MEETING SPECIAL NEEDS: Volunteer social workers in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, teach a mentally retarded girl (center) to draw (LU HANXIN)

More than two decades ago, Zhang Kun, a 65-year-old businessman and former teacher in Dongguan City, Guangdong Province, embarked on a philanthropic journey to help poor children.

In 1988, Zhang came across a letter from a poor student seeking financial help to finish her education. He helped the writer and then paid dozens of visits to schools in remote rural areas to find more children in need. Over time, his philanthropic mission attracted a group of like-minded donors. Together, they have supported around 4,000 students over the past 23 years.

However, Zhang has had difficulty getting approval for his charitable organization from the local government. Five times in the past seven years, he tried to register with the civil affairs department of the local government, but his applications were rejected each time.

According to the Regulation on Registration and Administration of Social Organizations, which became effective in 1998, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) must find a government department or agency to be their supervisory body before they can be legally registered. Zhang had not been able to find a supervisory body.

In July 2011, Minister of Civil Affairs Li Liguo announced at a meeting that independent nonprofit organizations in the fields of charity, social welfare and social services would be allowed to register directly with civil affairs departments, without first finding a supervisory body.

Although the local government had announced the introduction of the liberalization policy when Zhang handed over his application materials for a sixth time, he wasn't very hopeful. But this time, to his surprise, his One Thousandth Charity Services Center successfully completed the registration process within two hours on October 1, 2011.

Zhang's success, widely reported by the local media, soon led to the registration of a number of local NGOs.

As of the end of 2010, China had a total of 440,000 registered social organizations, while another 3 million remained unregistered. The simplified NGO registration policy is intended to encourage more NGOs to register and offer more public services.

Qing Lianbin, a sociology professor at the Party School of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, said that NGOs that are increasingly active in community development should receive more support from the government.

At a seminar on social management attended by provincial-level leaders in December 2011, Zhou Yongkang, a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, reiterated the importance of improving social management by incorporating lessons learned from good community-level experience.

"The task of improving social management is a vital function of community-level organs, and the government will increase allocations of manpower and material resources to allow local bodies to carry out these functions," Zhou said.

Changes

In 2011, the Chinese Government attaches great importance to improving social management.

Last February, Chinese President Hu Jintao, also General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, said that officials need to adopt more innovative social management methodologies and improve their work efficiency.

In March 2011, the government work report endorsed by the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, said that the Chinese Government will accelerate reform of the social management system. The outline of China's 12th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development (2011-15), adopted in March, lists "strengthening and making innovations in social management through seeking both temporary and permanent solutions" as a key target.