Chinese Communist Party Members Research Articles

Do political affiliation and economic wellbeing thwart religious identification in China?

Abstract While the Chinese government's stated position is to support religious freedom, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is officially atheist. Individuals who profess faith are typically unable to join and members who practice a religion face expulsion and a loss of benefits. This paper analyzes the extent to which the CCP's policies regarding religion may influence religious identification over the life cycle in China. To do so, we contrast changes in religious affiliation before and after retirement for CCP members and non-CCP members. We find a significant increase of religious activities and religious faith in CCP members after retirement – suggesting: (1) people's acknowledgment of religious belief is significantly influenced by CCP regulations and (2) the biggest influence from a material benefits perspective occurs for those CCP members employed in the Chinese government system.

Public attitudes toward hydropower in China: The role of information provision and partisan identification

The development of hydropower projects needs public support. Although China has led the world in hydropower development during the past few decades, little is known about how the Chinese public views existing hydropower projects and future hydropower development plans. Based on an online survey experiment (N = 2971), this study investigates the effects of five types of information provision, including (1) power generation benefit, (2) emission reduction benefit, (3) flood control, navigation and grid benefits, (4) negative environmental impact and (5) involuntary migration impact of hydropower, and partisan identification on public attitudes to China's hydropower policy and most representative hydropower project, the Three Gorges Project. First, information provision about the benefits of power generation has no significant effect on public attitudes to the Three Gorges Project and China's hydropower development plans. Second, information provision about the benefits of emission reduction and flood control, navigation and grid effects can significantly increase public evaluation of the Three Gorges Project, but does not influence public support for abstract hydropower development plans. Third, information provision about the negative impacts on the environment and involuntary migration can significantly decrease public evaluation of the Three Gorges Project and support for hydropower development plans. Finally, Chinese Communist Party members have more positive attitudes to China's hydropower development plans and the Three Gorge Project than the non-members, and they are more responsive to environmental information but less responsive to the migration issue.

His house, her house? Gender inequality and homeownership among married couples in urban China

Nearly four decades of housing reforms have transformed China into a homeowner society with homeownership rates exceeding 90 % in 2019. However, exactly which household member owns the property has seldom been studied. Using the 2017 China Household Financial Survey, this study examines the distribution of homeownership between the husband and wife, which is of great importance for understanding gender dynamics and intra-household inequality in urban China. Employing multi-level multinomial regressions, the results show that husbands generally have an absolute advantage of being the owners, which is stronger among the younger cohort. However, a wife's higher socioeconomic status, indicated by education, occupation, Chinese Communist Party membership, or hukou status, significantly increases her propensity to be stated as the deed owner. Furthermore, the gender disparity in homeownership between the husband and wife narrows in developed cities. We argue that the overall male dominance in household homeownership is structured and strengthened by the promotion of homeownership as a social norm, trapping both men and women in the reproduction of gender inequality.

The impact of information interventions on public opinion on social media regulation: Evidence from a survey on Twitter’s Trump Ban

There has been a heated debate on the desirability of and the procedure justice concerning Twitter’s Trump Ban. Using online survey data with student subjects, we investigate how information shapes people’s attitude on Twitter’s Trump ban. We find that people’s attitude can be significantly influenced by the information they receive. Our result shows that information related to public safety concerns and the explanation about free speech in Section 230 increases the support for the Trump Ban. Information about European Leaders’ concerns about the Trump Ban and information that may generate negative sentiment toward Twitter lead to a lower support rate for the Trump Ban. Information that may generate negative sentiment towards Trump does not lead to a higher support rate for the ban in the full sample, but only among the Chinese Communist Party members.

Political Discontent in China Is Associated with Isolating Personality Traits

Our personalities affect how we understand the political world, but research to date has focused almost exclusively on democratic contexts. How is personality related to political attitudes and behavior in authoritarian systems? Three original surveys of Chinese citizens (Nstudy1=2,024, Nstudy2=3,573, Nstudy3=1,986) show that discontented citizens in contemporary China are more fearful, disagreeable, and introverted, lacking close emotional attachments to others. Conversely, Chinese Communist Party members show high levels of extraversion and other traits associated with personal and professional success. These findings suggest a social element to regime support. China’s most dissatisfied citizens operate at the fringes of society, which may contribute to the durability of authoritarian rule in the country.

