POLITICAL mass gatherings in China often evoked painful memories of elder Chinese who went through the violent "class struggle sessions" during the "cultrual revolution" in the 1960s and 1970s.

People labeled "class enemies" - in many cases the heads of government offices, schools, and state institutes - were dragged to the crowd with their hands tied behind their back, then kicked and beaten, sometimes fatally.

But the mass gathering that took place in late October in Beijing's suburban town of Yongledian, like many others in rural China today, was of a completely different political dimension.

At the Yongledian public square, Party official Ding Jianhua delivered his annual work report to 5,000 villagers sitting on stools. Everyone was to fill out a questionnaire that would decide the 53-year-old's political career.

Facing the crowd for the third year, Ding said he has grown accustomed to these annual performance evaluation sessions once a year. If his performance was rated "unsatisfactory" by the majority of villagers two years in a row, he would have to resign as secretary of the Nanxi village committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), regardless of the length of his term.

Yu Xuehe, secretary of the Yongledian Township Party Committee, said over the past six years, nine village Party chiefs in Yongledian had been sacked for poor performance ratings.

Vibrant CPC-led grassroots democracy, from direct elections to various checks-and-balances, has changed the political culture in rural China, where for centuries, people used to call their feudal administrators "parent officials."

More than a week after the mass gathering in Yongledian, the CPC, the world's largest ruling party with 82 million members, convened its 18th National Congress in Beijing.

In a report to set the development agenda for the next five years or beyond, Party Secretary Hu Jintao called for both active and prudent efforts to "carry out the reform of the political structure and make people's democracy more extensive, fuller in scope and sounder in practice."

Though it is not clear when vibrant democracy at the grassroots will be expanded to upper levels of the Party hierarchy, political experts interviewed by Xinhua, including those involved in the drafting the report, said the Party is sincere in pursuing democracy. They said that positive changes, though they might not be imminent, can be expected.

Better democracy

China started political reform as early as in the 1970s. Important moves like the mandatory retirement of senior officials were made in the 1980s, spearheaded by charismatic former leader Deng Xiaoping.

In the 13th National Congress in 1987, the CPC stated its goal in political reform is to create a form of democracy better and more practical than the ones adopted by the developed capitalist states.

"The core of reform is to help the Party maintain leadership status, enhance the rule of law, and expand people's democracy," said Li Chongfu, a veteran Marxism scholar with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. "Multi-party rule is not a goal. Such a political system is intolerable in a socialist state."

Hu Jintao also reiterated in his report that "we will never copy a Western political system." Political experts said while the CPC's leadership is not to be challenged, the Party is undertaking reforms to make its decision-making more open through increased consultation with the public. Yan Shuhan, a professor at the Central Party School, said Hu's report signals efforts to boost "consultative democracy," a Chinese innovation in democratic form.

Rule of law

"Both Chinese and foreign literary works have a wealth of Robin Hood-style figures. But chivalry is not the answer, as he can help just a few people. In reality, one can only find justice in the rule of law," Tong Lihua, a Beijing-based lawyer, wrote in the preface to his book summarizing his 12-year experience managing a non-governmental legal aid center for child abuse victims and migrant workers denied wages and benefits.

"The best example in China's rule-of-law process is the way we deal with drink driving," Tong said. "When people see that no matter who is caught drink driving, he will be severely punished, most people won't drink if they drive."

Alcohol is indispensable in most dinner gatherings. While driving could not be used as an excuse for not drinking in the past, few drivers are forced to drink after tougher laws against reckless driving were enforced in2011. Official figures show a sharp decline of drink driving cases.

The CPC introduced "rule of law" in its five-year report at the Party's 15th National Congress in 1997. Since then, much progress in legislation and law enforcement has been made, but calls for greater reform, especially judicial reform, have grown louder in recent years.

"If you look at details, Indian democracy, Indonesian democracy, American democracy - they are all different in profound ways. But the basics that define democracy - election, the rule of law, supervision - are the same," said Cheng Li, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Brookings Institute

In an interview with Xinhua before the Congress, Li, a Chinese politics expert, said he believed "bold steps" of reform were being considered by the leadership because of the necessity to cope with fast-changing society, especially in the wake of the Bo Xilai incident.

"No organization or individual has the privilege of overstepping the Constitution and laws, and no one in a position of power is allowed in any way to take one's own word as the law, place one's own authority above the law or abuse the law," Hu warned in his report.

Political experts also noticed the emphasis on competitive election in Hu's report. The report calls for efforts "to improve intra-Party election to create a procedure and conditions that fully represent the voters' will," the first time such wording has appeared in the five-year CPC report.

Though competitive election is mostly practiced at the grassroots levels, there are signs that it is being expanded to upper levels of the Party hierarchy. "Competitive election has been used in a few provinces like Guangdong for top provincial Party officials this year," said Dai Yanjun, a Central Party School professor.

Some people might emphasize the defining moment for democracy, but in reality you do need the maturity of the society and some basic preparations," said Li, the Brookings researcher. "Democracy is a process, not an event."

The author is a Xinhua writer.