Quality Assurance in Construction by Independent Experts: A Case Study of the Efficiency Performance of State-Owned Enterprises in China

As a contribution to the wider theoretical discussion on quality assurance in team production, this case study describes, using the capital–output ratio as a measure of efficiency performance, the quality control problems of Chinese construction state-owned enterprises and explains, with reference to relevant scholarly opinions, why the outcome of legislative requirements for experts falls short of expectations in terms of neo-institutional economic reasoning. This is so, even though the law apparently addresses the principal-agent problem in teamwork by strengthening monitoring.

[1]  Weiying Zhang Decision rights, residual claim and performance: A theory of how the Chinese state enterprise reform works , 1997 .

[2]  Changqi Wu,et al.  The Ownership School vs. the Management School of State Enterprise Reform: Evidence from China , 2002 .

[3]  Z. Mi,et al.  Agency cost and the crisis of China's soe , 2000 .

[4]  P. Yung,et al.  TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE: THE IDEA OF THE COROLLARY OF THE COASE THEOREM AND A POSSIBLE APPLICATION , 2008 .

[5]  M. Shirley,et al.  Information, Incentives, and Commitment: An Empirical Analysis of Contracts between Government and State Enterprises , 1997 .

[6]  Chun Chang,et al.  Economic transition under a semifederalist government: The experience of China , 1998 .

[7]  Ping Yung,et al.  Supervising for quality: an empirical examination of institutional arrangements in China's construction industry , 2008 .

[8]  Jean C. Oi Fiscal Reform and the Economic Foundations of Local State Corporatism in China , 1992, World Politics.

[9]  F. M. Meijer,et al.  Deregulation and Privatisation of European Building-Control Systems? , 2006 .

[10]  Shares versus Residual Claimant Contracts: The Case of Chinese TVEs , 1998 .

[11]  L. Lai 'The Problem of Social Cost': the Coase theorem and externality explained: Using simple diagrams and examples to illustrate the role of land use planning in tackling externalities , 2007 .

[12]  Eth,et al.  Monitoring , Motivation , and Management : The Determinants of Opportunistic Behavior in a Field Experiment , 2008 .

[13]  R. Solow A Contribution to the Theory of Economic Growth , 1956 .

[14]  L. Xu,et al.  Politician control, agency problems and ownership reform , 2005 .

[15]  Ping Yung,et al.  The Coase Theorem and a Coasian construction economics and management research agenda1 , 2008 .

[16]  Robert M. Solow,et al.  Perspectives on Growth Theory , 1994 .

[17]  Z. Tao,et al.  A Multi-Task Theory of the State Enterprise Reform , 2001 .

[18]  M. Shirley,et al.  The Empirical Effects of Performance Contracts: Evidence from China , 1997 .

[19]  Huang Xiaobo The state, enterprises, and society in Post-Deng China. , 2000 .

[20]  Y. Qian,et al.  Insecure Property Rights and Government Ownership of Firms , 1998 .

[21]  Wulong Gu,et al.  A Theory of Holdouts in Wage Bargaining , 1998 .

[22]  L. Xu,et al.  Agency Theory and Executive Compensation: The Case of Chinese State‐Owned Enterprises , 2004, Journal of Labor Economics.

[23]  L. Lai Planning by Contract: The Leasehold Foundation of a Comprehensively Planned Capitalist Land Market , 2005 .

[24]  L. Lai,et al.  The Inner Logic of the Coase Theorem and a Coasian Planning Research Agenda , 2008 .

[25]  Debra J. Aron Firm Organization and the Economic Approach to Personnel Management , 1990 .

[26]  R. Coase The Nature of the Firm , 1937 .

[27]  F. M. Meijer,et al.  The Deregulation of Building Controls: A Comparison of Dutch and other European Systems , 1998 .

[28]  W. Woo The Art of Reforming Centrally-Planned Economies: Comparing China, Poland and Russia , 1994 .

[29]  Ross L. Watts,et al.  Agency Problems, Auditing, and the Theory of the Firm: Some Evidence , 1983, The Journal of Law and Economics.

[30]  Sanford J. Grossman,et al.  The Costs and Benefits of Ownership: A Theory of Vertical and Lateral Integration , 1986 .

[31]  Weiying Zhang A Principal-agent Theory of the Public Economy and Its Applications to China , 1998 .

[32]  Y. Qian,et al.  Institutional Environment, Community Government, and Corporate Governance: Understanding China's Township-Village Enterprises , 1998 .

[33]  Randy T. Simmons,et al.  All Organizations Are Public Bridging Public and Private Organizational Theories. By Barry Bozeman (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1987. xi, 184p. $21.95) , 1988, American Political Science Review.

[34]  E. Gu Beyond the Property Rights Approach: Welfare Policy and the Reform of State‐Owned Enterprises in China , 2001 .

[35]  Steven Cheung A Theory of Price Control , 1974, Journal law and economy.

[36]  L. Lai,et al.  The Coasian market-firm dichotomy and subcontracting in the construction industry , 2000 .

[37]  Colin Kirkpatrick,et al.  Centre on Regulation and Competition Working Paper Series Privatisation in Developing Countries: a Review of the Evidence and the Policy Lessons Privatization in Developing Countries: a Review of the Evidence and the Policy Lessons , 2022 .

[38]  L. Lai The leasehold system as a means of planning by contract the case of Hong Kong , 1998 .

[39]  Robert M. Solow,et al.  Growth Theory and After , 1987 .

[40]  M. C. Jensen,et al.  Harvard Business School; SSRN; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER); European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI); Harvard University - Accounting & Control Unit , 1976 .

[41]  K. Chau,et al.  TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE? AN EMPIRICAL APPLICATION OF THE COROLLARY OF THE COASE THEOREM , 2008 .

[42]  L. Xu Determinants of the Repartitioning of Property Rights between the Government and State Enterprises , 1998, Economic Development and Cultural Change.

[43]  C. Bai,et al.  Enterprise Productivity and Efficiency: When Is Up Really Down? , 1997 .

[44]  A. Walker,et al.  The measurement of total factor productivity of the Hong Kong construction industry , 1988 .

[45]  The State, Enterprises, and Society in Post-Deng China: Impact of the New Round of SOE Reform , 2000 .

[46]  H. Demsetz,et al.  Production, Information Costs, and Economic Organization , 1975, IEEE Engineering Management Review.

[47]  G. Jefferson China's State Enterprises: Public Goods, Externalities, and Coase , 1998 .

[48]  Fang Cai,et al.  Competition, Policy Burdens, and State-Owned Enterprise Reform , 1998 .

[49]  Yasheng Huang Managing Chinese Bureaucrats: An Institutional Economics Perspective , 2002 .