Social Sciences in China (Chinese Edition)

No.7, 2020

Whole of Government Reform and Reconstruction of the Theory of Administrative Subjects

(Abstract)

Wang Jingbo

As the theoretical origin of the system of administrative law, the theory of administrative subjects was rapidly instrumentalized by the immediate needs of administrative litigation in China following its importation from the West, which reducing its basic theoretical function. Innovation in the theory of administrative subjects needs to return to its original sphere, that of public administration. In response to trends in China’s overall government reform and expansion of social administration, the theory of administrative subjects should be reformed at the two levels of state administration and social administration. This means regarding the state as the administrative subject in a political sense and governments at all levels as administrative subjects in a legal sense, and thus stripping the functional departments of all levels of government of their qualifications as administrative subjects and endowing all kinds of non-governmental organizations engaged in public administration with the status of “quasi-administrative subjects.” The protection of the legitimate rights and interests of citizens, legal persons and other organizations would be best served by dissolving the joint and several relationship of administrative subjects with the persons to whom application for administrative reconsideration has been made and the defendants in administrative litigation, and by simplifying administrative relief under the principle of “the subject is the defendant” (the persons to whom the application for administrative reconsideration has been made). Getting off the circular arguments of administrative subjects and administrative behavior will be a factor in administrative subjects’ determination of their administrative acts.