A volunteer teacher from Beijing interacting with students in Lhasa in 2024. The year of 2024 marks the 30th anniversary of China’s implementation of paired assistance in the Xizang Autonomous Region. Photo: IC PHOTO

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In its national modernization process, China faces dual challenges: the burden associated with governance at scale and the imbalance in regional development. Through long-term practical exploration, “paired assistance” has emerged as a governance mechanism that facilitates horizontal resource transfers and promotes spatial justice through intergovernmental cooperation. As a distinctive scale governance technique, paired assistance has demonstrated significant governance efficacy, contributing to the development of a unique Chinese institutional framework for scale governance.

Conceptual characteristics and institutional evolution

The definition of paired assistance, widely accepted by the academic community, originates from the Three Gorges Project Resettlement Handbook, which describes it as an effective form of cross-regional, cross-sectoral, and interdepartmental cooperation. According to the handbook, “paired assistance” (also known as pairing assistance) refers to a state-led policy initiative designed to foster partnerships among different regions or industries. Through such pairings, the respective advantages of each participating region or sector can be effectively leveraged to achieve development goals.

In a broad sense, paired assistance refers to a state-led practice in which governments at various levels establish formalized pairing relationships between two entities to facilitate cross-regional flows of factors of production, including human capital, financial support, and material goods. In a narrower sense, it specifically denotes policies that explicitly use the term “paired assistance” in official planning and implementation that define fundamental principles, partnership structures, official deployment mechanisms, key tasks, funding scales, and organizational leadership arrangements. Paired assistance can thus be conceptualized as an institutional arrangement through which the state, under government leadership, employs a structured pairing mechanism to reallocate resources across different regions, industries, and governmental departments to enable effective governance at scale.

The term “pair” represents a regulatory principle that structurally constrains government-led assistance efforts. It determines both the direction of resource flows—including financial support, technology, talent, and services—and ensures that assistance follows a one-to-one pairing model. “Assistance,” on the other hand, refers to the actual implementation of support measures, encompassing the provision of human capital, financial resources, and material aid by the assisting party to the recipient. Assistance functions as both a means of resource aggregation, enabling the coordinated mobilization of diverse resource components, and as the ultimate objective of resource flows.

Based on its effectiveness in governance at scale, paired assistance can be categorized into three primary types: the border area governance model, the emergency and disaster response model, and the economic and social development model. The border area governance model is the most extensive in scale, scope, investment, and continuity. It mobilizes national resources to provide comprehensive and sustained support for ethnic minority and border areas. The emergency and disaster response model is implemented by the central government in response to a specific phased goal of national development or urgent crises, including disaster relief, post-disaster reconstruction, and public health emergencies. The economic and social development model facilitates poverty alleviation by supporting underdeveloped regions or promoting coordinated regional development to address the imbalances and inadequacies of basic public services in recipient areas.

Drawing on the historical trajectory of paired assistance within governance at scale, its institutional evolution can be broadly categorized into three distinct phases. The first phase, spanning from the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949 to the 1970s, marked the conception and initial establishment of the assistance system. The second phase, from reform and opening up in the late 1970s to the early 1990s, saw the formalization and expansion of the system. During this stage, paired assistance reflected two central priorities of the central government: first, dismantling administrative and regional barriers that restricted the flow of resources, thereby facilitating the transition from a planned to a market economy; and second, fostering the development of border areas and ethnic minority areas by channeling resources from more developed provinces to these regions.

Since the 1990s, paired assistance has entered a third phase of consolidation and refinement. As a critical policy instrument for strengthening intergovernmental collaboration and promoting equitable access to public services, paired assistance has acquired new characteristics in this period. First, with the transformation of the economic system, the model has gradually shifted from a state-led resource allocation approach to one increasingly driven by market forces. Assistance has also transitioned from direct financial aid—akin to a “blood transfusion”—to a model emphasizing self-sustaining development, comparable to “hematopoiesis.” Second, as governance priorities have shifted toward enhancing public service provision, the focus of paired assistance has expanded beyond economic development to include social development, integrating economic growth with efforts to equalize access to basic public services. Third, as administrative structures and governance mechanisms undergo modernization, a more institutionalized, standardized, and enduring paired assistance framework has progressively taken shape.

