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This paper interrogates the relationship between conventional planning and the emerging practice of urban experimentation through the lens of megaprojects. Focused on a low-carbon city project in Shenzhen, China, it illustrates how the project's large spatial-temporal scale facilitates a process of in-situ upscaling of planning innovation. This process involves iteratively trialing and refining novel practices through spatial demarcation and temporal phasing. This mutual constitution of megaprojects and experimentation highlights an urgent need to incorporate spatial and scale perspectives into studying and practicing urban experiments. This paper also highlights the re-negotiated planning paradox between control and flexibility under the experimental paradigm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a long tradition of constitutionalising environmental protection in the People's Republic of China ('China'). This is illustrated, for example, by the constitutionalisation of the need to construct 'ecological civilisation' – a set of values and development concepts included in 2018 as part of constitutional amendments. Yet, the Constitution of China is often described as a constitution without constitutionalism. This article examines the constitutional environmental provisions in China, as well as the underpinning constitutional theories, to demonstrate how China enjoys environmental constitutionalism. This version of constitutionalism, however, is absent of rights and overwhelmingly enforced through state-based approaches, which means that it is distinct from the rights-based and courts-centred versions of liberal constitutionalism. This study thus exemplifies how constitutional practices may adopt different formulations and environmental constitutionalism exists without being committed to liberal principles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective We aimed to study the distribution of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) constitution and related influencing factors in patients with impaired glucose tolerance (IGT). Methods A cross-sectional study method was used to enroll IGT patients who attended one of eight collaborating units across China between January and August 2021. Basic information was recorded, physical and laboratory examinations were completed, and the data on TCM constitution were collected according to the "classification and determination table of TCM constitution." Finally, patient information was entered into an Excel table, and the data were analyzed using SPSS 26.0. Results Among the 450 patients, a balanced constitution accounted for 37.3%, yang-deficiency constitution for 15.6%, phlegm-dampness constitution for 14.4%, and dampness-heat constitution for 10.9%. Among the biased constitutions, the proportion of men with dampness-heat constitution was higher than that of women, and the proportion of women with yang-deficiency constitution and blood stasis constitution was significantly higher than that of men (P < 0.05). The triglyceride level of patients with phlegm-dampness constitution was higher than that of patients with yang-deficiency constitution (P < 0.05); the HDL-cholestrol level of patients with yang-deficiency constitution was higher than that of patients with phlegm-dampness constitution (P < 0.05); and the uric acid level of patients with phlegm-dampness constitution, dampness-heat constitution, or yin-deficiency constitution was higher than that of patients with yang-deficiency constitution, and the UA level was the highest in patients with dampness-heat constitution (P < 0.05). Conclusion The distribution of TCM constitution in IGT patients was dominated by balanced constitution, followed by yang-deficiency constitution, phlegm-dampness constitution, and dampness-heat constitution. Gender, blood lipid levels, and UA levels were the main factors affecting the constitution status of IGT patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water Diversion Projects have become increasingly popular in improving water quality in various water ecosystems. However, these projects also require a more comprehensive evaluation. In this study, we introduced a digital stable marker tracing module and proposed a continuation-dynamic constitution analysis approach. We applied this approach to analyze the ecological tidal water diversion in Changshu town, China. The results showed that the mean diversion water age of the Yangtze River water source was 10.80 h, the residence time of the background water source in Baimaotang was approximately 4.0 h, and the contribution of inflow water sources from tributaries accounted for 15% of discharges. The results can demonstrate practicality of our approach in quantitatively evaluating water diversion impacts and optimizing cooperative diversion projects. Furthermore, our discussion led to the design of an ecological tidal water diversion based on optimized cooperative diversion, which showed element-complementary and whole-comprehensive effects. This indicates that the ecological tidal water diversion can extend the impact of cooperative diversion. The continuation-dynamic constitution analysis approach enhances the tracing capacity of inflow constitution and enables the distinction of different time-varying distributions of each inflow constitution. Therefore, this approach holds promise as an embedded "Digital stable marker tracing" module in the model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prescribed by the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, social rights provisions cannot be comprehended in isolation, nor can they be interpreted simply by referring to the concepts of positive rights or socio-economic rights in traditional constitutional theory. On the basis of the Constitution, social rights exhibit three interrelated dimensions from the perspective of systemic