Highlights

To Eradicate Market Distortion, and To Improve Competition Order- Brief Comment on The Survival and Development Environment Index for Chinese Private Enterprises

by ZHANG Shuguang, Chairman of Unirule Academic Committee

Translated by MA Junjie, Researcher, Unirule Institute of Economics

The above mentioned views are underpinned not only by theories, but also by substantial realities. The theories may have to be written in the form of papers, which could be held as obvious by many, and the reality is readily available to serve as evidence. Recently, Unirule China Entrepreneur Research Centre released a research report entitled “The Survival and Development Environment Index for Chinese Private Enterprises— Guangzhou and Zhejiang Province” (referred to as the “Index” hereafter) that provides new materials for our analysis.

Distinguished from other indices available, the Index offers an alternative theoretical basis derived from the competition order framework proposed by Walter Eucken, a German economist of the Freiburg school, in his book “Grundsätze der Wirtschaftspolitik”. Seven principles constitute the competition order: free prices, free trade, free contracts, private property rights, private liability, price stability, and the predictability of economic policy. These principles stand as general principles and common standards regardless of the peculiar situations and status of a country. Since China has chosen to establish a market economy, these principles should apply to its analysis as well. The so-called “Chinese characteristics” should not be the reason to deny and alter them. Therefore, it is appropriate and valid to apply this analytical framework and standards to the market environment and competition order of China.

The survey was well designed in the Index thanks to the unambiguous analytical theories and basis. There are seven field indices consisting of 34 sub-indices, among which 18 are subjective indices, eleven are objective indices, and five are mixed indices. There is certainly room for improvement concerning the configuration and content of the indices. For example, further explanation is necessary for the four aspects of the administrative monopoly index (namely, market monopoly, intervention of corporate operation by the administrations, coerced transaction, and abuse of administrative monopoly power) are worth pondering on. Besides, the adopted inflation rate is not a perfect factor in measuring certain aspect than the corporate raw material consumption price index. It can also be improved in terms of a balanced mixture of subjective and objective factors for each and every aspect so that comparisons and analyses can be more easily undertaken. In general, the indices provided in this report are plausible and sufficient to reflect the variety of aspects of the operation and competition environment for enterprises.

The survey was firstly conducted in Guangdong and Zhejiang Province. These two provinces are more advanced than their peers with more active private enterprises, which should better showcase the causality and relativeness of certain factors and aspects. The rapid development of private economy/ enterprises has benefited these two provinces, making them the frontrunner and champion for the reform and opening-up of China. A comparatively better market order has also been developed there, which demonstrates the advantages of private economy and the benefit of the market. However, a look at the report findings may be disappointing. It is even more disappointing to compare the findings with those of other provinces.

Both provinces ranked low in the overall index of survival and development environment for private enterprises. If 6 is designated to be the threshold, Guangdong is graded 5.39, while Zhejiang is graded 5.83, both are below par. Among the seven sub-indices, the two provinces exceed 6 in only two aspects, i.e., price stability and influence of the social discourse. Guangdong is graded under 5 in four aspects: political order (4.62), the guarantee of rule of law (4.63), open market (4.81), and financial freedom (4.84); while Zhejiang is graded under 5 in two aspects: political order (4.41) and the guarantee of rule of law (4.84). Among the 34 indices, Guangdong is graded above 6 in eleven items, and below 6 in 23 items; while Zhejiang is graded above 6 in 15 items, and below 6 in 19 items. This reflects only the two more developed provinces in China, let alone those less developed provinces.

Two items that are graded the lowest are political order and the guarantee of rule of law in the findings of the two provinces. In the 11 indices combined, three items are graded below 3, and half of them are graded below 4. If we take into account the low-graded items of non-official payment, taxation policy, macroeconomic policy fluctuation, and corporate subsidies in the sub-index of private property rights protection, it is apparent that the main factor for the worsening market environment is the administrative power. As a matter of fact, some interviews in the report also prove this. For instance, when asked about the dependence on administrative power of private enterprises, many answered that it is very necessary or very important, with survey figures of 80% for Guangdong, and 84% for Zhejiang. Only a very small figure chose “independent from administrative power”, and the figure is respectively 3% and 8%. 100% of the polled answered that it is necessary to be involved in politics and be a representative of the National People’s Congress or member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). And the main purpose for doing so was to guarantee political rights (69%) and political security (63%). The key issue is easy to crack and the policy proposal is only reasonable.

