Abstract:

The government's procurement of services from social organizations represents a central strategy in advancing supply-side reforms of public services. "Reverse embedding" describes the government's active integration of administrative logic into the operations of social organizations through mechanisms such as financial oversight, administrative directives, and evaluation criteria. While this strategy seeks to enhance public service delivery, it has produced challenges, including administrative dependency and limited innovation, which have become significant barriers to improving public service quality. This paper introduces the concept of "reverse embedding," systematically elucidates its underlying mechanisms, and situates it within the broader context of embedding theory. It examines the inherent tensions between administrative and professional logics and establishes a four-level analytical framework: institutional environment, interaction process, behavioral outcomes, and governance optimization. Drawing on theoretical models from new public administration, collaborative governance, and welfare pluralism, the study highlights the explanatory value of reverse embedding for understanding government-society collaborative governance in China. The paper also outlines pathways for optimizing governance structures, emphasizing four key dimensions: contract governance, relational governance, multi-actor governance, and digital governance. It further underscores three foundational elements for fostering the autonomy of social organizations: diversified funding, professional capacity building, and industry self-regulation. The principal theoretical contribution of this study is the extension of embeddedness theory, providing new insights into organizational autonomy in non-Western contexts and offering a fresh analytical lens for exploring the enduring "control-autonomy" dynamic in government-society collaboration.