On Power Operation Mechanism In Chinese Colleges And Universities

Recently, with the adjustment and restructuring of China's social and economic structure, the social status of higher education and its functions have also undergone a significant change, which requires adjustments of the structure and operating mechanism in order to adapt to the new situation."Power", as one of three elements of the higher education system organization, is the core to control, maintain, integrate and transform the higher education system. To explore the power operating mechanism in the process of reform and development of higher education is a theoretical problem, as well as a practical issue.Looking at existing research at home and abroad, most domestic scholars and researchers continued the study of dual power structure of Western analytical framework, focusing on the relationship between the academic and the executive power. Based on the situation of generalized academic power and weakened executive power, they put forward that the key point of enhancing Higher Education Management System lies in the integration of the two powers and the establishment of coordinated operating mechanism between them. However, this dual power structure neglects the significant functions that universities of socialism with Chinese characteristics must serve the socialist modernization, must be combined with productive labor, and must cultivate socialist builders and successors with moral, intellectual, physical developed comprehensively. The performance of these functions requires the leadership of the party with the college, and the political power plays a leading role in the universities during the operation. Besides, some other researchers believe that there exists the power of democratic management in addition to political power, administrative power and academic power. As a basic form of democratic management and supervision, the university staff congress plays an irreplaceable role in improving management efficiency, promoting the school harmonious and stable development and achieving the goal of school management. This paper argues that the Chinese characteristics power system include the political power led by the Party, the academic power led by principals, the executive power led by professors, and the democratic management power based on the representative assembly. These four types of power are interrelated and mutual constrained. Their functions in colleges and universities are contained in the higher education leading mechanism, the managing mechanism, and the power operating mechanism with Chinese characteristics under the president responsibility system. Among them, the party leadership is the core, principal responsibility is the key, Professor of scholarship is the fundamental, and democratic management is the guarantee. In China, however, the power operating mechanism within colleges and universities shows the feature of a dominant executive power hierarchy management because of its imbalance. Thus, this paper argues that there are the following four problems in the process of power operation inside colleges and universities: administration authorization, the overlapping of party and government authority, academic authority marginalization, and democratic supervision mechanism formalization.In response to these problems, this paper illustrates from the following two major aspects to perfect the president responsibility system. On the one hand, we should strengthen the system construction and further clarify the powers and responsibilities of different power bodies with system construction as the center, which means to improve the working mechanisms in order to coordinate the relationships between the different powers. On the other hand, we should hold a people-oriented view and innovate management models to achieve the scientific management, which means to overcome the"official position"ideology, to foster the management idea of"Management is service", to change management methods, to improve management efficiency, to construct a professional management system, and to promote the professionalization for principals and administrative staff.