Crisis Rhetoric and Policy Change in China

This book explores how China's political system responds to crisis. A crisis is an episode whose impact cannot be controlled merely by astute on-the-ground incident management, particularly in cases involving widespread doubt about the legitimacy of established policy paradigms or the political order as a whole. Crisis can create “political windows” for advocacy groups challenging established policies in pluralist democracies. The political battle between competing definitions of an uncertain and ambiguous situation among the various actors provides them with crisis-induced opportunity space for dramatic policy change. However, the process of crisis-induced policy change, mainly by crisis framing, in non-west regimes like China has not been adequately addressed. As China's leadership foregrounds legitimacy in “victory” over COVID-19, and a new era of climate change disasters begins, this dynamic model of crisis and recuperation will offer food for thought for scholars of Chinese andglobal politics.

Yihong Liu is assistant professor in School of Public Administration and Policy, Renmin University of China. He was born in Chongqing in 1984 and got a Public Administration Ph.D. degree from Utrecht University’s School of Governance in 2019 Feb. During his Ph.D. studies, he made a short visit to London University’s School of Oriental and African Studies in 2014. Now, he is Vice-Editor of Public Administration and Policy Review Journal (in Chinese) and Member of Board Committee of Risk, Disaster, and Crisis (in Chinese). He is hosting a special issue of Public Administration Reform in New Era in Public Performance Management Review. His research focuses on crisis management and policy process.