Local State-Building and Bureaucratization of China's Public-Sector Service Organizations: A Case Study of the Environmental Protection System in Guangzhou

Contrary to the official Chinese rhetoric about vesting more autonomy in public-sector service organizations and distancing them from local state agencies, increasing recentralization and bureaucratization of the service organizations are occurring. As an example, following several rounds of reforms, the public-sector service organizations in the environmental protection system in Guangzhou have either been directly integrated into the city's Environmental Protection Bureau or brought under greater control by the Bureau. This article examines the process and the underlying reasons and analyzes what this case study explains about important generalizable trends in China's local state-building.