Asia Report #19 | April 2013
According to conventional wisdom, rising corruption reduces economic growth. And yet, between 1978 and 2010, even as officials were looting state coffers, extorting bribes, raking in kickbacks, and scraping off rents at unprecedented rates, the Chinese economy grew at an average annual rate of 9 percent. This paradoxical trend was the subject of a lecture – China: Rapid Growth and Rising Corruption in China – in the Rising Power Initiative’s Asian Economic Challenges series. Andrew Wedeman, professor of political science at Georgia State University, was on hand to talk about his recent book Double Paradox: Rapid Growth and Rising Corruption in China and why the Chinese economy performed so well despite widespread corruption at almost kleptocratic levels.
Read the full report for “China’s Twin Paradoxes: Rapid Growth and Rising Corruption” (PDF).
