Environmental Statecraft, Fragmented Authoritarianism, and Technocratic Governance: The Structure and Agency of China's Local Environmental Politics

Abstract

ABSTRACT Local environmental politics in China is often said to be dominated by state‐controlled modes of multi‐level governance. However, top‐down governance is embedded within and transformed by local politics, adding complexity to governance practices and environmental outcomes. This article draws on the case of Hengqin's Tianmu River to provide a context‐rich and theoretically nuanced account of how local environmental politics emerge through the interplay of structure and agency. We explain how the local government co‐opted the environmental impact assessment process to expedite a flagship development project and restructured the public‐participation mechanisms embedded in the river chief system into a technocratic governance approach. These findings complicate narratives of China's environmental governance—local governments are not simply implementers of top‐down strategies (which themselves are inconsistent). Rather, local political‐technocratic dynamics continually contest and reshape top‐down initiatives, bending them to context‐specific realities.