(Why Couldn't the Neighborhood Committee Replace HOA in China?)

Abstract

Chinese Abstract: 最近一段时间存在着一种由居委会来领导监督业委会，甚至代替业委会的观点。本文采用新制度经济学的理论和方法来分析业委会所代表的城市制度结构。我们的主要观点是居委会不能代替业委会。分析的出发点是城市土地利用的两个空间事实，即不动产的消费和地方公共品的消费是捆绑在一起的，以及不动产所有者的事后流动性会大大降低。这两个事实会导致城市土地利用中的胁迫问题。整合不动产所有者和地方集体品提供者可以有效地解决胁迫问题。除了讨论整合的几种可能形式以外，我们还提出了居委会在未来代替业委会的基本条件。English Abstract: In recent years in China there is an argument that the neighborhood committee should not only guide and monitor the homeowners association (HOA) but also replace it. Our objective is to analyze the urban institutional structure that is represented by HOA and our approach is based on New Institutional Economics. Our main argument is that the neighborhood committee cannot replace the HOA. The building block for our analysis is two spatial facts in urban land use, i.e., the consumption of real estate and that of local collective goods are bundled together and homeowners’ ex post mobility is greatly reduced. These two spatial facts lead to the hold-up problem, which manifests in NIMBY and regulatory takings. An efficient solution to the hold-up problem is to integrate the homeowners and the collective goods provider. We discussed some basic conditions for the neighborhood committee to replace the HOA in addition to several possible forms of integration.