Study On River Basin Water Environment Management System Of China

In recent years, study on river basin environment management system is arising in the intellectual community of China. However most of existing literature is describing phenomena, and there is little research deeply exploring river basin water environment management system. According to existing research on public administration, study on river basin water environment management should include four dimensions, which are central-local government relationship, relationship among local governments, relationship among different functional departments and relationship between governments and society. These dimensions generally reflect the inside structure of river basin water environment management system and outside relationship with the society.In the study on river basin water environment management system, we should find questions from evolution history of management system. River basin management system in Kuomintang Period (before 1949) is the foundation of existing river basin water environment management system. According to the development of environment protection institutions and river basin management institutions, the history of river basin water environment management system of China can be divided into five periods, such as Kuomintang Period (before1949), Starting Period (1949-1978), Transition Period (1979-1994), Deepening Period (1995-2005) and Strengthening Period (after 2006). Seeing from the history of its development, river basin water environment management system of China is driven by five impetuses, which are unexpected river basin water pollution, attention and improvement from high leaders of state, changing of relationship between local governments, conversion of government function and promotion of public participation. According to the management practice and theoretical research, there are four aspects of defects in river basin water environment management system of China, which are authority of bureaucratic control weakening, local governments harming each other, different departments cooperating badly, and sustained improvement mechanism being absent.According to the unitary state structure, central-local government relationship is the dominating factor in river basin water environment management system of China. The essence of central-local government relationship is to ensure that local governments effectively implement the environment policy for river basin water pollution from central government. The basic principle of central-local government relationship can be interpreted from two viewpoints which are Theory of Decentralization and Theory of Centralization. The former emphasizes local governments'respective interest and independence from central government, and the latter pays more attention to the authority of bureaucratic control on local governments from central government. As so, the essence of central-local government relationship is how to stimulate local governments'positive action and ensure authority of central government. During river basin water environment management, local government and central government are respectively on behalf of partial interest and whole interest of the residents dwelling along the river basin, that's to say, special interest and common interest. The combination of this interest conflict with decentralized management system of river basin water environment in China impedes policy implementation, and then weakens authority of central government. In order to uphold authority of central government and ensure effective policy implementation, there are three kinds of ensuring mechanisms in the river basin water environment management system of China, which are mechanism of personnel appointing and removing, mechanism of special transfer payments, and mechanism of business supervision. Viewed from practice, these mechanisms are not perfect, and can't effectively ensure authority of central government.Improvement of the relationship among local governments is helpful to get rid of"tragedy of the common"in river basin water environment management. The core of relationship among local governments is to internalize externality of river basin water pollution through mechanisms of competition and cooperation. The basic principle of relationship among local governments may be analyzed from two viewpoints as competence and cooperation. The competence viewpoint arises from pursuit for special interest of local governments or other local interest, and the cooperation viewpoint is put forward to internalize the externality of local governments'action. Interest conflict causes revival among local governments, which is along with negative externality and increases social transaction cost. Cooperation among local governments is helpful to eliminate negative externality and decrease transaction cost, so as to make Pareto improvement of social welfare. Viewed from a theoretical point, competence relationship among local governments is more stable than the cooperation relationship among them. Viewed from practice, competence among local governments can also internalize externality in case of proper designation of institution. Combining with public ownership of river basin water environment rights, local governments'pursuits for economical benefits cause"common tragedy"of river basin water environment. The objects local governments competing for are influenced by central government and civil society. If the"firm-like action"pursuing for economic benefits by local governments can be converted, the"common tragedy"of river basin water environment will be restrained. As for cooperation among local governments in river basin water environment management, there are many kinds of organizing form, such as"market signature","organization signature"and the mixture of them. During river basin water environment management, cooperation among local governments needs certain promotion mechanisms such as market mechanism and bureaucracy mechanism. These organizing forms and promotion mechanisms all have good and bad effects in river basin water environment management, and may be complementary to each other.Improvement of relationship among functional departments is helpful to achieve the comprehensive goal of river basin water environment management. The core of relationship among departments is to properly arrange power and obligation for different functional department. The basic principle of relationship among functional departments may be interpreted from two aspects such as labor division and department coordination. The labor division of functional departments