interpretation: promoting people's wellbeing, promoting democratic politics, and promoting citizens' participation in state-building. In the overall structure and normative intention of the Constitution of China, social rights are not only a kind of socio-economic right, but also a fundamental right with a socialist nature. Specifically, social rights are individuals' right to claim their economic welfare from the state, as well as the basic civil right of realizing a comprehensive social identity. They have a social and economic nature, and to a certain degree a political nature. Correspondingly, the normative structure of social rights, and in particular their functions and orientation toward obligation, are constructed on the basis of this kind of nature. The functions of social rights are most frequently manifested as objective value order, and its specific duty to protect not only points to specific state institutions such as the constitutional review organs and judicial organs, but to the whole national governance system, thus forming a Chinese-style institutional guarantee model of social rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article juxtaposes modern Chinese constitutions and constitutionalism with constitutionalism chiefly developed in the West for clarity on the former's lineage. As constitution is a concept foreign to China, there is no need for the country to enact any constitution unless it genuinely intends to embrace the true spirit of constitutionalism. A comparison of three signal Chinese constitutions yields an ironic, counterintuitive result, for the Constitution of the Republic of China is a refutation of the Nationalist Basic Law of the Political Tutelage Period (enacted in 1931), whereas the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, though enacted by the Communists, bears the legacy of the Nationalist Basic Law of the Political Tutelage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese national legislature has enacted a national security law (NSL) for Hong Kong. This paper applies the theory of national security constitution as developed by Professor Koh to examine the impact of the NSL upon four core constitutional principles in Hong Kong's mini-constitution which underly its national security constitution and to evaluate the nature of the impact. The paper argues that the NSL has, instead of applying and supplementing the existing underlying constitutional principles in the mini-constitution, changed them to various degrees, and the pre-NSL bifurcated national security system for Hong Kong and mainland China has been replaced by an integrated national security system under the NSL. The impact caused by the NSL is so significant as to amount to a permanent paradigm shift to a new post-NSL national security constitution. The paper also argues that the theory of national security constitution has its limitation in its application to subnational Hong Kong because its mini-constitution and the underlying principles therein can be modified by national legislation, such as the NSL, of its sovereign, China. Through a comparative study with the USA, the paper proposes that the theory of national security constitution needs to be modified by adding that different effects may occur to a sub-national national security constitution depending on the source of the framework national security legislation. Hong Kong's failure in its constitutional duty to enact national security legislation under Article 23 of the Basic Law has led to the enactment of the NSL by China. Such legislation from the sovereign has changed the underlying constitutional principles and is fundamentally different from sub-national framework legislation that only implements and supplements those principles. However, a comparative study with Macau indicates that the theory of national security constitution is still applicable to a sub-national entity such as Macau so long as China as sovereign exercises self-restraint and any framework national security legislation is enacted at the sub-national level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When do socialisation efforts succeed? This paper fills a theoretical gap by theorising effective state socialisation in international relations while also tackling an empirical puzzle: why do the EU's and the US's respective socialisation efforts towards China produce inconsistent outcomes? We argue that the efficacy of socialisation depends on the socialisee's perception of whether the norms or roles the socialisers advocate are appropriate, and the socialisee's perception of whether the socialisers' behaviours are consistent with those norms or roles. By innovatively structuring Mill's methods in a two-level hierarchy that accommodates equifinality, we investigate three sets of cases of socialisation outcomes between China and the EU as well as China and the US. The empirical analysis supports our theoretical argument that effective socialisation is a process of constituting the socialisee's interests and perception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of China's endeavour to modernize and internationalize its cities, it has repeatedly eliminated street markets and street vendors. But in the (post‐)pandemic context, regulating street businesses inclusively turned out to be an efficient way to generate jobs that has been widely promoted. This turn reveals a new pattern in China's urban governance that might contribute to rethinking the state–informality nexus. In this article we draw on observations and interviews in Chengdu and on critical discourse analyses of related government documents and news reports to suggest that there is an underlying logic of control that governs the state's new tactics for regulating street businesses. We examine three tactics—performative tactics of regulation, spatial tactics of control and temporal tactics of contingency—to uncover the