Study Of The Actual Effect On The Audit Supervision At Institutions Of Higher Learning In China

China is one of the earliest countries that have introduced the audit supervision system. With a long history behind, the audit supervision has become a basic law stipulated by the nation constitution and has developed a relatively complete system. In the past 20 years, the audit supervision has contributed much to the reform, development and stability of institutions of higher learning in China (particularly referring to public institutions of higher learning in this paper).With the deepening of the reform and opening up initiative, and the implementation of the strategy of rejuvenating the country through science and education, higher education in China has witnessed fast development. The institutional reform within the university system has also been gradually put forward. Enlarged capital investment, enlarged student enrolment, improved efficiency and overall quality of education have become the general trend of the reform and development in colleges and universities in China. On the one hand, it added new vitality and vigor to the development of colleges and universities. On the other hand, the fast development gave rise to more incidents of corruption on university campuses. The frequent media exposure of university corruption cases in the past few years has made us realize the importance of strengthening the audit supervision on university campuses.But to date most of the research on the audit supervision at institutions of higher learning focused on internal audit supervision on campus, discussing such issues as the function of the internal audit supervision, the independence of the internal audit, and the improvement of the quality of internal auditing personnel, etc. There is no discussion on how to improve the actual effect on the audit supervision on university campuses from the legal perspective in the current literature. Based on the current audit supervision system in China, this paper explores how to enhance the effectiveness of the audit supervision of colleges and universities from the legal perspective. The major contents are as follows: First, the laws and regulations concerning the audit supervision including the national audit, folk audit and internal audit are briefly reviewed since the founding of P.R. China. The description of the gradual legalization process shows the importance the government has attached to the audit supervision. Secondly, in order to give readers a general picture of the Chinese audit supervision system, the paper also reviews the types, the subject, the object, the target, the basis, the procedures, the methods and the goals of the audit supervision. In addition, the key points and difficulties of the audit supervision at colleges and universities in China are analyzed, and the corresponding countermeasures are put forward. To borrow some insights from other countries and regions, the paper then examines the audit supervision systems at institutions of higher learning in the U.S., Canada and Hong Kong, comparing their similarities and differences. After comparing the audit supervision at the colleges and universities both at home and abroad, this paper proposes three aspects that China can borrow from other countries' experiences, they are, establishing an audit committee system, paying attention to follow-up audit supervision, and raising the awareness of risk-oriented audit supervision. After that, from the legal perspective, the paper discusses the five major constraints on the actual effect on audit supervision at colleges and universities in China:laws and regulations on the audit supervision is defective; the internal audit system is imperfect; the conflicts resulting from the weak audit supervision subject and the complex supervision object; low awareness of the law and the risk of its violation; backward supervision techniques and the inappropriate use of audit results. The author believes that strengthening the actual effect on the audit supervision of colleges and universities is necessary. It is required by the rapid development of colleges and universities, and it also meets the requirement of the anti-corruption movement on university campuses in China. Finally, from the legal perspective, such as the legislation, enforcement, legal education and legal accountability, the paper puts forward six proposals to enhance the audit supervision work in current system in China:1) Establishing and perfecting national laws and regulations on the audit supervision at institutions of higher learning; 2) Building a sound internal audit supervision system in accordance to the national laws and regulations; 3) Raise people's awareness of law through legal education; 4) Adopting scientific approaches in the audit supervision and paying attention to the use of the audit supervision results; 5) Optimizing the internal audit supervision enforcing team; 6) Perfecting the legal accountability and incentive system of the audit supervision. These proposals have theoretical values for improving and perfecting the laws and regulations of the audit supervision work at colleges and universities, and for better protecting the healthy development of the higher education cause. They also have practical values to enhance the actual effect on the audit supervision at colleges and universities, to further promote the internal system construction and the anti-construction work on university campuses, and to improve the efficiency in the use of funds and managerial benefit of running a university.