Peking University, Beijing, May 13, 2010: A special project on government’s buying of public services from social organizations in China led by Prof. Wang Puqu from PKU School of Government was evaluated by experts from China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs (MCA), and the achievement won the first prize of the theoretical research initiated by MCA on the construction and management of China’s social organizations.

Based on information and data from field researches about cases on Chinese government’s buying public services from social organizations, the project combined theoretical and empirical study, problems and approaches, and research achievement from China and other countries. Considering the current situation in China and experience from the world, it summarized the overall situation and specific cases of government’s buying public services from social organizations, analyzed advantages and disadvantages of both the government function and market mechanism in terms of public service supply, and came up with well-targeted principles, policies, and resolving plans on this issue. In this way, it has great value for the government to improve public service supply mechanism, realize government management and service innovation, public institution reform, and the equalization of rural and urban basic public services. Meanwhile, this project analyzed the reason for Chinese social organizations’ weak points in receiving and supplying public services in perspectives of both objective system and subjective initiative. It put forward detailed suggestions to improve social organization construction and management and make use of the functions and advantages of social organizations in several aspects, including governmental and social concepts, construction of relevant systems, cooperation between government and society, financial support, and the sense of responsibility of social organizations. The achievement provided valuable reference for optimization of the environment of social organization development and promotion of the orderly construction and healthy development of social organizations.

It is reported that the achievement of this project and another project under the same name led by Prof. Lester M. Salamon and his team has been combined together into “Research on Government’s Buying Public Services from Social Organizations – An Analyze on Chinese and Global Experiences,” an achievement of a joint project under MCA, World Bank, and EU and published by Peking University Press. Prof. Lester M. Salamon is an expert in government action and non-profit organization research, also professor at Institute for Policy Studies and Director of Center for Civil Society Studies at Johns Hopkins University.

Translated by: Qin Yixiao

Edited by: Jacques

Source: PKU News (Chinese)