Chinese Entrepreneurs, the Party-State, and Gender: Women Succeed in Business without the CCP

AbstractIn this article, we take a gender perspective to explore the relationship between private entrepreneurs’ business success and their Chinese Communist Party (CCP) membership. We theorize that, due to male-dominated CCP-business networks, female entrepreneurs are not able to leverage CCP membership into greater business success. Observable implications of this are that women will experience little or no business advantage from Party membership, while men will experience a significant advantage. The independence of women's business success from Party connections allows the possibility that women have carved out an area of autonomy from the party-state. Using a series of national entrepreneur surveys collected between 2002 and 2012, we assess the degree of empirical support for our expectations. We show that the CCP does appear to function as an exclusive “boys’ club” in terms of profitable patronage or networks, while the most successful women tend not to be Party members. The surveys also provide some evidence consistent with a CCP effort to recruit successful female entrepreneurs in order to curtail their autonomy. Our findings suggest non-CCP female entrepreneurs are a significant but generally overlooked socio-economic group with considerable potential autonomy.

Social Connection, Political Identity, and Employees’ Labor Protest Propensity in China

Scholars have long been interested in studying the effects of social and political control on collective action in China. However, few studies have investigated whether the relationship between social and political control and collective action changes over time. In this study, we examined the relationship between social connection, political identity, and employees’ labor protest propensity with a comparative perspective of time. Using data from the Chinese General Social Survey, conducted ten years apart in the years 2003 and 2013, we found that the relationship between social connections, political identity indicated by Chinese Communist Party (CCP) membership, and labor protest propensity differ with these two samples. The relationship between the strength of social connection and labor protest propensity is significant in the 2003 sample, but becomes insignificant in the 2013 sample. The effect of employee’s political identity on labor protest propensity also varies in the two samples. Further analysis shows that CCP members who rated themselves as having a similar social economic status with their peers have a higher intention to participate in a labor protest than party members who rated themselves as having higher social economic status than their peers. This study’s findings demonstrate the importance of considering a time comparative perspective when studying what predicts employees’ labor protest propensity.

Inhibitors to Christianity According to Atheist and Nonreligious Chinese Graduate Students Attending a Christian University in the United States: A Grounded Theory Study

This grounded theory research investigated the experiences of 25 Chinese graduate students attending a Christian university in the United States, most of whom self-identified as atheist or nonreligious upon entry. Interview and questionnaire data identified that 23 of 25 participants experienced an overall increased openness to Christianity during their graduate studies; two students' worldview remained approximately the same. However, in that process of worldview change, all participants experienced competing influences that affected their perceptions of Christianity—some influences increased their openness to Christianity and some influences inhibited their openness to Christianity. To restate: Whereas my first article published in this journal focused on influences that increased openness to Christianity, this sequel article focuses solely on the influences participants described as having decreased (or inhibited) their openness to Christianity in theoretical–curricular and relational–cultural dimensions. These 10 inhibitors include (a) Participants’ Surprise at Discovering They Were Attending a Christian University; (b) Modern Chinese Education’s Naturalist Training; (c) Nonsystematic Presentations of Christianity; (d) Religious Pragmatism and Relativity; (e) China’s Climate of Pressure and Corruption; (f) Chinese Communist Party Membership, Affiliation, or Influence; (g) Pushy Chinese-Speaking Church Movements; (h) Cynicism of “Fake” Conversion; (i) Mockery From Peers; and (j) Perceived Hypocrisy of Christians. The article concludes with Implications for Practice for Christian university administrators and faculty working at institutions that enroll Chinese students as well as student life organizations and other personnel seeking to serve the Chinese university student population.

Who supports expanding surveillance? Exploring public opinion of Chinese social credit systems

Pervasive surveillance in modern society has raised mounting debates, which are largely concentrated on the ethical dimension and lack sociological examination. Drawing on innovative national survey data, this study analyzes public opinion about social credit systems, an emerging infrastructure that expands the depth and breadth of surveillance in China. I find a general high support for expanding surveillance and punishment yet key variations among different social groups. Counterintuitively, people with higher political capital do not wholly embrace the expanding surveillance and punishment. For example, Chinese Communist Party members are less likely to support state-centered social credit systems compared with the general public. Higher political trust in the regime and socioeconomic status is consistently correlated with higher support, while different media consumption showed limited correlations. This study proposes an alternative theorization of surveillance and enriches our understanding of the heterogeneity and dynamic of the state and public in the authoritarian regime.

The Factors Affecting Volunteers' Willingness to Participate in Disaster Preparedness.

