Dissecting the Chinese Legislature’s First Annual Report on Constitutional Enforcement

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China’s national legislature, the National People’s Congress (NPC) and its Standing Committee (NPCSC), has the constitutional power and duty to “oversee the enforcement of the Constitution.” Yet for decades this task had remained a low priority for the legislature. Since Xi Jinping took power in late 2012, he has “elevated the Party’s rhetorical commitment to the Constitution” on numerous occasions. For instance, in writing to commemorate the current Constitution’s 40^th anniversary in December 2022, Xi stressed the need to “continuously enhance constitutional enforcement and supervision”—and to, of course, do so under the Party’s leadership. Against this backdrop, the NPCSC has made constitutional enforcement a more significant and visible part of its work; its annual work reports to the NPC have included dedicated sections on “constitutional enforcement” [宪法实施]¹ since 2020.

On February 23, possibly starting a new yearly practice, the legislature posted on its official website a report on its efforts to “strengthen and innovate constitutional enforcement” in 2023, written by the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission’s Office for Constitution.² The report is worth reading for it not only discloses new constitutional practices from the past year that may have escaped most people’s attention, but also catalogs the kinds of activities that officially constitute “constitutional enforcement.” The report also likely serves as the basis for the section in the NPCSC’s forthcoming 2024 work report on constitutional enforcement. Below, we will discuss the report through a mix of summary and translation: parts that we found particularly noteworthy will be translated and annotated, whereas the rest will be summarized to varying extents. We added some paragraph breaks and text formatting in blockquotes to improve readability.

I. Constitutional Enforcement Through Legislation

“The most important way to ensure constitutional enforcement with scientific, effective, systematic, and complete systems is to improve the socialist system of laws with Chinese characteristics with the Constitution at its core,” says the report. It then emphasizes two aspects of the NPC’s legislative work in 2023.

1. Promulgating the 14^th NPCSC’s five-year legislative plan. According to the report, five-year legislative plans serve not only as the “master blueprints” for the NPCSC’s legislative work, but also as an important way for the Party to exercise “centralized, unified” leadership over legislation. The report highlights what it calls “an innovative measure” of constitutional enforcement: outlining the full NPC’s legislative agenda at its five annual sessions when formulating the new five-year legislative plan so that the NPC’s exclusive authority to enact or amend “basic statutes” is more than theoretical. The 14^th NPC, as a result, amended the Legislation Law [立法法] in 2023, is set to revise the State Council Organic Law [国务院组织法] next week—and, according to a legislative official, will review changes to the Law on the Delegates to the National People’s Congress and Local People’s Congresses at All Levels [全国人民代表大会和地方各级人民代表大会代表法], a new Law on National Development Plans [国家发展规划法], and an Ecological and Environmental Code [生态环境法典] at its remaining three sessions (not necessarily in this order).

2. Enacting laws related to the Constitution. “Constitution-related legal schemes” [宪法相关法律制度], the report explains, “are the part of the socialist system of laws with Chinese characteristics that is more closely related to the Constitution and play an important role in ensuring that the systems, principles, and rules established by the Constitution are fully implemented.” The report continues with the following eight broad examples:

First, to implement the spirit of the 20^th Party Congress and the provisions of the amended Constitution, [we] clearly provided for upholding the Party’s comprehensive leadership when formulating or amending laws including the Foreign Relations Law [对外关系法], Patriotic Education Law [爱国主义教育法], Counterespionage Law [反间谍法], Law on Ensuring Food Security [粮食安全保障法], and Charity Law [慈善法] . . .

Second, [we] amended the Legislation Law to make clear the latest guiding ideologies of lawmaking, improve China’s unified and hierarchical lawmaking system and working mechanisms, establish a constitutional-review system, improve the mechanisms for connecting and harmonizing legislation and reform, add provisions concerning supervision commissions and supervision regulations [监察法规], and further enrich and develop the constitutional provisions on the lawmaking system and authority.

Third, [we] enacted the Patriotic Education Law to implement the constitutional provision on educating the people in patriotism . . . .