state's centrality and the tactics it uses to consolidate such centrality in the name of informality. Regarding informality and state centrality as conditions for each other allows us to interrogate both the internal logic of control and its manifestations in everyday statehood. Within the informal constitution of state centrality, everyday negotiations and contestations of spatial claims eventually render the 'ordinary state' a hegemonic locus that shapes urban experiences and politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Constitution of China does not match China's image as a great power, in the sense that it is silent on its spacial scope, in particular the extraterritorial aspects of fundamental rights articles. Currently, fundamental rights research in China has mainly focused on the relationship between a State and its residents, while overlooking the extraterritorial aspect of rights protection. This reflects an outdated approach of constitutional law based on a rigid idea of territoriality. This article, however, argues that the Chinese Constitution should reflect the horizon of a great power and that its fundamental rights articles should be interpreted as being capable of extraterritorial application. In doing so, it depicts the potential occasions where the extraterritorial approach of the Chinese Constitution is pertinent. It then reveals that the extraterritorial approach is neither implausible nor self-evident on the basis of comparative law study. It then explores the legal doctrine for the extraterritorial application of fundamental rights articles in the Chinese Constitution in the light of China's role as a great power. Finally, it addresses how the extraterritorial approach of the Chinese Constitution might function in China's legal practice and how such an approach might affect human rights discourse in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2018, the Fifth Amendment to China’s Constitution changed the name of the Law Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC) to the ‘Constitution and Law Committee’. This involved more than a name change; rather, faced with a legitimacy crisis, the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC) has a strong interest in augmenting the existing basis of legitimacy and creating a new source of power resting on popular sovereignty. The idea of popular sovereignty in the Chinese context is defined as the combination of sovereignty of the people and leadership of the CPC. As the central institutional device to guarantee people’s sovereignty, the people’s congress system has its own difficulties. Although it is the highest authority endowed by the Constitution, the NPC is actually a ‘strong on paper, weak in practice’ body. The creation of the Constitution and Law Committee, entrusted with the power of review by a decision issued subsequent to the Fifth Amendment, can contribute to enhancing the role of the NPC. This could be viewed as part of the CPC’s efforts to implement functionally the principle of popular sovereignty, which, in turn, can help uphold and safeguard regime legitimacy in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the mid-2010s, China's policy toward the Kashmir dispute between India and Pakistan has shifted away from its traditional contours, where Beijing distanced itself from the dispute and acted as a mere development partner in the Pakistan-controlled territory. Although the much-hyped China–Pakistan Economic Corridor itself did not significantly change the nature of China's development and economic activities in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, after its launch in 2015, Beijing signaled its willingness to take a mediator role, conducted activities entailing the employment of the PLA in the area, and even nudged Islamabad to take steps that would affect the geographical scope of the Kashmir sovereignty question. Then, in the wake of India's announcement of the abrogation of Article 370 of the Constitution and the reorganization of the state of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019, China's Kashmir policy further drifted away from its traditional line. References to the United Nations Security Council resolutions on Kashmir reemerged in China's public statements and Beijing took diplomatic actions to support Pakistan's bid to internationalize the Kashmir issue. As a result, China's Kashmir policy has been turning into a serious source of friction in Sino–Indian relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of Ecological Civilization was recently inscribed in the Chinese State Constitution - a sign of its importance - but what is this concept about? And what is its importance, in the light of dialectics and historical materialism, for China's national development project? Making a qualitative analysis of primary and secondary sources, we will try to draw a theoretical and historical framework, demonstrating how, through the contradictions, the Chinese State has been advancing in its objectives. Analyzing the existing literature, one can see the diversity of the study and the interpretation of this concept. We also see that the understanding of Ecological Civilization must be made based on the study of the material conditions existing in China and that the answer to the problem of development occupies the centrality of the question. We conclude that Ecological Civilization - an integral part of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics - is born in response to the contradictions that the post-1979 development model created and that its appearance corresponds to the need to find a new development model that puts the focus on the qualitative question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The advent of techniques of sex selection that rely on assisted reproduction led to a questioning of whether sex selection should be deemed always and everywhere unethical. While