They differed mainly over: First, the root problems, with some saying that the establishment of function was the problem, and others saying it was a problem of power and responsibility structures; second, the reasons for this were disagreed on, some saying that scientific, democratic, holistic principles were not used during the reform process, and others saying that special interests in ministries and in local government chose biased reform policy...

EO: Were there any more concrete suggestions?

Shi: There were many concrete ideas and suggestions, a total of 900. They were basically rooted in the base level of government and the inter-relations between higher and lower level administrations. For example, talking about the expansion of organizations, staff exceeding quotas, there was universal agreement that because of the Organization Law and related regulations, administrative bodies and state-run institutions have no way to manage and are very relaxed. Thus, the bloating of staff became common practice, and stability in staff numbers became the exception..

Another example is vertical management. In the beginning there were two forms of management, but when national and local economic development conflicted, many enforcement agencies hit a wall, called “can't stand up, can't sit down” because local officials are powerful and have a say in determining their career advancement.

In order to solve the problems of carrying out central policy, some policy-enforcement agencies instated vertical management systems-- for example, in industry and commerce, in quality control, auditing, environmental protection, customs, etc. But vertical management encountered another problem; that is, they could manage what was invisible, and couldn't manage what was visible. The central government had the power to manage but couldn't see things, and local government could see things but couldn't deal with them.

So why would Hu Jintao, at the 17^th Party Congress, strengthen government's system of powers and responsibilities? If you have this power, you have to be responsible for it, you bear a degree of responsibility, you must seize the necessary power. And what kind of situation is our government's system of responsibility and power currently facing? To take one province as an example, as soon as it's said that the next tier down of government will have its power to enforce revoked, that morning it will be worked out, and that afternoon it will happen. But as soon as it is decided that power is to be transfered down to the next level of government, a week or even a month later, nothing has happened.

Through the survey we realized, the phenomenon of disconnectedness is pretty severe, and is concretely embodied by two aspects: inside government, power is at the bottom but responsibility is at the top; in the State Council, a minister listens to a department head, who listens to the section chief, with the last having the most actual power. Between local and central government, power is on top, responsibility is on the bottom; the central government has 60 or 70 percent of the financial resources, and it manages 30 or 40 percent of affairs. Meanwhile, local government has exactly the opposite.