ABSTRACT
The Chinese non-governmental and non-profit organizations (NGOs, or NPOs) have made unprecedented progress in number, size, type and functions as a direct outcome of the state’s encouragement and society’s response to the new challenges brought on by the reforms begun in 1978. Surging from different backgrounds, today these new entities engage in a wide array of operations, and carry out diverse missions. Despite the increasing interest in China’s state-society relations among students of modern China, the face of the NGO sector remains unclear. Not until 1998 did the government finally establish a legal structure for China’s NGO sector by issuing regulations for both social organizations (SOs) and non-governmental and noncommercial enterprises (NGNCEs). Yet, at the same time, many different terms are used to describe NGOs without having any official or legal interpretations. Furthermore, the strong official influence on non-governmental matters and the close relations between the government and many NGOs have raised serious questions as to whether Chinese NGOs are real NGOs and whether they play independent roles that differ from the party-state. The NGOs’ autonomous nature and their relations with the government have become such major issues in this field of study that they merit further discussion before proceeding to an analysis of NGO roles.
