China moves to clarify duties for grassroots officials

The long-standing problem of unclear divisions of responsibility at the grassroots level, which had placed heavy burdens on township and subdistrict officials, is being addressed nationwide through the introduction of clearly defined lists of administrative duties.

"In the past, tasks such as supervising non-coal mine safety or handling forest-related violations were assigned to subdistricts. However, without professional staff members or relevant law enforcement authority, we found it very difficult to carry out such work," said Lu Yang, Party secretary of Gaotaizi subdistrict, which is part of Mingshan district in Benxi, Liaoning province.

Similar challenges have been reported by grassroots officials across the country. As a result of overlapping and poorly defined responsibilities, townships and subdistricts had often been left to manage highly technical matters — including water pollution control, gas safety inspections and ecological restoration — that exceeded their capacity.

To resolve this, since February 2024, all of China's 38,000 townships and subdistricts have compiled lists of administrative responsibilities. By the end of June, the lists were completed and made public.

The initiative established three categories of responsibility: matters for which townships and subdistricts bear full responsibility; matters where they play a supporting role alongside higher authorities; and matters that are reclaimed by county-level or higher authorities because grassroots bodies lack the expertise or authority to handle them.

"Now, with these responsibility lists, tasks that we cannot handle have been returned to where they belong. We can devote more time and energy to implementation, development and public services," Lu said.

The new framework has already helped settle long-standing disputes over responsibilities in fields such as emergency management, agriculture and rural affairs, ecological protection and natural resources, where higher authorities take the lead and townships and subdistricts provide support.

Wu Lei, deputy leader of the comprehensive law enforcement team in Xiatang township in Changfeng county, part of Hefei, Anhui province, recently worked with officials from the county's ecological environment bureau and urban management bureau to handle complaints about heavy cooking fumes from restaurants.

For years, the township had asked the county to reclaim the responsibility for managing restaurant emissions. But the county's ecological environment bureau argued that enforcement authority lay with urban management, while the county's urban management bureau insisted that sampling and evidence collection were technical matters under the environmental authority.

The blame kept shifting back and forth, and eventually the issue was pushed back to the township, which lacked both power and capacity, leaving residents dissatisfied.

With the new responsibility lists in place, Changfeng clarified that the urban management bureau now handles administrative penalties, the ecological environment bureau provides technical support and the township enforcement team conducts routine inspections.

"This responsibility list allows us to focus more on livelihood services, economic development and social security," said Fan Shaobin, Party secretary of Xiatang.

According to Cao Hongtao, an official from the State Commission Office of Public Sectors Reform, the office, together with relevant departments, has reclaimed 965 duties for higher-level authorities and identified 53 essential tasks to protect livelihoods, safety and basic public services.

"Tasks such as special equipment supervision and environmental impact assessment approvals for construction projects have been taken back by higher authorities," Cao said. "This has clarified the roles of townships and subdistricts, streamlined county-township relations and helped resolve long-standing disputes over overlapping responsibilities."