Month: May 2023

NPC Calendar: June 2023

Here is our recap of NPC-related events in June 2023 at our monthly newsletter.

The 14th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) will convene for its 3rd session in late June. The Council of Chairpersons is expected to meet in mid-June to decide on the agenda and dates of the session.

According to the NPCSC’s 2023 legislative work plan, the following bills will return for further review:

The NPCSC is expected to review one or more additional bills at its upcoming session.

China’s National Legislature Releases 2023 Legislative Plan

On Monday, May 29, China’s national legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC), released its legislative work plan for 2023 (Plan). The Plan was preliminarily approved by the Council of Chairpersons in December 2022 and finalized on April 14. It sets forth priorities for all aspects of the NPCSC’s legislative work in 2023, which include a list of legislative projects scheduled for review or research this year. Other aspects of the NPCSC’s legislative work include upholding the Communist Party’s leadership of lawmaking, implementing the Constitution, dealing with expiring reform authorizations, and improving legislative procedure. We, as usual, will focus on the list of legislative projects in this post, but will also note a few other notable tasks included in the Plan.

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The Content and Context of Chinese Military’s New Authority to Change “Wartime” Court-Martial Rules

On February 24, 2023, China’s national legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC), adopted a decision authorizing the Central Military Commission (CMC), China’s highest military authority, to “adjust” the way in which the Chinese military applies the Criminal Procedure Law [刑事诉讼法] during “wartime” (the Decision). That is admittedly (three-month-)old “news.” We did not write about it then because the Decision’s timing was not self-evident and the scope of its authorization unclear. Its accompanying explanation, we had hoped, would shed light on those questions, but it was not immediately released.

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Term Review: How Long Did It Take the 13th NPC to Pass a Law?

The five-year term of the 13th National People’s Congress (NPC) recently ended. At the risk of overpromising, we plan to write a few end-of-term reviews on different aspects of the 13th NPC’s lawmaking over the next several months. In this first installment, we will try to answer the question “how long does it take the (last) NPC to pass a bill?”—as well as subsidiary questions like “when is [insert bill of your choice] up for its next reading?” and “how many reviews will the bill go through?”

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