To improve the survival and development environment for private economy/ enterprises is to improve the market environment and the competition order for China. It can be solved by issuing a few administrative suggestions or holding some conferences.

Firstly, it needs a shift of ruling and governing. If state-owned economy/ enterprises are still deemed as the economic basis for socialism and the ruling party, and if the controlling power and influence of the state-owned economy/ enterprises are still to be enhanced and expanded, then a particular and abnormal market status will be granted to them. Therefore, the state-owned economy/ enterprises have the backing of administrative power, which makes private economy/ enterprises the second-class citizens. In this condition, a market order with fair competition will never be established. If the ruling notion is not adjusted, the previous document that’s supposed to initiate new reforms for non-state-owned economy/ enterprises, namely the “Document 36”, is invalid, let alone the so-called mixed-ownership and public-private partnership. In fact, the handed-in fiscal revenue by private enterprises has long overtaken that of state-owned enterprises. It is obvious that the private economy is now the economic basis of this country. Then, let us ask it is who that eats the dinner and smashes the pot?

Secondly, it is of key significance to maintain the power of the government, of government officials, and of the administration. Power must never be abused. This is not purely a slogan. It is not reliable to leave the administrative power to the government and its officials, because they will never be capable of constraining themselves from abuse of power. However, it is sad to see that Chinese people are doing just that. In fact, the nature of power is self expansive with a tendency to be abused. Therefore, the utmost solution is to constrain power by division and institutions, by independent supervision of the society and the media.

In the current development stage, it is necessary for the government to implement certain industry policy and environment policy. However, the execution of such policies should not be targeting at containing the development of private economy/ enterprises, but at protecting them and facilitating their development. I, therefore, propose that the shut-down of private enterprises should be compensated with a certain amount of shares of the state-owned economy in the current condition, should the private enterprises be shut down for their nature of ownership.  

Thirdly, it is critical to modify certain laws, absolving evil laws and executing good laws while maintaining the judicial independence in order to protect the property and security of citizens by law. There have been some improvements in the amendments of the existing criminal law, for example, the establishment of the principle of presumption of innocence, and the abolishment of death penalty for economic charges. However, it is still of heavy traits left over the era of planned economy. Many criminal charges are vague and hard to measure. Many private entrepreneurs have been persecuted by such charges with their property deprived and their families shattered. It is, therefore, understandable why about 38% of the polled answered that they were either preparing to migrate to other countries or have already done so. Besides, the inclination for migration gets stronger with the scale of the enterprises, which should sound an alarm for the ruling party. If it is not only a slogan to uphold the rule of law and to improve the market environment and the competition order, then false charges should be withdrew and flawed crimes should be canceled.

2015/9/21, Beijing

Current Events

Seminar on China’s Urbanisation and Planning Innovation Held in Beijing

On the morning of September 16th, a joint seminar between Unirule Research Centre for Urban Development and Fanhua Group on “China’s Urbanisation and Planning Innovation” was held in Beijing. Present at the seminar were Professor SHENG Hong, Director of Unirule; Mr. YANG Tianju, President and senior engineer of Fanhua Group; Mr. MA Jun, Director of Fanhua Group 5th Designing Unit; and Ms. QIAN Pu, Deputy Director of Unirule Research Centre for Urban Development. About 50 people from the media, academia, and the planning circles attended this seminar.
 
 
Mr. YANG Tianju spoke on “Innovation Model and Practice of Urban Development”. He reflected on the background of the reform in China, and the evolution of China’s peculiar urbanisation process by proposing the notion of “smart city”. Ms. ZHAO Peng spoke on “Innovative Thinking on Urban Spatial Planning in the New Era”. She used two cases, namely the Lijiang urban comprehensive planning, and the Caofeidian new town planning. She pointed out that, in the past, urban planning was mainly determined by the will of the government, i.e., government-led. And then as the development pattern of China changes over time, the urban planning should also evolve. Professor SHENG Hong gave a presentation on “Market, Spatial Economics, and Urban Planning”. He thought planning should follow the logics of the market mechanism which forecasts the future development trend of a city. This was the best planning method. Professor SHENG Hong also introduced the 10-D Spatial Simulation Planning Model(SSPM), which was an innovation of Unirule Institute of Economics.  (To read more)

