Cut off the dirty hand reaching into the "ivory tower"
Grasp the "key minority", strengthen education management, improve the internal supervision and control mechanism of universities
● Colleges and universities have the dual characteristics of high concentration of power and rich resources, and the risks of power rent-seeking and benefit transmission are intertwined.
Problems in financial management, selection and employment, state-owned assets, examinations and admissions, cooperation in running schools, infrastructure and logistics, affiliated hospitals, etc. are prone to occur frequently
● In the current anti-corruption work in colleges and universities, there are still system gaps in some important areas and key links, some systems lack pertinence, systemicity and operability, and many systems have not been well implemented
● It is necessary to seize the “critical minority” of leading cadres, especially the main leading cadres, to strengthen education, management and supervision to ensure the correct exercise of power; while severely cracking down on corruption in the university system, strengthen legal publicity and education to create a good Anti-corruption atmosphere; further improve the internal supervision and control mechanism of universities and promote the "sunshine" operation of public power
□ Our reporter Zhao Li
□ Sun Yifei, our intern
The anti-corruption of the "ivory tower" continues to advance!
Entering October, relevant parties released a lot of anti-corruption news, including several university presidents: Tang Nong, deputy secretary and president of Guangxi University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Wang Xueyong, former deputy secretary and dean of Daxinganling Technician College, and president of Shanghai University of Engineering Science Xia Jianguo, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and President of North China University of Technology Ding Hui have been investigated and dealt with.
"Currently, corruption cases in universities in our country are showing a trend of frequent occurrence. These places that were originally considered to be'clear water yamen' are becoming new areas for the spread of corruption. At the same time, this also proves that as long as there is power, there is room for rent-seeking. Without effective supervision and restriction, corruption may breed." Peng Xinlin, deputy director of the International Anti-Corruption Education and Research Center of Beijing Normal University, said in an interview with a reporter from the Rule of Law Daily.
According to Song Wei, director of the Center for Integrity Research of University of Science and Technology Beijing, as the role played by the discipline inspection committees of universities continues to increase, the effectiveness of the anti-corruption efforts of universities will be more consolidated. This is an overall trend.
However, areas such as fund management, selection and employment, state-owned assets, and examinations and admissions will continue to be high-prone areas for corruption in colleges and universities in the future, so corruption risks still exist.
Eliminating risks can only rely on deepening reforms and strengthening supervision and restriction of power. "Because universities have their own industry characteristics, it is necessary to further explore the laws and characteristics of corruption in universities and propose more targeted anti-corruption measures."
University cadres fell in succession
Corruption risks are relatively concentrated
In November 2015, eight party members and leading cadres at the Communication University of China were "linked" for disciplinary violations, which became a typical case of collective corruption in colleges and universities.
According to media statistics, from November 2017 to February 2020, the website of the State Supervision Commission of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the Supreme People's Procuratorate reported a total of 61 college cadres that were investigated, involving 55 colleges and universities.
It is understood that 57 of these dismissed cadres had served as vice-presidents or above when they were in school, accounting for 93.4% of all persons investigated; the above 55 universities are mainly provincial ordinary undergraduate and junior colleges, of which 34 are Ordinary undergraduate colleges and universities, accounting for 61.8%.
Although there are various reasons for the fall, corruption and bribery are still the main reasons.
Except for the 19 people who are still under investigation and have not been notified of specific violations of discipline and law, all the other cadres investigated are involved in corruption and bribery of different amounts.
It is also common to conceal personal income during employment, maintain improper sexual relations, and use power to seek personal gains for relatives and friends.
In addition, there are some cadres involved in private use of cars, business violations, intervention in projects and other violations of law and discipline accompanied by abuse of power.
