Global Issues
CHINA: Slowly, Transparency in Public Funds Taking Root
For six decades, governmental budgets and spending in China have remained classified and inaccessible to the general public. Yet this may be about to change.
In January, in what some are calling China’s first case of 'naked government', Baimiao, a small town in the southern province of Sichuan, released its latest budget to the public. The details were not pretty: they showed that 65 percent of local government spending had gone to accommodating and entertaining officials.
Then, in March, Guangdong, the province closest to Hong Kong and the manufacturing heartland of China, announced that it would be publicising its financial budget for this year. This is the first time that a provincial-level administration has decided to release these records since the People’s Republic of China was founded in 1949.
Many feel that this could be the beginning of greater government transparency in China.
'In the past this (greater transparency) has been a topic that nobody was allowed to talk about, but at least now we can talk about it in the open and hope for a change,' Li Chengyan, a professor at Peking University’s School of Government, told IPS.
'Although it is just a beginning, I believe we will see a chain effect; other local governments will have to make their budget transparent under pressure from the public,' Li continued.
Within three days of Baimiao releasing its one-month budget, the news had reached hundreds of thousands of Chinese Internet users. Rather than the high amount of spending on entertainment resulting in a public backlash, however, the reception was generally kind — people were just happy to know how their taxpayers’ money was being spent.
'It does not matter how much you spend on entertaining, as long as all the numbers are transparent,' wrote one commentator on the popular online Chinese bulletin board Tianya. Another added: 'At least this is a step forward. But for a small village like Baimiao, its one month’s expenses are really too high.'
In a 2008 report, the International Budget Partnership, a global organisation that aims to help promote greater government transparency, rated China at just 14 out of 100 for transparency of its public budget. Britain and the United States topped the list with 88 and 82 respectively.
'Open budgets are empowering. They allow people to be the judge of whether or not their government officials are good stewards of public funds,' IBP Director Warren Krafchik said at the time of the report’s release. Corruption and extravagant spending among government officials has become an increasing concern for China’s general population. A campaign to clean up the southern province of Chongqing has seen the arrest of at least 50 government officials, including the chief of Chongqing's justice department, Wen Qiang. In the process, the local party secretary, Bo Xilai, has become a hero for many and an outside bet for high office in two years’ time when the top leadership in China changes.
'I hope there is an honest and upright official like Bo Xilai in every province, municipality, city, district, town and village of China,' wrote one online commentator. Greater budget transparency is seen as one of the ways to limit opportunities for corruption. 'From what some of the corrupt politicians wrote in their confessions, we can tell that non-transparent government spending is the major factor that makes corruption possible,' said Peking University’s Li. 'There is no one to monitor them.' Greater transparency is not just about reducing the instances of corruption, however, but also about reining in excessive spending. 'The money that’s been taken by corrupt politicians is only a small amount of the bigger picture,' said Zhang Ming, a professor at the political science department of Renmin University of China. 'More has been wasted by government officials who entertain, travel and consume at the state’s expense.'
Even in China’s smallest towns, citizens see their local officials eating lavish banquets, driving fancy cars and spending taxpayers’ money freely.
In fact, the high spending in Baimiao on entertainment and accommodation was not a surprise to many. Li predicts that in some cities and towns, these expenses could be as high as 70 to 80 percent of their budgets.
The hope is that the drive toward greater transparency will spread across China, though many are cautious about the overall effect of any improved accountability.
Last month, senior government official Gao Qiang, vice chairman of the National People's Congress (NPC) Financial and Economic Affairs Committee and director of the budgetary affairs commission of the NPC Standing Committee, announced that the country’s overall Budget Law could be revised in August. The issue of the public release of government budgets is one of the things expected to be addressed.
But Gao warned that even after these possible changes, it would still be difficult for the general public to find out how much officials spend on luxuries, since budgets in China do not require that level of detail and specification.
While governments may be becoming more open with their records, understanding what these documents say and reading between the lines are skills that the Chinese public is unpractised in.
'Without a proper supervising institution, we, the masses, won’t be able to read the budgets, and won’t be able to tell whether the numbers are real,' Zhang warned.
© Inter Press Service (2010) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service