service providers and sub-national levels of government have sometimes differed from the strategic priorities set by the central government. Case studies suggest that the existing institutional arrangements and administrative structures have not created a basis for appropriate incentives and capacities among local government agencies and providers of services to implement government policies and, for instance, ensure equitable access to essential services of acceptable quality. As the previous chapter illustrated, for instance, the implementation of the “equal treatment” policy for migrants is uneven across cities.

## **Box 4 Accountability in Governance**

Accountability ensures actions and decisions taken by public officials are subject to oversight so as to guarantee that government initiatives meet their stated objectives and respond to the needs of the community they are meant to be benefiting. Accountability, along with responsiveness, fairness and responsibility, is a dimension of public sector governance.

_Accountability_ exists when there is a relationship where an individual or body, and the performance of tasks or functions by that individual or body, are subject to another’s oversight, direction or request that they provide information or justification for their actions. Therefore, the concept of accountability involves two distinct stages: _answerability_ and _enforcement_ .

Answerability refers to the obligation of the government, its agencies and public officials to provide information about their decisions and actions and to justify them to the public and those institutions of accountability tasked with providing oversight. Enforcement suggests that the public or the institution responsible for accountability can sanction the offending party or remedy the contravening behavior. As such, different institutions of accountability might be responsible for either or both of these stages.

Source: World Bank <u>http://siteresources.worldbank.org/PUBLICSECTORANDGOVERNANCE/Resources/AccountabilityGovernance.pdf</u>

**_China is moving in the direction to improve accountability relationships for public service delivery, including the underlying regulatory, monitoring and enforcement systems_** .  As international experience suggests, the nature of public services, including their role in economic and social development, positive externalities that need to be promoted, and information asymmetries that need to be overcome, make governance reforms difficult.  In China, the effort is further complicated as agencies with policy interest in any given sector at the central and sub-national level are numerous and only weakly coordinated, their relationships with providers are often plagued by inadequate funding allocations and arrangements, and conflicts of interest, and citizens are yet to play an active role in public services.

# **Relationships within government**

**_Within government, accountability relationships related to essential public services are yet to be clearly defined_** in both the vertical dimension (across government levels) and horizontal dimension (across agencies at each government level).  As discussed below, this problem has been widely recognized and in 2008 the Government of China launched a new initiative to reorganize ministries and government agencies with the objective of greater clarity and efficiency in the government administrative structure.

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