State Council Information Office
The State Council Information Office (SCIO; Chinese: 国务院新闻办公室; pinyin: Guówùyuàn Xīnwén Bàngōngshì; lit. 'State Council News Office') was the chief information office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China and is currently an external name of the Central Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party.
Information office overview
April 8, 1980
- External name of the Central Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party
- Administrative office of the State Council
225 Chaoyangmennei Street, Dongcheng District, Beijing
39°55′53″N 116°25′37″E / 39.931293°N 116.426952°E
国务院新闻办公室
國務院新聞辦公室
State Council News Office
Guówùyuàn Xīnwén Bàngōngshì
Guówùyuàn Xīnwén Bàngōngshì
Historically, SCIO was the external name of the Office of External Propaganda (OEP) of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) under an arrangement termed "one institution with two names." In 2014, OEP was absorbed into the Central Propaganda Department, turning SCIO into an external nameplate.
Structure[edit]
Before its absorption to the Propaganda Department, the OEP had nine functional bureaus, with corresponding ones in the SCIO, as well as supervised organs. It oversaw the China Foreign Languages Publishing Administration, while its seventh bureau oversaw the China Society for Human Rights Studies (CSHRS), a front group established in 1993 dealing with human rights-related narratives towards China.[4]
The office formerly had responsibility for internet censorship in China. The SCIO's Internet Affairs Bureau dealt with internet censorship and repressed "disruptive" activity on the web in mainland China.[8][9] In May 2011, the SCIO transferred the offices, namely its fifth and ninth bureaus, which regulated the internet to a new subordinate agency, the State Internet Information Office (SIIO).[10] In May 2014, with the abolishment of the OEP, the SIIO (renamed in English as the Cyberspace Administration of China) was absorbed into the newly established Central Leading Group for Cybersecurity and Informatization.[4]
Since the 2014 merger SCIO's nine bureaus are now controlled by the Central Propaganda Department, sometimes used by the department's bureaus as external nameplates.[4]