Disaster preparedness is crucial for providing an effective response to, and reducing the possible impacts of, disasters. Although volunteers’ participation plays an important role in disaster preparedness, their actual participation in disaster preparedness activities is still low. To find ways to encourage more volunteers to participate, this study analyzed the social background and organizational and attitudinal factors affecting the volunteers’ willingness to participate. Questionnaires were distributed to 990 registered disaster volunteers across Beijing and the data were analyzed using linear regression models. Results revealed a weak willingness to participate in disaster preparedness. Only 28.08% of the respondents indicated that they were “very ready” to participate in voluntary disaster preparedness, and 14.65% showed “a little bit” of interest. The following was concluded: (1) Disaster volunteers’ social background variables were related to their willingness to participate in disaster preparedness. Compared to male volunteers, female volunteers were more willing to participate. Chinese Communist Party members were more willing to participate than non-members. (2) Providing accidental life insurance for the volunteers had a positive effect on their willingness to participate in disaster preparedness. Provision of more training had a negative effect on the volunteers’ willingness to participate, indicating a low quality of training. (3) Organizational identification was positively related to the volunteers’ willingness to participate. According to these results, we suggest that volunteer organizations should improve their standards and procedures for disaster volunteer recruitment and selection, and gain a deeper understanding of the needs of the disaster volunteers in order to better motivate them to participate.

Finding trustworthy common ground: analysis of Chinese trust in Americans (2012–2018)

ABSTRACT Using four waves of CFPS data from 2012 to 2018, we focused on the degree of Chinese individuals’ trust in Americans, and found that the Chinese interviewees were ‘very distrustful’ Americans. We employed the random-effects ordered probit method to estimate the model, and made the following key conclusions: in terms of individual characteristics, (1) gender factors affect Chinese trust in Americans, the degree of trust among males is higher than that among females; (2) the Chinese individuals’ trust in Americans gradually decreases with the advance of age; (3) the level of education has a positive correlation with international trust. Meanwhile, socioeconomic factors play an important role in explaining the degree of Chinese individuals’ trust in Americans. Chinese individuals with higher social status and relative income are more likely to trust Americans. Moreover, the attitude and evaluation of individuals towards the government are also worthy of attention. Importantly, in contrast to earlier published findings, we found that Chinese Communist Party members were more likely to trust Americans, while military veterans, however, have a low degree of trust in American people, which might be highly correlated with the China–US political relations.

Higher education and family background: Which really matters to individual’s socioeconomic status development in China

The study finds that the higher education and parents’ occupations both have a significant impact to individual’s social economic development measured by ISEI (International Socioeconomic Index), but higher education’s impact is greater. In addition, from 1980s to 2000s, the impact of higher education has been diminishing as the access to higher education increased significantly. Data also shows that certain sectors, such as government employees, Chinese Communist Party members, city/urban households, had a clear advantage. To our surprise, gender and minority status had no statistical difference in ISEI. Several policies were recommended to break the social stratification in the near future.

Impact of work ethic on proactive work behaviors: The moderating roles of education and party affiliation in China

This study examined the relationship between work ethic and proactive work behaviors by focusing on the moderating roles of education and party affiliation. The theoretical model was tested using data collected from employees in China. Analyses of 746 usable questionnaires collected at two phrases were used to empirically test the relationship between the work ethic and proactive work behaviors. The relationship between work ethic and proactive work behaviors was more pronounced for those with lower education. It was also founded that the work ethic had a significantly stronger positive influence on proactive work behaviors among non-Party members than among the Chinese Communist Party members. Finally, we discussed the theoretical and practical implications of this study, future research directions and limitations at the end of this article.

Grain exports and the causes of China's Great Famine, 1959–1961: County-level evidence

This study quantitatively evaluates the relative importance of different causes of China's Great Famine, especially for the importance of grain exports. We exploit county-level over-time variations in crop specialization patterns to construct Bartik-style measures of export shocks. Using county-level panel data from 1955 to 1963, we regress death rates on the Bartik export measures with county and province-year fixed effects as well as time-varying effects of county-level observables. We use weather shocks to instrument for output and consumption. The regression results suggest that increases in grain exports substantially increase death rates. This effect is larger in counties that are further from railways and with fewer local Chinese Communist Party members. To examine the relative importance of different mechanisms, we also estimate the effects of the procurement policy, the determinants of grain output, and the relationship between death rates and county-level average caloric consumption during the famine period. The counterfactual experiments indicate that the fall in agriculture production, the increase in procurement partly driven by grain exports, and the increasingly progressive and inflexible procurement policy collectively increased the number of excess deaths, where no single factor dominates. In particular, grain exports explain 15 percent of excess deaths, which is one-fourth of the effect of the increase in procurement rates between 1957 and 1959.

