White Paper: Human Rights, "Consultative Democracy" and Judicial Rights

“Democratic Rights”

The section began by saying, "in 2014 China officially designated December 4th as the national Constitution Day through legislation with a view to advancing the rule of law, enforcing the implementation of the Constitution, and promoting citizens' democratic rights to civic participation, democratic legislation, consultative democracy, community-level democracy, citizen supervision and freedom of speech."

That being said, the paper then expanded on the workings of the people's congress system, as it worked and deliberated many legislative works, including work reports from the government, Supreme People' s Court and Supreme People's Procuratorate. "In 2014 the Standing Committee of the NPC deliberated 20 draft laws, revised 10 laws, enacted two laws, and provided eight legal interpretations." "The Standing Committee also improved the post-legislation appraisal mechanism to make appraisal a standardized practice that is done on a regular basis. A sound operation mechanism for the enactment, revision, abolition and interpretation of laws was established step by step."

"Consultative democracy", the paper says, "is a form of democracy unique to China's socialist democratic politics." The paper then reported that China "explored with consultative democracy in greater width and depth, strengthened the function of democratic supervision, continued to strengthen consultation among political parties, in the people's congresses, governments, the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and people's organizations, and at the community level" and "efforts were made to build a complete consultation democracy system with proper procedures, and expand channels for citizens to participate in state and social governance in an orderly manner, all of which improved the scientific and democratic level of decision making."

The Chinese government has indeed made strides in encouraging an evolved relationship with citizens moving forward in consultative democracy. According the white paper, the government has "implemented the Regulations on the Disclosure of Government Information, gone all out to make government affairs public, promoted e-government and online services to ensure timely and accurate access by ordinary citizens to information, and put the government under public supervision." Improving the fluidity of this process, the State Council worked in 2014, "canceling and delegating to lower levels over 246 items for administrative approval" and "stipulating that no department should exercise administrative approval beyond the list of 1,235 items so as to minimize the possibilities of officials seeking personal gain through power and improve the procedure of the exercise of power."

The recent crackdown on corruption has been a very prominent topic, and the paper listed many figures for filed complaints, cases and sanctions for 2014. Efforts have also been made to deter illegal practices and bring existing offenders to justice. These efforts detailed in the report have "have helped the government hunt down over 500 escaped convicts and recover over three billion yuan in illegally diverted funds", and in all, "departments at all levels retrieved 10.5 billion yuan for the country."

The white paper also insisted that "China's human rights will not be able to make progress without the construction of core socialist values", "namely, prosperity, democracy, civility, harmony, freedom, equality, justice, the rule of law, patriotism, dedication, integrity and friendship." "They are supplementary to each other", the paper said. Bring awareness to such values, "the state renewed its efforts to promote human rights education, and advanced the construction of core socialist values, launching volunteer services and programs inculcating filial piety education, integrity education, thrift education, cultivating and inheriting fine family traditions, school mottoes, entrepreneurship, fine village traditions and festival culture, and publicizing public service advertisements titled "Our Values.""

In addition to the work enhancing social values, freedom of speech is now also better protected as "the public can air opinions, and raise criticisms and suggestions freely through the news media, and discuss problems of this country and society." According to the paper, "the government encourages enterprises to provide various Internet services to the public in accordance with the law so as to create a good environment for the public to acquire and exchange information." Additionally, "social organizations playing their roles better. Renewed efforts are being made to promote the direct registration of social organizations, providing more favorable conditions and an institutional guarantee for citizens to safeguard their legitimate rights and interests, express their legitimate demands, participate in the management of public affairs and engage in social services through these social organizations."