IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/jpamgt/v45y2026i1ne70076.html

Officials’ Early Life Experience and Policymaking: The Enduring Impact of China's Great Famine on Government Objectives

Author

Listed:
  • Caiwen Hu
  • Zhenyu Wang

Abstract

This study examines how officials’ heterogeneous preferences, particularly shaped by traumatic childhood experiences, impact government policy decisions. Leveraging China's Great Famine as a natural experiment, we apply a cohort difference‐in‐differences (DID) approach to analyze the effect of officials’ exposure to famine on government objectives in their jurisdictions. Results show that famine‐exposed officials, particularly those aged five or older during the crisis (a formative period for value formation), systematically set lower economic growth targets, reflecting trauma‐induced risk aversion rather than diminished administrative capacity. Two key findings support this interpretation: (1) Jurisdictions led by famine‐exposed officials achieve comparable economic outcomes, and (2) these officials allocate greater resources to social stability expenditures. The evidence highlights how early‐life adversity embeds risk‐averse heuristics in bureaucratic decision‐making, with lasting implications for institutional governance.

Suggested Citation

  • Caiwen Hu & Zhenyu Wang, 2026. "Officials’ Early Life Experience and Policymaking: The Enduring Impact of China's Great Famine on Government Objectives," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 45(1), January.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:jpamgt:v:45:y:2026:i:1:n:e70076
    DOI: 10.1002/pam.70076
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/pam.70076
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/pam.70076?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:jpamgt:v:45:y:2026:i:1:n:e70076. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/34787/home .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.