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since the reform and opening up, the government institutions have been reformed

they are constantly streamlining their deliberative and coordinating bodies.

a new round of local institutional reform is accelerating. recently, many places such as hunan, shandong, sichuan, jiangxi, guangxi, zhejiang, and jiangsu have been abolishing a large number of deliberative and coordinating institutions.

looking at august, on august 20, the official website of the anhua county government of hunan province announced that the county had abolished all types of deliberative and coordinating bodies set up in townships; on august 16, the official website of the tancheng county government of shandong province issued a notice stating that all existing deliberative and coordinating bodies in guichang township, tancheng county were abolished, and no deliberative and coordinating bodies would be established in the future.

photo/visual china

zhang nandiyang, professor at the school of public administration of renmin university of china, told china newsweek that since the reform and opening up, every government agency reform has been continuously streamlining the deliberative and coordinating bodies. "once the deliberative and coordinating bodies are found to be showing a trend of expansion, they will be streamlined. this is a reform that has been promoted from top to bottom."

a large number of deliberative and coordinating bodies

recently, the abolition of grassroots deliberative and coordinating institutions has attracted attention because the number of deliberative and coordinating institutions in many places has become very large. many townships have abolished dozens or even hundreds of deliberative and coordinating institutions at one time. for example, the government of dianshanhu town, kunshan city, jiangsu province announced a list of 102 deliberative and coordinating institutions to be cleared, and anhua county, hunan province abolished 1,450 township deliberative and coordinating institutions.

what is a deliberative and coordinating body? according to the definition of the central organization and establishment commission, a deliberative and coordinating body refers to an inter-departmental coordination body established to complete a special or temporary task.

for example, the deliberative and coordinating bodies for the cleanup in dianshan lake town this time include: the town’s special rectification leading group for the problem of illegal occupation of farmland for building houses in rural areas, the town’s leading group for the installation of elevators in existing multi-story residential buildings, the town’s public security video surveillance construction and networking application leading group, the town’s construction bureau (greening and street lights) landscaping hazardous chemicals safety leading group, etc.

there are many reasons why there are so many deliberative and coordinating bodies in various places.

on the one hand, when the government handles cross-departmental tasks, the deliberative coordination agency is indeed a very important tool. hu yefei, associate professor at the school of international relations and public affairs of fudan university, said that cross-departmental coordination has always been a major and long-standing problem within administrative agencies, and the deliberative coordination agency is often regarded as an efficient cross-departmental coordination tool by the administrative functional department that leads a certain matter, because the deliberative coordination agency is usually led by a senior leader who serves as the head of the agency, "which means that the leader thinks this issue is very important", which can help the leading department save more communication costs.

zhang nandiyang pointed out that since the 18th national congress of the communist party of china, the country has developed very rapidly and is therefore facing a large number of new situations, new trends, and new business forms, such as digital transformation and platform economy. "this has brought many new demands on government governance. it also means that there will be a large number of departmental collaboration or joint governance scenarios, so a large number of new deliberative and coordinating bodies will be established."

on the other hand, as a government institution established to deal with temporary, phased or sudden tasks, the establishment of a deliberative and coordinating body is relatively arbitrary.

ye tuo, a professor at the school of public administration of south china university of technology, told china newsweek that there is currently a lack of clear laws to restrict when deliberative and coordinating bodies should and should not be established. there are only some principles-based provisions, which are equivalent to giving the power to establish deliberative and coordinating bodies to local governments at all levels.

