Chapter 7 Chapter Five: Conflict of Interest Becomes "The Source of Corruption"

Conflicts of interest threaten the public's confidence in the objectivity of officials' decision-making and are also an important source of corruption.Therefore, anti-corruption should start with preventing conflicts of interest. "It is not allowed to allow or condone spouses, children and their spouses to engage in business or business activities that may conflict with public interests in the areas and business scopes under their jurisdiction after they have registered for business in other places." This is one of the prohibited behaviors for party members and leading cadres in the "Code for the Integrity of Party Members and Leading Cadres in Politics" promulgated by the Central Committee on February 23, 2010.This standard puts forward the concept of "conflict of public interest" in many places.

"This is based on the relevant experience and practices of various departments in my country in recent years. There have been many explorations in preventing conflicts of interest. It is a leading countermeasure to prevent corruption from the source." Professor Li Chengyan, a doctoral supervisor at the School of Government and Administration of Peking University, accepted the reporter. said during the interview. It is understood that in the anti-corruption practice of many countries, the occurrence of various corruption phenomena is prevented by perfecting and perfecting the mechanism for preventing conflicts of interest.The so-called conflict of interest refers to the conflict between the public interests represented by government officials in public office and the private interests they themselves have.The interests here are not only financial interests, but also professional interests, personal reputation, and so on.

Many interviewed experts believe that conflicts of interest are common in various fields in my country at present, and have become an important source of corruption.Relevant departments should improve and improve the mechanism for preventing conflicts of interest as soon as possible, because this is an important pillar of the national clean government system and directly affects the overall effectiveness of clean government construction. On March 1, 2010, Nan Yong, the well-known "head" of the Chinese Football Association, was arrested on suspicion of accepting bribes for manipulating football matches during the anti-gambling storm in football!

As we all know, before his sacking, Nan Yong was not only the full-time vice chairman of the Chinese Football Association, but also the director of the Football Management Center of the State Sports General Administration. The former position was regarded as the head of a non-governmental organization, and the latter was a bureau-level government official.Before that, he was also the leader of a commercial organization - the chairman of the Chinese Super League. The Chinese Football Association and the Football Management Center are two brands and one team, which determines that the Chinese Football Association is both an authority and a market player.Experts interviewed pointed out that Nan Yong has several roles, both a "referee" and an "athlete", so it is inevitable to use the rules and policies formulated by himself to seek profits in the market.

In some major corruption cases that occurred in the past, there were conflicts of interest.For example, Zhou Guangyu, the former director of the Construction Bureau of Daiyue District, Tai'an City, Shandong Province, has personal assets of tens of millions of yuan and 18 companies involved in real estate development, pawn, guarantee, pharmaceutical and other industries. The intermediate court sentenced life imprisonment and confiscation of all personal property in the first instance; Lei Jianmin, the former director of the Linwei District Transportation Bureau of Weinan City, Shaanxi Province, set up four engineering project departments privately, representing Party A's Linwei District Transportation Bureau, and Party B for his personal projects The Ministry signed a false contract on Tongcun Road to extract project funds, and was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Weinan City Intermediate Court at the first instance for committing corruption, accepting bribes, and unknown sources of huge amounts of property.

It is understood that some conflicts of interest in our country have attracted attention due to the occurrence of the case and have been regulated, while some are extremely concealed and have no specific and clear sentencing in law, such as officials who retire and work in private companies with high salaries, and officials manage privately. business related to his private interests and the interests of his relatives, etc. "Over the past 30 years of reform and opening up, my country's social and economic development has undergone great changes, and many social conflicts have arisen, among which conflicts of interest are the direct manifestation." Professor Wang Yukai from the Public Administration Department of the National School of Administration told reporters, "At this stage, There are three major conflicts of interest in our society, namely conflicts of interest between labor and capital, conflicts of interest in social distribution, and conflicts of interest between the government and the public.”

