This paper summarizes watershed governance at home and abroad from three aspects including the coordination organization, the mechanism and legalization of watershed governance, and builds a framework for modern Chinese watershed governance system. This framework includes the following three parts. Firstly, constructing a national coordinating institution for watershed governance to implement centralized and unified governance and resolve the “collective action dilemma”; Secondly, promoting the legalization of watershed governance, improving the comprehensive legislative principles, holistic laws and regulations based on the watershed units, strengthening joint law enforcement and promoting a seamless connection between legislation, administration, and justice for the effectiveness of governance; Thirdly, establishing a systematic concept of governance covering mountains, rivers, forests, fields, lakes and grasses, building an integrated mechanism of watershed governance, thus to promote the diversification and systematization of watershed governance as well as the coordination and integration within different regions and departments.