Theorizing continuity and change in socialist regulation

• Published date: 01 April 2023
• Author: John Gillespie
• Date: 01 April 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/lapo.12212

ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Theorizing continuity and change in socialist

regulation

John Gillespie

Monash Business School, Monash University,

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

Correspondence

John Gillespie, Monash Business School,

Monash University, Caulfield East,

Melbourne, Victoria 3145, Australia.

Email: john.gillespie@monash.edu

Abstract

How does regulation change in authoritarian polities that

tightly control public discourse and social mobilization?

Socio-legal theories assume that regulation changes

through intersubjective dialogical exchanges that per-

suade regulators to alter how they perceive social prob-

lems and the appropriate regulatory responses. Although

this framework captures regulatory change in transparent

dialogical spaces, it misses much of the regulatory story

in the opaque discursive processes that order authoritar-

ian polities. This article turns to sociological institutional

theory—a non-dialogical theory to understand regulatory

change in Vietnam’s authoritarian polity. It investigates

how commercial regulation in Vietnam has responded to

an emerging mixed-market economy, at the same time

the state has suppressed public dialogical challenges to

socialist ideology. It concludes that regulatory change

occurs when regulators respond to economic and social

crises and layer new ideational components onto old pro-

grammatic ideas, converting them to new uses.

1|INTRODUCTION

How does regulation change in authoritarian polities

1

that tightly control public discourse and

social mobilization? Socio-legal theories assume that regulation changes through intersubjective

dialogical exchanges that persuade regulators to alter how they perceive social problems and

devise appropriate regulatory responses (Chua & Engle, 2019; Nobles & Schiff, 2013). Although

this framework captures regulatory change in transparent dialogical spaces, it is less well-

equipped to explore the opaque processes that shape regulatory change in authoritarian polities.

This article turns to sociological institutional theory (Hacker et al., 2015; Mahoney &

DOI: 10.1111/lapo.12212

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits

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adaptations are made.

©2023 The Author. Law & Policy published by University of Denver and Wiley Periodicals LLC.

Law & Policy. 2023;45:211–233. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/lapo 211

Thelen, 2010)—a non-dialogical theory to understand regulatory change in Vietnam’s authori-

tarian polity. It investigates how commercial regulation in Vietnam has responded to an emerg-

ing mixed-market economy, at the same time the state has suppressed public challenges to

socialist ideology (Malesky & London, 2014; Vu Thanh, 2017). The article theorizes how regu-

lation can change without public discourse and/or social mobilization influencing the back-

ground beliefs

2

that inform regulators.

The collapse of socialism in the Soviet Bloc was accompanied by the literal collapse of

structures and institutions previously considered indestructible, such as the Berlin Wall and

the communist party (Verdery, 1996). Market reforms swept away most background beliefs

that justified and maintained the socialist command economy. In contrast, the ruling commu-

nist parties in socialist Asia (i.e., China, Vietnam, and Laos)

3

introduced mixed-market regu-

latory reforms during the late 1970s and 1980s that legalized capitalism without proclaiming

the end of socialism (Malesky & London, 2014;Ph

:

am Duy Nghĩa, 2015). Market liberaliza-

tions in Socialist Asia have transformed without fundamentally displacing the institutional

structures and epistemic settings that supported socialist regulation, such as party leadership

and state control over key industrial sectors (Le & Liu, 2006;V

˜

uV



an Phúc, 2014). As Luu

Ha Vi (1997,pp.1–4) observed in relation to Vietnam, “the marriage of the private sector

with a ‘socialist orientation’is one of convenience, not true love.”Building on this observa-

tion, this article explores how communist party leaders in Vietnam have remained committed

to core socialist ideas at the same time they have presided over-regulation that has incremen-

tally legalized a mixed-market economy.

Party leaders in Vietnam exercise extensive control over public discourse and social organi-

zations to ensure that discussions shaping economic regulation remain within their ranks

(Reis & Mollinga, 2015). Dialogical controls inhibit the public discussion of ideas that might

challenge party tropes and persuade regulators to end socialism and fully embrace neo-liberal

or other modes of capitalist economic regulation (Endres & Leshkowich, 2018; London, 2022).

The party controls the ideas circulating in public discourse by tightly managing state and social

media (London, 2022; Wells-Dang, 2022). In addition, it constrains the formation of business

and social associations that might mobilize opposition to party policies (Wells-Dang, 2022). A

United Nations Development Programme report revealed the effectiveness of state controls

over public discourse (UNDP, 2016). It found that public participation in lawmaking is almost

entirely filtered through party agencies and networks.

This article develops a theoretical framework that aims to explain how commercial regula-

tion evolved in Vietnam’s tightly managed discursive environment. Much socio-legal theory

assumes that regulatory change occurs directly through dialogical persuasion or indirectly

through social movements that influence the ideational context that defines the range of regula-

tory possibilities (Chua & Engle, 2019; Ewick & Silbey, 1998). These social constructionist theo-

ries focus attention on how discourse, identity, and social mobilization communicates and

constitutes regulatory ideas. For example, legal consciousness studies explore legal change by

examining the ways in which people discuss, experience, understand, and ultimately act in rela-

tion to law (Chua & Engle, 2019; Ewick & Silbey, 1998). Systems theory adopts a more inter-

subjective focus by examining how different epistemic communities dialogically interact with

each other to shape regulatory systems (Nobles & Schiff, 2013). Discourse in these theories is

treated as an interactive dialogical process, by and through which social agents generate and

communicate ideas to regulators (Carstensen & Schmidt, 2016; Ewick & Silbey, 1998). Regula-

tory change occurs when coordinated and sustained dialog changes the background beliefs info-

rming regulators.

Discourse-based theories evolved to explain regulatory change in liberal democracies where

the dialog influencing regulators is often (but not always) transparent and observable

(Carstensen & Schmidt, 2016; Ewick & Silbey, 1998). This raises the question, how should we

study regulatory change in authoritarian polities where policymaking is often secretive, opaque,

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