Government legal advisers play an important role in formulating policies to promote administration according to law.

It is necessary to establish a lifelong accountability system for major decisions and incorporate the effectiveness of the rule of law into the performance appraisal. It also lists "deepening administration according to law and accelerating the construction of a government ruled by law" as one of the six major tasks to comprehensively promote the rule of law. This is an inevitable requirement for China to be in power, to be in power and to build a China ruled by law. This requires us to establish and improve the government advisory system, fully protect the rights and status of legal advisers, and ensure the efficient operation and legal implementation of the legal advisory system. I. Concept and function of government legal adviser A government legal adviser is a natural person or organization that provides legal advisory services to the government. The system of government legal adviser is the general name of how to produce, operate and improve the system and rules of government legal adviser. At present, the government legal adviser in our country refers to the institution that signs the legal adviser service contract with the government, among which the most important institution is the law firm, followed by the work unit where the legal expert works. With the growth of lawyers in China and the standardized development of the lawyer industry, the role of lawyers in social affairs is becoming more and more obvious. Lawyers should not only have professional legal knowledge, but also have rich practical experience. Therefore, as consultants hired by the government, they can look at government behavior with the role and mentality of social supervision, while consultant lawyers are not limited by internal personnel of administrative organs, and can judge government behavior from a relatively objective and fair perspective. The government legal adviser system plays an important role in ensuring the legislation, law enforcement and supervision of administrative organs. In the legislative stage or before making major decisions, the government can effectively improve its administrative ability according to law by asking government legal advisers to give legal opinions. , so that the government's legal adviser can fully participate in government decision-making and policy-making, and ensure the legitimacy of government policies and decisions. In the stage of government law enforcement, the government, as an administrative subject and a civil subject, participates in economic and civil activities at multiple levels, resulting in a large number of legal affairs. When the government conducts investment and procurement activities according to law, it can hire legal advisers to participate in non-litigation affairs such as contract negotiation, drafting and review; When there is a dispute or contradiction between the government and other legal persons and organizations, legal advisers may be hired to represent the government in court to participate in litigation. The government legal adviser system is also an important guarantee to guard against legal risks and supervise government decision-making. Legal opinions, certificates of legality of major decisions and legal review issued by legal advisers can study and evaluate legal risks and put forward risk prevention measures. At the same time, the filing system of these legal documents can effectively supervise whether the relevant government officials make risk prevention and decision-making according to the suggestions already put forward in the legal documents, and can play a certain preventive role for the relevant government staff to take advantage of their positions to abuse power for personal gain. Two. Brief introduction to the legal adviser system of governments in developed countries and regions ruled by law (I) The evolution and development of the legal adviser system of American governments. At the beginning of the federal government of the United States, there was no Ministry of Justice, but the President set up a special position for work needs: "Attorney General", whose duty is to give opinions and suggestions on legal issues at the request of the President of the United States. Although the "chief agent" is not a member of the president's cabinet, he can attend cabinet meetings as nonvoting delegates and can be said to be the president's personal legal adviser. In the next hundred years, the general counsel appeared in various departments of the federal government and participated in the daily work of various departments of the federal government. After the Civil War, the United States established the Ministry of Justice, and the president's "chief agent" directly served as the attorney general of the US government. The attorney general is the chief legal adviser to the president and government of the United States. His duty is to handle legal affairs for the president and government of the United States. The Ministry of Justice employs a large number of lawyers to handle the legal affairs of the federal government. Each department has also set up its own office of departmental legal adviser, and the President appoints a general legal adviser. Its basic duties are to provide legal advice to department heads and legal guidance to business officials, and its work also includes reviewing all work plans and administrative rules. The employees in the legal advisory offices of all departments are lawyers, and the scale and number account for the vast majority of lawyers hired by the government. Among them, the Legal Advisory Office of the Ministry of Agriculture has four regional offices and 13 branches, and the Legal Advisory Office of the Ministry of Health has 10 regional offices, each with a size ranging from 6 to 29 lawyers. The state government also adopts a system similar to the federal government, and employs a large number of lawyers to handle