The Geopolitics of Sovereign Data

CASE STUDIES

CASE SUMMARY: This piece argues that China's official economic data is fundamentally unreliable because the government prioritizes political requirements over statistical accuracy, creating a major liability for investors. It highlights practices like "adding water" to provincial GDP figures and recent decisions to stop publishing data on capital outflows as examples of an opacity that erodes trust. The article concludes that this forces observers into a "cottage industry" of using proxy indicators, such as electricity consumption or railway cargo volumes, to try and discern the true health of the Chinese economy.

REFERENCE: This summary was AI generated. Full text originally published as: Kit Dawnay, “Trust in China’s Economic Data,” Sovereign Data Vol. 2, No. 3 (March 2016). ISSN: 2059-075X.

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