Development of Neo-institutional Politics in China

This article examines the basic ideas and problems of historical institutionalism and ra-tional choice of institutionalism,which are major schools of neo-institutional politics.On the basisof this review,the author believes that it is necessary to integrate these theories.Neo-institutionalpolitics is applied by Chinese scholars to analyze the relation between the government and the en-terprises as is revealed by the reform of state-owned enterprises,discuss the overall political andeconomic changes brought about by the reform and open-up policies,and explain the political de-velopment and institutional construction in modern China.On the other hand,the author pointsout,Chinese scholars usually compare the theories of institutional changes with Marxist concep-tion of state,which leads to a theoretical paradigm of wholism different from either the intermedi-ate organization determinedness or the individual preference determinedness in neo-institutional-ism.