The demise of collective units that attach citizens to the state in China has been overstated; the hegemonic form of Chinese citizenship today links participation and welfare entitlement to membership in a collective unit in a specific locality. This article presents an ethnographic account of the operation of this “normal” form of local citizenship in resident and villager committees in Tianjin. These committees combine participatory and welfare dimensions of citizenship in one institutional setting. Here, citizens are bound to the state through a face-to-face politics that acts both as a mechanism of control and a channel for claims-making, a mode of rule I term “socialized governance,” which blurs the boundaries between political compliance and social conformity, and makes social norms a strong force in the citizenship order. While variably achieved in practice, this form of citizenship represents an ideal that shapes conditions for politics and perceptions of inequality.

Previous studies have found no relationship between scholar participation and public project performance. Building on the work of Lindblom (1977; 1990), I propose a model depicting scholars' roles in social organizations and governance. A study of thirty-two cases of large public works projects in China and seventeen projects in thirteen other countries shows a moderately positive relationship. The study further shows the greatest influence on project success occurs when participating scholars serve as information brokers and entrepreneurial activity organizers. Successful scholar participation occurred through five working principles: (1) there is dispersed and specialized knowledge production; (2) there is dispersed and asymmetric knowledge possession; (3) knowledge-driven volitions and consensus are criteria for knowledge; (4) the satisfaction of diverse and heterogeneous individual needs is realized through knowledge-driven institutional arrangements; and (5) there are multiple methods of knowledge application. In general, scholar participation seems to be more effective in projects in which there is low political intervention, and in village and county projects. The results of the study provide a theoretical and empirical foundation for further research on scholar participation in social organizations.