Advancing the Effective Empowerment of Consultative Democracy by Digital Technology

In recent years, as a new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation accelerates, digital technologies represented by big data, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and mobile internet have been vigorously developed and deeply applied. They are extensively and profoundly driving the penetration of technological governance into all fields and the entire process of economic and social development, becoming a powerful force driving changes in modern social production and life. In the current era, as the leading force of the world’s technological revolution and industrial transformation, digital technology is increasingly integrated into all fields and the entire process of economic and social development, profoundly changing modes of production, lifestyles, and methods of social governance.

近年来，随着新一轮科技革命和产业变革加速演进，以大数据、云计算、人工智能和移动互联网等为代表的数字技术得到蓬勃发展和深度应用，正在广泛而深刻地推动技术治理向经济社会发展的各领域和全过程渗透，成为驱动现代社会生产生活变革的强大动力。当今时代，作为世界科技革命和产业变革的先导力量，数字技术日益融入经济社会发展各领域全过程，深刻改变着生产方式、生活方式和社会治理方式。

As an important component of whole-process people’s democracy, consultative democracy in China has roots, origins, and vitality. It possesses a deep cultural foundation, theoretical foundation, practical foundation, and institutional foundation, and is an important institutional design for ensuring the people’s position as masters of the country. The continuous maturation of digital technology and the ongoing expansion of its application scenarios, while driving the iterative development of the economy and society, have also opened up broad space for the practice of consultative democracy, becoming a key engine driving the transformation and innovation of the national governance system, and profoundly changing the methods and effectiveness of people’s participation in political activities. Compared with electoral democracy, the attributes and functions of digital technology have stronger coupling and correlation with the practical links of consultative democracy, enabling it to provide new technological conditions and practical foundations for consultative democracy, and to broaden the breadth and depth of democratic participation.

作为全过程人民民主的重要组成，协商民主在我国有根、有源、有生命力，具有深厚的文化基础、理论基础、实践基础、制度基础，是保证人民当家作主的重要制度设计。数字技术的不断成熟和应用场景的持续拓展，在推动经济社会迭代发展的同时，也为协商民主的实践开辟了广阔空间，成为驱动国家治理体系变革与创新的关键引擎，深度改变人们参与政治活动的方式和效能。相较于选举民主，数字技术的属性功能与协商民主的实践环节的耦合性和关联度更强，能够为协商民主提供全新的技术条件和实践基础，拓宽民主参与的广度和深度。

In this sense, empowering consultative democracy with digital technology can not only reduce the practical costs of building consensus and enhance the political efficacy and efficiency of consultative democracy, but also effectively stimulate the inner vitality of China’s socialist democracy, better transforming the institutional advantages of consultative democracy into governance effectiveness.

从这个意义上说，以数字技术赋能协商民主不仅可以降低凝聚共识的实践成本，提升协商民主的政治效能和效率，还能有效激发我国社会主义民主的内在活力，更好将协商民主的制度优势转化为治理效能。

While digital technology empowers consultative democracy, the problems of technological abuse that arise also urgently require our high attention and systematic prevention and control. It should be recognized that digital technology is merely a tool for stimulating consultative efficacy, not the ontology; the fundamental purpose of digital empowerment lies in unleashing human vitality and realizing people’s free and comprehensive development. Therefore, to advance the effective empowerment of consultative democracy by digital technology, we must adhere to a people-centered approach, focus on the interactive integration of humanistic orientation and technological governance, and through measures such as bridging the digital divide, breaking through information cocoons, and ensuring data security, better realize “consulting with the people and for the people.”

数字技术在赋能协商民主的同时，产生的技术滥用问题，也亟须我们高度重视和系统防控。应当看到，数字技术只是激发协商效能的工具而非本体，数字赋能的根本在于释放人的活力、实现人的自由而全面发展。因此，推进数字技术有效赋能协商民主，必须坚持以人民为中心，注重人文导向与技术治理的互动融合，要通过弥合数字鸿沟、突破信息茧房、保障数据安全等措施，更好实现“协商于民、协商为民”。

Bridging the digital divide. For the practice of consultative democracy, digital infrastructure construction and the digital literacy of consultative subjects are fundamental factors affecting the empowerment of consultative democracy by digital technology, and are also supporting elements for bridging the digital divide. On the one hand, relevant departments should continue to increase policy supply and capital investment, promote the optimization and upgrading of digital infrastructure, increase the penetration rate of digital devices, and build more convenient and efficient consultative platforms to precisely adapt to various consultative application scenarios. In particular, they should promote the extension of digital resources to the grassroots level and their sinking to underdeveloped regions, further enhance the popularity of digital technology at the grassroots level, break down data barriers and information silos, and lower the threshold and cost of digital participation. On the other hand, attention should be paid to guiding the public to adapt to the development trend of digital democratic political practice, enhance their ability to apply digital technology and their information literacy, enable digital technology to play a more active and proactive role in the practical process of empowering consultative democracy, and truly make them participants and promoters of consultative democracy.

