Measurement, Assessment and Reward: The Challenges of Building Institutionalized Social Credit and Rating Systems in China and in the West

Abstract

This short essay has two objectives. The first is to examine the challenges that social credit, ratings or assessment systems pose for effective implementation. To that end, Section II considers first the difficulties of separating the role of social credit as a set of techniques and as a means of advancing ideological principles and objectives. It then considers social credit as a project of informatics. It then examines the control element of social credit systems, and ends with a consideration of social credit as governance. To understand the shaping of law today (and soft law as well) one must understand social credit. The second is to examine some aspects of Western rating and accountability systems to consider resonances with Chinese social credit. To that end Section III considers some of the ways in which Western efforts at social credit institutions have sought to meet these challenges. It considers the context of social credit systems in the West, and its operationalization, principally in the private sphere. It examines the use of asocial credit as a technique of governance and as a means of embedding international standards in domestic behavior.

Keywords: China, Social Credit, Rating Systems, Administrative Discretion, Rule of Law, Assessment, Compliance

JEL Classification: P21, M14, P36, K42, H11, H89