Lost and Added in Translation: A critical review of the implementation strategies for a market reform in China

Abstract: Developing markets to serve the poor is an increasingly popular approach in the development industry. This study explores how a market model that contains standards and guidelines for market development has been used to construct a market for social services in China. The author worked three month as an intern with the ILO international project management team that has designed and implemented the market model. Interviews, observations and desk reviews were conducted to study the strategies used to enroll actors and regulate and co-ordinate behavior in the market place. When discussing the empirical findings, the author has used socio-economic theories on the construction of markets and combined these with institutional theories on the use of standards. The results show that a market model can serve as a tool to provide a vision and unite actors around common goals and objectives. However, the voluntary nature of the standards in the market model limits the ability of the market designers to control the implementation process. The market designers have been forced to negotiate and manipulate the original model during the implementation process, which has resulted in an unstable market with conflicting interests and goals built into the design.