Article ID: | iaor20081068 |
Country: | United States |
Volume: | 18 |
Issue: | 4 |
Start Page Number: | 480 |
End Page Number: | 515 |
Publication Date: | Jan 2006 |
Journal: | Journal of Public Budgeting, Accounting and Financial Management |
Authors: | Ma Jun |
Keywords: | economics, management, government, politics, time series & forecasting methods |
Sometimes regarded as the best method of prioritizing budgetary expenditures, Zero-Based Budgeting (ZBB) was introduced into China in the early 1990s and systematically adopted since the recent budgeting reform although it has experienced numerous failures in many countries. This study examines ZBB as practised in Hubei province in China. In Hubei, although the reformers are intended to create ZBB as a general budgeting framework, eventually, it was a Chinese style Target-Based Budgeting (TBB) rather than ZBB that has been put into place. Interestingly, ZBB has not disappeared but is deliberately applied to budgetary decisions of one type of expenditures under the Chinese style TBB. However, even in the field where ZBB is practised, its achievements are at best moderate. The Chinese experiment of ZBB presents something new not only for the theory of ZBB but also for the budgeting literature.