Assessing China's E-Government: information,service, transparency and citizen outreach of government websites

This article examines e-government development and its impact on authoritarian rule in China. It is widely believed that e-government can help to encourage government transparency, expand the information flow, promote work efficiency and increase citizens' political participation. This may be true in open democracies, yet there is little scholarly support for this conventional wisdom applied in authoritarian societies. In this article, we review the current condition of e-government in China by a detailed analysis of 29 government websites at the provincial/metropolitan level. We look at what kinds of features are available online, such as information available and services provided. We also examine the transparency and citizen participation efforts and whether e-government in China today will result in movement toward e-democracy tomorrow.