aims at efficiency improvement. Due to influence of barrier among departments, special interest and other factors, professional labor division aiming at department efficiency improvement hinders increasing efficiency of the whole administration. This is paradox of professional labor division. Department cooperation is the coordinating action for common management object among different departments. With boundaries of departments'obligation destroying common object of public management and special interest of departments hindering process of department coordination, department cooperation aiming at improvement of the whole administration performance decreases management performance. This is structural-functional paradox. These two paradoxes show that labor division and department cooperation based on obligation-aimed principle can't avoid original defects. Object-aimed labor division and cooperation among departments provides opportunity for efficiency improvement of labor division and coordination. Only through object-aimed organization reform, cooperation among functional departments can be improved entirely. As for river basin water environment management, related functional departments can be divided into three kinds such as departments of general supervision, industry-classified management and comprehensive regulation, which have boundary questions of obligation and come into bilateral monopoly. Combined with bilateral monopoly, special interest of departments causes alienation of labor division and decreases efficiency of labor division. Conflict between single function of functional department and comprehensive object indicates that the basic principle of professional labor division should be object-aimed. Achievement of the object of river basin water environment management needs cooperation from relevant functional departments, but interest conflict and technological hindrance bring trouble to coordination. Motivation of department cooperation during river basin water environment management comes from department interest, common vision, organization pressure and so on. Forms of department cooperation during river basin water environment management include joint dispatching documents, association of enforcement and inspection and so on, which need proper coordination mechanisms such as bureaucratic coordination and institutional coordination. All these cooperation forms and coordination mechanisms have advantages and disadvantages.Opening system is the key to continuously improve river basin water environment management system. The core of opening system is to properly deal with relationship between government and society during river basin water environment management. The basic principle of management system opening may be interpreted from such viewpoints as Bureaucracy Theory, System Theory and so on. In order to avoid uncertainty, Bureaucracy Theory argues administrative organization should be closed which causes lack of organizational response. Systematic theories on management and politics all regard administrative system as open system, and argue that management system should exchange energy with outside environment. The opinion of this dissertation holds that fundamental motivation of management system improvement exists outside system, and only management system opening can provide motivation for system improvement. Administrative management system opening is along with potential risk, which is closely related to the uncertainty of risk society. Elimination of risk from opening of administrative management system depends on two factors, one of which is government opening gradually and the other is social participation in good order. As for river basin water environment management in China, government openness is so low that decreases response from government to public. During river basin water environment management, there are three aspects of internal factors hindering system opening, which are political considering on social stability from central government, original benefits of local governments and organizational inertia of functional departments. There are three internal impetuses promoting system opening, which are central government, local governments and functional departments. As for river basin water environment management in China, public participation is so limited that political participation is distorted and legality of government is destroyed. Viewed from practice, there are three aspects of social factors hindering system opening, which are traditional political culture of society, degree of social economy development and uncertainty of water environment pollution. There are three social impetuses promoting system opening, which are news media organizations, environment NGO and some stakeholders.On the basis of analysis above, river basin water environment management system should be improved with these four aspects. As for relationship of central-local government, it requires to enhance the authority chain of central-local government, adjust interest balance structure of local government and strengthen central government's determination for environment protection. As for relationship among local governments, it requires to revise the guidance function of central government, encourage the public to affect positively on competition object of local government and standardize relationship among local governments with the method of legislation and so on. As for relationship among functional departments, it requires to properly define obligation and power of each department, promote object-aimed organizational structure reform and improve cooperation mechanism among different departments. As for relationship between government and society, it requires to promote public governance of river basin water environment, practice opening of government information, and implement open-aimed functional and structural reform and administrative process rebuilding. At the same time, CPC and government should be engaged in enhancing the public's desire for participation and ability of participation in river basin water environment management.In a conclusion, river basin water environment management system is comprehensive, flexibility and full of valuable tendency. According to practice and demand, we may design suitable river basin water environment management system. Otherwise, there are some shortcomings in the study such as imperfect logical reasoning, incomplete resource collecting and so on, which need to be improved in the future. Future study will be focused on construction of theoretical framework and applying empirical study methods and so on.