Intellectual basis and operational logic

The conceptual foundation of parired assistance is deeply rooted in China’s agrarian civilization and the traditions of its Great Unity system. The cultural essence of this practice is shaped by refined traditional values such as “All under Heaven as one family” and “When one region is in distress, support comes from all directions.” The philosophy of Great Unity has served as a trustworthy political and cultural resource for mobilizing society in times of need. These traditional values provide the intellectual impetus for scale governance mechanisms such as paired assistance.

Unlike purely economic transactions, paired assistance should be understood within the broader strategic goal of governing a vast nation like China effectively. Governance at scale involves multiple objectives, including maintaining social stability, ensuring regional balance, and fostering economic development. Addressing these challenges requires the central government to adopt a strategic and holistic approach to coordination and planning. Under unitary system, centralized coordination ensures the effective integration of government-led initiatives, enterprise participation, and broad societal engagement, forming a collaborative and incentive-driven governance framework.

The operational framework of paired assistance is structured around the administrative contracting system and the project-based implementation mechanism. This dual framework allows the central government to not only mobilize and allocate resources more efficiently but also decentralize and redistribute the administrative burden and scale of management to local governments. 

First, within the administrative contracting system, higher-level governments delegate rigid assistance mandates to lower-level governments through a hierarchical structure. This process progressively breaks down and redistributes the responsibilities and pressures associated with assistance efforts. 

There are two primary administrative contracting models within the paired assistance system: diagonal contracting and direct contracting. With diagonal contracting, the central government assigns paired assistance responsibilities to provincial-level governments, establishing a pairing relationship between localities with asymmetrical administrative statuses. A notable example is the partnership of Jilin Province in northeast China with Altay Prefecture in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Under direct contracting, paired assistance operates as a strategic incentive mechanism for local governments that receive assistance mandates. The combination of political promotion incentives and performance evaluation metrics fosters horizontal competition among assisting local governments and their officials, ensuring the effective execution of paired assistance objectives.

Second, the project-based implementation mechanism serves as the technical foundation for the execution of paired assistance initiatives. It operates through a highly structured system that encompasses project selection, approval, construction, supervision, and evaluation. Once the administrative contracting system determines the specific assistance tasks, the assisting local government is responsible for fundraising, project selection, and project execution. Based on the nature of implementation entities, paired assistance projects can be classified into four categories: non-reimbursable aid projects, infrastructure assistance projects, collaborative projects, and reimbursable aid projects.

Future research agenda

First, it is necessary to clarify the conceptual boundaries and institutional framework of paired assistance. Scholarly perspectives on the scope and role of paired assistance in scale governance continue to diverge across disciplines and contexts. As a broad governance concept, paired assistance encompasses diverse policy initiatives. Future research should focus on defining its scope, nature, objectives, principles, and goals. Critical questions include whether China’s fiscal and tax system can sustainably support paired assistance and whether existing legal frameworks provide adequate safeguards. Addressing these issues will enhance the precision of academic research and ensure the intensity and depth of policy implementation.

Second, the internal mechanisms and operational logic of paired assistance in scale governance need to be further examined, with a focus on identifying emerging practices with discernable patterns. Future research should place paired assistance within a broader framework of national governance at scale, examining its position in and significance to the national governance system. A cyclical analytical approach—moving from events to structures, and then from structures and models back to events—is essential for uncovering the underlying patterns that shape the practice of scale governance through paired assistance.

Third, it is advisable to theorize paired assistance within a localized governance context and advance the development of normative theories with practical guiding significance. Beyond insights from multiple disciplines, including intergovernmental relations, poverty governance, borderland governance, ethnic studies, and institutional analysis, scale governance offers a new perspective and enhances the explanatory power of comparative studies. The future agenda of paired assistance research should refine conceptual boundaries and develop theoretical frameworks while exploring its role in addressing scale governance challenges across political, economic, cultural, and social dimensions. This will enrich China’s independent knowledge system with insights that integrate theoretical depth and practical applicability.

Wang Hongwei and Zhou Guanghui (professor) are from the School of Public Administration at Jilin University.

Edited by REN GUANHONG