Research On The Reform Of Internal Governance Structure Of Public Universities In China

Currently, governance philosophy and modernization of governance system hasbecome the overall objective of China’s reform. Different from management,Governance is a new way of thinking and action. To reflect levels of governance, thetop-level design needs to be established for the reform, and the crux lies ininstitutional design. In the report of third plenary session of CCP,“institution” hadbeen mentioned for44times. It is obvious that institutional construction wouldbecome the focus of reform in the future.Under this background, modernization of university governance would bespotlighted due to the uniqueness and central status of universities, and moderngovernance of universities is still dependent on institutional design. To reflect betterthe spirit of times as well as humanism, institutional design should be guided byethics which have more to do with science, democracy and legality than the good/evildualism or institutional morality. It would be beneficial to the reform of internalgovernance of domestic universities to exert institutional analysis, institutional designand ethical judgment on the long-term issues in university governance.This thesis is divided into five parts:The first part is the clarification of institutional ethic. Based on existingdefinitions of institutional ethic, a reconsideration of institutional ethic is proposedaccording to genuine characteristics of institutions, the requirements of socialdevelopment, as well as the specific logic of social cognition. That is, institutionalethic is not just moral judgment of metaphysics, but the value pursuit by institutionitself, it is the dialectical unity of values both moral and functional.The second part examines the ideological origin of institutional ethic. The veryidea of institutional ethic dates back to the democracy and democratic thoughts ofancient Greece. In the era of Enlightenment, theories of separation of powers from Locke and Montesquieu brought capitalism into modern civilization, and since thenbecame the paradigm of governance in the western. Contemporary institutional ethicsin the west aim for preservation of capitalist regime. In contrast, institutional ethics inthe Orient have been defined by individual embodiment of moralities since ZhouDynasty without substantial exploration on the state level, and thereby influenceddeeply the process of modernization of China. In contemporary, institutional ethicneeds to be constructed to flourish to promote national revival.The third part deals with the issues of institutional ethic in the structure ofuniversity governance： the division of leader’s power, democracy and scientificdecision-making, democratic function of congress of teacher, and academicmanagement, etc. All these remain unsolved as heavy burden. In the perspective ofinstitutional ethic, they result from the lack of functional as well as ethical value ofinstitutions.The fourth part discusses the causes of these issues in the structureof university governance. Undoubtedly, they are attributed to ideologicalrestrictions and the delay in construction of university charters anduniversity institutions. However, what are deep-rooted include theconstraints of social structure, the influence of educational policiesand the lack of governance professionals.The fifth part revolves around countermeasures of construction of institutionalethic in the structure of university governance. The binary values are crucial:functional value and moral value, both are indispensable. Founded on science,democracy and legality, the functional value is the practical value of institutions at thesame time, to which all institutional issues must be tested. On the other hand, themoral value is what institutions ought to pursue, which exits in humanistconsideration and ethical care manifested in institutional design.