Reform Of Government Institutions Research Articles

Abundance of natural resources, government scale and green economic growth: An empirical study on urban resource curse

Based on panel data of Chinese cities in 2000–2020, this study analyzed the impact of natural resources abundance on green economic growth at the urban level, and also examined the mediated effect of government scale. The findings of the study reveal that: The “resource curse” phenomenon in China's various cities is significant. The relationship between environmental regulation intensity and green economic growth presented as “U-shaped curve”. The impeding effect of industrial structure, as well as the promoting effect of factors such as economic openness level, technical innovation and physical capital investment on the development of green economy were significant. However, the marketization level and education level did not show significant impact on green economic growth. Natural resources abundance can produce “curse” effect on green economic growth by promoting the expansion of government expenditure scale and government personnel scale. Government institutional reform policies can effectively alleviate the “resource curse” phenomenon in various cities. Therefore, this study argued that optimizing the government internal expenditure structure, reshaping the political incentive structure and reducing administrative regulations in the natural resources industries were effective ways to optimize the government expenditure scale and alleviate the urban “resource curse”. Scientifically determining the government personnel scale, reducing the scope and intensity of government intervention, and fully leveraging the public's social supervision function were effective ways to optimize the government personnel scale and alleviate the “Resource curse” of cities.

Comprehensive exploration of spatial planning in Zhejiang Province

Zhejiang Province has been committed to the planning reform since the mid-1990s to adapt to economic and social transformation, urbanization and reform of administration system. The province has explored such comprehensive planning as urban system planning, integrated urban-rural planning, overall planning of county/city administrative area, and “multi-plan integration” planning in tandem. The efforts of Zhejiang have become one of the critical sources for developing our territorial spatial planning system after the government institutional reform. In the current practices of territorial spatial planning, Zhejiang has pursued further innovative exploration on optimizing urban-rural pattern, improving spatial quality, promoting spatial management and control, strengthening cross-border coordination, and developing intelligent planning in light of its foundations. By reviewing the history of Zhejiang’s comprehensive planning, the paper summarizes the overall development trend and related experiences in planning to provide insights and topics for further discussion for our current across-the-board territorial spatial planning.

Does government institutional reform deter corporate tax evasion? Evidence from China.

Exploiting the quasi-natural experiment of the social insurance collection system reform implemented in China in 2000, based on data from China's industrial enterprise database from 1998 to 2006, we use the difference-in-differences method to test the impact of changing the social insurance collection institution on corporate tax evasion. We find that changing the social insurance collection institution from the social security department to the local tax department significantly deters corporate tax evasion. A series of robustness tests also support this conclusion. The reason is changing the social insurance collection institution to the local tax department increases its' social insurance information of the enterprise, and reduces the information asymmetry between the enterprise and the collection institution. Furthermore, we find that the impact of changing the social insurance collection institution on corporate tax evasion is more evident in the samples of labor-intensive enterprises, low labor cost enterprises, and enterprises under the jurisdiction of the local tax department. These results indicate that government institutional reform is a valid way to reduce the information asymmetry between the government and enterprises, which will finally deter corporate tax evasion.

Government Structure, Political Connection, and Enterprise Resource Acquisition of Multidimensional Environmental Impact: An Empirical Study Based on the Structural Equation Model.

Preferential access to scarce resources can bring competitive advantages and better performance to enterprises. However, the existing literature has a relatively single research path on the influencing factors of enterprise resource access, which has lack of sufficient research from the perspective of multidimensional environment. In particular, as an important factor affecting enterprises' access to external resources, few studies have given empirical results on the impact of political factors such as government structure on enterprise resource access. Preferential access to scarce resources can bring competitive advantages and better performance to enterprises. However, the existing literature has a relatively single research path on the influencing factors of enterprise resource access, which lacks sufficient research from the perspective of multidimensional environment. In particular, as an important factor affecting enterprises' access to external resources, few studies have given empirical results on the impact of political factors such as government structure on enterprise resource access. Through the discussion of multidimensional environmental factors, this paper can provide theoretical reference for the reform of government institutions and the establishment of good political relations between enterprises and the government. Focusing on the multidimensional environment of government structure, political relations, and enterprise resource acquisition, this paper takes 129 enterprises in Central China as samples and uses the structural equation model to empirically verify the relationship between the formalization of government structure, liaison mechanism, decentralization, and enterprise resource acquisition, especially the easing effect of political relations. The results show that the formalization of government structure is promoting enterprises to obtain policy resources and financial resources; the liaison mechanism helps enterprises to obtain financial resources and market resources; decentralization has a significant positive impact on enterprises' access to policy resources and market resources; and political connection magnifies the positive effect of government structure on enterprise resource acquisition, but there are differences in different dimensions.

