The Evolution Of Intergovernmental Relations Of Prefecture-level Cities And Counties In China

Since the establishment of PRC, the intergovernmental relations of provinces, prefecture-level cities and counties have been in a dynamic process of adjustment. The governance structure lingers between centralization and decentralization, eventually developed into the dominant form of the system of Prefecture-level city Lead County today. However, as the reform and open policy is being promoted further and market economy develops rapidly, the intergovernmental relations between local governments in China are facing new challenges. Several new trends present in the reform of the relationships between prefecture-level city and county, which attracts enormous public attention. There are more governments have been trying to find the breakthrough of governance structure, which is commonly known as the Province Administrating Counties Directly reform.The change has sparked the debate that how to cultivate a harmonious intergovernmental relation between local governments, and how to promote the regional governance. To achieve the goal better, this paper reconsiders the theories of regional governance in America to provide new direction in establishing a mutual intergovernmental relation in China.First, the paper outlines the evolution of relationship between prefecture-level cities and counties in China in sixty years evolution from1949to until today by using the axis of time order. And it summarizes the driving forces of evolution in five points: the contradiction between the supply and demand of administrative system, changes of political environment, the extension of modern market economic system, the shift from centralization to decentralization and the equation of public responsibility and power.Then the article introduces the three main theories in America, namely the Traditional Regionalism which advocates a sole robust government in metropolitan area, the Public Choice School which encourages a multi-center governance system and the New Regionalism that promotes a network of cooperation from multi-agents consists of governments, enterprises and non-profit organizations etc. What’s more, the driving forces of the evolution of the intergovernmental relations between prefecture-level cities and counties are comprised with roots of the evolution from the traditional Regionalism and new Regionalism.After the comparison of the regional governance between the USA and PRC, the conclusions can be distilled into three aspects:there are many similarities in the evolution of intergovernmental relationship between prefecture-level cities and counties in China and the evolution of the regional governance theories in the USA. The Prefecture-level City Lead County is familiar with the Traditional Regionalism while the Province Administrating Counties Directly and the New Regionalism are alike. Therefore, the similarity between them can provide us several suggestions combined with the reality of China’s political environment to build a harmony intergovernmental relation between provinces, prefecture-level cities and counties in the future.