According to different conditions and nature, schools and other educational institutions can have various subject qualifications when carrying out activities, such as administrative legal relations, civil legal relations, litigation legal relations and so on. This paper mainly discusses the qualifications of administrative legal relations and civil legal relations in schools. When the school participates in the administrative legal relationship, it is the subject of the administrative legal relationship; When it participates in civil legal relations, it is the subject of civil legal relations.
As the main body of administrative legal relationship, the legal status of school is stipulated by administrative law. China's Constitution, relevant laws and administrative regulations stipulate the rights and obligations of social organizations as the main body of administrative legal relations. Generally speaking, the rights of social organizations are: (l) the right to independently manage internal affairs according to law; (two) the right to safeguard their legitimate rights and interests according to law; (three) to represent and safeguard the rights and interests of members of the organization according to law; (4) the right to participate in state management; (five) the right to supervise the administrative organs or bring a lawsuit according to law.
While enjoying the above rights, social organizations should also undertake or perform the following obligations: (l) accept the leadership of China; (2) Abide by the Constitution, laws and decrees of the state and implement administrative regulations; (three) to accept the obligations entrusted by the state administrative organs to perform; (4) the obligation to punish according to law after breaking the law; Wait a minute. The main feature of administrative legal relationship is unilateralism. Therefore, when there is an administrative legal relationship between schools and state administrative organs, their status is not equal. As long as it is an administrative instruction issued by the state administrative organ according to law, the school should abide by it and not go its own way. If the school thinks that an administrative instruction violates laws and regulations, it can be reflected through certain procedures, or an administrative lawsuit can be filed according to law. But before making a veto, it still needs to be implemented. The provisions of the Education Law on schools, such as the establishment of schools, the rights and obligations of schools, all reflect the above characteristics.
As the main body of civil legal relationship, a school should meet the legal person conditions stipulated in the General Principles of Civil Law and have legal person qualification. The general conditions of legal person stipulated in the General Principles of Civil Law include the following four aspects: (1) being established according to law; (2) Having necessary property or funds; (3) Having its own name, organization or place; (4) Be able to bear civil liability independently. If a school meets these four conditions at the same time, it can obtain legal person status.
A legal person is a social organization corresponding to a natural person and can legally become the subject of civil legal relations. As a part of society, a legal person should be able to participate in civil legal relations as an independent and complete unit in its own name, enjoy rights and assume obligations, and be able to bring a lawsuit or respond to a court or an arbitration institution. According to the different purposes and tasks of legal persons, China's General Principles of Civil Law divides legal persons into two categories: enterprise legal persons and non-enterprise legal persons. Enterprise legal persons are divided into corporate legal persons and unincorporated legal persons. Non-enterprise legal persons include government agencies, institutions and social organizations. According to the classification of General Principles of Civil Law, schools should belong to public institutions as legal persons among non-enterprise legal persons. [Page]
The legal person status of a school is a kind of personality similar to a natural person, and it is a subject qualification with civil rights given to the school by law according to the nature and conditions of the school. According to Article 39 of the Education Law, "schools and other educational institutions that meet the requirements of legal persons shall obtain legal person status from the date of approval of establishment or registration." In other words, when examining and approving the establishment or registration of schools and other educational institutions, the school authorities should also examine whether they have legal person qualifications. If so, it shall be stated in the approval or registration documents that it has the legal person qualification.
Obtaining legal person status means that a school independently enjoys civil rights and bears civil liabilities in civil activities according to law. According to the General Principles of Civil Law and relevant laws, generally speaking, the civil rights enjoyed by schools mainly include property rights, creditor's rights, intellectual property rights, name rights, reputation rights and honor rights. While enjoying civil rights, schools should also bear all civil liabilities caused by their own civil actions as independent legal persons, including civil liabilities for violating contracts and infringing on the legitimate rights and interests of other social organizations and individual citizens.
What needs to be pointed out here is that not all schools meet the legal person conditions and have legal person qualifications. If a village-run primary school does not meet the requirements of a legal person, it cannot obtain legal person status. In addition, the internal institutions of the school, such as a teaching and research section of the school, do not have the qualification of a legal person, and are very different from legal persons in enjoying civil rights and bearing civil responsibilities. Schools and internal institutions without legal personality enjoy limited civil rights, except the rights of name, reputation and honor. In terms of property rights, they only enjoy the right to use and manage the property entrusted to them by the organizers, and do not enjoy other property rights; Cannot sign contracts with foreign countries; Do not enjoy creditor's rights; You can't accept donations in your own name. At the same time, it cannot bear civil liability independently.
These are the general civil rights and obligations of the school. As we all know, the purpose of running a school is not for civil rights, nor for general social welfare, but to train talents for the society. Therefore, the school's capacity for civil rights should be subject to necessary restrictions. The provisions of the third and fourth paragraphs of Article 31 of the Education Law embody the above spirit. Paragraph 3 of this article stipulates that "State-owned assets in schools and other educational institutions belong to the state." State-owned assets in schools mainly include state-owned school land, buildings, houses, equipment and educational funds allocated by the state. Schools have the right to possess and use these state-owned assets according to law, but while using and managing them, they must ensure that the state-owned assets belong to the state, and no department, organization or individual may occupy, misappropriate, intercept, destroy or even privately divide them. Schools are also not allowed to change their uses, use them for other purposes, mortgage or guarantee others at will. Paragraph 4 of this article stipulates that "school-run industries run by schools and other educational institutions shall bear civil liabilities independently." The school-run industry established by the school according to law is established by the school with its own funds on the premise of ensuring the assets needed for normal education, teaching and scientific research activities, with the aim of supplementing the shortage of school-running funds. According to the provisions of the Education Law, a school-run industry shall obtain the status of a legal person, and bear civil liability independently with all its legal person property, and shall not provide mortgage or guarantee for the school-run industry with the property of the school. In a word, it is of great significance to make restrictive provisions on the civil rights capacity of schools to ensure the normal education and teaching order of schools and prevent the state-owned assets of schools from changing their uses or even losing. [Page]
As can be seen from the above, the qualification of administrative legal relationship and the qualification of civil legal relationship in a school are two different qualifications, which are different in nature and cannot be confused. Administrative relations are the basis for developing other relations and an important guarantee for adhering to the socialist nature of national unified management education and China's education. However, administrative relations cannot replace civil relations between civil subjects. In China, for a long time, the government's management of schools is mainly based on pure administrative means. In this case, the independent legal person status of the school has no practical significance. However, with the deepening of the educational system reform, the autonomy of schools has been expanded, which means that administrative departments must change their functions and delegate power to schools, which will inevitably lead to a considerable number of original administrative relations changing in nature and becoming civil relations. With the deepening of educational system reform, this trend is becoming more and more obvious.
It should be pointed out that the legal person status and legal status of a school are two different concepts. The legal status of a school includes both its legal person status in civil relations and its legal status in administrative relations. Because the school has a variety of subject qualifications, just establishing its legal person status in civil legal relations is not enough to solve all the problems in the current system reform. In fact, the legal status of schools in the relationship between government and schools is an urgent problem to be solved in the current system reform. In order to get rid of the government's excessive administrative intervention in schools, make schools become independent subjects and enjoy real autonomy in running schools, we must first straighten out the relationship between the government and schools and clarify the status of schools in administrative relations according to law. Otherwise, the school can't get the right to run its own school, let alone establish its legal person status.