Off the wire
• France posts record wine sales in 2015  • Singapore's private home resale prices slightly higher in Jan.  • Former LA County Sheriff pleads guilty for lying to federal investigators  • Pregnant Australian woman confirmed diagnosed with Zika virus  • Aussie regulator prepared for legal action against bank swap bill manipulators  • Brazil's traditional Samba school wins Rio carnival competition  • Peruvian presidential front-runner calls for death penalty for child rapists  • Aussie scientists create "ground breaking" diet to effectively combat type 2 diabetes  • Premature babies could survive longer if given more oxygen: Aussie researchers  • Brazilian scientists design test to detect Zika in five hours  
You are here: 　 Home

Xinhua Insight: Revived consultation tradition helps seek maximum consensus

Xinhua, February 11, 2016 Adjust font size:

Wang Ji's experience of attending a consultation session of China's top political advisory body is nothing like one criticized as a well-meaning but monotonous talk by a "political flower vase."

Instead, the discussion, focused on nuclear power in China, and was really fierce to the extent that the host of the event kindly reminded the two sides that "we are exchanging opinions, not quarrelling", recalled Wang, chairman of the Dongfang Electric Corporation.

The discussion Wang participated in was a bi-weekly consultation session held by the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).

Since the first of its kind in October, 2013, such sessions have been convened over 40 times with more than 900 political advisors and experts attending.

Topics of such discussions include judicial power, poverty reduction, courier services and migrant workers' welfare.

Every discussion was presided over by Yu Zhengsheng, chairman of the CPPCC National Committee and a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee.

To ensure that opinions from the political advisors and experts practically carry weight in the decision-making process, leading officials from relevant governmental authorities are also invited.

On one occasion, a proposal at such consultation session by former NBA star and national political advisor Yao Ming to improve the country's approval system of major sports events was adopted by the central government within months.

Political advisors also criticise deficiencies in government work, including slow digesting of over-capacity and the response to some sensitive matters such as genetically modified food.

The bi-weekly sessions, together with the CPPCC's annual national session, standing committee meetings and special consultations, have are indispensable for CPPCC in playing its role of political consultation, democratic supervision as well as discussion and handling of state affairs.

The tradition of members of the CPC and non-Communist parties and personages without party affiliation holding routine symposiums to pool wisdom on state affairs dates back over half a century.

Between April, 1950 and July, 1966, such symposiums were held fortnightly and later irregularly until the chaotic Cultural Revolution.

The current bi-weekly consultation is an inheritance of the old consultation tradition to revive its vitality, top political advisor Yu said at the first session in 2013.

The revival of the consultation meeting tradition, according to Li Junru, former vice president of the Party School of the CPC Central Committee, embodies the CPC's efforts to promote consultative democracy, perfect a democratic system, enrich democratic forms and carry out political reform. Endi