By Gao Shiji, Li Zuojun & Chen Jianpeng, Research Team on “China’s Environment Regulation System in the New Era”, Research Institute of Resources and Environmental Policies, DRC

Research report No.32, 2016 (Total 4915) 2016-3-24

Abstract: According to the requirements of law-based government administration under the market economy, the reform objective of China’s environment regulation system is: to establish and improve China’s modern environment regulation system by following the principles of independence, legality, transparency, accountability, professionalism, law-enforcement capacity, high efficiency and credibility. Consequently we should push forward reforms in various aspects like special legislation, organization structure, power distribution, credibility mechanism, supervisory process and tools and supervision competence construction. This report comes up with relevant measures for environment regulation system reform during the 13th Five-Year Plan period and raises several policy options. These measures and options include: speed up the amendment of environmental laws and regulations, make laws more enforceable and feasible, push for the normalization, standardization and specialization of the administration of environmental justice, further increase the law-based environment regulation; optimize the organization structure of environment regulation at both the central and local-level departments, enhance regulation and supervision functions at the regional level, raise environmental information-acquisition competence of central-level environment regulation departments.

Key words: environment regulation system, environment governance, national governance, transition period, the 13th Five-Year Plan