The Constitution of the People's Republic of China is the
supreme law
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed.
When these princ ...
of the
People's Republic of China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
(PRC). In September 1949, the
adopted the
Common Program
The Common Program was the primary general policy document passed by the First plenary session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, first plenary session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in Septembe ...
, which acted as the temporary constitution after the PRC's foundation. On September 20, 1954, the
first constitution was adopted by the first session of the
1st National People's Congress
The 1st National People's Congress (NPC) was in session from 1954 to 1959. It held four sessions in this period. There were 1,226 deputies to the Congress. These were the first legislative elections to take place after the founding of the People ...
. The constitution went through two major revisions in
1975
It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe.
Events
January
* January 1 – Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...
and
1978
Events January
* January 1 – Air India Flight 855, a Boeing 747 passenger jet, crashes off the coast of Bombay, killing 213.
* January 5 – Bülent Ecevit, of Republican People's Party, CHP, forms the new government of Turkey (42nd ...
. The current constitution was adopted by the
5th National People's Congress
The 5th National People's Congress (NPC) was in session from 1978 to 1983. It succeeded the 4th National People's Congress. It held five plenary sessions in this period.
Seat distribution
The first session
*Chairman and Vice Chairman: ''Po ...
on December 4, 1982, with
five subsequent revisions.
The current constitution consists of 4 chapters and 143 articles. It explains the nature of the People's Republic of China, highlights the concept of democratic centralism, and states that the People's Republic of China is a "socialist state governed by a
people's democratic dictatorship
People's democratic dictatorship () is a phrase incorporated into the constitution of the People's Republic of China and the constitution of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The premise of the "People's democratic dictatorship" is that the part ...
that is led by the working class and based on an alliance of workers and peasants". It stipulates the central and local state institutions work under the
system of people's congress
The system of people's congress () under the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is the form of government of the People's Republic of China (PRC), and is based on the principle of unified power, in which all state powers are vested in the National Pe ...
, and states that China implements basic political systems such as the
system of community-level self-governance
The system of community-level self-governance ( zh, c=基层群众自治制度, p=Jīcéng Qúnzhòng Zìzhì Zhìdù) is a term used by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to describe a form of local government in the People's Republic of China (PRC ...
and the
regional ethnic autonomy system. The constitution also lists its basic national policies and establishes the leadership of the
Chinese Communist Party
The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...
(CCP).
History
The first Constitution of the People's Republic of China was declared in 1954. The current Constitution was declared in 1982,
after two intervening versions enacted in 1975 and 1978. There were significant differences between each of these versions, and the 1982 Constitution has subsequently been amended five times.
The 1982 Constitution expunges almost all of the rhetoric associated with the
Cultural Revolution
The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a Social movement, sociopolitical movement in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong in 1966 and lasted until his de ...
originally inserted in 1975. In fact, the Constitution omits all references to the Cultural Revolution and restates
CCP Chairman Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong pronounced ; traditionally Romanization of Chinese, romanised as Mao Tse-tung. (26December 18939September 1976) was a Chinese politician, revolutionary, and political theorist who founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in ...
's contributions in accordance with a major historical reassessment produced in June 1981 at the Sixth Plenum of the Eleventh Central Committee, the ''
.''
Structure
#Preamble
#General Principles (Chapter 1)
#The Fundamental Rights and Duties of Citizens (Chapter 2)
#The Structure of the State (Chapter 3) — which includes such state organs as the
National People's Congress
The National People's Congress (NPC) is the highest organ of state power of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The NPC is the only branch of government in China, and per the principle of unified power, all state organs from the Sta ...
, the
President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
* President (education), a leader of a college or university
*President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Arts and entertainment Film and television
*'' Præsident ...
, the
State Council State Council may refer to:
Government
* State Council of the People's Republic of China, the national cabinet and chief administrative authority of China, headed by the Premier
* State Council of the Republic of Korea, the national cabinet of S ...
