Tsinghua's 2026 Hotline Reports: Global Cities & China's 12345 Shift to Governance Hubs

Tsinghua University Releases Two Major 2026 Hotline Governance Evaluation Reports

At the 2026 Beijing "Jiesu Jiban" (Receive Complaints, Act Immediately) Reform Forum, a Tsinghua University team jointly with Cambridge University and Peking University released two reports: the Global City Hotline Service and Governance Effectiveness Evaluation Report (2026) and the National 12345 Hotline Service and Governance Effectiveness Evaluation Report (2026) . This marks the second global and national assessment following the inaugural 2024 edition, aiming to provide theoretical support and practical reference for urban governance modernization.

Global Report: 20 Cities, Four Development Models

The global report covers 20 cities across five continents — including Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, New York, Paris, Singapore, and Rio de Janeiro — selected for global influence and regional representativeness. The research methodology combined hotline institution interviews, 9,300 valid public survey questionnaires, tens of millions of crawled data points, and granular case studies.

Based on governance effectiveness performance, the report classifies the 20 cities into four development models:

Comprehensive innovation type : Beijing, Dubai, New York, Shenzhen, Seoul — balanced development across multiple dimensions.

Digital-driven type : San Francisco, Bangkok, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore — outstanding digital technology application.

Multi-stakeholder collaboration type : Buenos Aires, Chengdu, Toronto, Hamburg, Rio de Janeiro, Rome — emphasis on diverse actor collaboration.

Response-oriented type : Amman, Paris, Madrid, Wuhan — focus on service responsiveness and public experience.

Compared to the 2024 baseline, global city hotline governance effectiveness has improved overall, and a city governance ecosystem linked by hotlines is accelerating worldwide. China's 12345 hotlines also show a trend shifting from service capacity building to governance effectiveness enhancement.

National Report: 100 Cities, 8,550 Surveys, 3,000+ Test Calls

The national report covers 100 sample cities, collecting 8,550 valid public questionnaires and conducting over 3,000 effective test calls on 12345 hotlines and related service channels. The analysis finds that China's 12345 hotline institutional foundation has basically formed, with service capabilities converging across cities; development differences now lie primarily in governance effectiveness. The key to operational success is not merely city scale or development conditions, but whether organizational coordination, responsibility chains, and operational mechanisms effectively connect.

On digital transformation, the report notes that future development hinges not on "whether technology exists" but on whether technology embeds into governance processes, data supports decision-making, and intelligent applications genuinely improve citizen request handling quality and efficiency.

International Comparisons: Diverse Paths to Responsive Governance

The reports highlight distinct international approaches: New York's 311 feeds service data back into urban governance; Rio de Janeiro's 1746 uses hotline data to sense city operations; China's 12345 leverages data analysis and assessment to move from "receive complaints, act immediately" toward proactive governance. Despite differing models, all cities share a common concern: enabling citizen demands to enter governance systems conveniently, be precisely identified, effectively responded to, and substantively resolved.

In China, Beijing's "Jiesu Jiban" reform drives mega-city governance innovation through citizen demands, integrating hotline service resources and deeply embedding them into the full urban governance process. It demonstrates strong governance effectiveness in process governance, collaborative governance, digital governance, and responsive governance, highlighting the hotline's hub-like positioning in urban governance.

Future Outlook: Four Principles for High-Quality Development

Based on observed trends, the reports propose four forward-looking principles:

People-centered : Make public value the key yardstick for technology application.

Technology empowerment within institutional frameworks : Ensure intelligent applications operate within manageable, traceable, and correctable institutional structures.

Inclusive governance ecosystems : Prevent any citizen from being overlooked in digitalization.

Strengthened exchange and mutual learning : Promote global city-to-city learning and collective progress.

Expert Perspectives

Professor Meng Tianguang (Tsinghua University School of Social Sciences, Deputy Director of Digital Government and Governance Research Institute) stated: "Evaluating a hotline is essentially checking whether citizen demands are received and handled well; between 'one complaint, one resolution' we weigh a city's governance level." He emphasized that 12345 hotlines are accelerating from livelihood service portals to urban governance hubs, becoming engines for people-centered city building in the digital age. The next step requires not only "fast receipt, solid handling, strong technology" but also "promoting coordination, solving difficult problems, enhancing effectiveness."

Professor Helen Bao (Cambridge University Professor of Urban Economics and Public Policy, Director of Interdisciplinary Spatial Analysis Lab) noted that city hotlines must not focus solely on platform operational efficiency but must examine whether government responsiveness translates into citizen-perceivable governance outcomes. Aligning institutional efficiency gains with actual public experience has become a key challenge for global urban governance effectiveness improvement.

Both experts agree that Beijing's "Jiesu Jiban" reform offers a representative Chinese practice: a single hotline serves as a vital link between citizen needs and urban governance in Beijing, a window for observing people-centered city building and governance modernization nationwide, and a global sample for studying how cities enhance responsiveness and drive governance innovation.