During the interview, Peng Xinlin analyzed that corruption in colleges and universities presents six distinctive characteristics: First, corruption in colleges and universities is dominated by bribery and corruption, and the number of bribery and corruption cases involving power for personal gain, job gains, and power-for-money transactions has long ranked first; Corruption cases in colleges and universities involve a wide range of fields, but are relatively concentrated; third, collusion of corruption cases in colleges and universities occur frequently, and the phenomenon of "clustering corruption" is serious; fourth, corruption cases are prone to occur frequently, and the nature and degree of corruption are becoming more serious; fifth is the "intelligence" of corruption methods "High-tech"; Sixth, the persons involved in the case are younger, high-level, and highly educated.
"The areas involved in corruption in colleges and universities cover all aspects, but it is particularly concentrated in the fields of infrastructure construction, examination and enrollment, material procurement, campus asset management, and scientific research funding." Peng Xinlin said that the interests and resources in these fields are relatively concentrated and are prone to corruption. The key areas and key links have thus become a high incidence of corruption among college leaders.
Peng Xinlin said, for example, in the field of engineering construction, due to the large amount of funds involved in engineering construction and the long period, relevant personnel have great autonomy in decision-making and the issuance of project funds, and because the contractual counterparties are mostly civil entities such as enterprises , The market equivalent exchange is also invisible to colleges and universities; in the field of organization and personnel, colleges and universities have a certain degree of closure, and they have independent personnel appointment and removal rights to subordinate functional departments and members of the leadership team of secondary colleges. The discretionary power of personnel appointment and dismissal is relatively large, and it is easily affected by the subjective factors of main leading cadres in universities, leading to the emergence of power rent-seeking; in the field of scientific research funding, it is common for researchers to arbitrage scientific research funding through fictitious expenditures and other illegal means. Therefore, in recent years, many experts and scholars have been "lost" due to corruption of scientific research funds.
As early as June 2018, the "China Discipline Inspection and Supervision News" published an article that: "Universities have the dual characteristics of high concentration of power and high resources, and the risks of power rent-seeking and benefit transmission are intertwined. Fund management, selection and employment, state-owned Problems in assets, examinations and admissions, cooperation in running schools, infrastructure and logistics, affiliated hospitals, etc. are prone to occur frequently."
Peng Xinlin told the reporter of the "Rule of Law Daily" that due to the particularity of universities and the reform of the personnel organization cadre system in universities, a large number of young cadres and teachers with high education and high levels have taken up leadership positions in universities. They have high academic levels, active thinking, and courage. Become the backbone of the cadres and teachers of colleges and universities, but when faced with the temptation of power and the benefits brought by power, it is difficult to control oneself, and eventually fell into the abyss of crime.
"In college corruption cases, some corrupt elements have established strict defenses and anti-investigation measures in advance while committing corruption; some have used advanced technologies such as computers and the Internet to commit crimes, which makes their corrupt behavior extremely It is concealed, and it is difficult to find and investigate." Peng Xinlin said.
Lack of supervision and early warning mechanism
Lead to frequent corruption cases
As my country's anti-corruption and clean government work continues to deepen, many corrupt officials in the university system have been investigated and dealt with this year.
According to the information published on the official website of the State Supervision Commission of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, at least 14 bureau-level officials in the education system have been dismissed this year, and 10 bureau-level officials have been "double-opened."
On June 24, Wang Jian, former deputy secretary of the party committee and principal of Anhui University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, was expelled from the party.
After investigation, Wang Jian violated political discipline and opposed organizational review; violated the spirit of the eight central regulations by accepting banquets and travel arrangements for private business owners; violated organizational discipline, failed to report personal matters in accordance with the regulations, and used the convenience of his position to seek personnel benefits for others; Violation of integrity and discipline, illegal receipt of gifts and gifts; violation of mass discipline, illegal fundraising and apportionment of expenses from enterprises; violation of work discipline, failing to perform duties correctly; violation of life discipline; non-discrimination of relatives, using power for personal gain, and condoning relatives to use their positions to influence school projects Construction, and collaborating with relatives to illegally accept property from others, suspected of bribery crime.
On August 3, the website of the State Supervision Commission of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection announced that Wu Song, the former party secretary of Southwest Forestry University, was subject to disciplinary review and supervision.
