NPCSC Seeks Public Comment on 7 Bills: Legislative Oversight, State Council Operation, Border Health, Tariffs, Mineral Resources, Emergency Response & More

China’s national legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC), is soliciting public comment on the following seven bills through January 27, 2024:

Draft NameChinese TextExplanatory Document
State Council Organic Law (2nd Draft Revision)
国务院组织法修订草案二次审议稿		PDF · ΔPDF
Emergency Response and Management Law (2nd Draft)
突发事件应对管理法草案二次审议稿		PDFPDF
Rural Collective Economic Organizations Law (2nd Draft)
农村集体经济组织法草案二次审议稿		PDFPDF
Law on the Oversight by the Standing Committees of People’s Congresses at All Levels (Draft Amendment)
各级人民代表大会常务委员会监督法修正草案		PDF ΔPDF
Border Health and Quarantine Law (Draft Revision)
国境卫生检疫法修订草案		PDF ΔPDF
Mineral Resources Law (Draft Revision)
矿产资源法修订草案		PDF ΔPDF
Tariff Law (Draft)
关税法草案		PDF Δ (main text)
PDF (tariff schedule)
⚠️ The schedule is 1,486 pages long and 279 MB in size ⚠️		PDF

English translations will be provided if and when available. All explanatory documents are in Chinese and compiled in a single PDF; the links above will take you to the corresponding pages in the PDF only if you use a desktop browser—this does not work on a phone or a tablet.

Continue reading “NPCSC Seeks Public Comment on 7 Bills: Legislative Oversight, State Council Operation, Border Health, Tariffs, Mineral Resources, Emergency Response & More” →

NPCSC Session Watch: Chinese-Style Constitutional Review, Legislative Oversight, Charity Regulation, Border Health, Emergency Management & Mineral Resources (Updated)

China’s top legislature, the 14th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC), will convene for its seventh session from December 25 to 29, the Council of Chairpersons decided on Monday, December 18. The session’s tentative agenda includes twelve legislative bills, which we preview below.

Continue reading “NPCSC Session Watch: Chinese-Style Constitutional Review, Legislative Oversight, Charity Regulation, Border Health, Emergency Management & Mineral Resources (Updated)” →

Politburo Whisperer on Advancing “Foreign-Related Rule of Law”

By Moritz Rudolf

Prof. Huang Huikang giving a lecture on developing foreign-related legal system to the Politburo on November 27, 2023. Screenshot of CCTV’s Xinwen Lianbo program.

In official Chinese discourse, “foreign-related rule of law” (FRROL) [涉外法治] plays a crucial role in achieving the Communist Party’s Second Centenary Goal of “building China into a great modern socialist country in all respects and to advance the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation on all fronts through a Chinese path to modernization” by 2049. Yet FRROL is for the most part ignored outside of the PRC. This is a mistake. Understanding this concept is essential to grasping the fine-tuning of China’s global outreach.

In light of the Politburo’s November 27, 2023 group study session on FRROL, this post traces the evolving official framing of the concept. It also introduces and critically analyzes the recommendations for advancing FRROL that Prof. Huang Huikang [黄惠康], the most prominent authority on the subject within the PRC, likely shared with Chinese leaders at the study session. This post ends by assessing the outlook of the concept.

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NPC Calendar: December 2023

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

December 4 is China’s 10th National Constitution Day [国家宪法日].

The 14th NPC Standing Committee will convene for its 7th session in late December. The Council of Chairpersons is expected to meet in mid-December to decide on the agenda and dates of the session. The session is expected to review the draft revision to the State Council Organic Law [国务院组织法] and is scheduled to review the following bills according to the NPCSC’s 2023 legislative work plan:

The session is also likely to review one or more of the following bills:

Finally, the session will hear the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission’s annual report on “recording and review” [备案审查] and is expected to adopt a decision on “improving and strengthening the system of recording and review.”

Update (Dec. 1, 2023): This post was updated to include the draft Mineral Resources Law revision as a possible bill for review after it was approved “in principle” by the executive meeting of the State Council on December 1.

NPC Calendar: November 2023

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

The NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) is soliciting public comment on the following bills through November 23:

The NPCSC will convene for its next regularly scheduled session in late December.

NPCSC Seeks Public Comment on 6 Bills: State Secrets, State Council Operation, Food Security, Charity Regulation, Infectious Disease Control & Cultural Relics Protection

For an overview of key proposed changes to the Charity Law and the Law on the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases, please see this issue of our newsletter.

China’s national legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC), is soliciting public comment on the following six bills through November 23, 2023. The NPCSC also reviewed a draft Tariff Law [关税法] at its latest session, but did not release it for public comment today.

