Performance and the Chinese Political System: A Preliminary Assessment of Education and Health Policies

Abstract

Having a number of studies on what Kenneth Dolbeare has called “fundamental policies” in the education and health fields, we are now able to make a preliminary assessment of how the Chinese political system has performed along three important dimensions. With what degree of equity have services been provided across provinces? What have been the aggregate growth trends in education and health and what have been the long- and short-term costs of these patterns? Finally, what impact have the programmes had on the problems they were designed to overcome?