A Study on the System Reform of Administrative Examination and Approval in China: A Comparative Analysis of the Concentrated Permit Model and the Lean Government Model

         
Author Name MENG Jianjun (Visiting Fellow, RIETI) / PAN Motao (Tsinghua University)
Creation Date/NO. April 2020 20-J-026
Download / Links

Abstract

As a part of the structural reform of the Chinese government, administrative reform has attracted much attention. Under the guidance of the central government, the key content of the transformation of government functions is adapting to the development of a new economic society over a 10-year period from 2013. Administrative reform is based on the continuous promotion of administrative standardization, normalization, and the abolition of administrative examinations. At the same time, as one system design element, the central government delegates authority to local governments. The State Council recommends that local governments seek models of administrative licensing reform that are suited to local needs through an "encouragement and punishment" mechanism. As a result of our fieldwork research, we have found that the model of reform used for the administrative examination and approval system generally converged into two models, the Concentrated Permit Model and the Lean Government Model. By comparing and analyzing these two models, this paper looks at how to equalize administrative services while maintaining regional diversity through the trial and error of local governments in their efforts to undertake administrative reform in China.