【文章內(nèi)容簡介】 redistribution mechanism”Improving people’s quality of life by higher public expenditureKeeping social stability by providing a minimal social relief to the poor and people in needsInvolving various nonstate actors in welfare provisionHaving promoted fundamental value changes in social policy, the postMao leadership is well aware of the traditional welfare and social policy model being inappropriate. Nowadays, the Chinese leaders subscribe to the notions that the modern state should act as facilitator and enabler in public policy and public management, believing that the Chinese state should set out an appropriate regulatory framework for governing social / public policy. The actual financing, delivery and provision of social / public policy should rest with the market and other nonstate sectors。 while the state is responsible for creating a “safety net” to help those most needy and vulnerable. Thus, it is not surprising to see the practices and reform strategies monly adopted in the neoliberal economies to transform the way social welfare and social policy is managed used to reform the social policy sector in China. Even though postMao leaders feel unfortable with the term “privatization” the state has actually reduced its provision of social policy and social welfare. The demonopolization of the state in the social policy domain has undoubtedly rendered the conventional practices of “managerial paternalism” and “organized dependence” inappropriate. Generous welfare benefits that state workers had enjoyed in the Mao period are now considered as welfare burdens on the state (Wong and Flynn, 2001). A better understanding of social policy reforms in China could be obtained by contextualizing changes and transformations in social policy sectors in the overall policy paradigm shift from a bureaucratic governance model to deregulated governance and even market governance models (see discussion below). Recent administrative reforms to streamline and reorganize the ministries at central and provincial levels are designed to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of Chinese public administration. Such reengineering exercises are to separate government and enterprises, to simplify government structures and rationalize government responsibilities and to strengthen the rule of law (Yang Kaifeng, 2002). Unlike the Mao era when the state took up all responsibilities in social policy provision, financing and regulation, the postMao leaders have attempted to redefine the relationships between the state and the market, the munity, and the civil society (Wong, 1998。 Mok, 2000). It is in such a context that social welfare and social policy development in mainland China has begun to experience fundamental changes along the lines of privatization, marketization and societalization. Education and health services used to be welfare entitlements of urban residents in the Mao era, but people in the reform period no longer enjoy such privileges. Marketization, Privatization and Societalization of Education and Health Policy Openly acknowledging the fact that the traditional welfare / social policy model is inappropriate and increasingly less efficient and petitive in the global market place, the postMao leaders have begun to roll back from welfare / social policy provision and financing. Aiming at better use of limited public expenditure, reforms along the line of efficiency gains and value for money, ideas and practices central to the new managerialism, is adopted to transform social policy and welfare delivery. Hence, different marketrelated strategies are adopted in reforming education and health policy and governance. Let us now turn to how the processes of marketization, privatization and societalization have changed the education and health sectors in postMao China.Education Policy Since the late 1970s, the modernization drive, the reform and opening up to the outside world has transformed the highly centralized planning economy into a market oriented and more dynamic economy. In the new market economy context, the old way of “centralized governance” in education is rendered inappropriate (Yang, 2000). Acknowledging that overcentralization and stringent rules would kill the initiatives and enthusiasm of local educational institutions, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) called for resolute steps to streamline administration, devolve powers to units at lower levels so as to allow them more flexibility to run education. Central to the reform, strategies are closely related to the policy of decentralization, whereby schools and higher education institutions have been given more autonomy to run their own businesses (Min, 1994。 Mok, 2002). Reshuffling the monopolistic role of the state in educational provision, reform in educational structure started in the mid1980s and has manifested a mix of private and public consumption (Cheng, 1995). Proliferation of education providers and diversification of education finance has bee increasingly popular (Wei and Zhang, 1995。 Mok, 2006). Reductions in State Financing and the Growth of Individual ContributionsIn the early 1980s, Deng Xiaoping, the late leader of the CCP, made a very important remark that the Chinese government would mit itself financially by raising the government investment in education by benchmarking up to around 4 % of GDP being allocated to educational development. Since the 1980s, Chinese economy has had significant and consistent growth with an average rate of 910 % annually. Nonetheless, the total allocation of central government fund on education has been repeatedly reported low. In 1995, only % of GDP was allocated to education, it was slightly improved by increasing to % and % in 1999 and 2002 respectively. But state education financing declined again in 2005 with only around % of GDP being allocated to education. Recognizing the importance of providing basic education to Chinese citizens