Property Rights and China

• In Event: Property Rights and Corporations: Bringing the State Back in History and Theory

Abstract

Property rights has been central to social-scientific thinking about development and democracy, and is often used to explain the great divergence between “East” and “West.” This paper problematizes this perspective, not through an investigation of the presence or absence of property rights in imperial China, but through an examination of the idea of property rights in Chinese political thinking and practice.

Author

• Iza Ding, Northwestern University