Before falling from the horse, Wu Song was regarded as a "scholar official" for a long time.
According to official information, Wu Song once presided over the National Educational Science Planning Project (a key project of the Ministry of Education's Tenth Five-Year Plan for Educational Research) "Environment, System and Countermeasures for China's Higher Education Development after WTO Entry" and the National Center for Teaching and Research Project "University Spirit and Teaching Reform" "And many provincial-level key topics, and have won many national and provincial awards. Over the years, he has taught courses on the history of Western philosophy and special studies on Western political thought to undergraduates, masters, and doctoral students.
However, it was such a "scholar official" with abundant academic achievements and teaching experience that eventually fell into the quagmire of corruption.
On September 25, Chen Hongyan, the principal of Heilongjiang Preschool Teachers College, was investigated.
It is worth noting that this person graduated from Mudanjiang Teachers College and worked in this university for a long time from 1996 to 2008.
Not long ago, Fu Junlong, the deputy chairman of the Education, Science, Culture and Health Committee of the Heilongjiang Provincial People's Congress, had already passed away on August 10. This person also has many years of experience as a university leader and once served as the party secretary of Mudanjiang Normal University.
On October 3rd, Tang Nong, deputy secretary of the Party Committee and principal of Guangxi University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and Qin Yuwang, vice president of Guangxi University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, went to work together.
In Peng Xinlin’s view, corruption cases in colleges and universities reflect that schools are not in place in implementing various systems. For example, some colleges and universities have chaotic accounts, sitting on income and expenditure, and some violate national regulations to set up private “small treasuries” and “off-the-book accounts”. Violation of relevant regulations, illegal reimbursement, illegal payment of bonuses, etc.
The school lacks an effective monitoring and early warning mechanism for these loopholes, which eventually leads to corruption cases.
"When all kinds of colleges and universities independently run various tutoring classes and on-the-job academic education, due to their fully market-oriented operation, the tuition and accommodation fees charged are used very casually. Once they lack strong financial supervision and lack of restraint mechanisms, Corruption problems are extremely easy to appear." Peng Xinlin said.
“In recent years, universities’ self-sponsored education rights have increased, the internal power structure is relatively concentrated, and the amount of funds involved in universities each year is large, covering a wide range of fields. In this case, affected by the external environment and internal governance structure, universities also face The task of comprehensively and strictly governing the party and building a clean government and anti-corruption.” Zhuang Deshui, deputy director of Peking University's Research Center for Clean Government Construction, said that universities need to have economic and personnel exchanges with the society, and it will inevitably become a key area of corruption.
Zhuang Deshui believes that with the development of the current society, the emphasis on higher education is gradually increasing. Under such circumstances, if the power of higher education is not effectively supervised and restricted, problems may arise.
"Many colleges and universities are not open and transparent, which is also an important reason for corruption. If they are open and transparent, to a large extent, corruption risks can be prevented in advance and the occurrence of corruption problems can be reduced."
System reform continues to advance
More effective supervision
Behind the corruption problem is the loopholes in the restriction and supervision of the power operation of universities.
For a period of time, some people believed that colleges and universities were "special fields", and they had some scruples when dealing with violations of regulations and disciplines, and the supervision and enforcement of discipline and accountability were loose.
In October 2018, the General Office of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China issued the "Opinions on Deepening the Reform of Institutions Assigned by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the State Supervision Commission", and the inclusion of the party committee secretary and principals in the reform of the discipline inspection system of colleges and universities managed by the central government kicked off.
After that, the nomination, inspection, and appointment of the secretary of the Disciplinary Committee of the Central Management College were changed to be carried out by the National Supervisory Committee of the Central Discipline Inspection Commission and the Party Group of the competent department.
It is worth noting that at the beginning of this year, the State Supervision Commission of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection held the first meeting of the Secretary of the Discipline Inspection Commission of the Central Management College to clarify responsibility and integrity. This was regarded by the outside world as a new signal to continue to promote the reform of the discipline inspection system in the Central Management College.
