Prof Liang Ma Illuminates Central Government Dynamics for “Collaborative Research Postgraduate Students' Seminar Series”
The School of Graduate Studies of Lingnan University and The Education University of Hong Kong co-hosted the "Collaborative Research Postgraduate Students' Seminar Series" in the 2024/25 academic year. The inaugural online seminar, held on 31 October 2024, featured a compelling presentation by Prof Liang Ma from Remin University of China on"Studying the Central Government: My Personal Journey and Its Implications". The seminar attracted around 100 online participants, including postgraduate students and academics from various institutions.
Prof Liang Ma is a professor at the School of Public Administration and Policy and a Research Fellow at the National Academy for Development and Strategy of Renmin University of China. He received his doctoral degree from Xi’an Jiaotong University, China. Before joining RUC, he was a Senior Research Fellow at the Nanyang Centre for Public Administration, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. His academic pursuits span digital governance, innovation, and performance management, with his work featured in prestigious journals and as op-eds in both international and Chinese media.
Central government policies profoundly impact our daily lives, yet scholarly literature often overlooks this level of governance, focusing instead on local and grassroots entities. Prof Ma shed light on this gap with his compelling seminar titled “Studying the central government: my personal journey and its implication”. In his presentation, he delved into his recent research on China's central government, encompassing topics such as organisational restructuring, leadership dynamics, reputation management, and collaborative networks.
Prof Ma's seminar commenced with an exploration of the central government's political significance, addressing the intricacies of central-local relations in China, the enigmatic nature of central government operations, and the prevalent focus on grassroots governance research. He outlined China's five-tier administrative hierarchy and discussed the evolution of central-local research both within China and globally.
Drawing from his own research and publication journey, Prof Ma dissected the reforms within central government agencies in China, particularly the implications of agency mergers. His presentation highlighted the leadership traits that define central government reforms, using firsthand interview data to underscore these characteristics. He also presented findings on the interplay between leadership attention, agency termination, and agency reputation.
Furthermore, Prof Ma unveiled the intricacies of interagency policy implementation networks, demonstrating how policies from the central government result from close collaboration among various agencies. He traced the strengthening of this interagency trend over time and analysed the roles of leading and participating agencies within the central government. The seminar also covered the network positions of agencies and their correlation with termination.
In conclusion, Prof Ma outlined potential avenues for future research in central government studies. He advocated for historical and archival studies to probe the relevance and challenges of central government research, suggesting the incorporation of new theories and concepts specific to the Chinese context and beyond. He also proposed the use of methodologies such as big data analysis and the inclusion of additional agencies, like party and military entities, in future discussions.
The “Collaborative Research Postgraduate Students' Seminar Series” will continue throughout October to December 2024.
About the Collaborative Research Postgraduate Students' Seminar Series
The collaborative seminar series aims to provide a platform for research postgraduate students to share their work, engage in insightful discussions, and foster interdisciplinary collaborations across the two universities. By bringing together scholars and students from different backgrounds, the series encourages the exchange of ideas and the advancement of knowledge in key research areas. Since this semester, the seminar series is also supported by the Section on Chinese Public Administration (SCPA) of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA).
