A Study On Strengthening The Provisions Related To Public Participation In Budget Law

In 2004, The Budget Law was listed on the five-year legislation plan of the Tenth National People's Congress. The main purpose of the amendment is how to make it accommodate to the developments of social economy, embody the government's administration notion and satisfy the social public needs. With the reference to both overseas and domestic theory and practice, it is suggested that the strengthening of the provisions related to public participation should be one of the main content of the coming amendment.Through the analysis of the features of the modern budget law and the research on the problems of the present budget system in China, it is considered necessary to strengthen the legislation of public participation in budgeting process. First, as the purpose of budget has changed from satisfying the need of government administration to satisfying the social public need, the public consequently become the participator of the budgeting process. Second, the various corrupt budget problems expose the weakness of the budgetary supervision system. Public participation could become one kind of strong supervision power over budget. Three methods for public participation in budgeting process have been specifically introduced in this article. They are the opening of the financial and budgetary information, the budgeting hearings and the direct public involvement in low-level local government's budgeting process. These typical methods not only have been maturely developed overseas but also have got preliminary application within China.To strengthen the public participation in budgeting process, it is not adequate to merely rely on the government's goodwill and the public's voluntary organization. With the opportunity of the amendment of the Budget Law, it is necessary to stipulate the government's legal responsibility to organize public participation and the public's legal right of participating in budgeting process.