Fourth, [we] advanced “domestic rule of law” [国内法治] and “foreign-related rule of law” [涉外法治] in a coordinated manner and strengthened the development of foreign-related legal systems. [We] enacted the Foreign Relations Law to . . . expand upon, enrich, and develop the relevant constitutional provisions on foreign policy . . . . [We] formulated the Foreign State Immunity Law [外国国家豁免法], based on the principle of safeguarding equal sovereign among the states, to establish the principles, rules, and relevant mechanisms of China’s system of foreign state immunity, . . . and safeguard China’s sovereignty, security, and development interest.

Fifth, to implement the holistic approach to national security and the Constitution’s provision on national security, [we] revised the Counterespionage Law . . . ; and enacted the Law on Ensuring Food Security to lay down detailed norms for implementing constitutional provisions on the land system, on the State’s respect for and protection of human rights, and on practicing strict economy and combatting waste in the food-security field, providing strong institutional support for safeguarding the right to life and the nation’s food security.

Sixth, to implement the spirit of the provisions of the 2018 Constitutional Amendment on ecological civilization, [we] revised the Marine Environmental Protection Law [海洋环境保护法], enacted the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau Ecological Conservation Law [青藏高原生态保护法], and adopted the Decision on Establishing the National Ecology Day [关于设立国家生态日的决定], to further enrich the meaning of constitutional provisions on building an ecological civilization, the rational use of natural resources, protecting the ecological environment, and promote the legislative implementation of the Constitution in the field of ecological and environmental protection . . . .

Seventh, [we] formulated the Barrier-Free Environments Development Law [无障碍环境建设] and amended the Charity Law to implement the constitutional provision that the State respects and protects human rights . . . .

Eighth, to implement the constitutional provision on the State’s obligation to improve “the systems of enterprise operation and management,” [we] revised the Company Law [公司法] to improve the modern enterprise system with Chinese characteristics; and passed the Criminal Law Amendment (XII) [刑法修正案（十二）] to improve the relevant provisions on giving bribes and crimes relating to internal corruption in private enterprises to further strengthen equal protection for private enterprises.

The report, moreover, notes that the Constitution was expressly invoked—“This Law is formulated on the basis of the Constitution”—as the basis for 5 new laws enacted in 2023 and was newly added as the basis for 2 of the laws amended in 2023. One hundred and nine of China’s 299 national laws (as of today) were enacted on the basis of the Constitution, according to the report.

II. Constitutional Enforcement Through Personnel and Organizational Actions

The report includes the legislature’s work to effect term changes at various state institutions last year as part of its efforts to enforce the Constitution. “Under the Constitution, before an NPC’s term expires, the election of delegates to the next NPC must be completed on time, and a session of the new NPC must be convened on time for it to promptly staff [other] state institutions for a new term, thereby ensuring a smooth transition and effective operation. This is . . . an important way to enforce the Constitution for the nation’s long-term stability.” Accordingly, the report describes four kinds of actions the legislature took last year in more detail:

1. Overseeing the election of delegates to the 14^th NPC. The report notes that it is the NPCSC’s constitutional duty to preside over NPC delegate elections and to “ensure the proper functioning of the people’s congress system.” On February 24, 2023, the NPCSC certified the qualifications of 2,977 delegates-elect to the 14^th NPC.

2. Electing new state leaders. In particular, the report emphasizes the fact that, in a first after the 2018 Constitutional Amendment abolished term limits for the presidency, the 14^th NPC unanimously reelected Xi Jinping as the PRC president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, “reflecting the common will of all NPC delegates and people of all ethnicities across China.” The report also notes the legislature’s holding of constitutional-oath ceremonies in 2023 and briefly introduces the NPCSC’s use of its own appointment and removal powers in 2023.

3. Improving the NPCSC’s organization and procedures. On this front, the NPCSC amended the code of conduct for its members, updated the (unpublic) working rules of the various NPC special committees, and established a Delegate Affairs Commission pursuant to the 2023 Party and State Institutional Reform Plan [党和国家机构改革方案].

4. Reforming the State Council’s organization and procedures. As China’s supreme administrative body, the State Council “is an important component of the people’s congress system,” says the report. It discusses the post-1982 constitutional practice of prescribing a new State Council’s organization not by statute, but by ad hoc NPC decisions, and notes that the 14^th NPC continued this practice by approving a plan to reorganize the State Council and appointed members of the new State Council. The report also mentions that a constitutionally required statute, the State Council Organic Law, is undergoing revision for the first time since 1982. (The revision will pass next week.)

