Social Sciences in China (Chinese Edition)

No.4, 2018

An Administrative Law Perspective on the Reconstruction of the Power List System

(Abstract)

Zhu Xinli and Yu Jun

The existing power lists (of government powers and responsibilities) have a number of problems, including tension between the goals of “rule of law” and “governance”; a mismatch between tactics and goals in the course of implementation; and separation of the core categories of power and responsibility. This greatly weakens the function of those reforms that take governance as their value goal. To deal with these problems, a completely new logical structure involving a three-stage sequential power list has been proposed within the two-dimensional legality/optimality structure of modern administrative law. Firstly, legitimate criteria for power settings should be established to improve the property rights system and achieve a relatively thorough review and reconstruction of the existing structure of government power, so that reform is genuinely reoriented toward the core objectives of “remodeling the government/market relationship” and “improving the ability to govern.” Secondly, we need to provide a benchmark guided by the principle of administrative efficiency for the rational allocation of jurisdiction by subject area and level for government control powers and responsibilities. Lastly, we suggest as the optimum control tool an operational plan that will simultaneously take into account administrative efficiency and rights protection within the framework of the public law principle of proportionality.