"Among the three major conflicts of interest, conflicts of interest between labor and capital have the largest scope in our society. In the era of planned economy, this problem was not obvious. With the development of market economy, the problem has become more and more prominent." Wang Yukai further explained, "In society In terms of distribution of interest conflicts, with the wide disparity between the rich and the poor in society, the phenomenon of "hatred of the rich" is becoming more and more serious, and the social class antagonism caused by it cannot be ignored. In particular, the conflict of interest between the government and the public must be paid attention to, because the conflict of interest Behind the scenes, the essence is the conflict of interests between officials and the public, which directly damages the party's ruling foundation. Such as violent land expropriation, demolition, etc."

"The existence of conflicts of interest is inevitable. The key is to prevent the deterioration of conflicts of interest, especially to curb the invasion of vulnerable groups by powerful interest groups." Professor Zhang Ming, Department of Political Science, Renmin University of China, pointed out in an interview with reporters, "In some places When the judiciary is ineffective and the mediation mechanism is missing, if the public seeks to resolve the problem through petitions, online exposure, etc., it means that the problem has reached a serious level.” According to many interviewed experts, conflict of interest is an important source of corruption.Because in the decision-making process and administrative process, if the private interests of officials conflict with the public responsibilities represented by their official duties, if there is no system to solve them in a timely and reasonable manner, corruption will easily occur.

The reporter's investigation found that the current conflicts of interest among Chinese officials can be classified into three types: transactional conflicts of interest, influence conflicts of interest, and "rotational" conflicts of interest. "Transactional conflicts of interest are when officials take advantage of their positions to directly collect private interests from stakeholders." Li Chengyan said, "This kind of situation is relatively common. real estate developers to buy houses; officials who have the authority to approve the development of mineral resources buy shares in coal mines, invest in 'dry shares', and so on."

Among various conflicts of interest, influence-type conflicts of interest usually manifest as officials using the influence of public power to directly or indirectly realize the private interests of themselves, their relatives, or stakeholders, such as dealing with relatives, self-dealing, influencing transactions, nepotism, etc. relationship, etc. Compared with other conflicts of interest, "rotating" conflicts of interest are more concealed—some officials have dual roles of public and private, and use public power to seek private interests for themselves, their relatives, or stakeholders in the process of performing public affairs.Typical forms include starting a company by yourself, working part-time, and working in an enterprise after retirement.