III. Constitutional Enforcement Through Constitutional Review (and Interpretation)

Part III of the report, titled “Advance Constitutional Review and Ensure Compliance with the Constitution Throughout the Legislative Process,” is translated in full below with our annotations.

General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed the need to give full play to the core role of the Constitution in lawmaking and to ensure compliance with the Constitution [把好宪法关] at each stage of the legislative process. To strictly implement the provisions of the Constitution and laws as well as the requirements of the Party Central Committee’s [relevant] guiding document,* the 14^th NPC and its Standing Committee adhere to the comprehensive implementation of constitutional provisions, principles, and spirits; adhere to the systematic advancement of constitutional implementation, constitutional interpretation, and constitutional supervision; improve the system of constitutional review and advance such work; and have subjected [all normative documents] to review, [procedurally] connected all reviewing bodies, and developed a complete review process.

* This likely refers to a guiding opinion on advancing constitutional review that was issued by the Central Committee in February 2020, according to some legislative officials, but never made public.

(1) Improve the system of constitutional review

Institutionalizing and standardizing constitutional review was an important achievement in improving the systems for ensuring full implementation of the Constitution in 2023.

First, [we] established the system of constitutional review in a basic statute. To implement the [2018] Constitutional Amendment as well as the Party Central Committee’s decisions and plans, [we] amended the Legislation Law to improve the principle of “legislating according to the Constitution and according to law,” change “Law Committee” in the original Law to “Constitution and Law Committee,” clearly provide for the procedural mechanisms for constitutional review in the drafting stage of legislative bills, during the deliberative process, and as part of recording and review [备案审查; China’s process for resolving legislative conflicts].

Second, [we] clarified the relationship between treaties and agreements and China’s Constitution. [We] enacted the Foreign Relations Law to, for the first time, make such provisions of constitutional significance as “[t]he State is to conclude or accede to treaties and agreements in accordance with the Constitution and laws, and fulfill the obligations provided in the relevant treaties or agreements in good faith” and “[t]reaties and agreements that the State concludes or accedes to must not contravene the Constitution,” in statutory form, providing a statutory basis for further improving the mechanisms for conducting constitutional review of treaties and agreements.

Third, [we] promulgated the Decision on Improving and Strengthening the System of Recording and Review [关于完善和加强备案审查制度的决定] to clearly require advancing constitutional review as part of recording and review; focus on reviewing whether regulations, judicial interpretations, and other normative documents have contents that are inconsistent with constitutional provisions, principles, or spirits; diligently study issues implicating the Constitution [涉宪性问题]; and promptly supervise and urge the rectification of normative documents that contravene the Constitution or have issues of constitutionality [合宪性问题].*

* “Issues of constitutionality” [合宪性问题] and “issues implicating the Constitution” [涉宪性问题] are distinct concepts in Chinese law, though no official source has yet to articulate the exact differences between the two.

Fourth, [we] amended the working rules of the NPC Constitution and Law Committee to make clear that constitutional review is an important process of unified deliberations* [统一审议] and refine the relevant work procedures.

* “Unified deliberations,” in short, refers to the process whereby the NPC Constitution and Law Committee reviews and revises draft laws based on the opinions of various parties. For details, please see the “unified deliberations” diagram on this page.

Fifth, to implement the newly amended Legislation Law, [we] issued the first legal inquiry response [法律询问答复] during the current NPCSC’s term to clarify the procedural requirements for the constitutional review of local regulations* and give full play to the important role of the various levels of people’s congresses and their standing committees in ensuring the implementation of the Constitution and laws. In addition, [we] actively push for clarifying the procedural requirements for the constitutional review of administrative regulations [issued by the State Council] and rules [issued by State Council agencies or local governments] when [our] opinions were sought on the revisions to the Regulations on the Procedures for Formulating Administrative Regulations [行政法规制定程序条例] and the Regulations on the Procedures for Formulating Rules [规章制定程序条例].

* The regulations enacted by a municipal people’s congress must be submitted to the corresponding provincial people’s congress for approval before they may take effect, and the latter is required to review the constitutionality of the former’s legislation. The report likely refers to this procedure, but the legal inquiry response at issue has not been made public.

