- Evaluation shifts to what firms actually feel
- Legal certainty is the cornerstone of business climate
- Predictability matters more than preferential policies
1. From Policy Supply to Enterprise Experience: A Changing Yardstick
In recent years, local governments have rolled out a dense array of measures to improve the business environment: streamlined approvals, compressed timelines, reduced fees, and dedicated service windows for enterprises. These efforts have genuinely lowered institutional transaction costs. Yet the intensity of policy supply does not always translate into a proportional sense of gain among entrepreneurs.
The reason is that the business environment is not fundamentally about how many actions the government takes, but about what judgments enterprises form. When a private entrepreneur decides whether to increase investment, expand hiring, or launch a new production line, the basis is not the volume of policy documents but a holistic assessment: Are the rules clear here? Are commitments reliable? Can disputes be resolved fairly? This assessment is comprehensive, experiential, and difficult to replace with any single metric.
This is precisely where the Private Economy Promotion Law, which took effect on May 20, 2025, carries significance. It elevates principles previously scattered across various documents, notices, and opinions into stable legal norms. The value of law lies not in how detailed its provisions are, but in the predictable framework it provides—enterprises know what they can do, what they cannot, and what to rely on when their rights are infringed. This certainty is the most fundamental public good of any business environment.
2. Service Accessibility: How Good Policies Reach Enterprises
Another practical challenge is the "last mile" of policy and service delivery. Many localities have introduced substantial support measures, yet small and medium-sized enterprises often face a predicament: they don't know about the policies, don't know how to use them, or can't reach them. Large firms have dedicated policy research teams; SME owners often wear multiple hats and have no time to study application guidelines line by line.
This raises a critical question: service accessibility. A good business environment requires not just having policies but making them easily obtainable. The "enjoy without application" and "direct benefit delivery" mechanisms adopted in some localities point in the right direction—shifting from enterprises seeking policies to policies finding enterprises, and simplifying cumbersome application processes into automatic disbursement after data verification. The value of such approaches lies not in the amounts involved but in the signal they send: government services are moving from administrative convenience toward enterprise convenience.
Yet accessibility is not merely a technical issue; it is also a matter of attitude. The professionalism of window staff, the responsiveness of consultation hotlines, the consistency of grassroots enforcement—these details shape the most everyday perception enterprises have of the business environment. A company may not remember the full title of a document, but it will certainly remember whether a visit to a government office resulted in being passed around or being helped. The warmth of a business environment often hides in these specific, granular points of contact.
3. Expectation Stability: A Resource More Precious Than Incentives
If the rule of law is the skeleton of the business environment and services are its flesh, then expectations are its soul. What private enterprises fear most is not fierce competition but shifting rules. When a company cannot judge how long a policy will last, whether a promise will be honored, or whether an industry will suddenly change direction, the rational choice is to wait, contract, and refrain from investing.
The deeper proposition, therefore, is to enable enterprises to form stable, calculable, and predictable business judgments. This means ensuring policy continuity, constraining administrative discretion, and maintaining smooth, regular government-enterprise communication channels. The mechanisms established in recent years—such as entrepreneur participation in policy-making and face-to-face dialogue systems—are all laying institutional groundwork for expectation stability. Their significance lies not in resolving a specific problem at a particular meeting, but in making enterprises feel that their voices are heard and their concerns addressed.
One dimension that is easily overlooked: a rational atmosphere for public discourse involving enterprises. Private entrepreneurs are often more sensitive to the media environment than outsiders imagine. A healthy, rational, matter-of-fact public sphere is itself part of the business environment. Reckless labeling and escalation can create a psychological sense of insecurity among entrepreneurs—a hidden cost that is hard to quantify yet genuinely influences investment decisions.
Conclusion
Whether a business environment is good is ultimately not determined by evaluation rankings but by the real experience of millions of enterprises. Between policy supply and enterprise experience lie three gateways: legal certainty, service accessibility, and expectation stability. The Private Economy Promotion Law has built the institutional framework; the task ahead is to translate the principles within that framework into realities that enterprises can feel and reach in their daily operations. This takes time, and more importantly, consistent patience and sincerity. There is no finish line in improving the business environment—every step forward translates into a measure of confidence for the private economy.