Forum on “ The Survival and Development of Chinese Private Enterprises” and the Press Release of “Index of Survival and Development Environment of Chinese Private Enterprises” Held in Beijing

A Forum on “ The Survival and Development of Chinese Private Enterprises” and the Press Release of “Index of Survival and Development Environment of Chinese Private Enterprises” was held in Beijing on September 15th, 2015. Present at the forum were Mr. CHEN Youxi, famous lawyer; Professor ZHANG Shuguang, Chairman of Unirule Academic Committee; Professor MAO Shoaling from Renmin University; Mr. SUN Dawu, President of Dawu Group; Mr. Yuanfu, famous investor; Associate Professor WANG Jianxun from China University of Political Science and Law; Professor Qiufeng, President of Unirule Institute of Economics; and Mr. ZHANG Lin, project researcher of Unirule. Guests from the media, business, and academia also attended this forum.

 
The opening ceremony was held by Professor Qiufeng and Mr. MAO Yushi gave an opening speech. Mr. MAO Yushi said that “The reason why many entrepreneurs have immigrated abroad is that they sensed the worsening of the market economic environment. From an economic perspective, it is related to the understanding of the ‘labour value’ theory; by resource allocation, wealth is created and accumulated. In this process, entrepreneurs play an important role in this wealth creation.” 

Later on, Professor SHENG Hong moderated the first session. He thought the development of private enterprises means survival came first and development later. For example, BO Xilai persecuted several entrepreneurs when he was promoting “singing red songs and crashing down gangs”. The case of Cheng Kejie sounded an alarm that caused fear over survival of entrepreneurs, let alone the development of the enterprises. In this session, Mr. CHEN Youxi, famous criminal lawyer, gave a keynote speech on “Legal Issues for the Survival of Private Enterprises”. In the speech, he quoted several cases to illustrate the importance of entrepreneurs and the status of them. He thought it was critical to complete the market economic institution in order to protect the entrepreneurs.

Entrepreneur representative Mr. SUN Dawu introduced the recent case where his orchards were robbed by the local residents in Xushui. he thought it was very difficult to develop when the land property rights were ambiguous and unprotected. He also emphasised his vision for improve the current situations. (To read more)

Unirule Master Thoughts Class(2015) 3rd Session Held in Beijing

September 19th to 20th, Unirule Master Thoughts Class(2015) 2nd Session was held in Beijing. This session was joined by Professor ZHANG Shuguang, Chairman of Unirule Academic Committee; Professor SHENG Hong, Director of Unirule; and Professor LEI Yi, famous historian.

On the morning of September 19th, Professor ZHANG Shuguang spoke on “GU Zhun’s Thoughts, Spirit, and Comments”. In this session, Professor ZHANG Shuguang introduced GU Zhun’s theories and economic research, such as the market adjustment theory, price theory, and other establishment of his in political science and political philosophy. Professor ZHANG thought GU Zhun was not only an outstanding economist, but also a great thinker in the later half of the 20th century. GU Zhun was persecuted twice as a rightist, but his perseverance endured. Professor ZHANG also emphasised that GU Zhun should be considered as a man, instead of an immortal.
 

On the afternoon of September 19th, Professor SHENG Hong spoke on “Democracy and the Crowd”. He firstly analysed the nature of democracy and the crowd from the perspective of institutional economics. He thought democracy was the practical application of the spirit of contract in public areas, which was efficient; however, the crowd was easily manipulated by the group sentiments, which would result in inefficiency. Besides, the political power from the crowd was unlikely to be stable and sustainable. Professor SHENG Hong quoted Hannah Arendt and her comparison between the French revolution and the American one. He also analysed the specific forms of democracy and the crowd.
 

On the evening, Professor HE Weifang from Peking University joined the participants for tea. They also discussed the refugee crisis in Europe and the construction of the rule of law.(To read more)

News

Unirule 10-D Spatial Simulation Planning Model (SSPM)

The Unirule 10-D Spatial Simulation Planning Model (SSPM) is a mathematical and computational model based on economics. It is developed by a Unirule research team led by Professor SHENG Hong. SSPM is designed to simulate the development scale, economic density, industry distribution, resource constraints, ecological preservation, institutional influence, policy effect, and the evolution process in the next ten to twenty years or even longer period for a region. SSPM provides reference for the regional economic development strategy making, which can be directly adopted in the planning on regional economic development, population, land use, industry development, townships, water and ecology.

