China's political personalities are easing into the digital age.
They are inviting the public to voice opinions via the web and
increasingly relying on network communications to gauge public
sentiment and aspiration.
Chances are most officials now carry computers to attend the
National Congress, go online to chat with netizens about
legislation, or post New Year's greeting on bulletin-boards. Some
officials even have opened their own blogs, taking the vogue to an
extreme.
Last June, the secretary and mayor of the Chongqing Municipality solicited opinions with
regards to the pilot program of comprehensive reform of coordinated
urban-rural development on the net. And they even invited and met
one of the respondents in their working office.
Zhao Qizheng, former minister of the State Council Information
Office, opened his blog this month on Sina.com, China's largest
portal website. Zhao is currently the most senior official ever to
open a public blog. Many other officials have followed his
lead.
"Compared with the mayor's hotline, a blog is a better way to
interact with the public," said Xie Chuntao, a professor of the
Party School of the Central Committee of CPC.
Zhang Chunxian, secretary of Hunan Province, put a premium on the online
opinions, and said candidly to Nanfang Weekend: "More
people nowadays tend to voice their desires and opinions via the
Internet. Our work could be greatly improved if we tapped into net
resources."
Yu Youjun, the governor of Shanxi Province, admitted that if he had put
himself on alert to the real-time online news and public sentiments
expressed on the Internet, he could have better tackled the slave
labor case before it became a national disgrace. To improve
response systems for any future crisis, he has ordered departments
in Shanxi Province across-the-board to pay more attention to online
information.
The SARS crisis, the Songhua River pollution scenario and the
Shanxi slave labor scandal all showed that public access to
transparent information is a guarantee of political democracy.
Stifling public opinions and information channels only leads to
community distrust and angry outbursts. But websites inherently
embody the concepts of freedom, fairness and shared information,
plus they feature global platform services.
A significant question concerning how to sort out positive
online opinions has been raised, given that the net is also
swarming with subversive statements. Experts suggest that a
tolerant approach is apropos since public willingness to voice
their opinions should be greatly encouraged.
(China.org.cn by He Shan, August 21, 2007)