Overcoming Infrastructure Roadblocks: Are Chinese Lessons Relevant?
This paper aims to document and analyse the different approaches in overall infrastructure sector performance for these two very different countries from the policy and institutional dimensions. It identifies factors that have worked in China and India. It also identifies some important lessons which could be relevant for future infrastructure development.
For the last two decades, both India and China have grown at twice the global rate and If this trend continues for next few decades, with their vast labor supply, favorable demographics, and aspirations for reaching the developed world per …show more content…
In China, planning followed the first model. The State Planning Committee (SPC), and its subsequent variants, have been and remain at the center of China’s political and economic affairs. The SPC sets the national policy agenda, makes important policy decisions, and even guides the lawmaking process to ensure that these decisions are implemented. Through a dual-track implementation system, its policy-making role also extends to closely monitoring and guiding policy implementation. Thus the Chinese planning institutions fully integrate political economy considerations in the process of designing and implementing development plans. In China, strong accountability for delivery of plans was embedded through powerful party structure and this has so far led to better economic outcomes in terms of growth and infrastructure development.
The Indian planning process historically tended to be more technical than political. Although the Planning Commission, with the Prime Minister as the Chairman, had some institutional ties to the political decision-making process, the process has tended to be more technical in reality, captured at