Officials and experts reflected on a year of administrative reforms and discussed their future direction at a launch event and conference for the Blue Book on Public Administrative Reform (2013), held in Beijing on March 22. 

This round of political reform focused on administrative streamlining and decentralization, reducing review and approval procedures and administrative fees for business operation activities, and providing enterprises with more autonomy. Many experts have advised that decentralization, both of the government’s administration of enterprises and society, and higher levels of government’s administration of grass-root levels, is necessary for the government to function better.

In the surveys compiled for this most recent Blue Book, most respondents welcomed policies including (in order of preference) cancelling all evaluation and examination activities except those stipulated by law, administrative regulations and the State Council, reducing and decentralizing review and approval procedures for business activities, minimizing the issuance of certificates and licenses and loosening investment approval procedures.

In a round of institutional reforms announced during the first plenary session of the 12th National People’s Congress in March 2013, the ministries under the State Council were reduced from 27 to 25, while an additional two bodies were dissolved or merged into other agencies and commissions, among other consolidation, streamlining and restructuring measures.

“Given the whole picture, this is really just a very slight adjustment,” commented Mao Shoulong, a professor from the Academy of Public Policy at Renmin University of China. “It seems that plenty of similar reforms could be ramped up a notch, and that there is still ample room for reform.”

As far as space for implementing future reforms, Mao believes the major determining factors are the ongoing efforts at organizational streamlining and functional transition. One of the main reforms we need at the moment is a shakedown of administrative levels within State Owned Enterprises and public-sector agencies, Mao said. Within the government itself, he advised increasing the specialization of policy-making rather than bolstering departmental decision-making through individual administrative bodies.

Surveys conducted for the Blue Book indicated that more than half the respondents felt the Official Property Declaration System has played “an immeasurable role” in fighting corruption, though some respondents voiced pessimisms about how well it is working. Most expressed hopes that an effective system for officials to declare their property and for these declarations to be evaluated and approved will be put in place, along with further supplementary reforms and initiatives.

Initial results of an investigation in reforms to the official vehicle system by the Research Department of Social Development at the Research Office of the State Council  indicates that 22 provinces, regions and cities in the Chinese Mainland have been carrying out reforms in this area. Provinces that have not include Shanxi, Hebei, Qinghai, Fujian, Jilin, Guizhou, Ningxia, Xinjiang and Tibet. 

The research group suggested that central government organs should set a good example. Guidelines for actually implementing reform will have to be determined by local government based on the situation and realistic expectations in a given location, they advised.
 

The Chinese version appeared in Chinese Social Sciences Today, No.576, Mar 26.

Translated by Jiang Hong

Revised by Charles Horne