弥合数字鸿沟。就协商民主实践而言，数字基础设施建设以及协商主体的数字素养是影响数字技术赋能协商民主的基础性要素，也是弥合数字鸿沟的支撑性要件。一方面，有关部门要持续加大政策供给与资金投入，推动数字基础设施优化升级，提升数字设备普及率，搭建更为便捷、高效的协商平台以精准适配各类协商应用场景。特别要推动数字资源向基层延伸、向欠发达地区下沉，进一步增强数字技术在基层领域的普及程度，打破数据壁垒和信息孤岛，降低数字参与的门槛和成本。另一方面，注重引导公众适应数字化民主政治实践的发展趋势，提升数字技术应用能力与信息素养，发挥数字技术在赋能协商民主的实践过程中更加积极的主动作用，真正成为协商民主的参与者和推动者。

Breaking through information cocoons. In the current era of rapid digital technology development, the intelligence of search engines, the popularization of social media, and the widespread application of personalized recommendation algorithms, while bringing convenient information to consultative subjects, also narrow the construction of their own knowledge systems, strengthen individual subjective preferences, and thus lead to the solidification of thinking patterns. Breaking through information cocoons requires two-way efforts in optimizing the information production and dissemination process and cultivating consultative performance capabilities. On the one hand, as actual applicators of algorithmic recommendation technology, digital platforms should optimize algorithmic recommendations, promote algorithms for good, expand information boundaries, provide consultative subjects with diversified information choices and balanced reporting, and strive to seek a balance between meeting consultative needs and subjective experience. On the other hand, actively cultivate the consultative performance capabilities of consultative subjects. It is necessary to support various consultative subjects in “understanding the CPPCC [1]1 The Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) is a key political institution in China, serving as a platform for consultative democracy where various political parties, people's organizations, and individuals from all sectors participate in political consultation and democratic supervision., being capable of consultation, and being good at political deliberation,” leverage the advantage of some special consultative subjects who “naturally attract traffic,” and through methods such as setting up electronic mailboxes, WeChat, and Weibo accounts for CPPCC members, use modern digital communication technologies to proactively reveal their identities, so that the masses can find CPPCC members conveniently and in a timely manner, better helping to solve the people’s urgent, difficult, and anxious problems.

突破信息茧房。在数字技术高速发展的当下，搜索引擎的智能化、社交媒体的普及以及个性化推荐算法的广泛应用，在为协商主体带来便捷资讯的同时，也使自身的知识体系建构出现窄化，强化了个体主观偏好，进而导致思维模式出现固化。突破信息茧房，需在优化信息生产传播过程和培育协商履职能力方面双向发力。一方面，作为算法推荐技术的实际应用者，数字平台应优化算法推荐，推动算法向善，拓展信息边界，为协商主体提供多样化的信息选择和均衡性报道，着力在满足协商需求与主观体验之间寻求平衡。另一方面，积极培育协商主体的协商履职能力。要支持各类协商主体“懂政协、会协商、善议政”，发挥一些特殊协商主体“自带流量”的优势，通过设立政协委员的电子信箱、微信、微博等方式，利用现代数字传播技术主动亮明身份，让群众及时方便地找到政协委员，更好帮助解决群众急难愁盼问题。

Ensuring data security. While digital technology is widely applied in democratic practice, it is also necessary to guard against and be vigilant about risks and hidden dangers such as individual privacy theft and data leakage that may result from technological empowerment. Due to the characteristics of digital algorithms, data security risks are persistent and concealed, not only harming the personal privacy and personal safety of consultative subjects, but also increasing the difficulty of post-event supervision and accountability, weakening the public’s enthusiasm for participating in political life, and urgently requiring necessary measures for regulation and supervision. On the one hand, at the level of mechanism optimization, further standardize the full-process management of data application in the consultation process. Relying on big data resource platforms, achieve unified management of the entire process of data collection, storage, use, processing, transmission, provision, and disclosure. At the same time, enhance the ability to identify and control risks related to data aggregation and correlation, clarify the scope of data collection and use, strengthen awareness of data anonymization management, and desensitize and anonymize public data involving personal information to avoid infringing on the information rights and interests of relevant individuals. On the other hand, at the level of legal guarantee, strengthen the constraint and supervision of relevant communication platforms in the online public sphere, establish stricter rules for the collection and use of consultative information in the online platform public sphere, improve the construction of laws and regulations systems supporting consultative democracy with digital technology, build a fair and standardized digital governance ecosystem, and ensure that digital technology empowers consultative democracy safely and reliably.

保障数据安全。数字技术在广泛应用于民主实践的同时，也要防范和警惕技术赋能可能导致的个体隐私窃取和数据泄露等风险隐患。由于数字算法的特性，数据安全风险具有持续性和隐蔽性，不仅危害协商主体的个人隐私和人身安全，而且增加事后监督和追责的难度，削弱公众参与政治生活的热情，亟须采取必要措施加以规范和监管。一方面，在机制优化层面，进一步规范协商过程中数据应用的全流程管理。依托大数据资源平台，实现数据收集、存储、使用、加工、传输、提供、公开等全过程的统一管理。同时，提升数据汇聚关联风险识别和管控水平，明确数据收集和使用范围，加强数据匿名管理意识，涉及个人信息的公共数据要进行脱敏和匿名化处理，避免侵犯相关个人的信息权益。另一方面，在法治保障层面，要加强对网络公共领域相关传播平台的约束和监管，建立更加严格的网络平台公共领域的协商信息收集和使用规则，完善数字技术支撑协商民主的法律法规体系建设，构建公平规范的数字治理生态，确保数字技术赋能协商民主安全可靠。

(The author is a researcher at the Research Center for the Theoretical System of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics, Party School of the Dalian Municipal Committee of the CPC)

（作者系中共大连市委党校中国特色社会主义理论体系研究中心研究员）

Online editor: Tongxin

网络编辑：同心