western methodology.