, the
Central Military Commission Central Military Commission may refer to:
*Central Military Commission (China), the highest national defense organization in the People's Republic of China.
*Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of Vietnam, the highest body in Vietnam ...
, the Local People's Congresses at All Levels and Local People's Governments at All Levels, the Autonomous Organs of Ethnic Autonomous Areas, the
Commissions of Supervision, and the People's Courts and People's Procuratorates.
#The
National Flag
A national flag is a flag that represents and national symbol, symbolizes a given nation. It is Fly (flag), flown by the government of that nation, but can also be flown by its citizens. A national flag is typically designed with specific meanin ...
, the
National Anthem
A national anthem is a patriotic musical composition symbolizing and evoking eulogies of the history and traditions of a country or nation. The majority of national anthems are marches or hymns in style. American, Central Asian, and European ...
, the
National Emblem
A national emblem is an emblem or seal that is reserved for use by a nation state or multi-national state as a symbol of that nation. Many nations have a seal or emblem in addition to a national flag.
Other national symbols, such as national ...
and the
Capital
Capital and its variations may refer to:
Common uses
* Capital city, a municipality of primary status
** Capital region, a metropolitan region containing the capital
** List of national capitals
* Capital letter, an upper-case letter
Econom ...
(Chapter 4).
1982 Constitution
There had been five major revisions by the National People's Congress (NPC) to the 1982 Constitution. The 1982 State Constitution provided a legal basis for the broad changes in China's social and economic institutions and significantly revised government structure. The posts of President and
Vice President
A vice president or vice-president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vi ...
(which were abolished in the 1975 and 1978 constitutions) are re-established in the 1982 Constitution.
Prior to 1982 there were no term limits on key leadership posts. Deng imposed a two-term limit (10 years total) on all but the chair of the
Central Military Commission Central Military Commission may refer to:
*Central Military Commission (China), the highest national defense organization in the People's Republic of China.
*Central Military Commission of the Communist Party of Vietnam, the highest body in Vietnam ...
.
Much of the PRC Constitution is modeled after the
1936 Constitution of the Soviet Union
The 1936 Constitution of the Soviet Union, also known as the Stalin Constitution, was the constitution of the Soviet Union adopted on 5 December 1936.
The 1936 Constitution was the second constitution of the Soviet Union and replaced the 1924 C ...
, but there are some significant differences. For example, while the Soviet constitution contains an explicit right of
secession
Secession is the formal withdrawal of a group from a Polity, political entity. The process begins once a group proclaims an act of secession (such as a declaration of independence). A secession attempt might be violent or peaceful, but the goal i ...
, the Chinese constitution explicitly forbids secession. While the Soviet constitution formally creates a
federal system, the Chinese constitution formally creates a
unitary
Unitary may refer to:
Mathematics
* Unitary divisor
* Unitary element
* Unitary group
* Unitary matrix
* Unitary morphism
* Unitary operator
* Unitary transformation
* Unitary representation
* Unitarity (physics)
* ''E''-unitary inverse semigr ...
multi-national state.
The preamble describes China as "a country with one of the longest histories in the world. The people of all of China's nationalities have jointly created a culture of grandeur and have a glorious revolutionary tradition."
The preamble dates this revolutionary history as beginning in 1840.
Article 1 of the Constitution describes China as "a
socialist state
A socialist state, socialist republic, or socialist country is a sovereign state constitutionally dedicated to the establishment of socialism. This article is about states that refer to themselves as socialist states, and not specifically ...
under the
people's democratic dictatorship
People's democratic dictatorship () is a phrase incorporated into the constitution of the People's Republic of China and the constitution of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The premise of the "People's democratic dictatorship" is that the part ...
"
meaning that the system is based on an alliance of the working classes—in communist terminology, the workers and peasants—and is led by the
Chinese Communist Party
The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...
(CCP), the vanguard of the working class. Elsewhere, the Constitution provides for a renewed and vital role for the groups that make up that basic alliance—the
Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference
The Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) is a political advisory body in the People's Republic of China and a central part of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)'s United front (China), united front system. Its members adv ...