Draft NameChinese TextExplanatory Document
Law on Ensuring Food Security (2nd Draft)
粮食安全保障法草案二次审议稿		PDFPDF
Charity Law (Draft Amendment)
慈善法修正草案		PDF Δ
(English)		PDF
 State Council Organic Law (Draft Revision)
国务院组织法修订草案		PDF Δ
(English)		PDF
Law on Guarding State Secrets (Draft Revision)
保守国家秘密法修订草案		PDF Δ
(English)		PDF
Law on the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases (Draft Revision)
传染病防治法修订草案		PDF ΔPDF
Cultural Relics Protection Law (Draft Revision)
文物保护法修订草案		PDF ΔPDF

English translations will be provided if and when available. All explanatory documents are in Chinese and compiled in a single PDF; the links above will take you to the corresponding pages in the PDF only if you use a desktop browser—this does not work on a phone or a tablet.

Continue reading “NPCSC Seeks Public Comment on 6 Bills: State Secrets, State Council Operation, Food Security, Charity Regulation, Infectious Disease Control & Cultural Relics Protection” →

NPCSC Session Watch: Patriotic Education, State Council’s Governing Statute, State Secrets, Defense Minister Replacement & Legislative Aftermath of Covid-19

UPDATE (Oct. 24, 2023): On October 24, the NPCSC approved a revision to the Marine Environmental Protection Law and passed the Patriotic Education Law. Both will take effect on January 1, 2024.

In addition, the NPCSC adopted a decision authorizing the State Council to allow local governments to issue bonds within 60% of their annual new bond quotas before the NPC approves their annual debt ceilings for the next five years. It also approved an adjustment to the 2023 central government budget, authorizing the issuance of RMB 1 trillion of special treasury bonds for post-disaster reconstruction and related projects.

Finally, the NPCSC decided to remove Li Shangfu as defense minister, state councilor, and member of the Central Military Commission. It also removed Qin Gang from his state councilor position, after having removed him as foreign minister in July.

Before getting to the news, a note on our new link-archiving policy: After the NPC website’s recent URL change had created an acute link-rot problem for us, we announced a plan to deal with this particular incident and to prevent link rot going forward. One big change you will likely notice is that, with some exceptions, online sources subject to mainland China’s censorship regime (including all government websites) will be archived using perma.cc. Those visiting from mainland China should be aware, however, that perma.cc is blocked by the Great Fire Wall.

China’s top legislature, the 14th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC), will convene for its sixth session from October 20 to 24, the Council of Chairpersons decided on Friday, October 13. The session will tentatively discuss ten legislative bills, in addition to a potential motion to replace China’s current defense minister. We preview these agenda items below.

Continue reading “NPCSC Session Watch: Patriotic Education, State Council’s Governing Statute, State Secrets, Defense Minister Replacement & Legislative Aftermath of Covid-19” →

NPC Calendar: October 2023

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

The 14th NPC Standing Committee will convene for its 6th session in late October. The Council of Chairpersons is expected to meet in mid-October to decide on the agenda and dates of the session.

The session may review one or more following bills:

It is also expected to consider one or more bills scheduled for an initial review this year by the NPCSC’s 2023 legislative work plan.

Understanding Chinese Legislature’s New Five-Year Legislative Plan

On September 7, China’s national legislature, the 14th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC), released its five-year legislative plan (Plan or New Plan), setting the contours of its legislation through 2028. As a refresher, the Plan includes 79 top-priority projects in Category I, 51 lower-priority projects in Category II, and about a dozen topics for potential legislation in Category III. Starting with this post, we will take a close look at the Plan in a two-part analysis. Below, we will first discuss the principles of agenda-setting embodied in the Plan (and the relevant legislative tasks), then examine the fate of the uncompleted projects in the 13th NPCSC’s five-year legislative plan (Old Plan), and finally look at the areas of law that are featured prominently in the New Plan. The second part will take a primarily quantitative approach and evaluate the same metrics we used to analyze the Old Plan several years ago.

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China to Allow Some Suits Against Foreign States: A Summary of the Foreign State Immunity Law

Photo by UN Climate Change under CC BY 2.0.

On September 1, 2023, China’s top legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC), adopted the Foreign State Immunity Law (Law) [外国国家豁免法], which will take effect on January 1, 2024. The Law marks a historic change in China’s stance on foreign state immunity—a doctrine that shields states and their property from the jurisdiction of foreign courts—and brings China’s practice in line with international norms. In short, starting next year, foreign states will be subject to suit in China in certain circumstances as provided in the Law in which they currently enjoy immunity. Below, we for the most part offer only a straightforward summary of the Law, without attempting any critical or comparative analysis. For that, we recommend instead Prof. William Dodge’s two–part analysis of the Law’s December 2022 draft at Transnational Litigation Blog, which we drew on for our summary. Our English translation of the Law is available here and a chart comparing the Law’s two public versions here.

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