Application-essay formats and genres

What the application essay tests

The Shenlun (申论) exam, administered by the State Administration of Civil Service under the National Civil Servant Examination (国家公务员考试, "Guokao"), has since roughly 2010 shifted decisively toward application writing (应用文写作, also termed 贯彻执行题 "implementation tasks"). Where the older syllabus weighted the large discursive essay (大作文), contemporary papers—especially the 省级 (provincial) and 市地级 (prefecture/municipal) tracks—routinely allocate one or two mid-weight questions (15–30 marks) to a specific document genre.

The distinguishing feature is that you write as a named official actor, in a named document type, for a named audience. The 2021 and 2023 市地级 papers, for instance, set tasks such as drafting a 倡议书 (proposal/initiative letter), a 宣传稿 (publicity script), and a 工作汇报提纲 (work-report outline). The examiner is no longer grading your opinion; they are grading whether you can produce a usable bureaucratic artifact.

The five high-yield genres

Four formal elements recur and are scored across every genre: 标题 (title), 称谓/发文对象 (addressee), 正文 (body), and 落款/署名与日期 (signature and date). Master these, then specialize:

• 倡议书 / 公开信 (initiative letter / open letter): persuasive, addressed to citizens or a group. Opens with background and purpose, lists concrete calls to action, closes with an appeal. Requires 称谓 and 落款.
• 讲话稿 / 发言稿 (speech / address): spoken register, opens with 称呼 ("各位来宾"), uses signposting, ends with thanks. Mark for oral cadence.
• 汇报 / 简报 / 报告 (report / briefing): upward-facing, factual, structured 情况—问题—措施 (situation–problem–measures). Often a 提纲 (outline) only.
• 公告 / 通知 / 通报 (public notice / circular): the most formalized; governed in real practice by the 党政机关公文处理工作条例 (2012, effective 1 July 2012), which fixes the 15 official document types.
• 短评 / 评论 / 编者按 (editorial / commentary): evaluative, advances a thesis with reasoning—closest to the old essay but compressed.

The decoding discipline

Before writing, extract from the prompt four variables: 身份 (your role), 文种 (document type), 对象 (audience), 任务 (the specific task). A 2019 副省级 task asking candidates to write 'as a member of the survey team' a piece for the public demands a register shift no generic essay can fake. Misreading the 文种—writing a report when a proposal is asked—forfeits the format marks (格式分) regardless of content quality. This is the single most common avoidable loss on the application question.

Why this matters for the exam

The application question sits in the middle of the Shenlun paper between the summary/comprehension items (概括题, 归纳题) and the large essay (文章论述题), and it is where scoring is most mechanical and recoverable. Unlike the large essay, where graders exercise broad discretion over argument quality, the application question carries an explicit 格式分 (format marks) component—typically 2–4 of the 15–25 total—awarded purely for producing the correct title, addressee, body structure, and signature block. These are guaranteed marks that disciplined candidates bank and weak candidates throw away.

How it is tested

The task is framed by four constraints you must satisfy simultaneously: a role (身份), a document type (文种), an audience (对象), and a word limit (usually 400–600 characters). The 2023 市地级 paper and the 2022 省级 paper both set 'draft a [document]' tasks worth ~20 marks. Graders score on three axes: 格式 (format), 内容要点 (content points extracted from the materials), 结构与语言 (structure and register). Critically, the content points are not invented—they are mined from the given materials (给定资料), exactly as in the summary questions. The application question is therefore a hybrid: comprehension feeding a genre-specific container.

The PYQ angle and high-yield retention

High-frequency 文种 in recent Guokao and provincial 联考 papers: 倡议书, 宣传稿/讲解稿, 短评, 工作方案, 汇报提纲. Memorize the standard skeleton for each. Retain that the 党政机关公文处理工作条例 (2012) defines 15 statutory document types—决议, 决定, 命令, 公报, 公告, 通告, 意见, 通知, 通报, 报告, 请示, 批复, 议案, 函, 纪要—but the Shenlun exam most often uses semi-official 'soft' genres (倡议书, 讲话稿, 短评) that fall outside this list, so do not over-formalize. A frequent PYQ trap: the prompt says '不必拘泥于格式' (format need not be strict) for editorials yet demands full format for notices—read the licence line.

The register switch

Each genre carries an obligatory register, and the grader hears tonal slips immediately. A 讲话稿 (speech) must read aloud: it opens with a 称呼 ('尊敬的各位领导、同志们'), uses short signposted segments ('第一… 第二…'), and closes with thanks ('谢谢大家'). A 倡议书 is warm and hortatory, ending in an appeal ('让我们携手…'). A 汇报 is dry, third-person, fact-forward, and upward-deferential. A 短评 advances a single thesis and defends it. Writing a speech in report register, or peppering a notice with rhetorical flourish, costs structure-and-language marks.

A reusable body skeleton

Most informational genres collapse into a three-move body:

1. 缘由/背景 (occasion/background): one or two sentences stating why this document exists, drawn from the materials.
2. 主体 (substance): the content points, organized—by 分条列项 (itemized bullets) for proposals and notices, by 情况—问题—对策 for briefings, by 观点—论证 for editorials.
3. 结尾 (close): an appeal (proposal), a summary (report), or a thanks line (speech).

The itemized form (分条列项) is the safest default under time pressure because it makes content points visible to a grader scanning for them. The 2021 市地级 倡议书 task rewarded candidates who listed four or five discrete, parallel action items over those who buried the same content in prose.

Title and signature conventions

Titles take one of two forms: the complete form (发文机关+事由+文种, e.g. '××市文明办关于开展垃圾分类的倡议书') or the simple form (事由+文种 or just 文种, e.g. '倡议书'). When the prompt withholds the issuing body, use the simple form rather than inventing an organization—fabricated specifics are penalized. The signature block (落款) names the issuing party and the date; when unknown, write '××单位' and '××年××月××日'. Do not write real personal names or real dates. These placeholder conventions are themselves part of the 格式分 and are explicitly modeled in official answer keys published after each exam cycle.