China’s Judicial System

The Functions of Courts

• Authoritarian judiciaries have been found to

• establish social control

• promote regime legitimacy

• control administrative agents

• facilitate economic development

• help to implement controversial policies

Broadly speaking ...

• China’s judicial system includes:

– People’s Courts

– People’s Procuratorates

– Public Security organs

What do they report to?

People’s Congress

Government

(including Public Security organs)

People’s ProcuratoratePeople’s Court

Effective Party Control

• Political-Legal Committees at every level of the Chinese Communist Party hierarchy

• versus the goal of “judicial professionalism”– courts should be staffed and operated by

legally trained judges– the influence of non-lawyers or extra-legal

concerns on adjudication should be kept to a minimum

Strictly speaking ...

• The judicial system only includes the People’s Court system

• The People’s Court System includes:– Supreme People’s Court– Local People’s Courts– Special Courts

• 10 Maritime Courts• 75 Railway Courts (became local courts in 2012)• Military Courts

4 Levels of People’s Courts

Court level

Supreme People’s Court

Center

Higher People’s Court

Province

Intermediate People’s Court

City

Basic People’s Court County or district

Hierarchy of the Judicial System

• In common law systems, a decision made by a superior court is a binding precedent that all inferior courts are required to follow

• In China, as in other continental legal systems, this doctrine of binding precedents is not applied

• However, the appeal mechanism in effect renders the decisions of higher courts binding on lower courts

Hierarchy of the Judicial System

• The Chinese four-level court system only allows one appeal to be made to a court of higher ranking

• which minimizes the impact of the provincial high courts’ or the Supreme People’s Court’s decisions on those of lower level courts

Hierarchy of the Judicial System

• Compared with the organization of judiciaries in other countries

• there appears to be a gap in the formal legal control over lower courts by provincial high courts and the Supreme People’s Court

Judicial Reforms since 1990s

• predominantly carried out in a top-down manner

• Courts have developed into specialized legal institutions that are staffed by legally trained judges

• Chinese courts have expanded their jurisdiction and their caseloads have proliferated significantly

1st Trial Cases

Administrative Litigation Law

• Passed in April 1989 and implemented in October 1990

• Gives the court the power to uphold, revoke, revise, or compel administrative actions

• One of the few state-sanctioned means for private citizens to challenge the actions of government officials on many regulatory and administrative issues

Administrative Litigation Cases

Plaintiffs in Admin. Litig. Cases

After 17th Party Congress (’07)

• The Central Political-Legal Committee adopted a new document on judicial reform

• The “three supremes” doctrine:

1.the supremacy of the CCP

2.the supremacy of the people’s interests

3.the supremacy of the constitution and law

Populist Turn of Judicial Reform

• Judges are reminded of the need to consider the social and political consequences of their judgments

• To achieve a “harmonious society” and social stability, mediation is regarded as a more suitable tool than litigation

The Qi Yuling case (2001)

• In 2001, the Supreme People’s Court attempted to judicialize the constitution in the form of a “reply” to a provincial higher people’s court

• In 2008, the Supreme People’s Court repealed the “reply”

• Constitutionality