(2) Actively promote the routinization and visibility of the constitutional review of draft laws

To implement the amended Legislation Law as well as the Party Central Committee’s and the NPCSC’s plans and requirements, the Constitution and Law Committee and the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission have diligently worked to ensure that draft laws comply with the Constitution during drafting and unified deliberations by conducting constitutional review of each legislative bill and each draft decision on legal issues submitted for review and by making the corresponding arrangements depending on the circumstances, so as to work hard to implement the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important instruction that “compliance with the Constitution must be ensured at each stage of the legislative process.”

In formulating or revising laws including the State Council Organic Law, Foreign Relations Law, Patriotic Education Law, Marine Environmental Protection Law, Emergency Response Law [突发事件应对法], Counterespionage Law, Administrative Litigation Law [行政诉讼法], Charity Law, and Law on Ensuring Food Security, we reviewed the issues of constitutionality raised by the relevant parties; convened symposia with experts to discuss issues implicating the Constitution in the State Council Organic Law,* Preschool Education Law [学前教育法], and other laws; put forward interpretative research opinions on the meaning of relevant constitutional provisions; and made appropriate arrangements depending on the circumstances, to ensure that each law, each scheme, and each provision complies with constitutional provisions, principles, and spirits.

* The report discusses one constitutional issue with the draft revision to the State Council Organic Law in section (3) of this Part. So far, the legislature has not disclosed what constitutional issues were raised with respect to the other bills referenced in this paragraph.

To implement the statutory provisions on constitutional review, [we] have explored and formed a complete workflow in practice:
(1) When discussing a draft law, the executive meeting of the Legislative Affairs Commission will hear the research opinion of its Office for Constitution on the constitutionality of the draft;
(2) When the Constitution and Law Committee meets to conduct unified deliberations of a draft law, it will also hear a report on research opinions on issues of constitutionality or issues implicating the Constitution in the draft law, and provide explanations in documents such as the draft law’s explanation, report on the status of revisions, report on the results of deliberations, report on suggestions for revisions, and reference materials, depending on the circumstances; and
(3) When an NPC or NPCSC session deliberates a legislative bill, some constitutional review opinions will be printed and distributed to the session as reference documents or resources for reference by delegates or Standing Committee members in deliberating legislative bills, according to needs and the circumstances of our work.

This paragraph is significant in that it to our knowledge provides the first detailed official account of the process for ex ante review of national laws.

For example, during the process of updating the Charity Law, some were of the view that there was no adequate constitutional or statutory basis and no urgent practical need for the NPCSC to comprehensively revise [修订] the Charity Law, which was adopted by the National People’s Congress, after it has been in force for merely seven years; and if it were truly necessary to update it, it should be done in the form of an amendment [修正] to make necessary changes to part of its contents. After studying the issue, the Constitution and Law Committee and the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission concluded that it is necessary to resolutely implement the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important statement that “‘adhering to legislating according to law’ at its core requires ‘adhering to legislating according to the Constitution’” and to carry out work in accordance with the constitutional provisions on the legislative functions and powers of the NPC and the NPCSC, so they recommended, on the condition that the basic schemes of the current Charity Law be kept stable overall, switching the comprehensive revision to the Charity Law to a partial amendment, and that the Constitution and Law Committee respond to this issue of constitutionality in the report on the status of revising the Charity Law (Draft Revision). Eventually, the NPCSC successfully adopted a decision on amending the Charity Law after having twice reviewed the draft amendment.

(3) Implement the procedural mechanisms for constitutional interpretation

To implement the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s important instruction to “adhere to the systematic advancement of constitutional implementation, constitutional interpretation, and constitutional supervision,” the 14^th NPCSC has been actively implementing the procedural mechanisms for constitutional interpretation in the course of formulating and revising laws, by explaining or responding to issues concerning the understanding and application of the Constitution in formal legal documents such the explanations of draft [laws], reports on the results of deliberations, and reports on the status of revisions; by putting forward interpretative research opinions on the meaning of relevant constitutional provisions; and by using pragmatic, effective methods to actively respond to societal concerns, so as to properly resolve the practical need for constitutional interpretation and strive to achieve the unity of the Constitution’s stability and adaptability.