"The reform is conducive to enhancing the political status of the secretary of the discipline inspection committee in the leadership team of colleges and universities, and is conducive to the independent and authoritative work of the discipline inspection and supervision agencies of the central management colleges and universities, and the disciplinary inspection duties and roles." Zhuang Deshui said.
In Peng Xinlin’s view, this reform is of great significance and far-reaching impact. It has greatly enhanced the independence and authority of the discipline inspection work of colleges and universities. It will help the discipline inspection and supervision agencies of colleges and universities to perform their duties better, have a higher status, and have more confidence, thereby promoting colleges and universities. The comprehensive and strict governance of the party has been developed in depth and the modernization of the governance system and governance capabilities of colleges and universities.
Since the implementation of this reform, the results of the reform have initially appeared, and the advantages of the system are gradually being transformed into governance efficiency.
Song Wei also believes that the reform has resolved to a certain extent the problem of the relatively weak independence of the supervision of the discipline inspection committees in colleges and universities, and at the same time solved the situation of not dare to supervise, unwilling to supervise, and poorly supervised. “Driven by the system, discipline inspections at all levels Significant changes have also taken place in work, and the effectiveness of supervision has become more significant."
Judging from the current reform situation, Zhuang Deshui believes that in the process of gradual progress in the reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system of the Chinese management colleges and universities, there are three changes worth paying attention to: The first change is that the nomination of the secretary of the discipline inspection committee has changed, which has strengthened independence; The second change is that Chinese management colleges and universities can use eight supervisory measures to carry out their work in accordance with the requirements of the central government and the supervision committee, which greatly improves the supervision and supervision capabilities of the Chinese management colleges and universities; the third change is the relationship between the Chinese management colleges and other local commissions for discipline inspection. It can directly assist in the investigation, giving the central management colleges certain powers.
In addition, according to the requirements of the Ministry of Education, the Central Management Colleges and universities and some universities directly under the Ministry of Education will increase the personnel of discipline inspection and supervision institutions and internal institutions, and set up internal institutions in accordance with the requirements of the operation of the discipline inspection and supervision institutions, thus greatly enhancing the work capacity of the discipline inspection and supervision institutions.
However, many people in the industry have pointed out that my country is still in the process of exploring the reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system of Chinese management universities. Apart from the "Opinions on Deepening the Reform of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the State Supervision Commission", it has not issued specific details. Implementation rules.
How to promote and design the follow-up reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system of Chinese management colleges and universities needs to be further deepened.
In this regard, Zhuang Deshui believes that who is the subject of management by the discipline inspection and supervision organs of colleges and universities, that is, "what is the target of supervision?" is a question that needs to be solved urgently in the current reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system, and it is also a question that has to be answered in the reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system in colleges and universities. .
"At present, the difficulty of college supervision lies in how to achieve political supervision, how to supervise the effect of ideological and political education, how to supervise the implementation of the ideological responsibility system, etc. At the same time, colleges and universities undertake the fundamental task of teaching, educating, and establishing morality. Under the circumstances, how to give full play to the supervision effect of the discipline inspection and supervision organs and use supervision to ensure the implementation of the fundamental tasks of Lide Shuren is a realistic task and challenge." Zhuang Deshui said.
Improve the supervision and control mechanism
Ensure the right exercise of power
With the rapid development of higher education, related funds and resources are becoming more and more concentrated, and the power to allocate funds, personnel management and project approval is increasingly concentrated on top leaders and key positions in universities, plus relatively closed The operating mechanism has created some high-risk areas for corruption.
Peng Xinlin believes that in the current anti-corruption work in colleges and universities, there are still system gaps in some important areas and key links, some systems lack pertinence, systematization, and operability, and many systems have not been well implemented.
For example, some colleges and universities copied the relevant regulatory documents of the higher authorities without designing them according to the actual situation of the school; the system norms are too principled, the content is empty, the requirements are empty, and so on.
