In China, special interest groups can be described as interest coalitions made up of people and social classes who have the right to dominate public power and resources. Each coalition exists to safeguard the special interests of its own members; Special interest groups have three defining characteristics. They have grabbed, and will continue to grab most of the benefits generated by China's reform and opening-up policy; they will oppose social and political reforms in China, as such reforms are likely to damage their interests; and they have the ability to interfere with China's reform program. 　

In addition, China's special interest groups can be classified into seven categories: Powerful central government departments and their officials; local governments and their officials; state-owned enterprises and their executives; the transnational capital and its domestic agency; real estate developers; large private enterprises and capitals, including industrial capitalists and financial capitalists; experts and scholars that depend on all six aforementioned interest groups.

Experts believe that special interest groups were formed at different times for different reasons, with some being remnants of China's planned economy and others being formed in the so-called transitional institutions established during the process of reform and opening-up.

An interest group always gets benefits through institutions and sways governmental decision-making, but its methods do not qualify as an abuse of power, as interest groups employ legal means and methods to achieve their aims.

Conflicting interests

Mancur Olson, a leading American economist, believes that social groups always fight for income redistribution but no income creation, a course which usually lowers the economic growth rate and average per capital income, which has negative effects on society. Special interest groups can seriously harm Chinese society as well as its reform program.

First, it is difficult for the government to roll out policies which are beneficial to the social reform program due to interference from special interest groups.

Special interest groups also seriously undermine the ruling foundation of the CPC. Some special interest group members, who are also Party members often ensure that reforms are beneficial to them specifically but not to the general public as a whole. Such a situation is highly undesirable for the operation of state power.

In addition, the actions of special interest groups would make the entire economic system ineffective, triggering unsustainable economic development. For example, interest groups have distorted measures carried out in reforms of state-owned companies, which has a negative effect on resource distribution. Resources must then be overused, rendering China's development unsustainable.

The administration of interest groups

The administration of special interest groups has become one of the most important political issues in China. Although it is unlikely that the influence exerted by special interest groups on China's policy-making, legislation and other political processes will ever be eliminated, their influence can be weakened by checks and balances. The government plays the role of "check", and "balance" can be realized by increasing the number of special interest groups.

This demands that the government displays an open and transparency political process, and the government should also ease unnecessary controls over social organizations and adopt rules and laws to regulate the development of different interest groups. With such legal checks in place, it would be more difficult for any one special interest group to exercise more influence or gain much more benefits than any other.

A strict institutional system should be established with the aim of cutting the link between government officials and commercial action. It should be clearly defined which are rights of enterprises and what the government should take charge of and regulate. It should also be clearly specified that government officials are not allowed to engage in any commercial activities.

The monopoly status of China's state-owned companies should be broken, as this status allows such companies to benefit from not having to compete in the market. Even in the event that state-owned companies suffer huge loses, they are always bailed out by taxpayers' money allocated to them by the government.

Also, the policy-making process should be made accessible to the public and social groups. The system of government must be open and transparent because the public has the right to know what is going on. The government should provide more channels by which the public can assess its performance.

Finally, the legal system should be enhanced and all of the aforementioned reforms should be enshrined in law. Any individual, entity or government should be restricted by law.

The article was translated by Gong Yingchun. The original unabridged version was published in Chinese.

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.

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