A Research About How To Promote The Public Services Of Township Government

The term “public service” generally refers to the products and services intended for common consumption and provided by government or public organizations. Public service involves the basic education, health care, social security, public employment, culture, sports,and other things which have the closest link with people's development and needs, thus it directly concerns the basic needs of people's survival and development. As the most grass-roots authority that directly contacts and serves the masses, township government should be the primary provider of public service. With the accelerating social transformation,the potential demands for public services are gradually transforming into real demands in rural areas. Against this new background, the problem of how to promote the public-service capacity of township governments has aroused widespread concern. The settlement of this problem is not only of large strategic significance for promoting the comprehensive development of economy and society in rural areas and advancing the construction of new socialist countryside, but also of great practical significance for speeding up the process of overcoming poverty and simultaneously realizing an overall well-off society.This study is conducted based on theories about public finance and public service.Considering that financial investment is the basic guarantee and precondition for public service, the perspective of public finance is chosen in the study of township governments' public-service capacity. For township governments in poor areas, low fiscal revenues lead to inadequate investments in economic development as well as poor capacity of public service.In this paper, the status quo of and restricting factors for Y Town in G County, a poverty-stricken region in West China, are analyzed; furthermore, through referring to domestic and foreign experience in public-service investments, suggestions for enhancing township governments' public-service capacity are put forward from the following six aspects:optimizing fiscal expenditure structure and increasing financial investment; improving the transfer payment system and enhancing the capability of supporting public service; improving the quality of the public, and enhancing their ability to enjoy public service; promoting thereform of fiscal system, and clarifying the administrative and financial powers in townships;speeding up the conversion of township governments' functions, and building service-oriented governments; setting up a scientific evaluation system and improving public satisfaction.This paper includes the following innovations: firstly, by taking Y Town in G County, a poverty-stricken region in West China, as an example, the status quo of and problems in public service are systematically analyzed, thus providing a reference for region-based research on public service; secondly, from the perspective of public finance, a series of suggestions for enhancing public-service capacity is put forward, such as optimizing fiscal expenditure structure, perfecting the transfer payment system, and guiding public participation in public service by utilizing public finance.