“Administrative collaboration” is an important theoretical and methodological requirement proposed by the Chinese government to advance the environmental governance of the Yellow River Basin (YRB). In the governance of Yellow River water pollution, it has been regarded as a key strategy to respond to and resolve pollution issues. Administrative collaboration refers to the timely linkage and cooperation that government departments in different administrative regions of the basin carry out when water pollution occurs. China’s current legal documents have stipulated provisions on this; however, most of these provisions are only guiding rather than obligatory, so collaboration between government departments mainly relies on their respective willingness. As a result, administrative power barriers are difficult to break through, making it hard to implement collaborative governance. To address this, relevant entities should be endowed with obligations through legal provisions. This study innovatively proceeds from the perspective of normative texts, establishes administrative collaborative governance as a legal obligation that government departments at all levels must fulfill, and proposes a series of operable and specific supervision requirements. This is intended to ensure the effective implementation of administrative collaboration in governance practice, realize the value of sustainable basin development, and at the same time provide legislative references for governments around the world in carrying out collaborative governance of major rivers.