, minor political parties, and
people's organizations.
Article 3 describes the relationship between the central government and local governments: "The division of responsibility and power between the central and local government is governed under the unified leadership of the central government, while fully encouraging the principle of local government initiative and proactivity."
Article 35 of the 1982 Constitution proclaims that "citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy
freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or a community to articulate their opinions and ideas without fear of retaliation, censorship, or legal sanction. The rights, right to freedom of expression has been r ...
, of the
press
Press may refer to:
Media
* Publisher
* News media
* Printing press, commonly called "the press"
* Press TV, an Iranian television network
Newspapers United States
* ''The Press'', a former name of ''The Press-Enterprise'', Riverside, California
...
, of
assembly, of association, of procession, and of demonstration."
In the 1978 constitution, these rights were guaranteed, but so were the right to strike and the "four big rights", often called the "four bigs": to speak out freely, air views fully, hold great debates, and write
big-character posters
Big-character posters () are handwritten posters displaying large Chinese characters, usually mounted on walls in public spaces such as universities, factories, government departments, and sometimes directly on the streets. They are used as a me ...
. In February 1980, following the
Democracy Wall
From November 1978 to December 1979, thousands of people put up " big character posters" on a long brick wall of Xidan Street, Xicheng District of Beijing, to protest about the political and social issues of China; the wall became known as the ...
period, the four bigs were abolished in response to a party decision ratified by the National People's Congress. The right to strike was also dropped from the 1982 Constitution. The widespread expression of the four big rights during the student protests of late 1986 elicited the regime's strong censure because of their illegality. The official response cited Article 53 of the 1982 Constitution, which states that citizens must abide by the law and observe labor discipline and public order. Besides being illegal, practicing the four big rights offered the possibility of straying into criticism of the CCP, which was in fact what appeared in student wall posters. In a new era that strove for political stability and economic development, party leaders considered the four big rights politically destabilizing. Chinese citizens are prohibited from forming new political parties.
Among the political rights granted by the constitution, all Chinese citizens have rights to elect and be elected.
According to the later promulgated election law, rural residents had only 1/4 vote power of townsmen (formerly 1/8). As Chinese citizens are categorized into rural resident and town resident, and the constitution has no stipulation of freedom of transference, those rural residents are restricted by the
Hukou
''Hukou'' ( zh, c=户口, l=household individual) is a system of household registration used in the People's Republic of China. The system itself is more properly called ''huji'' ( zh, c=户籍, l=household origin), and has origins in Histo ...
(registered permanent residence) and have fewer political, economic, and educational rights. This problem has largely been addressed with various and ongoing reforms of Hukou in 2007. The aforementioned ratio of vote power has been readjusted to 1:1 by an amendment to the election law passed in March 2010.
The 1982 constitution included the birth planning policy known as the
one-child policy
The one-child policy ( zh, c=一孩政策, p=yī hái zhèngcè) was a population planning initiative in China implemented between 1979 and 2015 to curb the country's population growth by restricting many families to a single child. The progr ...
.
Revisions and amendments
7th National People's Congress (1988)
The National People's Congress amended Articles 10 and 11 of the Constitution to allow the emergence of a private sector and the transfer of the land use to private industry.
8th National People's Congress (1993)
9th National People's Congress (1999)
10th National People's Congress (2004)
The Constitution was amended on 14 March 2004 to include guarantees regarding
private property
Private property is a legal designation for the ownership of property by non-governmental Capacity (law), legal entities. Private property is distinguishable from public property, which is owned by a state entity, and from Collective ownership ...
(''"legally obtained private property of the citizens shall not be violated"'') and
human rights
Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...