government legal affairs. It can be said that America is a country ruled by lawyers. (II) Introduction to the Legal Adviser System of the Hong Kong Government During the British rule, the Hong Kong Government inherited the British system and established the Department of Justice on 1855 (then known as the Legal Department, but renamed the Department of Justice after the reunification with 1997, with the same functions and government status, but with a different name). The Chief Executive is the chief legal officer of the Hong Kong Government and is directly responsible to the Governor of Hong Kong. After the return of Hong Kong, the Secretary for Justice is one of only three policy secretaries in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. He is not only the chief legal adviser to the Chief Executive, the government, government policy bureaux, departments and agencies, but also a member of the Executive Council. The Department of Justice consists of five important departments, the main members of which are government lawyers. The whole Ministry of Justice is actually a big law firm. Apart from the power of prosecution, the Department of Justice is also responsible for drafting all laws of the Hong Kong Government, providing legal advice to government bureaux and departments, providing legal advice on land planning, infrastructure and environmental protection, representing the government in civil disputes involving the government as a lawyer or barrister, and attending multilateral agreement meetings as a member of the Chinese and Hong Kong delegations. It is the omni-directional infiltration mode of the Department of Justice that the daily work of the Hong Kong government is basically carried out under the guidance of the whole process of law, which is one of the reasons for the high degree of rule of law in Hong Kong society. Three. Analysis on the construction of government rule of law and the current situation of government legal adviser system in China (1) The country lacks the tradition of rule of law. China experienced more than 2000 years of feudal autocracy, and the feudal thoughts were not completely eliminated from people's minds. The idea of rule by man is deeply rooted, and the mature bureaucratic system of rule by man ensures the ubiquitous operation of administrative power, and the law is in an extremely secondary position. In the past 30 years of reform and opening up, the country's rule of law has made some achievements, but we must clearly realize that we are building the rule of law on the basis of a serious lack of rule of law tradition. When most ordinary people encounter problems, the first thing they think of is how to find relationships or even spend money to settle them. The phenomenon that power is greater than law, affection is greater than law, and money is greater than law appears constantly. It is precisely for this reason that the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China proposed that in order to comprehensively promote the rule of law, no organization or individual should have the privilege beyond the Constitution and laws, and it is absolutely not allowed to substitute words for laws, and to suppress and bend laws with power. (2) Leading cadres generally lack legal thinking. Leading cadres play a leading role in national governance and social management. Today's leading cadres should be said to have strong political thinking and economic thinking ability, but generally lack legal thinking. The outstanding performance is that many cadres do not look for rules when they encounter problems, do not act according to rules, do not use rules to solve problems, and rarely think about rules in their daily work. Some cadres even have extreme ideas above the law, such as the famous saying "What is law?" I care about it at ordinary times, and it cares about me when something goes wrong. "This led to the illegal operation of the government. For example, in many places, the contradiction between project construction land and farmland protection is solved by the illegal way of "getting on the bus first and buying tickets later". (III) Lack of rigid institutional guarantee for the legal adviser system At present, the working mechanism for legal advisers to participate in the operation of government power is in an embarrassing situation of "saying is important, doing is secondary, and being busy is unnecessary". Whether a local government establishes a legal adviser system, whether lawyers can participate in government services after the establishment, and the scope of lawyers' participation in government services are all lacking in rigid institutional guarantee, and the work is very arbitrary. It depends entirely on the subjective will of the main leaders of the government, and most of our leaders lack legal thinking and do not pay attention to the work of legal advisers at all. Therefore, at present, the overall level of the construction of the government legal adviser system in China is low. The working mechanism of legal advisers participating in the operation of government power and the guarantee system of government administration according to law need to be further improved. (D) The government legal adviser system is generally established, but it has little effect. The legal adviser system of China government was established in 1980s. At present, most local governments and departments have hired legal advisers, and many places have made some useful explorations. However, on the whole, the role of consultant lawyers is generally small, and they usually play some roles in the peripheral work of the government, such as accompanying leaders to receive visits, participating in resolving letters and visits related to law and litigation, and participating in handling major emergencies or mass incidents as firefighters. In many places, the legal adviser system is a mere formality. The government will set up a legal advisory group to solve this problem next time, and will