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Study On The Creative Issue Of The Public Decision-making System In China

Posted on:2006-02-17Degree:DoctorType:Dissertation
Country:ChinaCandidate:Z P LinFull Text:PDF
GTID:1116360155954608Subject:Political Theory
Abstract/Summary:PDF Full Text Request
In modern society, to evaluate the degree of democracy of a country is to see whether different kinds of interests and demands can be fully embodied and expressed in government public decision-making. That is, the degree of democracy of a country is, to a great extent, judged from the government public decision-making; namely, whether the public products and services offered by the government can equitably embody the interests and claims of the classes and social groups concerned. In this respect, we can say the rules of public decision-making is a reflex of democracy system, and the process of public decision-making is a reflex of the democratic level and development of democratic politics of a country. Therefore, study on the issue of public decision-making system is a key to the system arrangement of modern democratic governance mode, and it is also an important problem in the study of modern democratic politics. However, we have to track down the government management mode when we study the public decision-making system. The existing government organizing formation is considered to be the product of Industrial Revolution. The theory and practice of government management is based on the idea of bureaucratic administration. The pyramid management institution, which builds on Web's theory of Bureaucracy, is based on the political philosophy of "rational man", has bureaucracy as the very core, and aims at offering the human beings a perfect government management mode. However, under modern economic, political and technical condition, bureaucratic government mode is at an increasing larger scale. From the "government centralism"point of view, government is the only legal source of public power in bureaucratic government decision-making mode, and it is the only recognized legal decision-making body. The power must be centralized and the central government is at the center in the process of decision-making. In addition to this, the decision-making process of bureaucracy is hierarchical inside the government and close circulating from above to below. Public policies are actually formed in a close and limited network of policies that clear up the power of social organizations. Therefore, in the process of government public decision-making, we seldom take the external influence and interest groups into consideration, which leads to the lack of interaction with the society outside the system. This is a very important character of the decision-making of bureaucracy. In the present democratic society of pluralistic interests, the idea that how the traditional bureaucratic public decision-making mode, which has "government centralism"as its dominant idea, can realize the public interests effectively, and how we can make use of public spirits to administrate public affairs effectively, is facing unprecedented question and challenge. Though the government has made great effort trying to extricate from the difficult position, the research from "government centralism"point of view has restrained our scope of discussion and thinking ability. The traditional way of changing as the government change tends to solve the problem of improving the government's efficacy by expanding or reducing its staff. The government has tried to handle the problem properly, but it is always too late to catch up with the changes. Thus, the government is always at a loss what to do, hence the dilemma of "management crisis"or "un-administration", and the circle of bureaucracy. Therefore, we must reconsider and reevaluate the traditional public administration mode and public decision-making mode. As we can see from the reform of public administration in western countries in the 1970s, they tended to let the non-governmental organizations and private organizations take part in public supply. Their success shows that the government needn't be the only supplier and the participation of non-governmental organization and citizen can also maintain and enhance public interests. In modern democratic society of pluralistic interest, government is not necessary the only organization in realizing public interests. By comparing the western public welfare system with Chinese, we can find that every organization can take effect in the process of realizing public interests. No matter it is an individual, an enterprise in the market, a public welfare organization or a government, it can be the main body for the realization of public interests, and it can offer public welfare products or take part in public welfare activities. At the early stage of human history, someorganization played a main role. With the development of history and the diversification of society, the forms for the realization of public interests become pluralistic. Market, government and the third department become the basic three forms for the realization of public interests in modern countries. Then the key to the problem is to form a complete and perfect mechanism for the realization of public interests instead of relying only on one form to overcome the difficulty. The theory of public governance, which came into being in the 1970s, was formed after the introduction, development and improvement of the idea of governance into public administration. It is a new discipline including government administration management and public department management. It symbolizes reform to the political science and public administration study paradigm. As a replacement for traditional public administration paradigm, the raise of public governance theory shows people's brand new understanding on the management of public departments. It enables people to observe and consider from a more flexible interactionism respect and from multiply dimensions and different angles, so as to form a new paradigm and mode of thinking. The emergence of the theory proves that no matter it is "the invisible hand"of Adam Smith or "the visible hand"of Keynes, it can never overcome the contradiction between "market ineffectiveness"and "government ineffectiveness". Based on the increasing lager citizen society, the governance theory is a rational retrospection of the "double ineffectiveness". It transcends the "market ineffectiveness"theory of welfare economics and the "government ineffectiveness"of public choice theory. The key value of public governance theory includes "responsiveness", "interactive ness", "frankness", "transparency", "rule by law", "effectiveness", etc. The very essence is to realize the maximum public interests through the cooperative management of government and citizen on public activities, namely, "rule by kindness". It is believed that the immediate significance of governance theory is likely to help break the dilemma of "double ineffectiveness". However, the objective of public administration theory study is not to justify the existence of public interests; instead, it is to pay more attention to the measures and levels of their realization. In the traditional form of public administration, given the fact that the government is the only administrator of public affairs, people tend to place hopes on the "sound ruling and governance"of the government to ensure the realization of public interests, such as "strict and impartial laws, honest and incorruptible officials, andefficient administrative services". However, in the mode of public administration, with the pluralization of the administrators and administrative means of public affairs, "sound management"becomes the pursuit for the realization and enhancement of public interests. One of the essential characteristics is the return of powers from the state to society and the co-administration of public life by both the government and the citizens. If the traditional public administrative mode still seems partial in solving problems, then the public administration theory still has wavered the traditional mode systematically. The public administration theory is based on an extensive and comprehensive theory, and in the light of the complexity, diversity and mobility of public affairs. The theory has taken the diversification of core values as its goal and carried out an all-round reflection and exploration into political, economic, social and cultural value areas, the relationship between the government and the market, the government and civil society and within the government, the government organizing system, the public administration principles and operation measures, etc. The theory aims at the overall settlement of actual issues and the construction of an integral thinking framework for the good administration of public affairs. The general characteristic of this thinking framework is to get rid of the narrow-minded traditional thinking that severs the public sectors and the private sector, to remove from the simplistic rationale on the part of the government and the market, and to build a mode in which the government, the market and the civil society are interdependent and cooperative. Although such a theory is abstract, composite and multi-layered, which is not as feasible as the New Public Management campaign in its development in practice, yet this theory will have a profound impact on the long-term development. As David Richard and Martin Smith remarked, "administration"is a descriptive term used to emphasize the change of nature in the process of policy in the past decade. The term has made us extremely sensitive to the constant changes in the scope and action-takers involved in the formulating process of a public policy. Therefore, administration requires that we take all action-takers and locations into consideration, rather than limiting the attention merely to the "core administration department"in the formulating process of a single policy. At that time, people should focus not only on "how the government, acting as the representative and protector of public interests, can manage public interests efficiently", but also on "how they can get what they want from the government", regardless of whether it is offered by the public sector or theprivate sector. So, let us change an angle to consider the public decision problem. If government and citizen society can trust each other for a long term and establish interdependent manage relation and harmoniously cooperation relations between them, it will be good to the decision in public and efficiently. In fact, to realize the aim of public management, the government must cooperate with the other powers in the society. In any democratic policymaking, the content of interaction between a society and the government is reflected by the interest exchange of these two parties. When the government makes the decision for the sake of the nation, the decision hurt the public benefits. The public then asks the government for their benefits so that the two parts join the game. If the government neglects the public demand and carries their own policy out, the game would become the zero game or even bad end. On the contrary, if the government can consider the public benefits, the game would become good game, which is also called the 'trade situation'. The key to the problem is how to make the government admit the public benefits and influence their action. In order to do this, the colleague relationship between the government and the public is required, at the same time the public must have the enough power to send their opinions to the government, and the opinions must be thought about by the government. Only the three powers can make a good game end. So, the key to realize that kind of game is that the citizen should take part in the decision making for the public policy. At the same time, the actions the government does to respond to the benefits of society, which are the citizen claimed, must match the actual. There should be a mechanism between the government and the citizen that is helpful to cooperation. The good interaction and the cooperation relation between the government and citizen society should be done in the public decision process. Therefore, we must reform the public decision-making mechanism and renew the traditional contents to be perfect. And the reform's core is establishing the cooperation mechanism between the government and the citizen in the public decision. During the Positive interactive public decision, the most important thing is to change the government from the 'for the public'to 'with the public'making the policy, so that to realize the democratic essence ——'let the people make decision'. This is the important way that realizes reforming the public decision-making mechanism in the transformational period for the...
Keywords/Search Tags:Public Decision-making System, Creative Issue, Interactive Democratic Decision-Making
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