Painting a Rosy or a Black Picture—Cooking the Books

In the same way that supporters of an initiative try to minimize perceived costs and uncertainties, opponents frequently exaggerate them. For instance, in one interview I asked about the price tag for the Three Gorges Project,

noting that I had seen cost estimates that varied by a factor of five. My respondent, who was an ardent supporter of the project, bluntly replied that those who advance extremely high estimates "oppose the Three Gorges Project."^[54]

For this strategy to be effective, the bargainer must possess seemingly credible information. It is no accident that each ministry and locality has its own statistical units that tend to produce data supportive of local or organizational goals. I noted above, for instance, that central and local estimates concerning the number of refugees that would be generated by the Danjiangkou Dam diverged in a predictable fashion, with each side of the dispute promoting data most consistent with its interests. Similarly, respondents at one ministry at which I interviewed assumed that the figures I quoted from another ministry had been distorted in a way consistent with that other ministry's interests. One implication of this process is, of course, that more information will not necessarily speed up the decision process, unless the data are collected using agreed-upon methodologies in the first place.