Assessing China's Public Price Hearings: Symbolic Aspects

The effectiveness of the public hearing as a participatory instrument has been debated. This paper argues that evaluation of the public hearing could be improved by an interpretive and institutional analysis. Introducing four major recent public hearings, this comparative study assesses the development and use of public hearing in China's governmental price making. It concludes that the public hearing should be viewed as a type of participatory institution. Its effectiveness relies on other institutional factors and on whether it can evoke values of citizenship, due process and deliberation. Constrained by China's political and social institutions, current Chinese price hearings are framed on the basis of consumer rights rather than citizen rights. The public hearing is perhaps the oldest and most widely used technique for citizens to participate in governmental decision making in western countries (Checkoway, B. The politics of public hearing. J. Appl. Behav. Sci. 1981, 17(4), 566–583), but it is not a popular topic theme at present. While the public hearing originally emerged for the purpose of due process in trial‐type or quasi‐judicial rule making, it has become an important citizen participation instrument since the 1960s and 1970s (Ibid. and Cole, R.L.; Caputo, D.A. The public hearing as an effective citizen participation mechanism: a case study of the general revenue sharing program. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 1984, 78(2), 404–416), especially to make public policy responsive to those disadvantaged. In contrast, the public hearing was not in place until the late 1990s in China, but it has become a top issue theme since 2000. This paper aims to assess the development and use of public hearings in China from a comparative perspective: is it effective for citizens to participate? If not, will it work in the future? How does the institutional context affect the operation, effectiveness and symbolism of public hearings in China? The paper also sheds lights on how to use interpretive and institutional analysis for the evaluation of public hearings in general.