Shopkeepers in Chinese-dominated parts of New York City have long favored a particular form of extra-legal justice in dealing with badly behaving customers: catch the offense (typically shoplifting) on tape, seize the offender’s ID, take a photograph and threaten to paste the picture on the wall–along with the would-be thief’s name and crime–unless he or she agrees to pay a penalty. The approach has its critics but also benefits from a certain logic: Why bother going through the rigmarole and uncertainty of criminal prosecution when shame works so much better?

Now a group of local officials in China has decided to apply that approach to an entire city.

Frustrated at the inability of traditional propaganda and fines to improve the behavior of its citizens, the government of Wuhan, capital of central China’s Hubei Province, has teamed with local media to produce a city-wide name-and-shame list.

The inaugural list–released over the weekend and teased on the front page of the Wuhan Evening News with a blaring headline “City Reveals First Group of ‘Uncivilized Residents’”–verbally tars and feathers 40 people for engaging in one of four unacceptable activities: careless running of red lights, careless parking, jaywalking (“careless crossing of the street”) and littering (“careless throwing around of garbage”).

Offenders are named in three of the four lists (jaywalkers appear in photographs but aren’t named). Perpetrators of traffic offenses have their license-plate numbers listed along with the time and location of the infraction, while the list for litterers offers offenders’ ages as well as the punishment received (typically a 50 yuan fine).

(The lists and photos have been duly reproduced by Chinese media, including the website of Phoenix TV)

The Wuhan Evening News promises a fresh set of lists every week, but the categories could change. Next time, the lists might include “carelessly dumping sediment,” “throwing things from high places” or any number of other inconsiderate activities, Yan Hong, head of the Wuhan Civilization Office, told Xinhua (in Chinese) on Wednesday.

Public reaction to the new initiative appears sharply divided. A number of online commenters have lauded the lists as a way to improve Chinese people’s character (素质) – a topic of much discussion in the wake of the disaster in Japan, which has produced an outpouring of admiration in China for the discipline and orderliness of regular Japanese people. Others, however, have been less enthusiastic.

Many seem to bristle at the idea of government officials, who in China are often assumed corrupt until proven otherwise, labeling other people uncivilized.

“Work up a black list for the government, then its fair,” one commenter writing under the name Xiaosi Dake said on the microbbloging site Sina Weibo.

Many others worry that the list represents an infringement on privacy, with some questioning whether it’s legal. “Publicizing a list of uncivilized residents is a misuse of power!” Guo Pulong, an account based in the southern city of Shenzhen wrote on his microblog. “What legal basis does this have?”

As with the shame tactics employed by the shopkeepers in New York, the answer to the legal question in Wuhan isn’t immediately clear.

For his part, the man in charge of the lists suggests people focus more of their attention on the system’s intended goal. “Exposure is just the means, not the end,” the Civilization Office’s Mr. Yan tells Xinhua. “All of this is to build an enduring mechanism for establishing civilization and improving the character of residents on multiple fronts.”

– Josh Chin. Follow him on Twitter @joshchin

Reforms started in the late 1970s with the phasing out of collectivized agriculture, and expanded to include the gradual liberalization of prices, fiscal decentralization, increased autonomy for state enterprises, the foundation of a diversified banking system, the development of stock markets, the rapid growth of the non-state sector, and the opening to foreign trade and investment.

Deterioration in the environment – notably air pollution, soil erosion, and the steady fall of the water table, especially in the north – is another long-term problem.

The People’s Republic of China is the world’s second largest economy after the United States by both nominal GDP ($5 trillion in 2009) and by purchasing power parity ($8.77 trillion in 2009).

Some economists believe that Chinese economic growth has been in fact understated during much of the 1990s and early 2000s, failing to fully factor in the growth driven by the private sector and that the extent at which China is dependent on exports is exaggerated.

The two sectors have differed in many respects.

A report by UBS in 2009 concluded that China has experienced total factor productivity growth of 4 per cent per year since 1990, one of the fastest improvements in world economic history.

The market-oriented reforms China has implemented over the past two decades have unleashed individual initiative and entrepreneurship, whilst retaining state domination of the economy.

China now ranks as the fifth largest global investor in outbound direct investment (ODI) with a total volume of $56.5 billion, compared to a ranking of 12th in 2008, the Ministry of Commerce said on Sunday.

” Although the figure is already “quite amazing,” the volume is “not large enough” considering China’s economic growth and local companies’ expanding demand for international opportunities, Shen said.

China is expected to have 200 million cars on the road by 2020, increasing pressure on energy security and the environment, government officials said yesterday.

Although China is still a developing country with a relatively low per capita income, it has experienced tremendous economic growth since the late 1970s.

Even with these improvements, agriculture accounts for only 20% of the nation’s gross national product.

In terms of cash crops, China ranks first in cotton and tobacco and is an important producer of oilseeds, silk, tea, ramie, jute, hemp, sugarcane, and sugar beets.

Livestock raising on a large scale is confined to the border regions and provinces in the north and west; it is mainly of the nomadic pastoral type.

Offshore exploration has become important to meeting domestic needs; massive deposits off the coasts are believed to exceed all the world’s known oil reserves.

There are large deposits of uranium in the northwest, especially in Xinjiang; there are also mines in Jiangxi and Guangdong provs.

China also has extensive hydroelectric energy potential, notably in Yunnan, W Sichuan, and E Tibet, although hydroelectric power accounts for only 5% of the country’s total energy production.

Coastal cities, especially in the southeast, have benefited greatly from China’s increasingly open trade policies.

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Uncivilized? Chinese City Introduces Shame List