Current comparative studies exploring Chinese administrative reforms within the
broader international context of administration tend to compare Chinese administrative
reforms with industrial democracies. In other words, current studies on the topic of
policy transfer and learning from the West are mostly in the category of interpretative
research aimed at developing a better understanding of the learning phenomena in
current Chinese public administration reforms.
Popular researchers ‘from the West’ have failed to acknowledge that ‘learning’ is
locally based. In order to fill this theoretical gap in comparative oriented research, this
research aims to further develop the literature by recognizing the need to explain what
has been transferred and the underlying reasons for the Chinese administration system
from a party-state perspective and through the mechanism of policy transfer literature.
The focus of this dissertation is to better understand how the regime development
struggles in communist China affect how policy transfer is understood and interpreted
in the Chinese administrative system. In order to develop the basis for understanding
and analyzing policy transfer, this research develops a multi-level analysis, including
the central steering level and local implementation level.
This thesis applies case study method to explain policy transfer elements that are based
on Jowitt’s model. After applying elements of Jowitt’s policy transfer model to analyze
Chinese transfer of Master of Public Administration (MPA) program, this thesis found
that MPA policy transfer from Western countries, especially from the United States,
was a network that includes both ‘hard transfer’ and ‘soft learning’. ‘Hard learning’
aspects of the MPA which include cadre training tools, programs and implementation
are more telling of international policy in terms of influences on recipient policy
changes in cadre training system. Yet ‘soft learning’ aspects are professional and
systematic conception that are differed from the pre-existing training approaches.
This research strives to demonstrate how communist party adaptations serve the
furtherance of regime development, while at the same time incorporating policy transfer
elements from abroad. The evolution of MPA training within the Chinese system of
administration demonstrates the continuing balancing between central control and local
implementation, maintained by the Chinese communist regime.