Evaluating Poverty Alleviation by Relocation under the Link Policy: A Case Study from Tongyu County, Jilin Province, China
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Lines 58 to 80 show a review of existing poverty alleviation policies in various countries, yet the is a lack of an introductory paragraph that somehow introduces such countries early in the review of poverty alleviation policies. Likewise, a critical comparative analysis amongst such countries is also needed.
A comparative analysis between the Chinese case and poverty alleviation policies across countries is also missing. This section can be added before section 3.2.
Section 3.4 needs to be grounded on substantive literature review, particularly on governance and decentralization issues. I recommend the authors to cite relevant literature, such as:
Franco, I. B., and Ali, S. (2016). Decentralization, Corporate Community Development and Resource Governance: A Comparative Analysis of Two Mining Regions in Colombia. The Extractive Industries and Society, 4(1), 111 -119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.exis.2016.12.001
In the section data sources and methods, the authors should make explicit if apart from households they interviewed or surveyed other stakeholders such as government. If so, please make explicit which levels of governance they accessed to.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer:
Thank you for the comments, we deeply revised this manuscript. We have marked the main revisions in red. Please review it again, thank you!
Point 1: Lines 58 to 80 show a review of existing poverty alleviation policies in various countries, yet there is a lack of an introductory paragraph that somehow introduces such countries early in the review of poverty alleviation policies. Likewise, a critical comparative analysis amongst such countries is also needed.
Re: Thank you for the comments. We have added an introductory paragraph in section 2 that somehow introduces such countries early in the review of poverty alleviation policies and a critical comparative analysis amongst such countries. The revisions are as follows.
Generally speaking, in 1950s-1970s, most developing countries followed a development path based on industrialization through import-substitution in which the wellbeing of the population was promoted by the search for social justice [26]. Import-substitution development had a better performance on moderating inequalities, but its poverty alleviation effects were far from ideal since it didn’t make full use of the comparative advantages of developing countries. Since 1980s, especially after the end of Cold War in 1991, such neoliberal reforms as economy liberalization, privatization, and political decentralization have been promoted inexorably all over the world. Migration, non-farm and informal employment, and remittance have become essential to the survival of poor in most developing countries. Targeted monetary transferences to the extremely poor have become the dominant policy for poverty alleviation in developing countries, to allow everyone “play the market game” [26]. Spatial alleviating poverty program in developing countries has been neglected to a large extent, although rural economies everywhere are in depression and crisis with low price, declining public supports, rural exodus, increases in rural suicides and so on [27].
India has actively carried out anti-poverty work since independence. In 1960s India launched “green revolution” to increase food production, and financial support was provided for the development of the rural economy. Over the last two decades, the decline of poverty has been slower than economic growth in India owing to its liberalized journey. Moreover, due to insufficient policy implementation and social injustice caused by remnants of the caste system and the religious differences, India’s patterns of poverty show consistent intergroup differences over time [28, 29]. To promote the development of underdeveloped areas, Brazil has implemented a “growth pole” strategy aimed at helping the poor escape poverty through a “trickle-down effect” since the 1960s, but this has triggered a more serious wealth polarization problem. Since the 1990s, Brazil has actively reformed the income redistribution policy, guaranteed a national minimum income, implemented social assistance programs, and the poverty issue has been improved [30-33]. The famous “Oportunidades” program, has been implemented since 1997 in Mexico, was part of its overall neoliberal reform agenda [26]. “Oportunidades” program aims to break the intergenerational transmission of extreme poverty through human capital investment by conditional cash transferences on education, health, etc. The “Oportunidades” program was thought–out carefully and designed well, and has been replicated and promoted in many countries by the World Bank [34-36]. However, Boltvinik pointed that the replication of “Oportunidades” program requires the pre–existence of universalistic networks of basic services [26].
Point 2: A comparative analysis between the Chinese case and poverty alleviation policies across countries is also missing. This section can be added before section 3.2.
Re: Thank you for the comments. Considering the logical structure, we put the contrast between China and other countries in the section 2. The revisions are as follows.
Owing to the socialism regime and urban-rural dual system, China’s poverty alleviation policies have many unique features, such as equalitarian distribution of farmland and rural residential land, strict family planning, pro-peasant, countryside and agriculture supports, spatially-targeting on backward areas, and incipient welfare society building. Zhou et al (2018) summarized in detail of the stages and approaches of poverty alleviation in China since 1949.
Point 3: Section 3.4 needs to be grounded on substantive literature review, particularly on governance and decentralization issues. I recommend the authors to cite relevant literature, such as: Franco, I. B., and Ali, S. (2016). Decentralization, Corporate Community Development and Resource Governance: A Comparative Analysis of Two Mining Regions in Colombia. The Extractive Industries and Society, 4(1), 111 -119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.exis.2016.12.001
Re: Thank you for your understanding and insightful comments. We conducted a substantive literature review at the beginning of section 3.4. The revisions are as follows.
The function of poverty alleviation has not reached a consensus in terms of the tier of government that should perform it [52]. On the one hand, some claim that central government should conduct poverty alleviation efforts because of inter-jurisdictional mobility of the population and productive factors [53]; on the other hand, others argue that the spatial dimension would make subnational governments more efficient because proximity supposedly makes authorities more sensitive to the issues [54]. Earlier results show that the decentralization’s effects on poverty alleviation, income disparities and community development are contingent on governance quality [55-57]. In our opinion, the most difficult task for poverty alleviation in developing and transitional economies is how to share the developmental gains and coordinately solve the social and spatial issues between urban-rural, different regions and various population subgroups. PAR Fueled by Link Policy is one of the important and new poverty alleviation policies tried by China to achieve this most difficult task.
Point 4: In the section data sources and methods, the authors should make explicit if apart from households they interviewed or surveyed other stakeholders such as government. If so, please make explicit which levels of governance they accessed to.
Re: Thank you for the significant and constructive suggestions. We have made explicit which levels of governance we accessed to. The revisions are as follows.
First, a general knowledge of the overall situation of the PAR project in Tongyu County was gained through discussions with leaders of the Tongyu County Development and Reform Bureau, who are mainly responsible for the implementation of the PAR project; several typical projects (Lujia, Linhai and Tiexi) were selected on the recommendation of them. Second, the details of the implementation of the project were collected through discussions with the principal leaders of the townships where the selected typical projects were implemented; the deputy township mayors responsible for the implementation of the project were consulted about their ideas and opinions on the PAR project. Finally, the village leaders of projects were interviewed about specific information on the implementation of the project in the village.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
This is a very well written article. Its well organized and this article is very important to public policy in areas of agriculture and reduction of poverty. This is a must read article for anyone in Asian developmental studies.
Author Response
Dear reviewer:
Thank you very much for your hard work. We have carefully revised the article.We have adjusted the format of the references.
