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Practically since the beginning of the "reform and opening" period in 1978, China's central government has sought to shift from an extensive to an intensive development model — from growth based on capital accumulation to growth based on improvements in productivity. This year, however, while the planners continue to talk about the need for this long-sought-after transformation, they are moving in exactly the opposite direction, counting heavily on state-sponsored investment to keep the economy growing in the wake of the global financial crisis.
This is not surprising as they have had little success in transforming China's mode of growth, even under much more favorable circumstances. While this objective has been emphasized in every five-year plan since 1981, gross-fixed-capital formation has risen from 33% of nominal GDP in that year (as calculated by the expenditure method) to 42% in 2007.
A Missed Opportunity
Perhaps the best opportunity there has been to make progress on this issue came in 2001, the first year of the tenth five-year plan, which called for "taking structural adjustment as the main line." At that point, it could be argued, China had reached the level of self-sufficiency in industrial raw materials necessary for such a strategy to be feasible. And by then the unsustainability of the traditional model was already quite clear. In an address to the March 2001 meeting of the National People's Congress, premier Zhu Rong-ji even went so far as to say that "further development will be impossible without adjustment." Continued investment-driven growth, he argued, would only result in excess supply and put an unsupportable burden on China's resource base and natural environment.
But even with such unambiguous central-government backing, no adjustment was forthcoming. In fact, from 2001 to 2007 the ratio of gross-fixed-capital formation to GDP actually rose by four percentage points. And despite the tenth plan's call to reduce overproduction, redundant investment has led to severe overcapacity in a number of sectors. Excess capacity has been estimated at 50% or more for automobiles, ferrous alloys, and semiconductors, and 30% for steel. The latter translates into about 180 million tons per annum — greater than total US annual production!
Chinese economists generally attribute this policy failure to the difficulty of "system reform" — administrative change designed to increase the efficiency of the state sector — but seldom have much to say about why this is so hard to achieve. Their reticence on this point is not surprising, as the root of the problem is China's authoritarian regime itself.
Decentralized Knowledge
Any attempt at economic rationalization will inevitably meet with strong resistance from powerful people who stand to benefit from preserving the status quo. For example, local officials have for years blocked attempts to close small, inefficient plants that create economic growth in their jurisdictions and thereby improve their career prospects. Similarly, central government directives to avoid redundant infrastructure projects are often all but impossible to carry out because of the opportunities such investment affords the well-connected to "wet their beaks."
A more fundamental problem has to do with the nature of intensive growth itself. Unlike extensive growth, which is at least amenable to central planning, the innovation required for intensive growth relies on what Hayek referred to in his seminal 1945 paper on "The Use of Knowledge in Society" as "knowledge of the particular circumstances of time and place."
This type of knowledge, he pointed out, is "dispersed among many different individuals" and "by its nature cannot enter into statistics and therefore cannot be conveyed to any central authority in statistical form." Thus, as the Austrian economist Randall Holcombe put it in his 1998 article, "Entrepreneurship and Economic Growth,"Download PDF "central planning precludes entrepreneurship, which is necessarily decentralized in nature."
Clearly the central government cannot carry out a strategy based on improving productivity growth in the same way that it could implement an extensive growth policy such as increasing petrochemical production or expanding the railway network. Intensive growth can really only be carried out by the "man on the spot" (as Hayek put it) as only he is in a position to notice the opportunities for the necessary innovation.
The Leadership of the Party
Not only this, he must also have the right incentives, and in China these are often missing. While there is no shortage of Chinese entrepreneurs, their efforts tend to be directed as much toward improving relationships with local officialdom as with increasing economic efficiency. In many cases, as Mises wrote in 1949 of the totalitarian systems of his day, "social competition manifests itself in the endeavors of people to court the favor of those in power" rather than in attempts to build a better mousetrap.
While Chinese officials continue to emphasize the "new" strategy of moving towards intensive growth there is thus no reason to expect that this will be possible even once the situation has gotten "back to normal" and infrastructure spending is no longer necessary to support the economy. The problem is not really economic but political. And as long as "the leadership of the Party" and "Marxism, Leninism, Mao Ze-dong thought" remain enshrined in the preamble to the Chinese constitution, the solution is likely to remain as elusive as ever.