Audit Supervision, State-owned Assets Supervision and State-owned Enterprise Governance: A Study Based on the Background of Audit Officials in State-owned Assets Supervision

In the context of the deepening reform of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and particularly the duty of accountability audit and supervisory committee assigned to the government audit offices during the recent reform of government institutions, audit supervision plays an important role in the supervision of state-owned assets (SOAs) and the governance of SOEs. The existing literature mainly studies the governance effect of government audit on the listed central SOEs based on the audit finding announcements of central SOEs issued by the National Audit Office, but it generally regards government audit as a black box. In fact, officials usually play an active and significant role in the government’s decision-making. Therefore, this paper tries to examine the underlying mechanism of the governance effect of audit supervision on SOEs from the perspective of the background of audit officials in the supervision of SOAs.We conduct an empirical study with a sample of A-share listed local SOEs from 2003 to 2017, and find that the background of audit officials in the supervision of SOAs can improve the accounting information quality of SOEs. This result is more significant when audit officials’ supervision experience of SOAs is longer, audit enforcement is more powerful, and SOEs’ internal corporate governance is weaker. But the intervention of local leading officials due to political promotion incentives can weaken the governance effect of audit officials on SOEs. Further analysis indicates that the background of audit officials in the supervision of SOAs also has a real effect on SOEs, which can reduce the real earnings management, improve innovation performance, and ultimately increase the firm value.The findings of this paper not only confirm the heterogeneous impact of audit officials’ subjective initiative on the supervision of SOAs and the governance of SOEs from the perspective of individual work experience, but also reveal the transmission path of local leading officials’ influence on the decision-making of micro enterprises from the perspective of government audit, a professional administrative institution. Meanwhile, in the process of realizing the integration and optimization of audit supervision power and establishing a unified and efficient audit supervision system for the supervision of SOAs, the regulator should not only pay attention to training and improving the professional competence of audit officials through position experience, but also further strengthen the independence of audit offices and audit officials through deepening reform.

Overall Thinking of China’s Eighth Institutional Reform under the Perspective of System Theory

The reform of Chinese government institutions is a comprehensive system reform. System theory provides a theoretical perspective for the overall reform of the system engineering of Chinese government institutional reform, and provides an analytical framework for scientific understanding of the new era of socialism reform. In 2018, compared with the first seven institutional reforms, the reform of Chinese government institutions has shifted from unilateral one-way reform to comprehensive and systematic reform. The systematic nature of the eighth institutional reform is embodied in the purpose of institutional reform, the integrity of the reform of the party and government, the hierarchical nature of the main body and functions, and the environmental adaptability of emergency management and normal management. On this basis, System Theory provides ideas for thinking about how to continue to promote the future of institutional reform in China, namely, the direction of differential synergy, overall optimization, and self-organization. Therefore, the use of system theory to promote and analyze the reform of Chinese government institutions not only helps to understand the scientific nature of the new round of institutional reforms in 2018, but also helps to understand the development of government reforms in the future.

The reform of vertical arrangements of tax administrative agencies in China

The decentralized tax administration has been in place for over two decades in China since 1994. In March this year, National People’s Congress of China reviewed and approved the State Council Institutions Reform Plan and decided “we will reform the tax administrative system by merging the tax administrations on state and sub-national levels and assume it both tax and non-tax revenue administrative responsibility in the corresponding jurisdictions”. The article aims to explain to readers that China’s tax authorities have to a large extent absorbed common international practices and general experience. The history of the vertical arrangements of China’s tax administration is revisited through descriptive and comparative analysis. The reasons for the cancellation of the sub-national tax bureaus in China are analyzed followed by the international experience of the vertical structure of the tax administration. It is contended in the article that the reform of the vertical arrangements of the tax authorities is an attempt to deepen the reform of the fiscal system and promoting tax administrative agencies reform in the broad sense from the perspective of the modernization of the state governance system and governance abilities. The article concludes with a summary of several features of this reform. HIGHLIGHTS 1. Since 2018 year the subnational tax agencies in China will be abolished gradually and the separate system of vertical administrative agencies will officially end 2. The removal of the subnational tax agencies is the result of balancing on the advantages and disadvantages of the separate tax collection agencies and new overall goal of reform in China. It is part of the reform of government institutions aimed at promoting the modernization of the state’s governance 3. The reform is making full use of the advanced experience of foreign countries 4. The reform is based on the construction of a general public service supply system, with tax administration agency as part of it. It is a step forward in the direction of specialization and independence of tax administrations FOR CITATION Ma Jun. The reform of vertical arrangements of tax administrative agencies in China. Journal of Tax Reform , 2018, vol. 4, no. 3, pp. 223–235. DOI: 10.15826/jtr.2018.4.3.053 ARTICLE INFO Received April 24, 2018; accepted December 13, 2018

From Kapodistrias to Kallikrates: intraregional cooperation and local governments institutional reforms in Eastern Macedonia and Thrace

Intraregional cooperation is considered a crucial intangible asset of local communities strengthening local competitive advantages. Equally important, local government's institutional reform is an opportunity for improving intraregional cooperation. This paper assesses the association of intraregional cooperation and local government's institutional reforms in Eastern Macedonia and Thrace. Crucial terms of Kapodistrias and Kallikrates reforms are examined, namely, social capital, local entrepreneurship, local government's functions and intergovernmental cooperation. The methodology is based on an extensive form game between central state and region, and equilibrium is estimated through a closed–type questionnaire as well as by per capita intergovernmental grants. Results clearly demonstrate that central government's dominant strategy was the implementation of Kallikrates reform and that reform success was highly dependent upon social capital and strong local entrepreneurship.

