Development Process: Chinese E-governance from Exploration to Comprehensive Promotion

Abstract

If the government's adoption of computers represents the beginning of E-governance, China's E-governance forays can be traced back to the 1970s. Through more than 30 years of construction and development since, China has made significant achievements and accumulated valuable experience in E-governance sand has begun to pave the way for E-governance construction suited to China's national conditions. With government information technology as the incision point and major government-funded projects as links, promoting the adoption of information technology in the national economy and society has been the key to the success of Chinese E-governance. In general, Chinese E-governance construction has undergone five phases of development: (1) the pilot phase characterized by data processing (1973-1983); (2) the vertical construction phase characterized by information management (1983-1993); (3) the beginning of key transaction systems characterized by transaction processing (1993-2000); (4) the comprehensive promotion phase characterized by E-governance guiding national information technology development (2000-2006); and (5) the deep application phase characterized by a service orientation (2006 onward). Corresponding achievements in E-governance have been made and valuable experience accumulated in each phase.