China and India are normally associated with condemned practices, they are also implicated in processes that constitute globally stratified sex selection inclusive of its more valued form, often referred to as family balancing. Through an application of Ong and Collier's concept of global assemblage, I demonstrate how family balancing, which has taken on a "global form," is tied to an "assemblage" of factors related to the anti-natal, population control contexts that have been pervasive in Asia. Three simultaneously occurring processes since the mid-1990s constituted stratified sex selection: the surfacing of China and India as figurative counter examples in deliberations of ethics on new techniques; active (inter)national surveillance of sex ratios as well as denunciation and criminalization of sex selective abortion in China and India; and the role of China and India in neoliberalizing population control and developing globalized markets in reproduction. Accounting for globally stratified sex selection requires a more robust interpretation of ethics that rethinks disciplinary approaches just as much as relativist ones in which respect for individual autonomy tends to overtake all other concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The academic field of comparative constitutional law has recently had greater engagements with China's constitution. This Article explains the modes, conditions, and factors of these engagements. The country-studies of China's constitution echo and complicate recent comparative debates on transnational constitution making and the varieties of constitutionalism. Comparative constitutional scholarship formulates new concepts, such as constitutional entrepreneurship and constitutional dissonance, to understand China's constitution. Additionally, it explains China's constitutional divergence from the most similar case, namely Vietnam, and its unexpected constitutional similarities with the most different cases, such as the United States and the United Kingdom. Finally, this scholarship discusses China's constitution as a difficult case of constitutional authoritarianism, a prototypical case of authoritarian constitutionalism, - an outlier case of party-state constitutionalism, and an illustrating case of global constitutional trends, such as the statist constitutional model and presidential term-limit evasion. The comparative engagements with China's constitution are due to the increasing sociopolitical significance of the country's constitutional text and the institutional trend of its living constitutional order, as well as the recent jurisdictional, substantive, and epistemological expansion of comparative constitutional law. The comparative engagements are principally animated by scholars' intellectual curiosity to explore the unknown regarding China's constitutional dynamics and partially by the need of its constitutional development and particular outlooks on constitutional justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Northeast China (NEC) is a major soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] production region in China, where the germplasm of American soybeans are mainly from. The main stem node number (MSN) is a trait related to plant type and yield potential. With the soybeans expanded to higher latitudes in NEC, earlier maturity groups (MG 0, MG 00, and MG 000) formed based on MG I + MG II (MG I+II), and correspondingly the MSN decreased. To explore the MSN quantitative trait locus (QTL)–allele constitution, 306 accessions from NEC were studied using the restricted two‐stage multilocus genome‐wide association study (RTM‐GWAS) procedure. In total, 76 MSN QTLs and 183 alleles were identified, with their genetic contribution about 0.04–9.83% per locus for a total of 65.63% for all loci. With the MSN reduction from MG I+II to MG 0, MG 00, and MG 000 (17.89 to 13.11), the changed alleles accounted for 28.42% of all alleles (6.56% for new allele emergence plus 21.86% for old allele exclusion), whereas the major part of the alleles were those inherited from MG I+II (71.58%). Thus in the evolution of MSN in the NEC soybean population, inheritance is the first genetic motivation, exclusion and selection (positive allele exclusion, 65.00%) is the second, emergence and mutation (negative allele emergence, 95.67%) is the third, and recombination among retained alleles is the fourth. A potential of 2–5 MSN improvement keeping the MG earliness was predicted, and 49 candidate genes were identified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the latest amendment of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was reincorporated into the main body of the Constitution. This reincorporation constitutionally overarches a series of institutional reforms concerning the Party and state organs in 2018. In the analytical framework of the Party–state separation, this article aims to reveal the transformation of the Party–state relationship behind the positional alteration of the leadership of the CCP in the constitutional text and to indicate its possible consequences for the Chinese socialist rule of law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic policy does not require a constitutional grounding. However, many constitutions expressly dedicate articles and chapters to the national economy while others produce comparable effects by indirectly privileging particular economic arrangements. The constitutions of the US, the People's Republic of China and the Philippines and the Basic Law of Hong Kong can plausibly be invoked to justify State approaches to economic ordering. However, each of them essentially underdetermines the economic fundamentals of the polity, not merely by deferring their concretization to governments and judiciaries, but by eschewing to commit the State to an identifiable level of involvement. Underdeterminacy can result from a variety of structural features, such