For example, the draft revision to the State Council Organic Law would add a provision that the constituent members of the State Council include the “governor of the People’s Bank of China [PBOC]”; during deliberations, some recommended studying the constitutionality of the relevant provisions in the draft revision on the ground that article 86 of the Constitution does not clearly include the PBOC governor among the constituent members of the State Council. After careful research, the Legislative Affairs Commission put forward the Research Opinion on the Constitutionality of the Provisions in the Draft Revision to the State Council Organic Law Concerning the People’s Bank of China, which summarizes the NPC’s practice of approving State Council institutional reform plans and deciding to appoint constituent members of the State Council after the promulgation of the 1982 Constitution, studies and analyzes the enactment process of the Law on the People’s Bank of China [中国人民银行法] and its provisions on the appointment and removal of the PBOC governor,* argues that the Law on the People’s Bank of China and the aforementioned practice have de facto confirmed that the PBOC governor is a constituent member of the State Council, and concludes that “the draft revision to the State Council Organic Law, by summarizing years of constitutional practice and consistent with the relevant laws and decisions, explicitly includes the PBOC governor within the scope of constituent members of the State Council, and is consistent with practice and consistent with constitutional provisions, principles, and spirits.” The Constitution and Law specifically reported and explained this issue to the NPCSC in its report on the status of revising the State Council Organic Law (Draft Revision)to actively respond to concerns about constitutional issues and achieve the effect of building legislative consensus.

(4) Strengthen review and study of issues of constitutionality and issues implicating the Constitution as part of recording and review

In December 2023, the NPCSC heard and deliberated the Report on the Status of Recording and Review in 2023, and it was the seventh consecutive year in which the Legislative Affairs Commission submitted such a specialized report to the NPCSC, [which shows] that recording and review has become visible, institutionalized, and regularized.

According to the provisions of the Constitution and relevant laws, the administrative regulations formulated by the State Council; supervision regulations formulated by the State Supervision Commission; judicial interpretations formulated by the Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate; the various kinds of local regulations, autonomous regulations, and separate regulations formulated by the relevant local people’s congresses and their standing committees; as well as the local laws formulated by the two special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macao shall all be filed with the NPCSC for recording; and the NPCSC is to review the regulations, judicial interpretations, and other normative documents filed for recording, and annul, rectify, or otherwise dispose of regulations, judicial interpretations, and other normative documents that contravene the Constitution and laws.

As part of recording and review, the NPCSC strengthens review and study of issues of constitutionality and issues implicating the Constitution in regulations, judicial interpretations, and other normative documents, and properly handled problems including “unified transfer by higher-level procuratorates of procurators within their [respective] jurisdictions to handle cases,”* “use of ‘kin punishment’-style disciplinary measures against key persons concerning certain crimes,” and total bans on selling and lighting fireworks and firecrackers, so as to resolutely rectify unconstitutional and unlawful normative documents and uphold the Constitution’s authority and rule-of-law principles.

* Under the procuratorates’ organic statute, local procurators are appointed to specific procuratorates by the corresponding local people’s congresses. But the statute also allows a higher-level procuratorate to exercise “unified” authority to assign procurators to another procuratorate within its jurisdiction to handle cases. The problem referred to by the report involved a provision in a Supreme People’s Procuratorate (SPP) interpretation that allowed procurators seconded to another procuratorate to represent the latter in court in criminal cases, without being first appointed by the destination’s local people’s congress. The NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission decided in 2023 that the Constitution and relevant statutes generally require that such procurators receive new appointments from the people’s congresses overseeing the procuratorates to which they are seconded—a conclusion that the SPP memorialized in a set of rules issued in September 2023.

The NPCSC’s recording and review of the local laws formulated by the legislatures of the two special administrative regions [SARs] is an important authority vested in the NPCSC by the Constitution and the Basic Laws of Hong Kong and Macao, and is an important task for safeguarding the constitutional order and legal order established by the Constitution and the Basic Laws of Hong Kong and Macao in the SARs. Upon preliminary review, [we] have not discovered any circumstance requiring that [we] return any local law filed by the two SARs for recording in 2023.*

* Under article 17 of the two SARs’ Basic Laws, if the NPCSC “considers that any law enacted by the legislature of [an SAR] is not in conformity with the provisions of [its Basic Law] regarding affairs within the responsibility of the Central Authorities or regarding the relationship between the Central Authorities and [the SAR],” it may “return” the law in question to the SAR, thereby invalidating it immediately. The NPCSC’s review of SAR legislation is therefore doctrinally distinct from its review of mainland legislation (which is reviewable on broader grounds of constitutionality, conformity with Party policy, legality, and reasonableness). Yet, since 2019, the NPCSC has incorporated, so far only rhetorically, the article 17 process under the Basic Laws into the “recording and review” system that initially covered only mainland legislation.