"At present, the public does not trust certain personnel appointments and dismissals, government procurement, project bidding, and administrative approval. This kind of behavior weakens the public's basic trust in officials. In reality, even if officials do not obtain private benefits, as long as there is an obvious conflict of interest, the public has reason to question the objectivity of officials in the decision-making process and administrative process. " Because of this, preventing conflicts of interest is regarded by most countries as an effective forward-looking strategy to prevent corruption.In recent years, my country has promulgated dozens of regulations and policies aimed at conflicts of interest.Among them, the "Decision on Strictly Prohibiting Party and Government Organs and Party and Government Officials from Doing Business and Running Enterprises" issued in 1984; "Several Provisions Prohibiting the Use of Positional Convenience to Seek Improper Benefits"; issued in 1998, "Notice on Issues Concerning Decoupling Central Party and Government Organs from Economic Entities and Directly Managed Enterprises"; adopted by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress in 2009 The "Criminal Law Amendment of the People's Republic of China (VII)" clarifies the issue of penalties for accepting bribes by close relatives of state functionaries and former state functionaries. However, although dozens of such regulations and policies have been issued in the past, they only belong to internal party regulations and administrative regulations.In these regulations and policies, although there is no clear statement such as "prevention of conflicts of interest", many contents are aimed at preventing conflicts of interest, so as to prevent and control corruption from the source. On September 18, 2009, the "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Strengthening and Improving Some Major Issues Concerning Party Building under the New Situation" adopted by the Fourth Plenary Session of the Seventeenth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China clearly stated: "In accordance with the accelerated formation of a unified, open, competitive and orderly modern market system It is required to promote relevant reforms, establish and improve the system for preventing conflicts of interest, and improve the market operation mechanism in the fields of public resource allocation, public asset transactions, and public product production.” This is the first time that a central document uses the brand-new concept of “conflict of interest” as a clean government. From February 25th to 26th, 2010, the 2009 inspection work report meeting on the establishment of a system for punishing and preventing corruption was held in Beijing.He Yong, secretary of the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee and deputy secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, also emphasized at the meeting: "It is necessary to establish a sound system to prevent conflicts of interest, to minimize and avoid power rent-seeking opportunities in areas such as public resource allocation, public asset transactions, and public product production. " "The central government has repeatedly mentioned 'conflict of interest' recently, which shows that my country's anti-corruption is undergoing a transformation of thinking in the overall strategy, and it is trying to use a comprehensive and realistic strategy to prevent corruption, highlighting the importance of prevention and root cause work, and it is also the deepening of the anti-corruption construction. One of the signs of advancement." Li Chengyan analyzed it. In order for my country to advance anti-corruption in depth, many interviewed experts believe that the premise must be to start from the aspect of solving "conflicts of interest", which urgently needs to be combined with my country's actual situation, learn from foreign successful experiences, and establish an effective anti-corruption system as soon as possible. Conflict of Interest Mechanism. According to experts, developed countries such as Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom have enacted the management of conflict of interest activities as laws.It mainly stipulates strict and detailed regulations on matters that are likely to cause conflicts of interest, such as official property declaration, asset disposal, recusal, gifts and gifts, employment after leaving office, and economic investment activities.For example, the Canadian government promulgated the "Conflict of Interest Charter", and formulated the "Public Officials' Conflict of Interest and Post-employment Code of Conduct" for current and retired public officials; the "Conflict of Interest Act" in the United States is a criminal law that stipulates corresponding fines The United Kingdom has formulated a "declaration of interests" system for senior officials, requiring officials to first state whether the proposed decision-making matters are related to personal interests before participating in decision-making. "The anti-corruption experience accumulated by some countries is worth learning from." Wang Yukai said, "We must not only scientifically learn from the successful experience and practices of the international community in preventing conflicts of interest, but also fully consider our country's current specific anti-corruption situation and work priorities. Step by step and targeted to strengthen their own clean government construction." On October 14, 2009, China and the United States jointly held a symposium in Beijing on the theme of "Code of Integrity - Preventing Conflicts of Interest".He Guoqiang, Member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and Secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, pointed out when meeting with the participants: “The establishment of a mechanism to prevent conflicts of interest is an important topic proposed by the Fourth Plenary Session of the Seventeenth Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. China will combine the results of this seminar and absorb Based on the beneficial experience of various countries, we should study and formulate relevant systems as soon as possible.” It is understood that some local governments in my country have already "tested the waters" to prevent conflicts of interest. In July 2009, Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province issued the "Interim Measures for the Avoidance of Conflicts of Interest of State Staff in Wenzhou City".As a result, the unfamiliar concept of "conflict of interest" has officially entered the sight of local leaders. In February 2010, Hangzhou City, Zhejiang Province introduced a system to prevent conflicts of interest.According to reports, Hangzhou conducted research on this a few years ago. For example, the Municipal Commission for Discipline Inspection defined the behavior of Liu Moumou, who