as omissions, the use of contested concepts, the dilution of overarching economic alignments through countervailing constitutional provisions or limitations by ordinary legislation and the assortment of amorphous constitutional repertoires that give free rein to policy. The fact that even constitutions that were in their drafting informed not least by economic considerations fail to set the basic parameters of the economic arena queries the extent to which they can be said to embody any such underpinnings. It further questions the significance of constitutions and formal institutions in the formation of liberal market economies in particular and emphasizes the role of experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quality Problem or Issue: Chinese medical institutions need clinical guidelines to improve healthcare quality. Unfamiliarity with clinical methodology and procedures leads to poor quality.Initial Assessment: This study examined 327 clinical guidelines made in China during the period of 2006-10 and found these clinical guidelines have many problems in terms of guideline making procedures-compliant process, conflicts of interest disclosure.Choice Of Solution: Chinese Medical Association organized a working group in 2014 to make a national [Guideline for Clinical Guidelines Constitution/Amendment] and invited multidiscipline experts to prove its possibility.Implementation: Experts investigated and reviewed numerous domestic and foreign published literature within the past 2 years, concluded that a clinical guideline should have following seven components: I. Objective; II. General Principle; III. Procedure and Methodology; IV. Confirmation, Publication and Dissemination; V. Update and Amendment; VI. Implementation and Outcome Validation; VII. Reference.Evaluation: The [Guideline for Clinical Guidelines Constitution/Amendment] will improve the quality of Chinese clinical guidelines and regulate applications, as well as outcome evaluations of clinical guidelines in China.Lessons Learned: Standardized methodology and procedures are important for constituting high-quality clinical guidelines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines recent constitutional mobilisation in China, embodied in the weiquan (right defence) movement, Charter 08 and the 2013 constitutionalism debate. It contrasts Chinese and Vietnamese experience of constitutional mobilisation. This paper argues that constitutional mobilisation in China presents both convergence and divergence with those in Vietnam. The convergence stems from domestic dynamics, the impact of globalisation and the shared features of socialist/communist institutional settings. The divergence is due to Chinese constitutional exceptionalism and Vietnam's instrumentalist approach to global constitutionalism. Particularly, without necessary constitutional opportunity created by the constitution-making process, constitutional mobilisation in China has not created a national constitutional dialogue as has happened in Vietnam. This paper draws attention to the new function of socialist constitutions as a frame for social mobilisation and has general implications for the comparative inquiry into the social dynamics of constitutional law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses comments, questions, and conversations about the PRC's draft constitution of 1954 to assess state legitimacy and how people felt more generally about the Communist regime. Taking advantage of untapped archival sources in Hong Kong and the mainland—including classified intraparty reports and transcripts from meetings in factories, police stations, universities, and villages—this article challenges the conventional view that the constitution bolstered support for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Instead, the document generated a great deal of anxiety among ordinary citizens, as well as among CCP officials and the regime's favored classes. This "text-based" cause of emotional turmoil was a supplement to the classic forms of political terror that dominate the literature on Communist dictatorships. Despite widespread confusion, people's identification of problematic sections of the constitution turned out to be remarkably prescient in light of political disasters in the 1950s and 1960s and ongoing constitutional controversies in the era after Mao Zedong. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Social Sciences in China is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article presents the procedural rules of the Jiangsu Provincial People's Congress in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China. Topics discussed include provisions regarding holding of meetings, deliberation of work reports and bills and proposals, as well as examination of national economic and social development plans. Provisions on fiscal budgets, the addressing of inquiries and questions, and investigation committees are also discussed.

The article presents the procedural rules of Chongqing's People's Congress in accordance with the Constitution of the People's Republic of China. Topics discussed include detailed provisions on legislative procedures including preparation and holding of meetings convened by the Standing Committee of the Municipal People's Congress, and submission and deliberation on bills and proposals. Provisions on examination of fiscal budgets and handling of proposals and criticisms are also discussed.

The article presents the procedural rules of the People's Congress of the Tianjin Municipality (Municipal People's Congress) in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China. Topics discussed include provisions regarding holding of meetings, submissions and deliberation of bills and proposals, and addressing of questions and inquiries. Details regarding elections, resignations, and removals from office as well as supplementary provisions are also included.

