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Abstract

It is not easy to set up non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in China. They have to register with the government and, for a long time, the government subjected them to a complicated qualification system. They could not register with the Ministry of Civil Affairs (MoCA) directly. They had to get sponsorship from a suitable ‘business supervision unit’ within the government (‘盨盬眯眧眔’) and only then, once they had a sponsor, were they allowed to register with MoCA. Many NGOs were unable to find a suitable sponsor, so could not register with the government. This double filter definitely impeded the development of NGOs in China. They had to turn into underground organizations without any legal status, but they still functioned.

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© 2015 Chun-yi Lee

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Lee, CY. (2015). Growing or Perishing? The Development of Labour NGOs. In: Fulda, A. (eds) Civil Society Contributions to Policy Innovation in the PR China. The Nottingham China Policy Institute Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137518644_5

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