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Bulletin of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Chinese Version)

Keywords

public service；accessibility；social economic status；public resource；public capacity

Abstract

Balanced and equitable access to public services is a core element of high-quality development and is frequently emphasized in policy documents. Nevertheless, existing literature lacks attention to the conceptual elaboration and micro-level mechanisms of the accessibility of individual public services. Social economic status serves as a comprehensive and widely meaningful indicator of differences among individuals. This study argues that accessibility reflects the degree of adaptation between supply and demand in public services based on government-citizen interactions. The study proposes a unified analytical framework including public resources and capabilities on the demand side and administrative procedures on the supply side, aiming to explain the impact of social economic status on the accessibility of individual public services. Empirical findings from the 2015 and 2019 China Social Governance Survey (CSGS) underscore a significant relationship between social economic status and the accessibility of individual public services, operating through social support on the public resource side and fair treatment within administrative procedures. Furthermore, the Free Compulsory Education Policy has weakened the effect of social economic status, and the influence of public capability mechanism varies with the knowledge required for different public services. Theoretically, the study contributes to clarifying the conceptual scope and overall understanding of the accessibility of public services, broadening the perspective of micro-level research, and providing solid policy support and decision-making references to support the transition of public services from “nominal inclusiveness” to “substantive equity”.

First page

1970

Last Page

1983

Language

Chinese

Publisher

Bulletin of Chinese Academy of Sciences

References

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