Officials at the community level in China are able to undertake substantive work to efficiently serve the people, thanks to the implementation of government policies aimed at rectifying unnecessary formalities and bureaucratic practices.
Wu Chengli, chief of a branch committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the Minzhucun Community, southwest China's Chongqing Municipality, is one of those officials who freed themselves from the huge piles of documents and endless meetings, and managed to conduct more communication with residents to solve their problems.
"We have always wanted to engage with the masses, but a huge pile of paperwork and meetings have consumed a lot of time. Also, there are various inspections to prepare for, with inspection teams often coming every week. Staff members of our office all have to fill out a lot of work reports," said Wu Chengli.
Previously, huge piles of documents and endless meetings consumed a significant amount of time for grassroots officials. These burdens troubled Wu and many other grassroots officials like her.
To address this issue, General Secretary Xi Jinping, who himself once an official at grassroots, advocated short discussions, brief meetings, and issue concise documents when he worked as secretary of the Zhengding County Committee of the CPC, north China's Hebei Province, in the 1980s.
"General Xi has risen from the grassroots, and he deeply understands what the people need and where our grassroots efforts should focus and what we can achieve," said Wu Chengli.
Xi's inspection trips also consistently focus on relieving unnecessary burdens on grassroots officials.
When inspecting Tianjin Municipality in north China, Xi pointed out that leadership teams and leading officials at all levels should have a correct understanding of what it means to perform well and continuously combat pointless formalities to reduce burdens on community-level officials. It is essential to guide Party members and officials to dedicate themselves to work and make all efforts to achieve substantive outcomes, he said.
When visiting central China's Hunan Province, Xi pointed out that the CPC Central Committee clearly requires reducing burdens at the grassroots level, resolutely rectifying formalism and bureaucracy. He emphasized the need to streamline administration and continue advancing this work effectively.
"Every week, we have a fixed time for a unified coordination meeting, which takes half a day," said Wu Chengli.
The general office of the Central Committee of the CPC in 2019 issued a notice, deciding to designate 2019 as the "the year to reduce burdens on community-level officials" and making comprehensive arrangements to alleviate burdens at the grassroots level.
With the rapid development of digitalization and informatization, formalism at the fingertips began to emerge.
In order to address this problem, the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission on December 18, 2023, released guidelines aimed at preventing excessive formalities, in line with the central leadership's directive to combat bureaucratic practices.
During his inspection tour of southwest China's Chongqing Municipality on April 22 this year, Xi stressed the need to clarify powers and responsibilities for those working at the primary level to reduce their burdens.
Relieving grassroots burdens aims to dissolve the constraints of formalism, enhance grassroots governance efficiency, and ultimately benefit the people.
"We have disbanded unnecessary WeChat groups, deactivated many seldom-used applications, and consolidated system files and reports. Utilizing an integrated platform for reporting has fundamentally reduced our workload," said Wu Chengli.
"Previously, we used to submit at least 10 to 20 forms per month. Now, the number has significantly decreased. We only need to submit four to five forms the most and, in general, we only need to submit two or three," said Chen Yao, a grid officer at Minzhucun Community.
"I have only submitted two forms this month, up until now," said Wu Yue, another grid officer at Minzhucun Community.
Officials at grassroots streamline work to efficiently serve people
