Profile: Xi Jinping: Man of the people, statesman of vision (14)

（Xinhua）  09:24, December 24, 2012

At the same time, he encouraged more cooperation among Zhejiang, neighboring Shanghai Municipality and Jiangsu Province in order to tap their potential as an integrated economic powerhouse.

In 2004, under Xi's leadership, Zhejiang made an attempt to improve grassroots democracy. Villages there set up residents' committees to supervise the village Party committee and administrative committee on public affairs, a move that received a positive response from the public.

Village supervision committees, which sprang from the Zhejiang model, were later introduced in an amendment to the Organic Law of Villagers' Committees in 2010 by the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, the top Chinese legislature.

Shanghai was Xi's last local post before he was promoted to the central leadership. Despite a relatively short term in the country's financial hub, he left his mark by promoting the economic integration of the Yangtze River Delta and enhancing Shanghai's leading role in the region.

Xi added "enlightened, sagacious, open-minded and modest" to the official wording of the Shanghai Spirit slogan, which previously had just read "inclusive and sublime." The Shanghai Spirit was intended to capture the essence of the city. Media in Shanghai remarked that these emendations helped present Shanghai to the rest of the world in a deeper, more thoughtful way. These changes were also noticed by people outside Shanghai.