China's Local Governance in Perspective: Instruments of Central Government Control

With the world's largest population and fourth largest territory, China's size renders it difficult to govern. The degree to which the Communist Party has for years prioritized the task of maintaining stability (weiwen) is a key testimony to the potential fragility of the regime. A principal question that logically follows is: what keeps the regime from falling apart? This article surveys a range of instruments that the central government has deployed both historically and today in efforts to govern China's centrifugal localities. Seven dimensions of controlideological-normative, institutional, resource-allocative, personnel management, administrative monitoring, powers over key local sectors, and military forceare examined to assess the center's adaptive capacity in local governance.