not consult lawyers for many years. Legal advisers only appear in books or publicity materials and never participate in government services. (E) The overall enthusiasm of government consultants is not high. The government legal adviser system not only lacks rigid institutional guarantee, but also lacks financial guarantee. The government rarely pays fees for hiring practicing lawyers as consultants, and even if it pays, it is very limited, and it is difficult to form a "consideration". In addition, the affairs contacted by lawyers are mostly peripheral affairs, and the enthusiasm of consulting lawyers is generally not high. Four. Suggestions on Strengthening the Legal Adviser System of the Government (1) Governments at all levels should establish a legal adviser system. A society ruled by law, including a government ruled by law, cannot be built in a region alone. This is the conclusion of many well-known scholars, and the legal adviser system should also be fully promoted. Government departments at all levels in China have different decision-making power and administrative law enforcement power, and governments at all levels should be equipped with legal advisers. At the same time, to build a government ruled by law, administrative heads at all levels are the first responsible persons. If the top leaders can administer according to law, the government ruled by law will be half finished. It is necessary to provide full-time legal advisers to the top leaders of the government, so as to provide professional legal opinions and suggestions to the top leaders in a comprehensive and timely manner and evaluate the legitimacy of the top leaders in performing their duties. (two) to establish and improve the relevant supporting system of legal counsel, to establish a legal counsel consultation and demonstration system before the promulgation of major decisions and normative documents, and to promote the standardization and legalization of government decision-making; It is necessary to establish a legal risk assessment system for major government projects, major economic projects and major investments. Before making a decision, organize government legal advisers to demonstrate the legality and feasibility, so as to prevent and reduce the decision-making risk; It is necessary to establish a filing system for legal documents such as legal advice proposals, legal proof of major decisions, and legal review books to prevent relevant leading cadres from shirking their responsibilities under the pretext of "not knowing the law"; It is necessary to establish a review mechanism for the legality of major decisions of administrative organs, and establish a lifelong accountability system and accountability mechanism for major decisions. It is necessary to take the effectiveness of the rule of law construction as an important content to measure the work performance of leading bodies and leading cadres at all levels, incorporate it into the performance evaluation index system, and take the ability to abide by the law and handle affairs according to law as an important content to inspect cadres. (3) Actively guide legal advisers to participate in government work, organize legal advisers to assist the government in handling daily legal affairs, actively participate in administrative litigation and non-litigation legal affairs such as government investment and procurement, effectively resolve disputes and solve law-related affairs. Organize government legal advisers and professional lawyers to assist the government in handling letters and visits according to law, promote relevant departments to standardize law enforcement and fair justice, and guide the masses to reflect their demands according to law. Organize legal advisers to assist the government to carry out legal publicity and education, and provide basic government legal services such as legal consultation in streets (towns) and communities. Give full play to the role of government legal advisers in handling major, unexpected and sensitive incidents, assist the government in formulating and implementing disposal plans according to law, and properly handle contradictions and disputes and aftermath. (IV) Strengthening the Construction of the Team of Government Legal Advisers At present, there are five teams related to the work of government legal advisers, namely, judicial administrators, government legal staff, staff of the Law Department of government departments, public lawyers and social lawyers. Judging from the current actual development, the team of government legal advisers is basically undertaken by social lawyers. The Fourth Plenary Session proposed to build a team of lawyers with complementary advantages and reasonable structure, such as social lawyers, public lawyers and corporate lawyers. Strengthen the construction of legal service team, enhance the consciousness and firmness of lawyers to follow the rule of law in Socialism with Chinese characteristics, and build a team of lawyers with complementary advantages and reasonable structure, such as social lawyers, public lawyers and corporate lawyers. At the same time, it is necessary to establish a system for recruiting legislators, judges and prosecutors from qualified lawyers and legal experts, improve the standardized and convenient mechanism for recruiting talents from political and legal graduates, and improve the professional security system for government legal advisers. (5) Establish and improve the guarantee mechanism of the government legal adviser system, promote the government to purchase legal services, incorporate the government's purchase of legal services into the annual financial special budget of governments at all levels, and pay legal adviser fees in full and on time. Strengthen the funding guarantee for lawyers to participate in law-related petitions and public legal services, explore the formation of a funding guarantee mechanism based on cases and events, and gradually improve the level of protection.