City‐chief turnover and place‐based policy change: Evidence from China
研究利用2007-2017年中国城市工业用地空间分布数据，量化市委书记更替导致的地方政策变化，发现继任者通常放弃前任政策并在约一年后实施新政策，晋升激励越强变化越大，且政策不连续对经济发展有负面影响。
Abstract The linkage between political turnover and policy change has attracted considerable attention, but little empirical evidence and its impacts on regional development have been provided directly. In this study, we develop a set of indicators to directly quantify the within‐city place‐based policy changes in China between 2007 and 2017, based on the spatial distribution of city governments' industrial land supply. The results show city‐chief turnovers lead to significant changes in place‐based policies. A successor city chief typically gives up some previous place‐based policies immediately after taking office and implements new policies about 1 year later. In particular, successor chiefs with stronger promotion incentives make larger policy changes, to win more points in the competition with their predecessors. We also provide evidence that the place‐based policy discontinuity caused by political turnovers generates negative economic‐development impacts.