Unpredictably, the NCNA report included the following, discussing the Internet's role in promoting democracy in China with CSPAN-like broadcasts and public opinion polls:
On July 25, a live online broadcast in East China's Zhejiang Province attracted the attention of 100,000-plus netizens, which allowed them for the first time to watch online a session of the standing committee of the provincial people's congress, the local legislature, which is traditionally met behind closed doors.
"By watching live online broadcasting, Chinese citizens are endowed with a chance to participate in the democracy-building process," comments Xia Xueluan, a professor of sociology with Beijing University.
In fact, Zhejiang is not alone to apply the Internet to politics. The Beijing municipal government already launched an online opinion poll in 2003. Logging into www.beijing.gov.cn, local netizens can cast votes on 64 governmental organs under the municipality. In two years' time, more than 140,000 netizens have aired their views on the administrations' effectiveness, transparency and legal awareness. And their votes on issues ranging from whether the city should lift the ban on firecrackers to the area of buffer zone of the Forbidden City as a World Heritage Site has been taken into consideration in policy making.
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