From Click to Boom

The Political Economy of E-Commerce in China

Lizhi Liu

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Hardback

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English

Princeton University Press
19 February 2025

Political economy; E-commerce: business aspects

Series: Princeton Studies in Contemporary China

How the world's largest e-commerce market highlights a digital path to development

How do states build vital institutions for market development? Too often, governments confront technical or political barriers to providing the rule of law, contract enforcement, and loan access. In From Click to Boom, Lizhi Liu examines a digital solution: governments strategically outsourcing tasks of institutional development and enforcement to digital platforms-a process she calls ""institutional outsourcing.""

China's e-commerce boom showcases this digital path to development. In merely two decades, China built from scratch a two-trillion-dollar e-commerce market, with 800 million users, seventy million jobs, and nearly fifty percent of global online retail sales. Contrary to conventional wisdom, Liu argues, this market boom occurred because of weak government institutions, not despite them. Gaps in government institutions compelled e-commerce platforms to build powerful private institutions for contract enforcement, fraud detection, and dispute resolution. For a surprisingly long period, the authoritarian government acquiesced, endorsed, and even partnered with this private institutional building despite its disruptive nature. Drawing on a plethora of interviews, original surveys, proprietary data, and a field experiment, Liu shows that the resulting e-commerce boom had far-reaching effects on China.

Institutional outsourcing nonetheless harbors its own challenges. With inadequate regulation, platforms may abuse market power, while excessive regulation stifles institutional innovation. China's regulatory oscillations toward platforms-from laissez-faire to crackdown and back to support-underscore the struggle to strike the right balance.

By: Lizhi Liu
Imprint: Princeton University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 235mm, Width: 156mm,
ISBN: 9780691254098
ISBN 10: 0691254095
Series: Princeton Studies in Contemporary China
Pages: 328
Publication Date: 19 February 2025
Audience: College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , Primary , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Lizhi Liu is assistant professor at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University, where she is also a faculty affiliate of the Department of Government. She was named one of Poets&Quants Top 50 Undergraduate Business Professors.

Reviews for From Click to Boom: The Political Economy of E-Commerce in China

""One of the Best Books on China, China-Britain Business Council Magazine"" ""Winner of the Axiom Silver Medal in International Business, Globalization Category""