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实际上，自从1978年的“改革开放”以来，中国的中央政府就一直苦苦寻找从粗放型发展向集约型发展转变的道路——把发展从依靠资本积累转移到生产力的提升上。然而，今年尽管国际金融危机横行，中央政府却一面继续大谈对这一长期追寻转变的急迫需求，但是另一方面却南辕北辙，为了保持经济的增长继续严重依靠政府投资。
没什么好惊奇的，甚至是在形势更加有利的情况下，中国在转变经济发展模式方面毫无进展。尽管自从1981年以来的每个五年计划中都强调该目标，但是净固定投资占名义GDP的比重却已经从当年的33%上升到了2007年的42%。
错失机遇
取得进步的最好时机可能是在2001年，也就是第十个五年计划的开始之年，当时政府号召“把调整经济结构当成主线。”人们可以认为，那时中国在原材料供给方面实现了自给自足，使得这一战略切实可行。而且当时中国传统发展模式的不可持续性已经愈发明显。在2001年3月份召开的全国人民代表大会的讲话上，前国务院总理朱镕基甚至说道“不调整，经济就不可能进一步发展。”他认为，持续依赖投资拉动经济增长的方式只会导致产能过剩，并会对中国的资源基础和自然环境造成无法承受的重担。
但是，尽管中央政府明确表示支持该战略，却没有进行任何调整。事实上，从2001年到2007年，净固定投资占GDP的比重反而上涨了四个百分点。而且，尽管第十个五年计划要求削减过剩产能，但是过度的投资反而使得很多部门的产能过剩更加严重。据估计，汽车、有色金属和半导体产业的过剩产能达到了50%，而钢铁业也达到了30%。这意味着钢铁业每年的过剩产能就达到了1.8亿吨——这比美国的全年产量还高！
中国的经济学家一般把这一政策的失败归罪于“体制改革”的困境——为了提高国有部门效率而进行的行政调整——但是却很少提及难以实现的根本原因。他们在这一点上的沉默不语并不让人惊奇，因为问题的根在中国政府自身。
分散的知识
任何经济理性化（指计划经济）的企图都会不可避免地遇到人们的强烈抵制，因为人们可以从保持现状中获利。例如，多年来地方官员一直阻止那些关闭小而且没有效率的工厂的努力，因为这些工厂能促进其辖区内的经济增长，并有利于其仕途升迁。相似的，中央政府关于严禁建设过剩基础设施的命令也总成为耳旁风，因为这些投资为他们提供了贪墨的好机会（不知道怎么翻译才能更贴切）。
一个更根本的问题涉及集约型发展本身。粗犷型发展更易于中央的调控，与粗犷型发展不同，集约型发展所需要的创新依赖于“与时间地点密切相关的特殊环境的知识”，这正是哈耶克在1945年的重要文章“社会中的知识应用”提出的。
哈耶克指出，这种类型的知识“分散在不同的个体之间”，而且“因为其不可统计的本性，所以无法以统计数字的方式传递给任何中央政府。”因此，正如奥地利经济学家Randall Holcombe在其1998年的文章“企业家精神和经济发展”指出的那样，“中央计划遏制企业家精神，因为企业家精神实际上需要分权和自治。”
很明显，中央政府无法推行这样一种战略，它既能提高生产力，又能促进像增加石化生产和扩建铁路网这样的粗犷型发展。集约型发展只能由“那些身临其境的人”（正如哈耶克指出的那样）来实现，因为只有他才能发现那些进行必要创新的机会。
党的领导（可能有些敏感）
不仅如此，企业家还要有正确的激励，而这在中国却常常是缺失的。尽管中国从来不缺少企业家精神，但是企业家用于增加经济效率的精力与被迫用来改善和当地官场的关系的精力总是相差无几。正如身处全权时代的米塞斯在1949年写的那样，“社会竞争在迫使人们努力去迎合当权者，”而不是生产一个捕鼠器（应该指进行经济生产）时，“充分暴露了其本性” 。
尽管中国官员依旧强调向集约型发展转变的“新“战略，即使当情况“以往如初”而且经济发展不再需要基础设施建设支出的支持时，我们没有任何理由相信这可能发生。这不是一个经济问题，而是个政治问题。只要“党的领导”和“马列毛”依然现身于中国的宪法中，解决之道很可能就像以前一样无路可走。
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