This major aims to cultivate high-caliber compound talents with basic knowledge of management, economics, political science, law, etc. commanding the theory, technology and method of public affairs administration, having the basic ability of planning, coordination, organization and decision-making, as well as having public administration thinking and the ability to understand and analyze policies and carry out effective liason with the public sector.

This major started from the first cohort of undergraduates in 1978 in Ideological and Political Education. In 2002, the undergraduate major of Public Administration was established, and it was renamed in 2013 as Public Affairs Administration according to the Catalog of Undergraduate Majors issued by the Ministry of Education. In 2005, Administrative Management was rated as Provincial Key Discipline. In the “Evaluation Report of Universities and Disciplines in China (2019–2020)”, the major of Public Affairs Administration of the University ranks 16th among 296 universities. Having Sichuan Social Science Key Research Base “Research Center for Aging Cause and Industrial Development”, Sichuan Province Party Committee Department of Organization Cadre Education and Training (Southwest Jiaotong University) Base, Sichuan Universities Philosophy and Social Science Key Research Base “Chengdu-Chongqing Double City Economic Circle Transportation and Development Research Institute”, and on the basis of offering professional courses such as basic theory of public administration and related technologies and methods of public administration, this major pays heed to inter-disciplines, displaying a characteristic of cultivation as “public administration+transportation” and “public administration+city”; it also attaches importance to the integration of multiple methods to form the research-oriented teaching characteristics; it pays attention to the combination of multiple practices to highlight the characteristics of innovation and entrepreneurship education.