So far, SSPM has been adopted in the industry planning of Qianhai Area, Shenzhen, and the economic development planning of Yangcheng County, Shanxi Province.

Learn more about the SSPM

Current Researches/ Consulting

Improving China’s Implimentation and Supervision Institution of the Constitution

At present, research on the implimentation and supervision institution of China’s constitution is insufficient. Multiple problems exist in the current studies, such as the lack of a cultural perspective, and empathetic understanding of China’s political tradition; a lack of authentic Chinese perspective and an indulgence of Westernized framework of analysis; and a lack of reflection of the reality and the existing political framework.

The research on China’s constitution review institution should put the protection of civil rights and constitutional construction first, with a reflection of China’s reality and take in the advantages of external researches. A plausible research approach is as follows: 1. This research ought to provide a right relief mechanism; 2. It should take into account that China is a vast country with imbalanced regional development realities which foster unique and differentiated conceptions of the law and politics in general; 3. It should be built upon the current constitutional structure and take into account the interactive system of the power of the party, the National People’s Congress, etc. in order to make it a progressive research, which can enable the elements of constitutionalism to supplement the current constitutional framework; 4. Scrupulous examination should be given to constitutional practices in other regions and cultures, especially those influenced by the Chinese culture or with a similar institutional set-up, such as Taiwan and France; 5. Observations should be made in regard to the traditional Chinese institutions, such as the institution of the expostulation system (“谏议制度”, or giving advice),  supervision system, and the institutions established in this light, e.g., Taiwan’s Control Yuan.

Improving Entrepreneurs' Survival Environment: Abolishing Death Penalties in Relation to Fund-Raising Cases in China

In recent years, environment for private enterprises has been taking a deteriorating turn, which attracts attention from the media and the academia. The causes are complex and multi-faceted, including: 1, the abuse of powers by government officials as the government powers expand; 2, “the private-owned deteriorating with the state-owned advancing” (guojin mintui) worsens the picture where the survival environment for private enterprises gets more and more squeezed; 3, external demands of enterprises decrease while internal cost increases; 4, financial suppression escalates with the industrial restructuring and updating lagging behind; and 5, the fluctuation of macroeconomic policies by the government poses uncertainty for production and investment. Moreover, many innocent entrepreneurs were labeled and persecuted for their “gangster behaviors” by the policy and law enforcements in Chongqing city, which was just a glimpse of similar occasional “gangster crashing” movements in the country. Many entrepreneurs are suppressed and sanctioned in the name of “illegal fund-raising”. According to active law, the court can sentence entrepreneurs to death penalty with this charge.

Unirule Institute of Economics is planning to undertake research on the problems of the crime of “illegal fund-raising” and specific methods to abolish this charge.

It is fit for Unirule to carry out this research project. Unirule Institute of Economics is a non-profit, non-governmental organization, which focuses on institutional economics with expertise in economics, laws, and politics. It has been dedicated to independent research on China’s institutional reforms and public policies as well as the reform of private finance. In 2003, 2011, and 2013, Unirule held seminars on the cases of Mr. SUN Dawu, Ms. WU Ying, and Mr. ZENG Chengjie. These seminars have been very influential before and after the close of the cases.

Unirule Institute of Economics has undertaken research projects in corporate finance and private finance in recent years. Over the years, Professor FENG Xingyuan has been carrying out pioneering research on private finance and private enterprises. He has gained rich experience and published many publications and papers on relevant topics, including “Report on the Freedom of China’s Corporate Capitals”, “Report on the Survival Environment of China’s Private Enterprises 2012”, research on the risks of private finance, etc. In August 2013, Professor FENG Xingyuan and his research team completed and released the “Report on Private Enterprise Fund-Raiding in West Hunan and the Case of Mr. ZENG Chengjie”, which analyzed and assessed the process, nature, problems, and causes of a series of events and proposed policy recommendations concerning the fund-raising activities in West Hunan and the case of Mr. ZENG Chengjie.

