Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

Editor's Note:

It has been six years since China's State Council released the Regulations on the Disclosure of Government Information to boost regulatory transparency. As China's anti-corruption campaign is growing broader, governmental transparency is also a vital part of the work. The Unirule Institute of Economics, a think tank based in Beijing, recently invited some experts to share their ideas of how to make progresses.

Xu Xin, director of Institute for Advanced Judicial Studies, Beijing Institute of Technology

The phrase "push forward" is key to realizing government transparency. Since the 1980s, the Chinese government has been working on this aspect, but progress remains inconsistent, because this is an area where there are usually loud slogans but limited actions.

Who should take the initiative to push forward government transparency? Besides the subjective intention of the government, the public should play the main role.

For example, individuals can apply to the government to disclose the information they want. NGOs can do research on it and make an appeal. In addition, a group of people can act together in the name of public interest.

How to push forward? The first way can be application, which means citizens or organizations apply to the government to disclose certain information. It can be out of public interest, or out of defending the right of others.

The second way can be policy suggestions. For instance, I initiated a plan of asking courts to encourage the public to attend court trials and not to check the bystanders' identification cards.

This can help enhance the credibility of our judicial system and public trust in the courts. Now the dilemma China's judicial system faces is that even when the court makes a just decision, it is challenged by the public. So the judicial system must open itself to the public.

There are a few tactics for the public while requesting for government information.

For example, when we apply for information disclosure, we had better not leave our e-mail addresses. If we do, we may get an electronic reply, but a written one is more formal and authoritative.

People can also utilize social media such as WeChat to make their voices heard. In addition, NGOs can release evaluations on what different cities have done. The one ranked first will feel encouraged, while the last will feel ashamed and thus make improvement.

Bi Honghai, assistant dean at the Law School of Beihang University

Disclosure of governmental information can create a win-win situation. It not only benefits government organization, but also helps form a civil society.

Governmental transparency is a precondition of modern democratic politics.

Meanwhile, effective decision-making by the central government must be based on sufficient information. When there is a lack of information, the central government may make the wrong decision.

In China's traditional bureaucratic politics, a deep-rooted illness is cheating one's superiors and defrauding his subordinates. The breakthrough of the governmental transparency can be a lesson taught by the 2003 SARS outbreak.

Back then, the central government did not have a clear figure of how many people got infected and how many died to it. This almost led the epidemic to spiral out of control, and several provincial officials were sacked as a result.

This has made the central government realize the importance of information transparency from the bottom. The notion of "win-win" can be an effective tool to solve the problem of cheating one's superiors and defrauding his subordinates.

The government should also work on the aim of making information disclosure into law, and handle well its relationship with other relevant laws.

We live in an information era. As far as information management is concerned, secrecy, privacy, and the free flow and security of information should also be taken into consideration from a legal perspective.