Sustainability challenges and opportunities in Africa

In much of international development literature, thesub-Saharan African region represents a prolonged devel-opment crisis (Stiglitz 2007; Sachs 2005; Easterly 2006;Collier 2007; Moyo 2009). Despite the recent remarkabledevelopment gains by some sub-Saharan African countriesdriven by a combination of factors—increasing democra-tization and transparency, strengthening and reform ofgovernance institutions, surge in commodity prices, andthe adoption and implementation of more effectivemacro-economic policies—the region still faces dauntingsustainable development challenges. With 48 countries, apopulation of over 700 million, and an average per capitaincome of roughly US$1 a day, sub-Saharan Africaremains, in economic terms, the poorest region in theworld. Put in the context of global development trends,Africa’s development travails are complicated by a starkparadox—whereas extreme poverty levels have declinedglobally in various regions of the world since 1980, theproportion of people living in abject poverty in Africa haveincreased. To paraphrase Moyo (2009), the number ofAfricans living in abject poverty nearly doubled in 2 dec-ades (1991–2002). Notwithstanding Africa’s developmentcrisis, the continent is endowed with abundant renewableand non-renewable natural resources (African Develop-ment Bank 2007). In the context of sustainability, espe-cially the often complex links between environment anddevelopment, how best could Africa’s natural resources beharnessed to advance sustainable development of the con-tinent? How can Africa’s governance and institutionalframeworks and policies be strengthened to respond to theemerging and re-emerging sustainability challenges facingthe continent and its people?While the twenty-first century has witnessed sustaineddemand for Africa’s natural resources—oil, minerals,and other raw materials—the continent continues to lackeffective institutional capacity to manage these resourcessustainably. Added to the continent’s vulnerabilities toclimate change, Africa’s ongoing sustainable developmentefforts must, as of necessity, link the environment (nature),economic growth (wealth) and governance (power) as theessential elements in poverty reduction strategies (AfricanDevelopment Bank 2007). Although the linkages betweenAfrica’s socioeconomic development and the continent’snatural, ecological, and climatic factors have been thesubject of relevant development literature (Sachs 2005;Collier 2007), this discourse has also identified the need forthe continent to develop effective, accountable, and trans-parent governance institutions to manage these complexdevelopment-environment-climate linkages. Economic andinvestment policies in Africa that recognize and integratethese approaches will likely yield positive developmentoutcomes towards achieving the Millennium Develop-ment Goals (Kates and Dasgupta 2007; World Bank2002; United Nations Development Programme 2006;UNMillennium Project 2005).This Special Issue—focusing on African Regional Per-spectives—offers an overlapping theme that spans fourbroad categories of local and continent-wide sustainabilitychallenges in Africa: evaluation and assessment; integrat-ing indigenous knowledge; climate change; and policy andgovernance. The selection process, to the greatest extentpossible, prioritized inter-disciplinary and multi-institu-tional research. The African research priorities set out inthe Strategy for Global Environmental Change Research inAfrica: Science plan and implementation strategy (Odada

The transformation of China’s economic and government functions

The content of China’s economic transformation is not single, and this article argues that it includes three parts. The first is the reform of economic system, the second is the change in the pattern of economic growth, and the third is the adjustment of economic structure. Government is the leading force of China’s economic transformation, and repeated reform of government institutions has brought about some changes to government functions. But problems are obvious that lag changes of government functions have become an obstacle in China’s economic transformation. This article describes the historical evolution and the reality of China’s economic transformation, and analyzes the main reasons of lag changes in government functions, and reveals that the transformation of government functions is the key for successful transformation of China’s economy.

Remaking the Chinese State and the Nature of Economic Governance? The early appraisal of the 2008 ‘super-ministry’ reform

This report explains the shifts and strains in the 2008 super-ministry government reform, focusing on the reform of government institutions of economic governance. Drawing on interviews with officials and scholars in Beijing after the reform, and on Chinese-language reports and books, this study suggests that the key to substantial progress in remaking the Chinese state into a macroeconomic regulator is the reform of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), which was lacking in the 2008 scheme. Its powerful authority for investment endorsement is particularly problematic. A continued administrative malaise in the energy sector and strategically articulated state engagement in industrial development also should be noted as the salient features of China's economic governance.