Abstract:The political guidance office was a transitional political work organization established in universities from 1952 to 1957, which fully demonstrated the organizational construction and institutional exploration of the Communist Party of China in building new socialist universities. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, in order to achieve the goal of replacing old education with new education, the political and ideological leadership in universities must be strengthened. Under the situation of insufficient Party members and cadres in universities, unsound Party building foundation and system construction to be promoted, universities adopted the way of trial and gradual promotion to set up political guidance offices, establishing the system of political work. In practice and exploration, political guidance office gradually took on the organizational attribute of Party-government integration. It was not only the office of the Party committee, but also a part of the administrative organization of the school, working under the dual leadership of the Party committee and the president. Under the political guidance office were the organization section, the propaganda section, the youth section, the mass work section and other working sections. Universities provided the political guidance office with leading cadres and political counselors, formed the corresponding working system, and gave full play to the role of being exclusively responsible for political and ideological work. As a transitional institution, the system design showed the characteristic of the combination of unity and flexibility, which provided development space for universities to adjust measures according to the actual situation. The political guidance office targeted all the faculty and students in the school, and mainly undertook four tasks around the political and ideological work: to organize and carry out political theory study and social activities, to understand and reflect the ideological situation of teachers and students to promote educational reform, to combine political work with teaching work to ensure the completion of the education plan, to assess the political and ideological situation of teachers and students to provide reference for teacher development and student training. In practice, problems of the political guidance offices such as ambiguous organizational positioning, unclear division of work with other institutions, and insufficient work experience and professional ability of cadres were increasingly showing. With the strengthening of the Party's cadre and Party-building foundation in universities, the Party organization can carry out political and ideological work. After 1957, the political guidance office gradually withdrew from universities. Its work responsibilities and staff have been transferred to the Party committees of universities, making the Party committees of universities more robust. This has laid the organizational foundation for further exerting the Party's leading role and establishing the Party committee system. The political guidance office relieved the plight of the Party's weak leadership in political work in universities in the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China. It played an important role in building the political work system in the transitional period, establishing the leading position of the Party organization in universities, and constructing the leading and management system of higher education with Chinese characteristics, which taking the Party committee system as the core. In addition, the political guidance office left behind valuable historical experience and institutional heritage.