"the legal provisions are unclear, and local governments need to deal with many cross-departmental affairs. the combination of these two aspects makes local governments have the urge to set up various deliberative and coordination tasks," said yetuo.

in addition, he also pointed out that some local governments will take various measures to prove that they are promoting certain important tasks, including setting up deliberative and coordinating bodies. "institutions have been set up and documents have been issued. although the final effect is difficult to prove, we can give an explanation to our superiors."

centralized cancellation at the township level

according to information disclosed on local government websites, the deliberative and coordinating bodies that have been abolished are mainly concentrated at the township level.

take anhua county in hunan province, which abolished 1,450 township deliberative and coordinating bodies, for example. the county's organization department pointed out in an article that "we should give full play to the role of the party committee and government functional departments, strictly control the establishment of deliberative and coordinating bodies in accordance with laws and regulations, and make it clear that no deliberative and coordinating bodies will be set up at the township level."

a staff member of the organization department of anhua county party committee told china news weekly that "there will no longer be a deliberative and coordinating body at the township level," which is a statement clearly stated in the institutional reform plan from the central government to the local governments. in addition, the staff member pointed out that the abolition of the deliberative and coordinating body does not involve a reduction in staffing, because the staff of the deliberative and coordinating body generally comes from other departments with staffing.

china newsweek noted that in addition to anhua county, many places in hunan pointed out in the notice of abolishing deliberative and coordinating institutions that "there will no longer be deliberative and coordinating institutions at the township level." for example, the notice issued by jiaoxi town, liuyang city, hunan province on the government's official website shows that according to the "notice of the liuyang municipal party committee institutional reform leading group on issuing the implementation plan for institutional reform in liuyang city", "townships (streets) will not set up deliberative and coordinating institutions, and no various signs will be added except for the new era civilization practice center and other places where the central government has clearly required it." after research by the party committee and the government, the existing 31 deliberative and coordinating institutions and their offices will be abolished.

according to media reports, news from the organization department of the qionglai municipal party committee of sichuan province shows that the central government requires that provincial-level deliberative and coordinating bodies be strictly controlled within the number stipulated by the central government; districts (cities) and counties shall not set up deliberative and coordinating bodies in principle, and those that really need to be established must be reported to the higher-level party committee for approval in accordance with procedures; townships (streets) shall not set up deliberative and coordinating bodies.

in addition, china newsweek noted that many of the deliberative and coordinating agencies that have been abolished at the township level in various places have completed their historical missions. for example, a number of deliberative and coordinating agencies related to the covid-19 pandemic have been abolished in various places. xinchang town, jingzhou miao and dong autonomous county, hunan province recently issued a notice to abolish 28 deliberative and coordinating agencies, including the leading group for covid-19 vaccination for the elderly and the leading group for covid-19 prevention and control. daxin town, pingnan county, guangxi zhuang autonomous region, abolished the daxin town covid-19 joint prevention and control social prevention and control special leading group and its office.

many of the deliberative and coordinating bodies abolished at the township level were related to various special operations. for example, sanfengsi town, yueyang city, hunan province, issued a notice on july 25 stating that the county abolished the sanfengsi town special fight against organized crime and evil leading group and the sanfengsi town special action leading group for combating and rectifying pension fraud. jiaoxi town, liuyang city, abolished the jiaoxi town special action leading group for the concentrated rectification of stubborn and chronic problems in drug control and its office.

negative effects of quantitative expansion

the abolition and streamlining of grassroots deliberative and coordinating bodies are related to a series of negative effects brought about by their expansion in number.

"establishing a deliberative and coordinating body can enable departments to collaborate better. however, poor collaboration between departments often occurs. if a deliberative and coordinating body is set up as soon as a problem arises, it will lead to a large number of agencies, causing the government to become bloated and affecting administrative efficiency." zhang nandiyang said that deliberative and coordinating bodies were originally intended to improve efficiency, but too many of them would have a counterproductive effect.

zhang nandiyang added that although the deliberative and coordinating bodies are "led by leaders", the leaders' attention is limited. "we often say 'concentrate our efforts on major tasks'. if there are too many deliberative and coordinating bodies, all kinds of things need to be led by leaders, which will weaken their role in efficient coordination."

in addition, the expansion of the number of deliberative and coordinating bodies may also lead to path dependence among functional departments. hu yefei said that some problems could actually be solved within the functional departments, but because of cross-departmental coordination, some departments will promote the establishment of deliberative and coordinating bodies out of path dependence, resulting in the lack of motivation for functional departments to perform their duties if deliberative and coordinating bodies are not established.

