The Path Dependence And Conflicts Of Institutional Fields In The Reform Of State-owned Enterprises

China in the 21st century is in the time of all-round transformation of economic and social structures. Chinese economic and social development undoubtedly becomes one of the most concerned theoretical topics in the age of globalization.Aiming at the practical puzzle that reforms of state-owned enterprises didn't improve the efficiency, this paper introduces the research viewpoint of path dependence, and uncovers the fluctuant conflicts between the institutional fields of traditional society, planned economy and market economy by analyzing the reform of state-owned enterprise. It is the conflict between sensibility and rationality, and the conflict between instrumental-rationality and value-rationality that lead to the "lock up" state of the state-owned enterprise transition. To resolve these conflicts gradually, we must promote the differentiations between the fields of economy, politics and society, and make the domains of all the institutional fields clear. Currently, reconstructing the social basis is the practical way to resolve conflicts of institutional fields. 1. The conflict between institutional fields of planned economy and market economyThe institution of planned economy was gradually established and perfected from 1949 the year of founding new China to 1956 the year of finishing socialist reconstruction. It was composed of producing system, human resource system, financial system, identity system and the social security system of state-owned enterprises. Forming based on those series of system, recognized organizational behavior and system rules constitute the content of planned economy institutional field.Different from the institutional field of planned economy, market economy stems from globalization's pursuit of efficiency. Maximizing economic benefits becomes the core concept of the institutional field of market economy. This institutional field requires not only enterprises becoming independent and free main in market, but also enterprises regarding the pursuit of economic interests as an unique reasonable guideline for action. Chinese reform of state-owned enterprises just points to that direction gradually, however, on the one hand, our gradual reform wants to get rid of obstacles of planned economy; on the other hand, it has to rely on the existing institutional field to carry through marginal innovation and adjustment in the institution. Therefore, this contradiction leads to radical conflicts between the aim and the means in the process of state-owned enterprises reform, and conflicts in many aspects between new and old institutions, which distorts the original institutional design, and causes the problem widespread that the reform cannot improve efficiency.At the beginning of the design, ideas of state-owned enterprises reform were strongly constrained by this conflict. After the discussion of"Belonging to Socialism or Capitalism"being launched, because the ideology of public ownership in the institutional field of planned economy was challenged, we recognized the reform idea that"regardless of black or white, which cat catches mice is a good cat". However, to the specific guide line and value design, we chose the evolutive path of"Pareto efficiency", which is a mode of maximizing political effect. We fixed range, chose the breakthrough point, and weighed the strength for the reform according to an idea that makes the people whose interest are harmed as few as possible and the majority of people benefit. Such reform won the broad support of the people, state-owned economy in a short term rose constantly, and the profit of state-owned enterprises was strengthened. This option was the most realistic and effective reform which was based on the situation of our country at that time. However, we have to admit a fact that, in the early days of reform, the idea of only pursuing efficiency in the institutional field of market economy was defeated by the idea of maximizing the political effects in the institutional field of planned economy, which leads to conflict between the two in the later stage of transformation.After a short-term rapid growth, the benefits of state-owned enterprises began to slow down. Positive effect on stimulating enthusiasm of enterprises and workers in the early days of reform was gradually weakened, and it was urgent to further reform state-owned enterprises. The proposal of modern enterprise system was just the political feedback for the call. However, in the mobilization and establishment of institutional implementation and the process of solving contradictions, these two institutional fields constantly conflicted, which lead to a reform path of"alternative"at last.After transformation, the framework of modern enterprise system is established in the most of former state-owned enterprises, and the corporation becomes a new appearance of the former unit. Therefore, we can say that most enterprises transformation is only to use"a new bottle"of the institutional field of market economy to bottle"the old wine"of the institutional field of planed economy. 2. The conflict between institutional fields of traditional society and market economyChinese traditional society was a rural community. Through its rural nature and familial ethics, two keys can be discovered which are experience-based principle and social relation-based ethic. They continually shaped individuals and organizations in the society for a long history of several thousand years, which constitute the institutional field of traditional society.After comparing societies between China and the Occident, Liang Shuming asserted that China was neither society-based nor individual-based, but relation-based. Fei Xiaotong, profoundly expounded the feature of orderly different structure in his book of"Rural China". Under the influence of empirical principle and social relation-based ethic, Chinese people formed a unique way of sensible choice.For several thousand years, the characteristic of traditional society institutional field has deeply engraved in the hearts of every Chinese people through socialization, and becomes a kind of their spontaneous behavior. In the transition of state-owned enterprises system, this empirical principle and social relation-based ethic run through the transition, and play important roles in the gradual progress of institution, which have drastic collision with efficiency and rational principles required by the institutional field of market economy whose core is based on globalization. Sensible choice and rational pursuit have become prominent manifestation of those two institutional fields'conflict.At the beginning of designing the reform path of state-owned enterprises, the sensible choice of empirical principle in traditional institutional field deeply acted on the guide line of state-owned enterprises transformation. When we were vaguely aware that the reform of state-owned enterprises system had to put in practice, we did not form a development strategy for a long period and the aim and model of the transformation were not very clear. Instead, we adopted a way called"cross the river by feeling the stones", which is a typical mode of sensible choice of traditional empiricism. It was not based on"a careful analysis of information, precise measurement of benefit and strict compliance of economic and scientific principle, but on experiential facts that could be experienced in normal life". (Liu, Shaojie, 2002) Accordingly, the process of reform was bound to be a process of conflict between the sensible choice and the rational analysis. A series of reform policies were comprehensive guides based on the fact of sensible experience and the economic theory, so the whole process of reform was inevitably full of conflicts of these institutional fields.In the reform mobilization, the informal relationship-based way was widely used by leaders who implementing policies. Only combined with this sensible mobilization, could every rational institutional arrangement achieve broad acceptances and supports. The relationship direct decided the implementation results of the rational institution which led to an contradiction that, rational arrangements aimed efficiency in the institutional field of market economy had to rely on the traditional sensible relationship-based ethic to realize. Therefore, it led to various phenomena of distorting policies and modifying implementation in the reform of state-owned enterprises, which ultimately led to the rational principle of market economy giving place to the sensible choice of traditional society in the process of mobilization and implementation.It is obvious that, under the collision between the institutional fields of traditional society and market economy, various operational modes of informal institutions are prevalent and present an external modality, that is,"The rational choice is the leader, and the sensible choice is the mainstream". (Liu, Shaojie, 2004) In the transformation, formal rules based on rational designs and policies in the institutional field of marker economy mainly occur in official materials issued by the government, while the sensible choice is widely used in practice. Their conflicts run through the whole reform process of state-owned enterprises.