Business Ethics Declaration of Chinese Entrepreneurs

Over the last three decades, China’s economy has been embracing rapid growth with entrepreneurs being a key drive. The biggest and most significant structural change is the rise of entrepreneurs who constitute the pillar of the society nowadays. Today, the biggest, and the youngest group of entrepreneurs are going international, bridging China and the world.

However, because of the abnormal political, social and ideological environment of China for the last five decades, Chinese entrepreneurs happen to be widely confused and for the last thirty years, the emerging group of entrepreneurs has been suffering from severe anxiety over identity:

Firstly, due to the long time anti-market ideological propaganda by the authorities, many entrepreneurs believe they have the “original sin”. They are led to believe that their profits are based on exploiting the workers, which further leads to their confusion and anxiety over the ethical justification of their fortune and profits.

Secondly, this anti-market ideology also affects the public; leading the public to envy the fortune of entrepreneurs while disrespect them since their deeds are “unethical” and “dishonest”. This public opinion, in return, affects entrepreneurs’ self-identity. They, therefore, can’t convince themselves of the contributions they make to the society, or identify themselves within the social hierarchy.

Thirdly, Chinese entrepreneurs, especially those whose enterprises have gone international, are bothered with this severe identification anxiety. Chinese people stand out in entrepreneurship, so do Chinese enterprises. But what are the driving forces behind? Thanks to the long time culture break-up from the traditions, and the anti-tradition propaganda, Chinese entrepreneurs find it hard to comprehend and identify their cultural and social roles. This leads to the chaotic and restless mental state of entrepreneurs. This also results in the lack of a cultural supportive pillar for enterprise management in China.

“Business Ethics Declaration of Chinese Entrepreneurs” aims to provide answers to the anxiety over identity for Chinese entrepreneurs, to re-identify them by providing authentic and orthodoxical conceptions, to help them mature their thoughts and corporate social responsibilities.

This research project is committed to establishing a value system for Chinese entrepreneurs. To confront the anxiety over identity for Chinese entrepreneurs, this project provides answers to the three questions below:

1.Do Chinese entrepreneurs have the “original sin”?
2.What do Chinese entrepreneurs contribute to the society?
3.How do Chinese entrepreneurs gain respect?

An Economic Research of Chinese Urban Smog Management

The issue of smog has been on the spotlight in China that no matter government officials, ordinary citizens, or journalists and the press have expressed serious concern and anxiety towards it. Unirule Institute of Economics takes on this research topic and is conducting an economic research on China’s urban smog management.

The urban smog is attributed to multiple factors with many interest parties involved, which also makes it an economic issue. Unirule seeks to find a solution to the management of smog by the design of institutions from an economic point of view.

Fairness and Efficiency of Financial Resource Allocation

The first scale problem of the fairness and efficiency of financial resource allocation is whether the overall tax bearing standard falls within the optimal interval, whether the design of tax kinds and the mechanism will harm the development of the economy. The second scale problem is whether the expenditure structure of the existing financial resource allocation, especially transfer payment, obeys the principal of justice, and the efficiency of financial expenditure especially the general administrative costs.

Unirule Institute of Economics is going to undertake research on the fairness and efficiency of financial resource allocation with the emphasis on the second scale problem. In order to fulfill the ideal of justice in a society, the involvement of financial resource allocation is one of the methods, and a universal one. A state can promote justice by implying financial expenditure in two ways: the direct and the indirect way. When applying the direct way of implying financial expenditure measures to promote justice, financial expenditure is directly distributed to individuals to fill the gap of incomes between individuals.

Among the financial expenditure items of China are pensions and relief funds for social welfare, rural relief funds as well as social insurance funds. The indirect way is by governments' increase in expenditure used for supporting agriculture and villagers, construction of infrastructure, education and medical treatments. This research is on the justice of financial resource allocation and it deals mainly with whether the transfer payment of financial resources obeys the second rule of Rawls's theory of justice, which states that when violation to the first rule has to be made, resource allocation can be towards the poorest group of people. Besides the justice issue, efficiency is also involved in the financial resource allocation. The administrative costs of China have long been above the average standard of other countries in the world, therefore, a big amount of public financial resources are wasted (trillions of RMB per year as estimated). In regard with the efficiency issue of the financial resource allocation, this research deals mainly with the change of ratio of administrative costs by government agencies (in addition to other costs, such as medical treatments of government officials covered by public budgets, and housing subsidies) of financial income. The reform of the fiscal and taxation system is one of the core issues in China's on-going reforms. This research aims not at a comprehensive examination of the fiscal and taxation system, but a specific aspect which is the "fairness and efficiency of financial resource allocation", and evaluating the status quo of China's financial resource allocation.