yetuo also pointed out that the expansion of deliberative and coordinating bodies has also brought a lot of burdens to the grassroots, "because after the establishment of the body, documents must be issued and meetings must be held, and thus 'mountains of documents and seas of meetings' have arisen."

since the 19th cpc national congress, the cpc central committee has continuously rectified formalism to reduce the burden on the grassroots, and the ever-expanding number of deliberative and coordinating bodies is also one of the sources of burden on the grassroots to some extent. zhang nandiyang said that many staff members of deliberative and coordinating bodies are transferred from relevant departments. they have their own jobs, and the various tasks of deliberative and coordinating bodies will squeeze their time and energy.

increase and decrease cycle

since the reform and opening up, there has been a trend of increase and decrease in the number of deliberative and coordinating bodies at all levels, that is, "streamlining - expansion - streamlining again - expansion again".

"this is not a problem unique to us; it is a problem faced by administrative agencies in all countries around the world. this is why we must continue to advance government institutional reform." zhang nandiyang said that my country has been trying to break this cycle in the process of various institutional reforms.

hu yefei said that the increase and decrease in the number of deliberative and coordinating bodies is actually a relatively normal phenomenon. what should be paid attention to is not to allow the number of deliberative and coordinating bodies to expand excessively, and not to allow the benefits of the operation of deliberative and coordinating bodies to be less than the cost of setting up the institutions.

zhang nandiyang also emphasized that the increase or decrease of deliberative and coordinating bodies is not necessarily negative, and sometimes it is a healthy governance process. "new governance needs will promote the emergence of new institutions. when the deliberative and coordinating bodies have completed their historical mission, there is no need for them to continue to exist. this is a normal cycle."

since the cycle of increase and decrease of deliberative and coordinating bodies is difficult to break, how can we set up deliberative and coordinating bodies more scientifically and better play their role?

many experts pointed out that some principles should be formulated for the establishment of deliberative and coordinating bodies. yetuo believes that it is necessary to clarify under what circumstances deliberative and coordinating bodies can be established, and some restrictions can also be placed on the number of deliberative and coordinating bodies.

for example, zibo city in shandong province has standardized the deliberative and coordinating institutions, requiring "to focus on total quantity control and stricter institutional settings." specifically, the municipal party committee organization department implements list management, total quantity control, and dynamic adjustment. new deliberative and coordinating institutions will be strictly controlled. if the leading department can coordinate, the relevant responsibilities have been clearly undertaken by the relevant departments, and the work tasks are the same or similar to those of the established deliberative and coordinating institutions, no new deliberative and coordinating institutions will be established.

in addition, zibo also proposed that the staff should be streamlined. the municipal party committee and municipal government deliberative and coordination bodies generally have one director (group leader, convener) and one to two deputy directors (deputy group leaders, deputy conveners). the number of other members of comprehensive deliberative and coordination bodies should be controlled within 15 people, and those of specialized ones should be controlled within 10 people.

for another example, local governments also have countermeasures for the "mountain of documents and sea of ​​meetings" caused by the expansion of the number of deliberative and coordinating bodies. for example, zhangjiajie city, hunan province, has made it clear that the plenary meetings of deliberative and coordinating bodies should not exceed two or more meetings of higher-level bodies in principle. huang zhenlong, chief of the first secretary section of the zhangjiajie municipal party committee office, said that in the first half of 2024, the city promptly discovered and immediately stopped more than 20 meetings that violated regulations.

in addition, a dynamic adjustment mechanism can be set up around the deliberative and coordinating bodies to continuously monitor their operating results. both zhang nandiyang and ye tuo suggested that if the deliberative and coordinating bodies have completed their tasks, they should be abolished in a timely manner, rather than cleaning them up in batches every few years when it is found that there are too many bodies.

zibo proposed that the municipal party committee office and the municipal government office should work with the municipal party committee organization department and other relevant departments to carry out cleaning and standardization work every three years to ensure that the number of deliberative and coordinating bodies is controlled within the total amount.