The  uprise of "Open Government Information" movement in China

The people's "right to know" has been universally accepted as a pillar for democratic society. The advocating of institutionalizing the idea of right to know into a legal regime emerged, grew into a tide sweeping over almost all social systems, and climbed towards the climax in the passing decade, catalyzing freedom of information legislations in more than 40 countries across the continents. China, since its commencement of the reform and opening up policy, didn't stay outside this tide. However, the official recognition and realization of a people's right to know hobbled its way through the imperial custom of government secrecy inherited from the livelong history.

Recognition in the governance policies

Along with the economic booming and the increasingly social differentiation, the ruling Communist Party came to realize the importance of sharing information with the citizenry, following a relatively utilitarian approach: supporting the ongoing economic increase, helping curb official corruption, and providing a safety valve to release dissatisfaction from the marginalized civic groups.

Since the people's right to know first appeared in the Resolution of 13th National Chinese Communist Party Assembly in 1987, it has been acquiring stronger and stronger policy weight in the following resolutions which determine the whole institutional reform process . On the other hand, When China joined World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1999, its commitments under the entry agreement require the Chinese government to make trade-related rules and requirements transparent. Government transparency thus became a compelling concern to the central government. Driven by these factors, central government launched two campaigns across country: that of the "informatization"(信息化) of government affairs (via internet and other electronic forms to facilitate information exchange and dissemination) , and that of making administrative affairs open (政务公开). The latter movement was further promoted by a joint directive of the Central Committee of CCP and the State Council in 2000 , clearly addressing the people's right to know and urging the governments of lowest hierarchy to formulate relative policies and the complying institutions. Enormous as official circulars and notices from up to bottom were, the implementation was inconspicuous before the potential huge resistance of the bureaucratic bloc, for the policy cannot effectively inhibit the agencies' habitual abuse of "state secrets" to cover all about their expenditures, programs as well as their policies, and documents.

Hesitance in the nationwide legislation

Current Chinese legislation neither enshrined right to know nor mentioned the government transparency. Legal scholars impressed by the rapid expansion of freedom of information laws in foreign jurisdictions keep introducing them to domestic academy and developed relatively abundant research on this area. They also cooperated with the press and the media in arousing the public’s concern of their deserved rights. With the accumulating knowledge preparation and civic appeals, bills proposing national legislation on government information transparency were submitted to several recent annual meetings of the National People's Congress. A working party was set up in 1999 within the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences to study such legislation, and in 2000 it was committed by the Information Office of State Council to draft the regulation rather than an act. The draft was deliberated with adequate reference to current legal framework, transforming the freedom of information system into a more Chinese-style "Open Government Information"(OGI, 政府信息公开) institution. Notwithstanding its efficient submission early in 2002 and unanimous calls from the society for OGI after the SARS event in 2003, the draft encountered great obstruction and stayed upon the secondary legislative plan of State Council for as long as 3 years.

Breakthrough in the low-hierarchy enactment

While the central government mulls about national regulation, the flexible procedure of various kinds of local legislation put the local governments in a more advantaged position to institutionalize the right to know. The Guangzhou government, aiming to comply with WTO requirements and to gain from enhanced transparency greater administrative efficiencies experienced in his active experiments of open government information, bravely took the lead in formulating the first government information disclosure legislation. Taking effect from the beginning of 2003, this unprecedented local rule not only standardized municipal OGI practice and, but also introduced revolutionary regime of information rights for citizens, and set up fundamental principles of presumption of openness which raises the standards for compliance. Inspired the Guangzhou example and the lessons in SARS, the Shanghai people's government adopted the first OGI rule on provincial level in 2004, developing a more sophisticated approach to enlarge citizen’s right of access to government information and better organized program to supervise the implementation. These two pioneers stimulate their colleagues in other regions. Similar to the global legislative tide of freedom of information, a domestic legislative wave involved most local governments, even many of the organs of the central government. The Shanghai provisions were especially duplicated in other regional rules with moderate modifications. Along with the initiative from the government, the Guangdong people’s congress strided forward in 2005 to enact a model OGI regulation of higher legal force. Up till August 31, 2006, 12 provinces and 16 comparatively larger cities have passed legislations or government rules concerning open government information, while 25 ministries or departments directly under the State Council have promulgated rules or mesures to make administrative affairs open. In the absent of unified coordination, the scattered lawmaking attempts converge into an ongoing bottom-to-top movement, rewriting profoundly the nature of Chinese's right to know.