A Study On The Current Welfare Governance Model Of Social Old-age Service

Welfare governance is the application of the governance paradigm in social policies.In the face of the aging population and the weakening of the family endowment function,the principle of“the government leading,the mass participating”has been proposed regarding the development of China's old-age service,and a transition is demanded from the traditional government control to the multi-subject governance.In theory,the multi-subject governance has been viewed by scholars as a new way to carry out the welfare reform in China;in reality,it has been practiced and explored by the local governments from all provinces and cities,forming a variety of welfare governance ways including the government purchase service,the private management of public services,the co-construction of private services,and the subsidy distribution.However,the transition is not satisfactory in China and some scholars think that the current multi-subject collaboration is still in the state of government mobilization.Thus,what is the present condition of welfare governance practice?And how do the multiple subjects divide their work and interact with each other at this micro-level of governance practice?Currently,there is a lack of research regarding the welfare governance practice at the micro-level.Therefore,this thesis selected the welfare governance pattern of the current social old-age service as the topic of study,using the grounded theory to analyze the micro-level and process of the present welfare governance practice,aiming to find out the features of the multiple subjects' work division and interaction.Based on the findings,this author concluded that the current practice of welfare governance was still a "quasi-collaborative" governance pattern,and collaborative governance should be the future development direction.The specific content is as follows:First of all,the formation and social foundation of old-age service welfare governance in China were explored and reviewed.(1)In the process of its supply transformation,socialized old-age service has experienced four stages,which are the stage of the government-dominant Compensation Type of old-age service supply,the stage of the first exploration of socialized old-age service,the stage of the multi-subject old-age service,and the stage of multi-supply old-age service.The innovation of social old-age service supply depends on the implementation of welfare governance.(2)From the perspectives of the policy,practice and academia,the current welfare governance pattern has been formed.The primary issue in the development of social old-age service is how to promote a better cooperation among the government,the market and the society.(3)The complexity and diversity of social old-age service demands and the inadequate welfare supply have respectively formed positive and negative pushes to the common supply of multiple subjects.Moreover,the transformation of government function,the development of the third sector and the initiation of the civic welfare awareness have created a good environment for multi-subject governance.Secondly,focused on the social old-age service governance practice,the present welfare of governance pattern was identified and explained.The concrete steps include:(1)Construct the analytical framework of welfare governance.To explore the current welfare governance practice,this research not only paid close attention to the governance subjects involved,but also showed concerns about the role of the subjects and the interaction among them.Therefore,this thesis used Stepan and Muller'analytical framework of welfare governance for reference and supplemented their framework,in order to analyze the social old-age service multi-subject governance.(2)Under the analytical framework of welfare governance,the current situation of welfare governance practice was analyzed using the grounded theory.Specifically,based on three extracted samples,the thesis collected and sorted out the interviewees'descriptions regarding their roles,behaviors and relationships in welfare governance practice.By means of the grounded theory,the data were encoded and summarized,concepts being generalized.The combing of three samples'governance practice revealed that the subjects involved had different roles and relationships in different stages of the governance policy process.The current governance is embodied more obviously in the implementation phase of the governance policy,while the formation and supervision phases are still characterized by a relatively strong government leadership and control.Even in the policy implementation stage,there are still many problems in the functioning and interaction of the subjects under the influence of the traditional path.(3)Extract the current welfare governance pattern and identify the problems.Based on the case study,this thesis stated that current governance practice was only a kind of "quasi-collaborative" governance pattern,which emerged during the transition from the traditional social governance to the modern social governance.This pattern reflects a tendency to govern collaboratively by multiple subjects,but is deficient in terms of the role the subjects play and their interactions.This deficiency brings challenges to the advancement of the present governance,for example,difficulties that the government faces in the transformation to a service provider,ambiguity of the market's decisive role in the allocation of resources,insufficiency of the social autonomy and capacity,unequal relationships among multiple subjects,immature mechanisms of negotiation,collaboration and benefit expression.Finally,the future development direction and the specific realization path of social old-age service welfare governance were reflected on.(1)The future development direction of welfare governance should be collaborative governance.With its diversified governance subjects,the publicity of its governance objectives and the integrity of its governance network,collaborative governance has become the major pattern of the western governance reform,and has a high applicability in China's social service field.(2)The specific realization path of collaborative governance was identified.It was discovered that the specific realization path should centre on subjects' responsibilities and their positive interactions.Firstly,the government should play a leading role and promote its transformation into a "service-oriented government".Secondly,the allocation of market resources should make a distinction between the public and non-public services.Thirdly,social organizations should be fostered and promoted to become autonomous service subjects.Finally,the positive collaboration of multiple subjects should be facilitated in the full scale so as to establish governance mechanisms of negotiation,mutual trust,sharing,and consensus.