How China Came to Boom

You must thank the bureaucrats for the almost miraculous changes in China over the last 40 years.  That's what I get from this, via Lee Crawfurd post summarizing presentations at a World Bank seminar on bureaucracy:

 Yuen Yuen Ang — How has China done so well in last 40 years without democratic reform? Through bureaucratic reform which has provided accountability, competition, limits on power. 50 million bureaucrats: 20% managers & 80% frontline workers. Managers have performance contracts focused on outcomes, with published league tables. Frontline workers have large performance-based informal compensation. (bonus podcast edition with Alice Evans here)