To this end, Peng Xinlin suggested that, first, we must seize the leading cadres of universities, especially the "critical minority" of major leading cadres, strengthen education, management and supervision, promote the clean government of leading cadres, and ensure the correct exercise of power.
Colleges and universities should start from the height of reshaping the spirit of universities, effectively correct the lack of ethics of a small number of managers and the one-sided pursuit of interests, and truly prevent corruption from the source. This is a fundamental strategy to curb the high incidence of corruption in colleges and universities.
The second is to increase the intensity of "supervision and judicial intervention", actively carry out legal propaganda work, and combine crackdowns with warning education.
While seriously investigating and punishing corruption cases in the university system, we insisted on using case-based statements to serve as a warning.
While severely cracking down on corruption in the university system, we should strengthen legal publicity and education, and create a good anti-corruption atmosphere in colleges and universities, so that the "persons in power" in various positions dare not or want to corrupt.
The third is to further improve the internal supervision and control mechanism of various universities, and increase the supervision of key areas and weak links of universities’ infrastructure, enrollment, finance, procurement, and school-run industry, especially the concentration and power of "people, finance, and material". Departments with a large flow of funds must strengthen supervision, find out the crux of the problem, and gradually improve the supervision system, so that the activities of universities, especially the links that are prone to corruption, and the links involving capital revenue and expenditure, are under effective supervision, prompting The public power "sunshine" operates in order to discover problems and deal with them in a timely manner.
At the same time, we must pay close attention to the implementation of various rules and regulations to avoid situations where there is no good system and no good implementation.
In response to the concentration of crimes in sensitive posts, Peng Xinlin suggested strengthening exchanges and rotations between cadres. In the setting of posts, a mutual power restriction mechanism should be established to avoid corruption due to loss of supervision.
"In terms of the organizational guarantee for the construction of the anti-corruption and upholding integrity system in colleges and universities, the party committee of the university should be responsible for the overall planning and specific design of the construction of the anti-corruption and upholding integrity system in colleges and universities, and the construction of the anti-corruption and upholding integrity system should be included in the important agenda of the party committee. In the overall plan of school development." Peng Xinlin said that the administration of colleges and universities should give full play to their subjective initiative, and promote the construction of the anti-corruption and upholding integrity system with the party committees of the colleges and universities. The party and government have the same responsibility, and anti-corruption runs through every aspect of college governance.
At the same time, it is necessary to improve the feedback mechanism of anti-corruption and upholding integrity education, establish a review mechanism for the implementation of the anti-corruption and upholding integrity education system in universities, and provide regular feedback on work.
The original one-way communication by the competent departments of universities and colleges has been changed to two-way feedback. The opinions and opinions of teachers and students on anti-corruption education are collected regularly, and the evaluation of education effects is strengthened.
According to the actual effects of education, we will continue to innovate educational methods, reform educational methods, enrich educational content, broaden educational channels, and give full play to the fundamental and leading role of the educational system in the construction of the anti-corruption and integrity system in colleges and universities.
Regarding the reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system of Chinese management colleges and universities, Zhuang Deshui suggested that when conditions are ripe, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection can promote the reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system of Chinese management colleges and universities through a document, that is, to introduce a formal reform plan for the discipline inspection and supervision system of colleges and universities.
At present, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection has issued the "Measures for the Nomination and Inspection of Secretaries of the Disciplinary Committee of Central Management Colleges and Universities" to pave the way for the further advancement of the reform of the discipline inspection and supervision system in Central Management Colleges and Universities.
According to the requirements of the current system, the secretary of the discipline inspection committee of a central management university must serve in a different school, and cannot be generated by the university. "The essence is to strengthen the internal supervision of the university, enhance the independence of the discipline inspection and supervision agency of the university, and enable the discipline inspection and supervision agency of the university to be independent. Carry out operations without being affected by human relations and other relationships".
Cartography/Gao Yue