Page 34 - JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SCIENCE IN CHINA 2015 Vol. 41

Wugang JIN / A study on construction and accomplishment for the county level central-branch library system in China 033

Country-level governments have a lot of discourse power in making county-level policies
which usually come in packages. Generally speaking, the macro decisions made by the central
government and provincial governments are carried out by county-level governments in a way
that serves the development of farmers, villages and agriculture under the effective leadership
and supervision of township-level governments. In other words, though not the lowest level of
governing body, county-level governments are direct providers of public services for farmers.
In this sense, counties are the regional economic and political centers in rural areas. The core
of county governance is agriculture-related. The main tasks of county-level governments are to
address the issues concerning agriculture, rural areas and farmers and to balance the development
between urban and rural areas at county level (Zhu, 2002, p.365).
(3) In terms of fiscal administration, county-level governments are the basic units with
independent responsibility for revenue and expenditure
As the basic units of the national economy, counties are at the most fundamental level where
national policies are implemented in a direct way, and crucial players in building a moderately
prosperous society in an all-round way. It can be said that county-level economy is a real local
economy (Yan, 2005, pp.16-38). The ongoing reforms of “counties being directly administered
by provincial governments” and “township finances being directly administered by county
governments” in the recent decade have further consolidated and improved the public finance on
the part of county-level governments for the purpose of balancing the development of rural and
urban areas. By the end of 2012, 1 087 counties had their public finance directly administered by
28 provincial, municipal and regional governments, and approximately 29 000 townships (86% of
the total) had their public finance directly administered by county-level governments .
1 ①
(4) Existing practices show that the central-branch library system with counties as the basic units
has become an important organizational form and service model
In the process of establishing the central-branch library system across the nation (W. G. Jin & G.
X. Li, 2014), three models have taken shape, i.e. “Chancheng Model” featured with “one system,
one governing body” (Qu, 2005), “Jiaxing Model” characterized by multi-level financing and
centralized management” (C. P. Li, 2009), and “Suzhou Model” under which the municipal library
is entrusted by the district governments with the construction of libraries (Qiu, 2014). Although the
bodies responsible for the construction of libraries vary, the basic units are counties and the funds
are under centralized management, which lays the foundation for the integration of urban and rural
public library services in a coordinated fashion. Theorists have also preliminarily agreed to propose
the central-branch library system at county level. After in-depth study and analysis of various
forms of central-branch library systems practiced in China, a legislative study for the enactment
of The Public library law concludes that “district governments of big cities and governments of

① Data source: The Ministry of Finance of China. (2014). Situation of the reforms of counties being directly administered by
provincial governments and township finances being directly administered by county governments. Retrieved March 2, 2015, from
http://www.mof.gov.cn/zhuantihuigu/czjbqk1/jbqk2/201405/t20140504_1074648.html.