Policy context
Administrative policy: implementation, impact and effectiveness
| Authors: | Hong Hu Liu |
| Coordinating authors: | Constantinos Kosmas, Ruta Landgrebe, Sandra Nauman |
| Editors: | Alexandros Kandelapas, Jane Brandt |
Editor's note 20Mar14: Source D142-7.
In Chinese administrative policy, local administration is the "executive arm" of the central authorities with a clear duty to obey the State.
Overall, managed objects of administrative policies involve every aspect of the field of public administration. They are derived from a variety of laws, regulations, and other policy documents under the framework of the branch managers, and are performed by civil servants. Since the 1980s, the country's public administration policy and objective has been to encourage economic expansion in investment type. according to the economic logic of the State Council.
While the Constitution relies on the lower administrative policies for implementation, actual policy making focuses on problem solving giving rise to inevitable constitutional contradictions.
Finance Law [2006] No. 39 specifically addressed the goal of fundraising for lower administrative levels . These objectives can be summarized as to:
- be in accordance with national regulations regarding implementation;
- function according to the actual situation of local governments regarding preparation and implementation of local budgets;
- be accurate in terms of availability of funding;
- supervise in multiple ways;
- lower management costs appropriately.
Amendment of the Constitution in 1988, 1993, 1999, and 2004 have marked a gradual withdrawal of the Central Government from absolute dominance and increasing local government flexibility. The main actors in the administration are:
- Central authority: National People's Congress has supreme authority; they develop constitutional principles for the division of power structure.
- Local. The State centrally decided that the local government is a performer rather than a decision maker involved in the policy process.
- Civil society. Residents have no direct right to speak of political decision making.
There is no common set of policy procedures and instruments for administration; they vary according to sectoral policy. The following table gives a brief overview of horizontal administrative instruments relating to the administration of the state with special emphasis on regional and local government.
Main horizontal instruments related to administrative policy
| Type of instrument | Instrument |
| Legal, institutional | "PRC Public Security Administration Punishment Law" (1986) to maintain. "PRC Administrative Reconsideration Law” (1999) for the protection of citizens, legal persons and other organizations’ legal rights. "PRC Civil law” (2005) regarding norms of civil behavior. |
| Financial | Preparation and implementation of the national budget is an important means of control over administrative policy. The local government relies on central funding to maintain operations, but some regional governments have an independent budget. |
| Planning | When programming is completed by ministries and regional planning, the focus turns to financing and conditions. Financing cannot be independently completed by a single department, but rather it needs to rely on various sectors and regions together to raise funds to solve the funding, debt recovery, and other issues. In recent years, the State delegated some power of regional planning. |
| Infrastructure and communication | Use of information and communication technologies is uneven. Traffic pressure and congestion of the road network is a national problem. |
Source: authors
Since 2001, the Ministry of Finance encourages local governments to become financially independent, primarily by clearly dividing taxes into central and local. In addition, local governments receive central government funding, loans (using taxing power and property rights as collateral) and municipal services cost recovery (sewage and garbage disposal). Regions with development potential may benefit from assistance for public investment.