The draft law amending and supplementing several articles of the Law on Emulation and Commendation was presented at the First Session of the 16th National Assembly . This is not just about perfecting a law, but behind it lies a larger requirement: how to make emulation and commendation truly become a driving force for development, instead of merely a mechanism for recognizing achievements.
It's not about titles.
In any form of governance, rewards are not simply recognition. They are the way the State sends a message about values. What is honored today will become the standard of tomorrow. And those standards, when repeated long enough, will shape how the system operates and how society develops.
To put it briefly but essentially: whatever the state glorifies, society will move towards it.
In the history of the Vietnamese revolution, emulation and reward have been a constructive institution. From President Ho Chi Minh 's call for patriotic emulation, the spirit of emulation has become a method of organizing social energy: transforming patriotism into action, individual action into a movement, and from there, crystallizing into national strength.
The core of emulation at that time did not lie in titles. It lay in the ability to inspire and spread positive values in society.
However, over time, as the system of competition and reward became increasingly bureaucratic, the focus of this institution tended to shift. Titles, targets, and percentages gradually became the central focus. Real value – what should have been celebrated – was sometimes pushed to the background.
And from there, a familiar phenomenon emerges: the obsession with achievement. On the surface, this obsession might seem like a moral issue. But if you delve into how the system operates, you'll see that it's primarily an institutional problem. When achievement is measured by targets, and those targets are directly linked to rewards, then the behavior of organizations and individuals will adjust to those targets.
In education , when graduation rates become a performance criterion, evaluation standards may be relaxed. In administration, when the rate of timely processing of documents becomes a metric, processes may become overly technical. In healthcare, when the number of successful treatments becomes an indicator, the risk of selecting less risky cases may arise…
These phenomena don't necessarily stem from negative motives. They arise from the very way the system defines achievement. And then, the issue is no longer a matter of individual morality. It becomes a matter of institutional design. In a system where achievement can be optimized without correspondingly increasing real value, the obsession with achievement is almost inevitable.
Philosophical innovation - a condition for substantive innovation.
However, it must be clearly stated that competition itself is not the issue. Achievement is not the issue either. The issue lies in the relationship between achievement and value.
In a well-designed system, targets, movements, and public values can perfectly coincide. In that case, competition is the process by which society strives to create value. Achievement is a manifestation of competence and genuine contribution. But when these three elements become separated, achievement begins to lose its meaning. And from there, the obsession with achievement emerges as an inevitable consequence.
Therefore, the question is not whether or not there should be competition, but how to ensure that achievements reflect the values that society needs.
Many reforms begin with processes, organizations, and tools. But experience shows that these changes only produce sustainable results when they are guided by the right philosophy. If the philosophy doesn't change, then technical adjustments, no matter how sophisticated, will only make the system operate more smoothly within its existing logic.
This becomes even clearer when it comes to emulation and reward systems. It's not a neutral institution, but one that always carries a concept of value: what deserves recognition, and what deserves to be disseminated. Therefore, when discussing reforms to emulation and reward systems, the first thing to consider is not the criteria or procedures, but how the system identifies and evaluates value.
In previous development models, where the primary goal was mobilizing resources extensively, standardizing targets and organizing movements was appropriate. However, in the current context, where development increasingly relies on knowledge, creativity, and quality, this approach is beginning to reveal its limitations. Value no longer lies primarily in completing plans, but in the ability to create new approaches and improve the quality of development.
If the philosophy of competition and reward is not adjusted accordingly, the messages the system emits may become inconsistent. Therefore, reforming the philosophy is primarily a shift: from focusing on measuring what is easily measurable to gradually identifying and recognizing what is more meaningful for development. This does not mean denying the role of indicators, but rather repositioning them in relation to values.
At a deeper level, the question is how to maintain the connection between achievement and value. When achievement reflects value, it can become a driving force. But when these two elements gradually separate, the meaning of competition will diminish accordingly.
These findings suggest that adjusting the philosophy of emulation and reward is not only related to a single institution, but can open up broader changes in how the system operates and its development is oriented.
Emulation and competition - a model of national values.
At the heart of any civil service reform, the issue is no longer about reorganizing the apparatus or perfecting processes, but about a more fundamental question: what is the system choosing to glorify?
Because in any governance system, rewards are not merely recognition, but an act of value creation. What is celebrated becomes a norm; these norms, when repeated over a sufficiently long period, will shape how a society thinks, acts, and develops.
A system may not lack resources, people, or valuable initiatives. But if it lacks the ability to see and appreciate true value, those resources are unlikely to be fully unleashed. When achievement no longer reflects value, the system not only loses a motivational tool but also sends a misleading signal about what truly matters.
And when that signal is repeated long enough, it will subtly restructure the behavior of the entire system.
Therefore, the story of competition and reward transcends the scope of a law. It becomes a story about the philosophy of development: a nation chooses what to honor, and from there chooses the path it will take.
If excellence is limited by ratios, then the aspiration for excellence will also be limited. But if value is fully recognized and acknowledged, then competition will no longer be a movement to be launched – it will become a natural reflex of a society that strives for good.
Source: https://daibieunhandan.vn/thi-dua-khen-thuong-doi-moi-de-ton-vinh-dung-gia-tri-10412826.html
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