Remade in China

Political scientists who study economic institutions often focus on how resistant they are to change. Instead of dramatic change, they see path dependencies and national 'varieties' of capitalism. But what happens when economic globalizations gradually upends traditional economic arrangements? As Scott Wilson argues in Remade in China, that is precisely what has happened in the last decade in China. As foreign firms-particularly American ones-have penetrated deeper into the Chinese economy, they have also brought to new labor and legal institutions to China. The incremental penetration of these institutions in the Chinese economy has nudged China toward an American political-economic model. But the Chinese state has managed this convergence so that its own institutions have not been cast aside. Rather, through a process of state-guided globalization, the deepening relationship between China and Western economic and legal institutions has been more subtle, with domestic political actors ensuring that the alteration in course has not been too sharp. The convergence toward Western norms is evident throughout the economy, but the Chinese are active shapers of the process. Alongside a powerful argument about the importance of exogenous effects on domestic institutions, Wilson provides a richly detailed account of China's transforming economy, its labor markets, and the role of Chinese actors in managing the incorporation of American (and occasionally Japanese) norms.