“Identity premium” on subjective well-being: Evidence from the Communist Party membership in China

ABSTRACTJoining the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is often associated with material returns, but whether and how this contributes to better subjective well-being remains under-researched. Using data from the 2012 Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS), this paper examines the effect of party membership on Chinese residents’ subjective well-being. This paper has found that CCP membership, as a prestigious social identity, has a pure effect on subjective well-being. This happiness effect – termed by this research as identity premium – is greater when party membership is subject to scarcity. These findings suggest that it is the enhanced sense of self-regard brought by the relative value of party membership that boosts people’s satisfaction with life.

Wage premium of Communist Party membership: Evidence from China

AbstractSocial status and political connections may confer large economic benefits on an individual. Previous studies focused on China have examined the relationship between Communist Party membership and earnings and have revealed a positive correlation. However, the correlation could be partly or totally spurious. Using data from three surveys spanning three decades, we estimate the causal effect of Chinese Communist Party membership on monthly earnings in China. We find that, on average, membership in the Communist Party of China increases monthly earnings and the wage premium has grown in the last three decades. We explore potential causes and discover evidence that improvements in social networks and social rank, acquisition of job‐related qualifications and greater life satisfaction play important roles in increased earnings.

Partisan culture, identity and corruption: An experiment based on the Chinese Communist Party

We conduct a lab experiment to investigate the impact of partisan culture and identity on corruption behavior based on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Subjects are randomly assigned to a prime condition that increases the salience of the CCP partisan concept or to a control condition in which the partisan concept is not made salient. Our results show that when acting as public officials, subjects in the priming condition demand significantly lower bribes than in the control condition. Moreover, when subjects are differentiated by their natural partisan identity as CCP members or non-members, we find that non-members are even less corrupt in response to partisan concept prime, while the effect of priming on CCP members is insignificant. Our results, combining with additional evidence, suggest that the prevailing CCP partisan culture is generally able to undermine corruption behavior, while the partisan identity itself can work in the opposite direction.

Disparities in Subjective Wellbeing: Political Status, Urban-Rural Divide, and Cohort Dynamics in China

This paper investigates disparities in subjective wellbeing in China by analyzing the Chinese General Social Survey (2003–2015). Our hierarchical age-period-cohort models reveal how Chinese Communist Party membership, the urban-rural divide, and cohort differences have jointly shaped levels of happiness. Interestingly, the significance of political status in shaping happiness varies profoundly across birth cohorts and locations of residence. In earlier cohorts (1910–1948), Communist Party members in rural areas have a considerable advantage over nonmembers, but this advantage gradually diminishes later, except the 1977–1985 cohort. The advantage of urban party membership keeps increasing up to the cohort born during 1957–1965 but declines rapidly after that. Findings suggest that in the planned economy, political status plays a central role in promoting subjective wellbeing especially in urban China; the transition to a market economy in post-Mao China has reduced political disparities among younger cohorts, mainly for urban residents.

Enlightened One-Party Rule? Ideological Differences between Chinese Communist Party Members and the Mass Public

A popular view of nondemocratic regimes is that they draw followers mainly from those with an illiberal, authoritarian mind-set. We challenge this view by arguing that there exist a different class of autocracies that rule with a relatively enlightened base. Leveraging multiple nationally representative surveys from China over the past decade, we substantiate this claim by estimating and comparing the ideological preferences of Chinese Communist Party members and ordinary citizens. We find that party members on average hold substantially more modern and progressive views than the public on issues such as gender equality, political pluralism, and openness to international exchange. We also explore two mechanisms that may account for this party–public value gap—selection and socialization. We find that while education-based selection is the most dominant mechanism overall, socialization also plays a role, especially among older and less educated party members. Our findings caution against the simple, dichotomous characterization of political regimes and underscore an important tension between modernization and democratization in developing societies.

The changing faces and roles of communist party membership in China: an empirical analysis based on CHIPS 1988, 1995 and 2002

ABSTRACTThis paper analyses the evolution of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) using micro-data from three nationwide surveys. I examine how party membership affects people’s choice of employment, occupational attainment, and earnings, while including changes in the function of individual attributes and human capital. I endeavor to cover both urban and rural areas and gain a dynamic understanding of the topic.The proportion of people who joined the CCP as they grew older was relatively stable in the three surveys, while the overall education level of party members increased rapidly with time. Party membership and education had a statistically significant and positive effect on non-farm employment choice and earnings, but those effects decreased rapidly over time in rural China. In contrast, party membership and education exerted more and more of an effect on employment choice, occupational attainment, and earnings in urban China. Furthermore, in both rural and urban areas, the rate of return to education and the earnings premium for CCP membership are converging at the same level. This is evidence worthy of attention as it indicates that labor markets throughout the country are becoming integrated.