used his power to directly sell the cultural market business license he held in his hands, as a "direct transaction type". Conflicts of interest; officials are required to disclose information about the employment and business of family members, spouses and children, etc. However, the reporter's investigation found that my country's institutional regulations for preventing conflicts of interest are not perfect-these institutional regulations are not only scattered in various guidelines, regulations, and reports, but are not systematic, and the objects constrained by the institutional regulations are different. It is also difficult to unify the scale, and many of them are "inaccurate", which is time-sensitive and limited.More importantly, most of the regulations do not have corresponding punitive clauses and lack operability. Due to the existence of various disadvantages, the implementation effect of the system regulations on preventing conflicts of interests is not good.For example, "focus on prevention" has not been put into practice; the conflict of interest issues have not been dealt with in a timely manner; most officials have vague understandings; According to the opinions of the interviewed experts, in order to reduce the occurrence of corruption by preventing conflicts of interest, it is necessary to make reasonable arrangements in terms of power and interests on the premise of "information symmetry" between the government and the public, and to block the relationship between power and interests as soon as possible. Officials use their power for personal gain, and increase the supervision and handling of conflicts of interest. "We must pay attention to innovation in ethics education for officials, change the traditional ideological and political education methods, and help officials understand the nature of conflicts of interest." Professor Qi Shanhong of Nankai University suggested in an interview with reporters, "Integrity education should be combined with ethics training, and personal belief education. The usual practice is an important training content for officials to help them act in accordance with their beliefs from the heart, so as to prevent ideological deterioration, fundamentally solve various behaviors of officials’ rent-seeking system, and effectively resolve conflicts of interest, etc. Related questions." "As long as there may be conflicts between official activities and private interests, officials should avoid interests." Du Liyuan, a lawyer from Beijing Zhongsheng Law Firm, told reporters, "From the actual situation in our country, the People's Congress, the Political Consultative Conference, the party and government organs, and judicial organs Public officials such as civil servants are subjects involved in conflicts of interest. When they perform official duties, they should avoid those who have interests in themselves or those with whom they are husband and wife, direct blood relatives, collateral blood relatives within three generations, and close relatives by marriage. Since our country has a tradition of emphasizing social relationships, the scope of supervision and management needs to be expanded, including the relationship between classmates, teachers and students, fellow villagers, comrades-in-arms, and even former colleagues and lovers that can affect the fair and reasonable execution of official duties. Included in the scope of avoidance." "The official property declaration system is an important measure to prevent and control corruption. It can solve the problem of information asymmetry between officials and the public to a certain extent, and play an early warning role." Du Liyuan said, "But unfortunately, the property declaration system Laws and regulations have not yet been formed in our country, only stipulated through party discipline documents. For this reason, relevant departments should also speed up the legislative process of this system, and the declaration content should include the property status of individuals, spouses and minor children, such as wages, salaries, various Subsidies and welfare fees, stocks, pensions, real estate, bonds, interests obtained by individuals through other labor, interests obtained from investment and rewards, etc. The declaration content should be open to public scrutiny.” "Property declaration officials should conduct a detailed review, and those assets found to constitute actual or potential conflicts of interest must be disposed of." Professor Yang Fan, director of the Institute of World Economics, School of Business, China University of Political Science and Law, said in an interview with reporters, "At present, my country's Party and government agencies, people's congresses, and political consultative conferences absorb a group of elites from private enterprises and business circles, which may cause conflicts between their work and the assets they own. They should be managed through the sale of interests and secret trust management within the time limit specified after they take office. and other forms to complete the disposal of assets that constitute actual or potential conflicts of interest." "In order to make officials feel at ease in public affairs and avoid conflicts of interest due to taking into account private property, a better way is to implement secret trust management of official property." Yang Fan suggested, "Official property can be handed over to an independent trust agency for management. , while the specific organization and management information of the trust are kept secret from officials, and officials cannot know their own trust status during their tenure. That is to say, trust institutions do not disclose any information to officials, and are only responsible to government management departments.” "A perfect system for preventing conflicts of interest must have specific implementation measures, which requires strengthening the implementation mechanisms such as supervision mechanism, evaluation mechanism, reward and punishment mechanism, and recognition mechanism." Li Chengyan said, "During the entire implementation process, the behavior of conflicts of interest must be To form a powerful supervision system, we must give a comprehensive and scientific evaluation of the integrity of officials and the handling of conflicts of interest. At the same time, the discipline inspection and supervision agencies should fully understand the importance of preventing conflicts of interest, strengthen theoretical research and Policy exploration, etc.” Many interviewed experts believe that from the perspective of anti-corruption, my country needs a "Law on the Prevention of Conflicts of Interest", which summarizes the common content in the current policies and regulations, and uniformly introduces the concept of "conflicts of interest", which will further improve Systematic and effective construction of clean government.