E-government, Under The Rule Of Law Perspective

Along with the profound transformation from national administration idea to public administration idea, with the statement and sustainable perfection of new public management theory such as reengineering government theory and so on, and also with the rapid development of the global network information technology, e-government is produced in reality and can be promoted. E-government becomes the combination of the network information technology and the administrative reform. There are some situations which are not adapted with the rapid development of e-government. For e-government , our country is short of jurisprudential analysis and legislative regulations, the research of related legal system is not thorough, and guarantees of rule of law in deeper development is lacked for. Concentrating on the view of rule of law and discussing e-government's road of rule of law are positive for the sound development of e-government.E-government contains profound concept of rule of law. First is service concept. The way government manages social public affairs and provides public services is supposed to be perfected along with the network economy development. E-government transmits public services by a way that is more convenient, to the public and rather with cost-benefit. Using information method to alleviate the increasing social demand for government's public services and to make the government's way of service more convenient, transparent, fair and highly effective is no doubt the essence of e-government. To improve government's public services ability fundamentally is the core content and final target of e-government's construction. Second is participation concept. The government's information monopoly is broken by internet's open, free, multi-dimensional and equal essence. Individual liberalism and global consciousness value advocated by internet bring enormous impact to the traditional country's belongingness. The network information technology promotes public's sense of participation. The electronic technical methods reduce the cost for public's participation to the political life. The way public participate in the political life has an unprecedented development. Third is that e-government takes the public right as the central value concept. The core objective of reengineering government is to establish a government with high efficiency and be responsible for the public; the technical characteristic and the way of existence of internet itself also show the essence of opening, freedom, multi-dimension and equality. Without a doubt, e-government, as an intrinsic conjunction of the two above, takes public services as the ultimate value and also takes the public's right safeguard as its existence significance.The development of e-government's rule of law is not only embodied in concrete legal provisions. The more important is that it is embodied in concrete process of the rule of law's practice. Our country's e-government has experienced four development phases: the office automation, the informatization construction, the government on the internet and the comprehensive application. With the gradually advancement of e-government construction, the rule of law's practice of e-government has made some progress. First is that public services ability has obvious progress. Through the conformity of government resources and social resources, more highly effective convenient services with high quality are promoted. Government service consciousness is promoted and public services ability is strengthened unceasingly. Second, legislative democracy is enhanced effectively. E-government impels legislation participation of grass-root democracy and establishes the effective interaction mechanism for the collection, delivery and feedback of public opinions between the legislature and the public. E-govemment also has made contribution to the perfection of the legislature working routine and the enhancement of the efficiency. Third is the unceasing progress of the safeguard of public's right to know and the perfection of the information opening system. The government information can have transparent and thorough circulation in itself and make the government who grasps the hugest information resource and has the closest relationship with the public interest to be exposed under the sunlight by many kinds of communication medium, especially the network technology. Fourth is the government's electronic procurement. Under e-government condition, using the network technology, government's unification purchase may be effectively realized, public bidding may be more transparent, government procurement procedure may be simplified, purchase efficiency may be enhanced, purchase cost may be reduced and government procurement may have standardization. In addition, related clauses of "Administrative Permission Law" about e-government have the positive demonstration significance.Electronic democracy has the natural flaw is worth watchful: the difficulty to objectivity judgment of information, the populism even rioter politics risk and the government's first floor controlling force to the internet all indicate that electronic political life is still filled with risks. The challenge that the equality right facing in the network information age, the public participation representation, the highlighting of right to know and right of privacy and the expansion and puzzle of freedom of speech are the essential barriers that e-government's rule of law development must solve. Those problems of rule of law that exist in e-government's development are one part of the legal problems that can be met in the network information age. These problems not only appear in e-government, but also exist in traditional rule of law environment. And they are even more highlighted for the prosperity of e-government.To realize e-government's healthy and harmonious development, it should basically be decided by e-government's rule of law, conjunction of e-government and the constitutionalism concept, and also the regulation and innovation of related provisions of e-government. Firstly, the balancing of interest in the constitutionalism frame is the system foundation of e-government's healthy and harmonious development. E-government legislation should be based on the balance consideration of the public interest and the private interest. Public's individual interest and the group interest should obtain full respect. Individual right should be widely known in the implements of e-government. The government must not dominate the public interest above the private interest by the excuse of the public interest. When the private interest has conflict, judgment and choice of interest should be made through the balancing of interest mechanism which is established in advance and according to social economy concrete condition. Secondly, individual right can not violate other people's legal rights, and individual right must be necessarily limited. In the development of e-government, interweaved conflicts of rights appear inevitably. The right limit principle is really the necessity. Thirdly, the due process safeguard. The procedure provides the parties of e-government with rational choice opportunity, guarantees the parties of e-government definite rights and obligations and reduces the occurrence of willful behavior by systematic reasonable procedure. Finally, we can make a conclusion that many problems existing in the development of e-government concern correlation law vacancy. The development of e-government lies on several factors. But what is essential is using law to guarantee the function's exertion of e-governments, the regulation of government's behavior, and the guarantee of public right and the acquisition legal relief in the case.On the foundation of the analysis of Chinese and foreign e-government legislation surveys, the characteristics of e-government legislation such as integrity and neutrality principle and the attention to international cooperation can be obtained. E-government legislation is not done in one action; it can not be enacted ahead of time artificially. E-government legislation only can develop according to social realistic demand and the urgent degree by the way which is unceasing, by key stress and comprehensive. At the same time, we must base on the perfection of existing legal revision and not be blind to make new law. Otherwise not only is the huge waste of the legislation resources, but also is the deviation of social reality and unavoidably the legislation conflict can be caused. The basic legislation system of Chinese e-government should be wholly planed according to our country's reality by using e-government organization and control law, e-government action law, the right of privacy and individual data protection law, the right to know and the government information opening law, e-government technology security law, and also e-government supervision and relief law as representatives.