(''"the State respects and protects human rights"''). The government argued that this represented progress for
Chinese democracy
''Chinese Democracy'' is the sixth studio album by the American hard rock band Guns N' Roses, released on November 23, 2008, by Black Frog and Geffen Records. It was the first Guns N' Roses studio album since the 1993 covers album ''"The Spagh ...
and was a sign from the CCP that they recognized the need to adapt to the booming Chinese economy, which had created a growing
middle class
The middle class refers to a class of people in the middle of a social hierarchy, often defined by occupation, income, education, or social status. The term has historically been associated with modernity, capitalism and political debate. C ...
who wanted private property protections.
13th National People's Congress (2018)
The Constitution was amended on 11 March 2018, with 2,958 votes in favor, two against, and three abstentions.
It includes an assortment of revisions that further cement the CCP's control and supremacy, including setting up the National Supervisory Commission,
establishing a new anti-graft agency, extending the powers of the CCP's graft watchdog, adding Hu Jintao's
Scientific Outlook on Development
The Scientific Outlook on Development was a political doctrine of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), credited to former Chinese leader Hu Jintao and Hu-Wen Administration, his administration, who was in power from 2002 to 2012. The Scientific Ou ...
and
Xi Jinping Thought
Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, commonly abbreviated outside China as Xi Jinping Thought, is a political doctrine created during General Secretary Xi Jinping's leadership of the Chinese Communist ...
to the Preamble of the Constitution,
and removing
term limit
A term limit is a legal restriction on the number of terms a person may serve in a particular elected office. When term limits are found in presidential and semi-presidential systems they act as a method of curbing the potential for monopoly, w ...
s for both the President and Vice President, enabling
Xi Jinping
Xi Jinping, pronounced (born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has been the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Chairman of the Central Military Commission (China), chairman of the Central Military Commission ...
to remain president indefinitely. Xi is also the
General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party
The general secretary of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party ( zh, s=中国共产党中央委员会总书记, p=Zhōngguó Gòngchǎndǎng Zhōngyāng Wěiyuánhuì Zǒngshūjì) is the leader of the Chinese Communist Part ...
, the ''de facto''
top position in CCP ruling China without term limit.
The amendments also add the phrases "Communist Party of China" and its "leadership" into the main body of the Constitution. Prior to the amendment, the CCP and its leadership were only mentioned in the preamble. Constitutional preambles are often not legally binding and as the legal applicability of the Chinese constitution is debated,
the amendment may be seen as providing a constitutional basis for China's status as a
one-party state
A one-party state, single-party state, one-party system or single-party system is a governance structure in which only a single political party controls the ruling system. In a one-party state, all opposition parties are either outlawed or en ...
and formally rendering any competitive
multi-party system
In political science, a multi-party system is a political system where more than two meaningfully-distinct political parties regularly run for office and win elections. Multi-party systems tend to be more common in countries using proportional ...
unconstitutional.
Xi "now has the distinction of being the first Chinese leader ever to have his theories enshrined in the constitution during his own lifetime."
The leadership of the CCP is now constitutionally enshrined as the "defining feature of socialism with Chinese characteristics", and therefore it establishes one-party rule as an end-in-itself.
Xi says:
Constitutional enforcement
Though technically the "supreme legal authority" and "fundamental law of the state", the ruling
Chinese Communist Party
The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...
(CCP) has a documented history of violating many of the constitution's provisions and censoring calls for greater adherence to it.
The constitution stipulates that the National People's Congress (NPC) and its
Standing Committee
A committee or commission is a body of one or more persons subordinate to a deliberative assembly or other form of organization. A committee may not itself be considered to be a form of assembly or a decision-making body. Usually, an assembly o ...
have the power to review whether laws or activities violate the constitution.
Unlike many Western legal systems, courts do not have the power of
judicial review
Judicial review is a process under which a government's executive, legislative, or administrative actions are subject to review by the judiciary. In a judicial review, a court may invalidate laws, acts, or governmental actions that are in ...
and cannot invalidate a statute on the grounds that it violates the constitution.
Since 2002, a special committee within the NPC called the
Constitution and Law Committee
The Constitution and Law Committee of the National People's Congress () is one of ten special committees of the National People's Congress, the national legislature of the People's Republic of China.
