Design and learning effects of China’s expert advisory committees¹

1 “China” in this paper refers to People’s Republic of China.

Figures & data

Table 1. Institutional design of PABs and effects on policy advice.

	Transparency	Formalization	Government control	Inclusiveness
Pros	Democratic legitimacy and social credibility	Stable advice production and process legitimacy	Advice relevant to policymakers; advice reaching high-level decision-makers	Enhance legitimacy and local feasibility; integrate new values and interests
Cons	Citizen distrust and confusion; uncertainty and losing autonomy	Costly and not adapt to changing societal needs	Low autonomy of advice production and less innovation; Epistemic mode of learning is less dominant	Producing uncertain advice that complicates public communication, be partisan biased, serving competing political interests and for short-term firefighting

Table 2. Coding frame.

Basic information	Committee’s title Years of establishment
Formalization and transparency	Issue charters/by-laws Chairs’ appointment announcement Number of meetings since establishment Advising policies in meetings
Government control	Chairs’ backgrounds^a Government officials chairing the meetings Government officials speaking in the meetings
Membership composition	Members’ career background
Advice and advisory activities	Develop and implement strategies and policy plans Facilitate scientific and democratic decision-making Evaluation research and investigations Technical standards Innovation and new development of the sectors Facilitate scientific and democratic decision-making Consult the sectoral stakeholders or the public

^aCoding categories for chairs and members’ background (see Appendix 1).

Figure 1. Number of newly established ministerial EACs (1993–2018). Source: Authors’ database. The total number is 170, excluding four established in 2019 and three do not report years of establishment.

Table 3. Appointment, rules, meetings of EACs (1993–2018).

Public announcement	Yes	No
Official notice of establishment	139	39
Charters or by-laws	52 (31 online accessible)	126
Members’ appointment	145 (full list 122)	33
Change of membership	33	144
Government officials^a chair meetings	39	139
Government officials speaking in meetings	71	107
Members providing policy advice in meetings	27	151	Total = 178

^aWe only code the most recent meetings by the EACs. The government officials refer to those from the sponsoring government agencies. The number for “No” includes unknown cases.

Table 4. Meetings of EACs (1993–2018).

Years since establishment	0–5 years	6–15 years	16–25 years	26 years or more	NA
Meetings since establishment
1–5 times	80	77	12	1	170
6–10 times	1	0	0	0	1
Over 10 times	0	2	0	0	2
NA	1	1	0	0	5
Total	82	80	12	1	178

Note: Six EACs did not report their meetings or years of establishment and are not included in the table. NA: years or number of meetings are unknown.

Table 5. Chairs of EACs.

Categories of career background	Incumbent	Retired
Governmental think tanks	1	1
Non-governmental think tanks	73	3
Sponsoring government agencies^a	23	15
Non-sponsoring government agencies	27	9
Enterprises or companies	5	0
Social organizations	16	0
Total^b	145	28

Note: ^aSponoring government agencies refer to ministerial agencies that establish and provide secretariat support for the EACs; ^bThe number of chairs do not equal to the number of advisory committees. Some committees do not release their chairs’ and members’ information, and some committee chairs’ background belong to more than one category.

Table 6. Career background of members of EACs.

Categories of career background (containing more than 50% of members)	EACs with the list of full members
Non-governmental think tanks	100
Government agencies providing secretariat support	2
Other government agencies	8
Retired government officials	1
Social Organizations	1
Companies or enterprises	8
No categories are above 50%	3
Total	122

Note: The addition of all categories equals 123 because one EAC has two categories of 50% members.

Table 7. Non-governmental think tank (NGTT) members of EACs.

Categories containing more than 50% of NGTT members	NGTT members 50% or more of total	NGTT members less than 50% of total
University researchers	38	4
Party schools or administrative institutes	0	1
Academies of sciences, social sciences, or engineering	5	1
Research institutes, monitoring centers, planning institutes sponsored by government agencies	22	10
Hospitals	11	0
Private think tanks	0	0
No categories among NGTT members are above 50% or no NGTT members	24	7
Total	99	23

Note: One EAC’s NGTT members have equal number from universities and government-sponsored institutes/monitoring centers

Table 8. Advice and advisory activities of EACs.

Advice	Yes (no. of committees)	No (no. of committees)
(1) Develop strategies and policy plans	61	116
(2) Implement strategies and policy plans	136	41
(3) Evaluation research and investigations	71	106
(4) Technical standards	36	141
(5) Innovation and new development in the sector	59	118
(6) Facilitate scientific and democratic decision-making	77	100
(7) Consult the sectoral stakeholders or the public	9	168

Note: Coding is based on the recent government press release about committee meetings.

Table A1. Codebook for EACs’ roles, functions, and production of policy advice.

General rules	1. Coded sentence shall be complete, including the subject
	2. Coded sentence shall include relevant words and phrases that show its relevance to the corresponding categories
	3. “Policies” include reform (gaige) initiatives and programs (xiangmu)
	4. Present/yes = 1, Not present/no = 0
A. Responsibilities
A1	Help government to implement policies/plans
A2	Facilitate scientific and democratic decision-making
A3	Provide government policy advice
A.3.1	Development strategies or plans
A.3.2	Technical standards
A.3.3	Innovation and new development in the sector
A.3.4	Consulting the sectoral stakeholders or the public
B. Activities
B.1	Research and investigations
B.2	Meeting (the most recent) discussions
B.2.1	Whether members provide policy advice in the meeting
B.2.2	Whether sponsoring government agency’s officials attend
B.3	Government officials attendance (the most recent meeting)
B.3.1	Whether incumbent government officials chair the meeting
B.3.2	Whether incumbent government officials give speech

Table A2. Coding categories for chairs and members’ career background.

Categories	1. Incumbent (1.a) and retired officials (1.b) of the sponsoring government agencies (which establish the advisory committee)
	2. Incumbent (2.a) and retired officials (2.b) of other government agencies
	3. Incumbent (3.a) and retired members (3.b) of government think tanks
	4. Incumbent (4.a) and retired members (4.b) of non-government think tanks
	4.1 Universities
	4.2 Party schools or administrative institutes
	4.3 Science/Engineering/Social Science academies
	4.4 Research/planning institutes, centers, labs affiliated with government
	4.5 Hospitals
	4.6 Private think tanks
	5. Incumbent (5.a) and retired members (5.b) of enterprises or companies
	6. Incumbent (6.a) and retired members (6.b) of social organizations
	7. Incumbent (7.a) and retired members (7.b) of other organizations (e.g. media)