The Main Development Stages of the Information Industry of the PRC
Authors: Guo Zhiliang 
Published: July 2022

The purpose of this paper is to determine the qualitative features of development and transformation vectors of the information industry of the People’s Republic of China.

The methodology. The research was conducted using a set of theoretical and empirical methods of scientific knowledge, which made it possible to identify the main stages in the evolution of the scientific and technical information system of the People’s Republic of China, to establish innovation vectors of its modern development. The following scientific approaches were cognitive tools for the implementation of this goal: systematic, historical, comparative, as well as research methods: statistical, modeling, content analysis of the website of the Institute for Scientific and Technical Information of China.

The results. The generalization of the history of the origin and development of the scientific and technical information system of the PRC has identified three main stages of its institutionalization: starting stage (1956–1976), stage of sustainable development (1977–2000), stage of innovation changes (2001–present). At the first stage, a powerful start in the development of an effective state system of scientific and technical information was interrupted by a decade of regressive influence on the socio­economic development of the so­called “cultural revolution”. The second stage was marked by the breakthrough technologies in the implementation of projects for the development of effective tools for searching and systematization of scientific and technical information, in particular, the development of the “Chinese Library Classification” and the “Chinese Subject Thesaurus” in all fields of study, which won the National Prize in Science and Technology in 1983; the creation of the first automated abstract database “Chinese Pharmacy Abstracts” in 1984; the development of unique software for Chinese characters that ran on IBM­class computers, etc. The organizational infrastructure of the national scientific and technical information system was based on a combination of territorial and branch principles, as a result, regional information centers were formed in 27 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions of the country, as well as departmental ones at large enterprises of 64 ministries of the PRC. The qualitative features of the third stage of development of the Information Industry of China — the stage of innovation changes — identify the processes of digital globalization, automation of Big Data processing, mastering the capabilities and technologies of artificial intelligence in the management of big data and the extraction of explicit and implicit knowledge.

The scientific novelty. The author suggests a periodization of the main stages of development of the state system of scientific and technical information of the People’s Republic of China into scientific circulation for the first time; reveals the qualitative features of its functioning at each historical stage; identifies the vectors of diversification of Intelligent Products and Services, transformation strategies for the application of Smart Knowledge Service ecosystems, operated on the basis of analytical processing of big data by artificial intelligence technologies.

The practical significance. The experience of developing the information industry and its transformation into the knowledge industry in China is useful to be borrowed by the Ukrainian state scientific and technical information system.