The Third Plenary Session of the 18th Central Committee made it clear: "Accelerate the reform of the classification of public institutions, increase the government's purchasing of public services, promote the rationalization and de-administration of public services."To establish a corporate governance structure for public institutions and promote the conversion of conditional institutions into enterprises or social organizations.Establish a unified registration management system for various public institutions."Many people interpret this decision, and these interpretations analyze its significance to the de-administration of universities.However, most of these interpretations are separate interpretations, focusing on the "gradual elimination of schools, research institutes, hospitals and other administrative levels" praise.This interpretation is essentially a misreading.It tends to create the assumption that de-administration equals de-officialization.From the point of view of university governance structure, this part of the content of the greater significance is to put forward a new idea of government and university governance relations.In other words, "accelerate the reform of the classification of public institutions, increase the government's purchasing of public services, and promote the rationalization of relations between public service units and competent departments."The true meaning of this sentence is that the government should gradually change the way it manages universities, gradually rationalize the relationship between the government education authorities and universities, and implement the separation of management and management evaluation.After this step is implemented, the administrative level of the university is abolished.Therefore, "Decision" not only puts forward the idea and measure of perfecting the external governance of the university, but also puts forward the concrete way.
But this paragraph cannot be interpreted separately, especially in a way that reverses the relationship between the past and the future.In the first part, "accelerate the reform of the classification of public institutions, increase the government's purchasing of public services, and promote the rationalization of relations between public service units and competent departments.""It's a prerequisite, it's a prerequisite; it's a consequence.The first part deals with the "original" of university administration, while the second part gradually abolishes the administrative level of schools, research institutes and hospitals.If only "target" is emphasized, then this kind of rectification is meaningless, only sample part-time job, can eliminate the soil of university administration.
On the surface of university administration, universities run universities in a bureaucratic way, and university bureaucrats have a monopoly on power.But essentially university administration is a continuation of the government's management of universities.When the government manages universities in the form of government departments, universities can only operate according to bureaucratic systems and mechanisms, otherwise they will make the mistake of "political correctness".Imagine that when government is both the organizer, administrator and judge of universities, universities can only be in harmony with government departments if they are "isomorphic", otherwise they are liable to cause tension between universities and government departments.So how can universities not operate in a government manner?If the government does not change the way it manages universities and does not separate management and evaluation, it will put universities in a very awkward position if it simply removes the administrative rank of universities.Because the government governs universities in a government-run way, universities will be less able to deal with government departments, and the external environment for university development will be more difficult.Only when the government changes the way of governing universities, can universities become independent scholars, can they be responsible for their actions, can they not be disturbed by external factors, do academic work and educate people.By this time, the administrative level of the university was meaningless, and the cancellation was just a matter of smooth sailing.
The relationship between government and university is the most core and key content of university governance, which can also be said to be the handle of Chinese university governance structure.With the implementation of the decision of the Third Plenary Session of the 18th Central Committee, the governance structure of Chinese universities is expected to make new progress.