History
The special committee was created ...
has been responsible for constitutional review and enforcement.
The committee has never explicitly ruled that a law or regulation is unconstitutional. However, in one case, after media outcry over the
death of Sun Zhigang
The Sun Zhigang incident () refers to the 2003 death of the migrant worker Sun Zhigang in Guangzhou, as a result of physical abuse he suffered while being detained under China's custody and repatriation (C&R) system. The case received massive at ...
the State Council was forced to rescind regulations allowing police to detain persons without residency permits after the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPCSC) made it clear that it would rule such regulations unconstitutional.
Criticisms
The
Open Constitution Initiative
The Open Constitution Initiative (OCI) (), sometimes referred to in English as Gongmeng, was an organization consisting of lawyers and academics in the People's Republic of China that advocated for the rule of law and greater constitutional prote ...
was an organization consisting of lawyers and academics in the People's Republic of China that advocated the
rule of law
The essence of the rule of law is that all people and institutions within a Body politic, political body are subject to the same laws. This concept is sometimes stated simply as "no one is above the law" or "all are equal before the law". Acco ...
and greater constitutional protections. It was shut down by the government on July 14, 2009.
In early 2013, a movement developed among reformers in China based on enforcing the provisions of the constitution.
In 2019, Ling Li of the
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna (, ) is a public university, public research university in Vienna, Austria. Founded by Rudolf IV, Duke of Austria, Duke Rudolph IV in 1365, it is the oldest university in the German-speaking world and among the largest ...
and Wenzhang Zhou of
Zhejiang University
Zhejiang University (ZJU) is a public university, public research university in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China. It is affiliated with the Ministry of Education (China), Ministry of Education. The university is part of Project 211, Project 985, and D ...
wrote that "the constitution appeals to
he CCP
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (letter), the fifth letter of the Semitic abjads
* He (pronoun), a pronoun in Modern English
* He (kana), one of the Japanese kana (へ in hiragana and ヘ in katakana)
* Ge (Cyrillic), a Cyrillic letter cal ...
because it does ''not'' provide solutions to fundamental issues of governance. Instead, such issues are kept out of the constitution so that they can be addressed by the Party through other regulatory mechanisms outside of the constitutional realm."
See also
*
Constitutional history of the People's Republic of China
The constitutional history of the People's Republic of China describes the evolution of its Constitutional system. The first constitution of the People's Republic of China was promulgated in 1954. After two intervening versions enacted in 1975 ...
*
Constitution of the Republic of China
The Constitution of the Republic of China is the fifth and current constitution of the Republic of China (ROC), ratified by the Kuomintang during the Constituent National Assembly session on 25 December 1946, in Nanking, and adopted on 25 De ...
*
History of the People's Republic of China
On 1 October 1949 CCP chairman Mao Zedong proclaimed the People's Republic of China (PRC) from atop Tiananmen, after a near complete victory (1949) by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the Chinese Civil War. The PRC is the most recent p ...
*
Politics of China
In the People's Republic of China, politics functions within a socialist state framework based on the system of people's congress under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), with the National People's Congress (NPC) functionin ...
*
Law of the People's Republic of China
The Law of the People's Republic of China, officially referred to as the socialist rule of law with Chinese characteristics, is the legal regime of China, with the separate legal traditions and systems of mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau.
C ...
*
Constitution of the Chinese Communist Party
The Constitution of the Chinese Communist Party has 55 articles and its contents describe the program of the party, as well as its organizational structure and party symbolism. The Chinese Communist Party adopted its first program at the 1st ...
References
Citations
Sources
*
External links
Official Translation of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China*
ttp://english.people.com.cn/constitution/constitution.html English version of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, incorporating amendments up to 2004The National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China: Constitution of the People's Republic of China (Full text after amendment on March 14, 2004)
{{Asia topic, Constitution of, title=Constitutions of Asia, IR=Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran
1982 in law
Constitution of China
Government of the People's Republic of China
Politics of the People's Republic of China
1982 in Beijing
Law of the People's Republic of China