Research On Subject System Of Comprehensive Urban Management Enforcement In China

With the rapid development of economy and the acceleration of urbanization in China, some social issues have become more and more complex, thus causing many problems to urbanization. In order to improve the law enforcement effectiveness and level of urban management, institutional construction of relatively concentrating the power of administrative penalty has been carried out in the area of urban management. Relatively concentrating the power of administrative penalty, as a concentration point for social contradictions in the age of transformation, can on one hand mitigate such problems as "duplicate law enforcement" and "repeated law enforcement", and on the other maintain the balance between the urban management order and the wellbeing of the "disadvantaged group".The issue of comprehensive law enforcement in urban management has been attached great importance to by the central government. In the Decision of the CCCPC on Some Major Issues Concerning Comprehensively Deepening the Reform reached at the3rd Plenary Session of the18th CPC Central Committee, the work of urban management has been separately mentioned that "We will straighten out the urban management law enforcement system, and improve the level of law enforcement and service quality."At present, flaws still exist in terms of the subject qualification and legal status for comprehensive law enforcement, the limits of power and function are not clear, and contradictions sometimes arise among the functional departments for unclear power division. The urban management subject is not only faced with the doubt from the law enforcement counterparts, but also put into a "disadvantageous position" when coming into contact with other departments. Its law enforcement behavior neither receives the recognition of the law enforcement counterparts, nor obtains the cooperation of other departments. In addition, some scholars even thought that the establishment of the law enforcement subject in urban management is inconsistent with the principle of the administrative organic law, and therefore it is not a qualified administrative body. Hence, it is imperative to specify the administrative subject qualification of comprehensive law enforcement agencies in urban management, straighten out the urban management law enforcement system, and improve the level of law enforcement and service quality.Firstly, the author holds that the urban management comprehensive law enforcement agencies have the administrative subject qualification for the following reasons:1). The urban management comprehensive law enforcement agencies have the legitimate authority. As expressly stipulated by Article16of the Administrative Penalties Law, the exercise of the administrative penalty power for relevant authorities is to be concentrated to one administrative body.2). Enjoying independent legal status, the urban management law enforcement agencies can exercise their own power and bear legal liabilities on their own name. According to some documents of the State Council, the administrative authorities exercising the power of administrative penalty in a concentrated manner shall be treated as an administrative body of the same-level government instead of an internal or interior organ of a government department.3). The urban management law enforcement agencies are operated under a reform-oriented model, which can achieve obvious results within a short period of time and adjust itself according to the problems occurring in the reform, thanks to the flexibility and pragmaticality of administration itself. Therefore, the defects in the setup procedures of the urban management comprehensive law enforcement agencies will not affect the establishment of their subject qualification.4). Legal regulations about the merger and establishment of administrative agencies have to be modified so as to provide the legal foundation for administrative agencies to adjust institutions in relatively concentrated power of administrative penalty.Besides, some already-existing problems cannot be avoided in straightening out the urban management law enforcement system:1). In the leadership system, there are no relevant leading departments of sectors at the central and provincial levels, so the general "top-down" system background cannot be complied with and the demands of law enforcement agencies at the grassroots level cannot be reflected.2). In the institutional setup, there is a disparity between the institutional name and level as well as a lack of the principle of establishing comprehensive law enforcement subjects.3). In the personnel system, the composition of the law enforcers of urban management departments is complex, their origins diversified and their staffing level confused.At the end of this paper, the author puts forward some advice about straightening out the urban management law enforcement system and improving the level of law enforcement and service quality from perfecting the concept of urban management law enforcement, specifying the functional orientation of urban management law enforcement and exploring into the leadership mechanism of reform institutions.