Research On The Soft Environment Of Economic Development Of Northeast Old Industrial Base

The soft environment of economic development is a major problem in China which has emerged gradually in the process of economic development and social change. As a most successful country in current economic transition and social transformation among the developing countries, China has accumulated much successful experience in the process of constructing the soft environment of economic development. This research will not only contribute to further deepen reform and opening-up, but also will provide valuable experience to other developing countries. However, in the transformation process from planned economy to market economy, as the eldest son of the People's Republic of China, Northeast Old Industrial Base has emerged economic decline. The Northeast phenomena, the New Northeast phenomena and the After Northeast phenomena have come into being in sequence. This research will offer help to explain and reveal the essential characteristics and general laws of the soft environment of economic development. However, the theoretical study into the soft environment for economic development is relatively late, as this system of it is all-embracing and complex; the existing literatures have not yet formed a unified concept and a systematic analytical framework about it. Through analyzing and combing the existing literatures, this paper analyses the changes of the soft environment of economic development in Northeast Old Industrial Base under the theoretical framework of institutional change about the new institutional economics, taking the soft environment change from investment to economic development as the main line. The paper's aim is to re-interpret reasons for the lack of soft environment for economic development in Northeast Old Industrial Base, and the relative policy suggestions are proposed.1. The literature review about the soft environment of economic developmentAccording to the concept of soft environment of economic development, and the research ideas of this paper, the literature review of the soft environment for economic development includes three parts: the review about the soft environment for investment, the review about the soft environment for economic development and the review about the soft environment of China's regional economic development. In the relevant existing literatures, there isn't a clear conceptual division in the soft environment between the investment and the economic development. This paper will define the soft investment environment as "small caliber" of the soft environment, and its research scope limited in the investment. While the soft environment of the economic development is the "large caliber" of the soft environment, which includes the entire national economy. In the review about the soft investment environment, the paper will comb the definitions, elements and evaluation systems and evaluation methods in the existing literatures. In the review about the soft environment of the economic development, the paper will sort and summarize the definitions, elements, functions, characteristics in the literatures. In the review about the soft environment of the regional economic development in China, the paper will comb the literature of the soft environment of economic development of different parts and summarize the research methods and contents.2. The research on the theory of the soft environment of the economic developmentIn the academic filed, the researches on the soft environment of the economic development are still on the primary stage, unified definitions and theoretical framework have not formed. In the existing literatures, the system contains a series of institutional elements. But in the different literature, there are some differences about which elements contained in the system. The main reason is the different purposes and objects of analysis. And the theoretical research basis of the soft environment is mainly the institutional theory, but a few literatures has combed and summarized it. The paper redefines the concepts and refers that the soft environment of economic development is a set of non-material elements which are in the external and impact the economic activities. The system contains three subsystems: the macro-policy environment, the legal environment and the social and cultural environment, and five features: the public feature, the comprehensive feature, the multilevel feature, the systematic feature and the dynamic feature. The construction of the soft environment of economic development has important effect and significance to stimulate economic vitalities and provide impetuses to the economic development.The institutional theories of the soft environment contain the concepts and features of the institution, the institutional change theory and related models. Currently, there are still differences in the understanding about the concept of institution in the academic field. The paper reviews and summarizes the definitions from the different economic schools and the different scholars, and reviews the debates about it, and then enhancing the understanding about the concepts and the important roles in the economic activities. In the studies on the institution, the analysis to the institutional change is very important, but yet to form a unified analytical framework for it. The more extensive and sophisticated theory of institutional change is from the New Institutional Economics. Among the theories, the institutional change theory made by D.C.North is the most representative. This paper combs and comments the main point about institutional change theory.The evolution and change of the soft environment is essentially the process of institutional evolution and change. In the past, the scholars'view is base on institutional supplying, and the research focus on advantages and disadvantages of the soft environment in the different regions. This paper's view is base on institutional demanding, and establishes the analytical model to the process of the institutional change about the soft environment from the investment to the economic development. 3. The effective change from the soft environment of investment to the soft environment of the economic developmentSince reform and opening, China has experienced the soft environment change from the investment to the economic development. The central government set up a numbers of the open coastal cities, the special economic zones and the economic development zones, and set a series of preferential policies to attract foreign investments. During the 90s of the 20th century, China has become the world's second largest FDI recipient country that is only the second to the United States. The imposed change of the soft environment of the investment causes the institutional changes of the whole national economics, including the government functions, the administrative efficiency, the administrative regulations, the market rules, and the social and cultural environment and so on. In the process, this change of the southeast coastal areas is effective, making the market order and social order keeps improving, and the economic and social development go to the prosperous.4. The change of the soft environment of economic development in Northeast old industrial baseAs compared with the southeast coastal areas, the change of the soft environment has fallen into the trap of low efficiency in Northeast old industrial base. Since reform and opening, the central government has been working to improve the soft environment of the investment, encouraging and supporting the various regional investments. But during this period, due to the low efficiency of the soft environment in the Northeast Old Industrial Base, the investment is poor and the folk capital is non-utilized. More importantly, the low efficiency of the investment in this place has led to the lack and absence of the soft environment for economic development. The underlying cause of this phenomenon has three aspects: First, the central government set a double institutional supplying and the competition among the different local governments; Second, the characteristic of the personalized trade; Third, the impact by"the market culture", the social cultural environment of Northeast Old Industrial Base is vacuum, the result of evolution has formed specific behaviors. In view of the bottleneck of the institutional change, this paper will also propose the paths for effective change to promote the economic development of soft environment in Northeast Old Industrial Base.5. The construction of the soft environment of the economic development of Northeast Old Industrial BaseIn view of the problems and deficiencies of the soft environment of the economic development in Northeast Old Industrial Base, and the paths, this paper proposes a series of policy suggestions for the construction of the soft environment of the economic development of Northeast Old Industrial Base.