Research on China's Urbanization on the Local Level

Urbanization is one of the most essential economic and social policies of the new administration. The emphasis of this policy is posed on medium and small cities as well as townships. As noticed, there are thousands of industrialized townships in China with their social governance lagging far behind their economic development.

Firstly, a big population is located in between the urban and rural level, which can't transform into citizens. Hundreds of millions of people have left their villages and moved to commercialized and industrialized towns. They are in industrial and commercial occupations and it is highly unlikely that they would go back to their villages. However, they are not entitled to local Hukou registration, which further leads to the deprivation of various rights, for example, the right of education.

Secondly, public governance in such industrialized and commercialized towns, in general, is at a rudimentary level. The number of officially budgeted posts is asymmetric with the population governed, which leads to the employment of a large number of unofficially budgeted staff and unjustified power to govern. There is a lack of financial resources for the local government to carry out infrastructure construction or to provide public goods sufficiently. Thirdly, the urbanization results in imbalanced development of the structure of society. Since the industrialized and commercialized townships are unable to complete urbanization, urbanization in China has basically become mega-urbanization which is dominated by administrative power. Local governments centralize periphery resources with administrative power and construct cities artificially, which impedes townships and villages from evolving into cities by spontaneous order. Fourthly, industry upgrading can't be undertaken in those industrialized and commercialized townships and the capacity for future economic development is greatly limited. The industry upgrading is, in essence, the upgrading of people. Enterprises ought to draw and maintain technicians, researchers, and investors, to meet their needs for living standards, which cannot be satisfied by townships. Similarly, the lagging urbanization reversely sets back the cultivation and development of the service industry, especially the medium and high-end services.

Unirule Institute of Economics is going to carry out research on urbanization of China on the local level, aiming at improving public governance of the industrialized townships, optimizing the urbanization methodologies, and improving the "citizenization" of migrant workers, therefore further pushing social governance towards self-governance and democracy.

Research on the Public Governance Index of Provincial Capitals

At the beginning of the year 2013, Unirule conducted field survey, including more than 10 thousands of households in 30 local capital cities. According to the field survey, the Public Governance Index was derived. The main conclusions of the PGI report as below:

Three statements summarize the status quo of public governance in provincial capitals. Firstly, public services have generally just gotten a pass. Secondly, protection to civil rights is disturbing. Finally, governance methodologies need improvements. These statements point out the solution: the structure of the society needs to be altered from that with a government monopoly to a civil society with diverse governance subjects. The ranking of provincial capitals in the public governance assessment from the top to the bottom is as follows: Hangzhou, Nanjing, Urumqi, Tianjin, Chengdu, Shanghai, Beijing, Nanchang, Xi'an, Xining, Shijiazhuang, Wuhan, Guangzhou, Yinchuan, Hohhot, Chongqing, Shenyang, Changsha, Jinan, Kunming, Nanning, Haikou, Fuzhou, Guiyang, Harbin, Hefei, Changchun, Zhengzhou, Taiyuan and Lanzhou.

Generally speaking, all provincial capitals are graded comparatively low in the three public governance assessments from 2008 to 2012. Even those that ranked the highest in performance have just barely passed the bar of 60 points. Few provincial capitals with poor public governance got over 50 points.

There is a certain amount of correlation between the changes of ranking and improvements in public governance in provincial capitals. In the short term, should the capital cities be willing to raise their rankings, they can achieve this by increasing transparency in government information and civil servants selection, encouraging local non-governmental organizations, or promoting wider participation in local affairs. There is but a weak correlation between public governance and the local GDP level. However, a strong correlation exists between the rankings and the equity of local fiscal transfer payment. That is to say, a region gets a higher ranking in public governance if subsidies to local social security, medical care, education and housing are distributed more to the poorest residents in that region. On the contrary, a region's ranking falls if such resources are distributed with prejudice to the groups with high incomes. This phenomenon shows that equity is of significance in the assessment of the government by the people.

