Collaboration Or Control:The Effects Of Government Cultivation Models On Government-Nonprofit Relationships

To promote the construction of a modern governance system together with nonprofit organizations,the Chinese government has issued a series of policies to support the development of nonprofits in recent years.Correctly handling the relationship between the government and nonprofit organizations,and promoting the benign development of their relationship,is not only a necessary condition to give full play to the role of nonprofits but also one of the crucial objectives of the government’s support policies.However,how can a more benign and healthy government-nonprofit relationship be formed under the government’s support policies? Existing research has identified two possible effects of the government’s support policies on governmentnonprofit relationships.The government’s support policies may promote collaboration between the government and nonprofits,but it may also be a way for the government to strengthen its control over nonprofits.Considering the "strong country and weak society",it has become a controversial and urgent theoretical issue whether the government and nonprofits can form a healthy and collaborative relationship.The research on this issue is not only a continuation and reconsideration of the existing theories on the government-nonprofit relationship but also a review of the nonprofits’ development path with Chinese characteristics different from the western model,which would benefit promoting the research on the state-society relationship theory with more Chinese applicability.Therefore,this dissertation focuses on the effects of government support policies on government-nonprofit relationships and discusses how to build a more benign and healthy relationship between the government and nonprofit organizations in the process of government cultivation.Although existing studies have identified the two effects of the government’s support policies on the government-nonprofit relationships,there is little research on further revealed the conditions and the mechanisms that influence the development direction of the governmentnonprofit relationship.Also,there’s less consideration of the dual behavior logic of the government in handling the government-nonprofit relationships and less attention on the impact of the action and development quality of nonprofits in the analysis.Under the government cultivation model,this dissertation mainly tries to answer the following two questions: what are the factors related to the government cultivation model that affect the development direction of the government-nonprofit relationship,and what is the mechanism?First of all,this dissertation develops a comprehensive theoretical framework by identifying the core dimensions of government cultivation models and introducing the theory of interorganizational power.And then,this dissertation develops the first measurement model for the characteristics of government cultivation models according to the two dimensions of participation opportunity openness and resource allocation mechanism,and develops the second measurement model for the characteristics of the government-nonprofit relationships,based on the three dimensions of control,decision-making mutuality and mutual benefit in the relationships.Moreover,this dissertation screened samples using the NGO Directory published by China Development Brief on its website and conducted an email survey of 1012 target nonprofits.This study also distributed online questionnaires in the form of snowballs as a supplement.Finally,338 questionnaires were collected.After removing invalid samples,this study received a total of 317 valid samples covering 24 provinces across the country.Utilizing the data to build a structural equation model(SEM),this study tests the effects of the cultivation model on the characteristics of the government-nonprofit relationship.Then,this study uses hierarchical regression analysis to test the moderating effects of the three inter-organizational power sources,namely,resource dependency,political connections,and cooperation specificity,in the process of the cultivation model affecting the characteristics of the government-nonprofit relationship.The results show that the effects of government cultivation models on the development direction of the government-nonprofit relationship depend on the degree of indirectness of the cultivation model.Namely,the higher the degree of indirectness,the more likely the governmentnonprofit relationship is to develop in a benign direction with weaker control characteristics and stronger partnership characteristics.One of the conditions to realize the partnership between the government and nonprofits is to adopt an indirect cultivation model with higher openness of participation opportunities and a lower administrative degree of resource allocation mechanism.The analysis of the mechanisms indicates that the inter-organizational power sources regulate the effects of the cultivation model on the government-nonprofit relationship.In these paths,political connections and cooperation specificity have positive moderating effects.This implies that the inter-organizational power sources can enhance the adaptability of nonprofits to the policy environment set by the government cultivation model.This dissertation provides new empirical evidence for exploring the nonprofits’ development path with more applicability in China,and for exploring how to build a more benign and healthy government-nonprofit relationship under the government’s support policies.Firstly,the government’s support does not necessarily mean the government’s control over nonprofits.The indirect cultivation model formed through policy improvement can promote the benign development of the government-nonprofit relationship.Secondly,control and collaboration are not either relationships.In the current political ecology in China,it is a more realistic choice for nonprofits to sacrifice part of their autonomy to obtain development opportunities and achieve their organizational goals through government cultivation.Thirdly,a higher indirect cultivation model is more conducive to the government to achieve its multiple objectives of support policies.Fourthly,nonprofits can use sources of inter-organizational power to enhance their adaptability to the policy environment,improve their power structure with the government at the micro level,and promote the benign development of their relationships with the government.The results show that,under the joint action of the government’s improved policies and the interaction of nonprofits,the nonprofits’ development path with government support and nonprofits’ participation is more applicable to China than the western path;At the micro level of inter-organizational relations,the cultivation of government is also likely to achieve collaborative governance between the government and nonprofits,and promote the benign development of the government-nonprofit relationship.To promote the benign development of the government-nonprofit relationship,the government should establish a unified and integrated platform for the cultivation of resources information to improve the openness of participation opportunities;At the same time,the government should heighten the competitiveness of resource allocation by enhancing mutual understanding between the government and nonprofits and forming an evaluation mechanism.For nonprofits,they should make full use of the positive effects of political connection to improve their power position with the government,collaborate with multiple government departments to reduce the level of cooperation specificity,and reevaluate the advantages or disadvantages of undertaking government projects to make full use of government resources and promote their development.