LOCAL GOVERNMENT,ENTERPRISES AND INDIVIDUALS:ECONOMIC TRANSFORMATION IN THE PEARL RIVER DELTA—A Case Study in Beijiao Township,Shunde City

摘要

The Pearl River(Zhujiang)Delta(PRD)has been a focal point in reform era ac ademic circles not only for its dramatic industrial growth but a lso the simultaneous agricultural development.Unlike most of existing research on the PRDeconomic development and transformation fromthe whole region level,this paper explored this question f romthe perspec-tive of a township using Beijiao in Shunde City as a case study.Unlike the c onclusions of existing studies whic h attribute the regional economic transition to the macro factors,particularly the influence of external investment,t his research re-veals that at the level of township,t he local government,the town-villa ge owned enterprises and the individ uals have been playing remarkable roles in local economic transformation.In the early stage since the economic reform,Beijiao township government,replacing the central a nd provincial governments before,b egan to manipulate the development o f town-village owned enterprises and lead the local economic transformation from agricultural to industrial dominated.As the town-village owned enterprises grew during the later years,they gra dually acted as the main dominant pla yer leading the local agricultural and industrial growth.At the same time the individuals in Beijiao were playing more in dependent role to gain their most profits.While the local government changed to be t he real manager of local economies.S o the local economic transition was not entirely externally driven.In another word,the“driven from outsidemodel can not totally explain the economic fact in this specific region.