When residents are not satisfied with medical care, elderly support system, water supply and electricity supply, the situation can be improved when they complain to the government. But when similar situations take place in public transportation, environment greening, heating systems, and garbage management, whether by collective actions or filing complaints to government agencies, residents can hardly be satisfied with what the government does.

According to the three public governance assessments carried out from 2008 to2012, we discovered that the Gini coefficient of residents in provincial capitals was decreasing and the income fluidity was improving. From 2010 to 2012, citizens' comments on protection of civil rights are deteriorating, especially in terms of property and personal security. The request for freedom of speech is also increasing. For the moment, citizens in provincial capitals have a low evaluation on the cleanness and honesty of local governments.

Research on Disclosure of Government Information

Room for reforms is getting narrower as the opening-up and reforms deepen. It also leads to a more stabilized vertical mobilization of the demographic structure with the conflicts in the distribution of interests exacerbating. A collaborative system centering the political and law system and involving close cooperation between the police, courts, petition offices, and the city guards (Chengguan) is developed to deal with social unrest. This system is operated by local governments and finalized as a system of maintaining stability (Weiwen). There have been Internet spats over the amount of Weiwen funds. It is unsustainable to maintain such a Weiwen system, and the disclosure of government information is the most significant approach for this end. The essence of public governance is to dissolute conflicts instead of hiding and neglecting them. And one way to achieve this is by sufficient communication. Public and transparent appraisement and supervision cannot be achieved without transparent government information, otherwise the result will be the exclusion of citizens from public governance.

Unirule Institute of Economics has been undertaking research on the disclosure of government information since 2011. This research is carried out not only from the perspective of the regulations for the disclosure of government information which evaluates whether governments of various levels are obeying the regulations and their performances, but also by examining information disclosure laws in developed countries while looking at the status quo in China. There are seven aspects where government information disclosure can be improved, namely, information disclosure of government officials, transparency of finance, transparency in the decision-making mechanism, transparency in administration, transparency in public services, transparency of enterprises owned by local governments, and transparency in civil rights protection.

Upcoming Events

Unirule Biweekly Symposiums

Unirule's Biweekly Symposiums are known in China and throughout the world for their long history of open and in-depth discussions and exchanges of ideas in economics and other social sciences. Over 380 sessions have been held and over 15,000 scholars, policy makers, and students, as well as countless readers on the web, have directly and indirectly, and participated in the Biweekly Symposium for close to 20 years.

Biweekly Symposiums begin at 2 p.m. every other Friday and are free and open to the public.

Schedule
Biweekly Symposium No. 533: 11th Sep., 2015
Biweekly Symposium No. 534: 25th Sep., 2015

Previous Biweekly Symposiums

Biweekly Symposium No. 530: No Pure Domestic Affairs for a Super Power

Lecturer: Professor XU Zhangrun

Host: ZHANG Shuguang, Chairman of Unirule Academic Committee

Commentators: LI Xing, ZHENG Yewu, MO Zhihong, CHENG Xiaohe, SHENG Hong

In this session, Professor XU Zhangrun combed through the paradigms of China's foreigh policy and proposed that there was no simple domestic affairs when it comes to the policy making of a super power. He drew from the evolution of China's foreign policy and thought as China emerged as a super power, its influence grew with its economic development, which cast its contraditions home abroad. Professor XU Zhangrun thought it would benefit China's rise to consider how its domestic affairs were properly handled in order to make up for the legitimate image in the international community.

Biweekly Symposium No. 531: On Islam

Lecturer: Professor CHEN Haowu

Host: ZHANG Shuguang , Chairman of Unirule Academic Committee

Commentators: LI Lin 

As the world is more and more affected by the extremism of Islamic belief, study of the Islamic religion and its influence in the domain of social and political affairs, economic prospect, and its radicalisation becomes more and more urgent and benefitial. Professor CHEN Zhiwu started this session by introducing the Islamic religion, culture, and the Muslims. A grand history unfolded in the process, and its repercussions are seminal. In the discussion, many questions concerning the link between the radicalisation and terrorism, the Islamic expansion in Europe and the world, and the ethnic policy of China were heatedly discussed.

Editor: MA Junjie
Revisor: Hannah Luftensteiner