IV. Constitutional Enforcement Through Oversight

The NPC and its Standing Committee are vested with the authority to oversee the enforcement of the Constitution, the report notes. It adds that their oversight focuses on four issues: (1) “whether the major national policies and various national undertakings provided by the Constitution and laws are effectively implemented”; (2) “whether state institutions are performing their duties according to the Constitution and laws”; (3) “whether regulations and other normative documents contravene the Constitution and laws”; and (4) “whether citizens’ fundamental rights and duties are fully protected.” Specifically, the report lists four main ways in which the legislature discharged its constitutional oversight duty in 2023:

1. Improving oversight mechanisms. The report references the pending amendment to the Law on Oversight by the Standing Committees of People’s Congresses at All Levels [各级人民代表大会常务委员会监督法] and the December 2023 Decision on Improving and Strengthening the System of Recording and Review—both seek to improve the relevant legislative oversight mechanisms. In addition, the report cites the revision to the Administrative Reconsideration Law [行政复议法], which serves to “implement the constitutional provision that citizens have the right to submit criticisms or suggestions to, or file complaints, charges, or reports against, state organs and state employees.”

2. Conducting budgetary oversight. The report first recites the NPC’s constitutional power to approve the central budget and annual budget report, as well as the NPCSC’s authority to approve partial budget adjustments while the NPC is not in session. It then lists the routine budgetary actions taken by the legislature last year—approving the central budget in March, approving the central final accounts in June, etc.—as well as a few less routine ones. The latter include (1) establishing a system under which the State Council reports to the NPCSC on the management of government debt (the State Council is expected to submit the first such report later this year); (2) approving the issuance of special treasury bonds to fund post-disaster reconstruction and related projects; and (3) authorizing the State Council to allow local governments to issue a certain amount of bonds before the NPC approves their annual debt ceilings for 2024–2028.

3. Hearing specialized work reports. According to the report, hearing the specialized work reports of the administrative, supervision, and judicial authorities is the “main way” in which the legislature exercises its constitutional and statutory oversight authority and is also “a basic institutional arrangement of the people’s congress system.” Among the 22 work reports heard by the NPCSC in 2023, the report gives special attention to the State Council’s report on the central government’s transfer payments [转移支付] to local governments, for it touches on a “constitutional matter”: the division of fiscal powers [财政事权] (a government’s obligation to use fiscal funds to provide certain public services) and spending responsibilities [支出责任] (a government’s duty to pay for those services) between the central and local governments.

4. Recording and reviewing normative documents. The report essentially offers a highly condensed version of the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission’s 2023 report on recording and review. It also newly discloses that the Commission rectified over 230 problematic normative documents in 2023.

V. Constitutional Enforcement Through Propaganda and Theoretical Research

1. Raising awareness of the Constitution. The report mentions the official symposium on constitutional enforcement held on last year’s National Constitution Day (December 4) and other propaganda and educational activities taking place that day across China. The report also recounts official efforts last year to raise awareness of the Constitution among “key groups,” including leading cadres and the youth, such as a policy document issued by the general offices of the Central Committee and the State Council on establishing a list of intra-Party regulations and state laws that leading cadres ought to know and understand. The report concludes this section by discussing a few local measures to promote public awareness of the Constitution.

2. Researching “socialist constitutional theory with Chinese characteristics.” The report says that the NPC and its Standing Committee have endeavored to “summarize, refine, study, and explain iconic concepts and original ideas . . . that reflect China’s modern constitutional practice” to develop a “discourse system on China’s Constitution” with distinct Chinese and epochal character. The report then lists a few of the legislature’s relevant publications from 2023, including a piece in the Party’s Qiushi journal on constitutional enforcement, and notes its effort to increase the capacity of universities and other research institutions to conduct theoretical research on the Constitution and to do so with the “correct political orientation,” with an eye toward “continuously increasing the persuasiveness and influence of China’s constitutional theory and practice.”

1. This term can also be translated as “constitutional implementation.” We use the two English translations interchangeably in this post. ↩︎
2. It appears that the report has since been published in the fourth issue of the People’s Congress of China [中国人大] magazine in 2024. ↩︎