Competition for attention in the Chinese bureaucracy

Researchers of the Chinese bureaucracy generally believe that policy promotion depends on the power of the party committees because they have absolute authority in China. This intuitive argument, however, lacks support from rigorous empirical research and theoretical analyses. Through close observation of the Bureau of Justice, this paper analyzes how differentiated authority affects organizational interaction and triggers the corresponding government behavior. The paper finds that while the functional bureaus could use professional authority to carry out policies, they nevertheless choose to rely on the administrative authority of the government and the political authority of the party committee. We illustrate the process, mechanism, and consequences of attention competition. The process reflects that the party committee has real authority, while the government has formal authority and the functional bureaus have only symbolic authority. This differentiated authority has three consequences: (1) the “Matthew effect” of the authority structure, (2) functional bureaus competing fiercely for the party committees’ attention at the expense of accomplishing routine work, and (3) rule of the leader’s personal preference instead of the rule of law in governance.