The new FOI development in China

China learnt FOI development from the world and promoted its own FOI regime progressively in recent years. There is a rapid uptake of the Freedom of Information (FOI) legislation at provincial level in China. Since January 2004 when Shanghai adopted the first Information Access legislation at province level in the Mainland of China, about 9 provinces and 1 special municipality in the Mainland[1] have made their provisions on access to government information operational. Many other regional governments have pending FOI schemes, such as Zhejiang and Ningxia Huizu Autonomous Region. About 15 comparatively larger cities[2] also have promulgated their own FOI legislation since 2003. The national FOI legislation, Freedom of Information Regulation has been considered by the State Council since 2002 and finally been approved on January 17, 2007, although the final draft did not published and it is still needed to further amendments.[3]
[1] One Special Municipality and two Provinces separately brought the FOI legislation into their administrative area in 2004, including Chongqing Special Municipality, Hubei and Jilin Provinces. There are six Provinces adopted FOI legislation in 2005 and five Provinces took the legislation into effect in the same year. The six Provinces comprise Guangdong, Hebei, Hainan, Shaanxi, Liaoning and Heilongjiang. One province, that is Jiangsu, finally published it Interim Measures on Open Government Information in 7 August 2006 and the effective date is 1 September 2006.
[2] A comparatively larger city refers to a city where a provincial or autonomous regional people’s government is located or where a special economic zone is located, or a city approved as such by the State Council. According to Article 63 of the Legislation Law 2000, the people’s congresses or their standing committees of the provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government and the comparatively larger cities may formulate local regulations. A comparatively larger city refers to a city where a provincial or autonomous regional people’s government is located or where a special economic zone is located, or a city approved as such by the State Council. Guangzhou city passed its first FOI legislation in China in 2003, about 7 larger cities introduced FOI legislation in 2004, including Hangzhou, Changchun, Ningbo, Chengdu, Kunming, Wuhan, Datong. 4 in 2005, including Haikou, Zhengzhou, Wulumuqi and Anshan. 3 in 2006(Suzhou, Benxi, Shenzhen).
[3] Yuying Liu, Chinese Ordinance of Open Government Information has been Listed as the Prior Consideration by the Stat Council (2006) Xinhua Net at 10 September 2006."> " title="permanent link">#