Civil Aviation Administration of China
People's Republic of China government body overseeing civilian airflight
The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) is the civil aviation authority of China, operating under the Ministry of Transport. It oversees civil aviation and investigates aviation accidents and incidents. It is headquartered in Dongcheng, Beijing.
Before Deng Xiaoping's reform of separation of government and enterprise, the agency operated the CAAC Airlines with monopoly status from 1953 to 1987.
History
On 2 November 1949, a month after the proclamation of the People's Republic of China, the CCP Central Committee decided to found the Civil Aviation Agency under the name of the People's Revolutionary Military Commission, and under the command of the People's Liberation Army Air Force, to manage all non-military aviation in the country, as well as provide general and commercial flight services. The Civil Aviation Agency was created in December of the same year, and established offices in Chongqing, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Tianjin, and Wuhan. On 10 March 1950, the Guangzhou Office began to work, managing civil flight services in Guangdong, Guangxi, and Hunan. Later, it was merged with Wuhan Office to form the Civil Aviation Office of Central and Southern China on 21 January 1951, in Guangzhou, it was renamed Central and Southern Civil Aviation Office, working for civil flight administrations in Guangdong, Guangxi, Hubei, and Hunan.
On 7 May 1952, the People's Revolutionary Military Commission and the State Council issued the Decision for Reorganizing Civil Aviation (Chinese: 关于整编民用航空的决定) and the Civil Aviation Agency of the People's Revolutionary Military Commission was transferred to the military system and was under the direct control of the PLA Air Force, then split the civil aviation administration division and airline division to form the separate Civil Aviation Agency and civil airline. Under this decision, from July to November 1951, the Civil Aviation Agency had four administration offices in Shanghai (Eastern China), Guangzhou (Central-Southern), Chongqing (Southwestern China), and Tianjin (Northern China).
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Civil Aviation Administration of China” is people's Republic of China government body overseeing civilian airflight. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Civil, Aviation and Administration, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “people's Republic of China government body overseeing civilian airflight” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1329619. VIAF identifies the subject as 131534459. The Library of Congress control number is n84217884. 3 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1953, 1987, 1949 and 1950.
Later summaries often reconcile disputed chronology or motive more neatly than the contemporary record permits. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Civil Aviation Administration of China”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Civil Aviation Administration of China primary sources, Civil Aviation Administration of China archive and Civil research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Civil Aviation Administration of China”?
- Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
- Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Civil Aviation Administration of China” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.