The Yuanfeng Reforms during the reign of Emperor Shenzong of Song mainly focused on two aspects.

First, the "Ji Lu Ge" was promulgated. The promotion of officials must refer to the "Ji Lu Ge", and the official rank and salary standards no longer need to be approved by the prime minister.

Second, under the name of restoring the old system, the three-province system of the Tang Dynasty was restored. After the Yuanfeng reform, the power of the prime minister was divided into the Left Pushe and the Right Pushe, who were responsible for the Menxia Province and the Zhongshu Province respectively, and the emperor issued orders directly to the officials of the three provinces.

These two points can be summarized as weakening the power of the prime minister and allowing the emperor to directly participate in state affairs, thereby strengthening the emperor's personal power and strengthening centralization.

Although there is also the practice of replacing officials with ranks to make their positions consistent with their titles, reducing the phenomenon of officials not doing their job, it also reduces the unclear boundaries of positions among officials and the imagination of officials shirking responsibility, thereby improving administrative efficiency and reducing unnecessary financial expenditure.

But in essence, the Yuanfeng Reforms were merely a ploy by Emperor Shenzong of Song to strengthen central power and weaken the power of the prime minister. Furthermore, the impact of the Yuanfeng Reforms was limited to the central government; for local governments, the effects were minimal due to numerous obstacles.

Therefore, this reform was more of an excuse for Song Shenzong to expand his imperial power than a reform. It did not do much to solve the problems of low administrative efficiency and serious redundancy.

Inside Guanjia Hall, Zhao Jun looked around at the crowd and said, "The Yuanfeng Reforms only weakened the power of the prime minister and strengthened the central imperial authority. Wang Anshi's reforms aimed to improve the administrative efficiency of officials and change the phenomenon of officials being in office but not doing their job. Unfortunately, Song Shenzong was too obsessed with imperial power, which led to the failure of Wang Anshi's reforms."

"Grandson, this is where you're wrong. You yourself often say that strengthening imperial power is beneficial to the emperor. Then why couldn't the Yuanfeng Reforms strengthen imperial power first and then improve government administrative efficiency?"

Zhao Zhen objected, "Perhaps Song Shenzong originally thought so."

"But his approach is wrong."

Zhao Jun shook his head. "It's clear that we need to cooperate with Wang Anshi's reforms and improve administrative efficiency to complete the reforms, but he only cares about increasing his own imperial power. He's putting the cart before the horse, brother."

"Forehead"

Zhao Zhen was choked for a moment, not knowing how to refute, so he turned his head to look at Lu Yijian and others.

Lü Yijian understood and said, "There's nothing wrong with strengthening the imperial power."

"That's natural."

Zhao Jun spread his hands and said, "Look, historically, my brother's imperial power was supervised by the prime minister, censors, and the Imperial Censorate. He couldn't do anything he wanted to do and could only be mediocre. But now that the Constitutional Council has been established, hasn't the imperial power increased?"

Everyone rolled their eyes.

The establishment of the Constitutional Court did increase the imperial power in a certain sense.

Since the Political System Council controlled all officials and began to issue orders to the whole country, and the emperor was able to control the Political System Council, he controlled power through the Political System Council, just like the Cabinet in the early Ming Dynasty and the Grand Council in the Qing Dynasty.

But all this is premised on the emperor being able to control the Constitutional Court.

Now Zhao Jun of the Political System Council has absolute power and Zhao Zhen listens to him. It feels like the emergence of the Political System Council only strengthens the imperial power on the surface, but in fact it strengthens the power of Zhao Jun himself.

However, because the Constitutional Council increased the power of the prime minister, the emperor and the prime minister became a community of interests, and everyone suddenly became a beneficiary, so they did not have to worry about being dismissed from office. Therefore, everyone only criticized in their hearts and did not dare to speak out directly.

Zhao Zhen naturally knew that although the Constitutional Council strengthened his imperial power, as long as he listened to Zhao Jun, Zhao Jun would become the center of power, so he could only roll his eyes and swallow his anger.

no way.

Who made the Song Dynasty so damaged that it needed someone to save it?

"So what should we do now?"

Zhao Zhen asked.

"The Jingyou reform requires clear definition of official posts and responsibilities, and the efficiency of each government office must be improved. A responsibility system must be established, and buck-passing and wrangling must no longer occur."

"Do you have any rules?"

"It's already been done. Here are the plans for each department."

Zhao Jun opened his notebook and opened the plans for various departments that he had made these days in the form of PPT documents.

Everyone gathered around.

The first page you see is a department framework diagram. At the top is a picture of the emperor with an arrow next to it and the word "emperor" written on it.

Below the picture of the emperor are several figures of scholars and officials, with the words "Political System Yuan" written next to them.

Logically speaking, there is no internet access when you come across it, so if you want to make a PPT, you have to find pictures on the Internet.

But Zhao Jun couldn't resist including photos of all the previous textbooks, which also included some normal pictures of historical figures, which could be directly cropped with screenshot tools and used.

Below the Constitutional Court, a large number of arrows were marked, showing more than 20 or 30 departments including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of National Defense, National Development and Reform Commission, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Science and Technology, National Audit Office, etc., all with pictures posted on them.

Zhao Jun pointed upward and said, "If we want to streamline departments and determine responsibilities, we must first plan the various functional departments, then assign officials to them, and clarify their responsibilities and obligations. Therefore, I drew on the political systems of later generations to develop a plan for government departments."

"Can you tell us about it?"

Zhao Zhen said.

Zhao Jun said, "This plan is to establish the emperor as the head of state, the Constitutional Council as the highest administrative body, and each department under it to perform its duties, in order to streamline government departments and improve administrative efficiency."

Lü Yijian thought for a moment and said, "It's similar to the Han Dynasty's system of three dukes and nine ministers, and a bit like the Tang Dynasty's system of three provinces and six ministries."

My dear, there is more to this chapter. Please click on the next page to continue reading. It will be even more exciting later!