This article explores the different jurisprudential approaches to the interpretation of the constitution of People's Republic of China to see what they reveal regarding legitimacy in modern China. In detailing the theoretical foundations and evaluating the political aspirations of the Democratic, Normative and Political Schools of thought that comprise contemporary Chinese jurisprudence, it argues that these jurisprudential schools reveal three sources -- the people, the rule of law and the Chinese Communist Party -- as constitutive and potentially contending sources of legitimacy and sovereignty in Chinese constitutionalism and politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Jurídica Piélagus is the property of Universidad Surcolombiana and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including the various forms of entrenchment, differentiation on the constitutions and courts in China and in Taiwan, and the concept of constitutional identity in Germany.

Disease-based biobanks have operated in hospitals and research institutes in China for decades, and China has recently embarked on a plan to establish further biobank networks with the aim of promoting data sharing among the existing biobanks. Although the Chinese Constitution has only recently begun to recognize individual privacy as a distinct and independent constitutional right, biobanking in China has been loosely regulated under a patchwork of sometimes overlapping laws (such as the Interim Measures for the Administration of Human Genetic Resources) and regulatory instruments, as well as and the policies of individual biobanks and networks of biobanks (such as the Shanghai Biobank Network Guidelines). A Draft Ordinance on Human Genetics Resources is currently being developed that will deal in more detail than previous laws with issues such as management measures, legal liability, and punishment for violations. International data sharing will be tightly regulated under this new law, and individual biobanks' policies such as the Shanghai Guidelines may choose to regulate such sharing even more. In contrast with national regulatory instruments, the Shanghai Guidelines also contain detailed de-identification policies, and explicitly endorse broad consent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay is presented on the evolution of relational property rights in China as of 2015, and it mentions farmers' land use rights, state monopolies, and Chinese rural land reform measures. Contract rights and legal land titles are addressed, along with the in rem theory of property in China. The collective ownership of land in the country is examined, along with the Chinese Constitution and the nation's Land Administration Law. Agricultural land and rural-urban land conversion are assessed.

In 2013, a debate on constitutionalism erupted between liberals advocating better implementation of China's Constitution and anti-constitutionalist voices claiming that this would harm the political order and the reform project. The debate emerged against the background of a choppy political transition and proliferating social concerns, as well as hopeful expectations regarding the new leadership. However, the anti-constitutionalist position was closely aligned with the new Politburo Standing Committee's agenda, which continues to reject the notion of a law-based political order and institutionalization of fundamental relationships between the Party, the state and citizens. This has significant implications for the direction of Chinese legal reforms and related scholarly understandings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The third plenary session of the 18th Central Committee of the CPC points out that it is necessary to establish a scientific index system and assessment standard for constructing the rule of law;and the fourth plenary session stresses further that the effectiveness of constructing the rules of law is a key point in the measurement of the working performance of leaders at all levels. This is apparently an effective way for the improvement of the rule of law in China. It is also important to defend the authority of the Constitution and the law. There hence arise a number of new requirements, such as the modernization of the national governance system and the management ability, the attainment of the target of building a well-off society and government of law by the year of 2020, and a proper understakding of the urgent demand of constructing the rules of law in China. Therefore, it is time to start from the practical condition of China to learn beneficial experience from advanced countries, to combine essentially the top-down orientation by the Government and the bottom-up mass participation, and to construct in class the index systems of the rules of law in terms of the particular characteristics to promote constantly the construction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is the first detailed exposition of the "National Discussion of the Draft Constitution". In mid-1954, Chinese engaged in a wide-ranging deliberation about political and social rights, the obligations of citizenship, state symbols, political institutions and ideology. Many asked penetrating and frequently prescient questions about law, citizenship, class and political power, and offered provocative suggestions for revision. Using archives and intra-Party publications, we argue that, for citizens, the constitutional discussion constituted the earliest national-level, semi-public exposé and critique of the entirety of CCP governing practices--a "dress rehearsal" for the 1956 Hundred Flowers Movement. For officials, the constitutional discussion provided an opportunity to deploy the coercive language of "state law" to overcome resistance to collectivization, and a tactic to deal with "unruly" citizens. We further suggest that the 1954 discussion set the terms of broad-based, but ultimately limited, constitutional critique from the 1950s until the present. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers developments related to the educational law of China. The topics discussed include the changes made to the said law since 2011, the upgrades made on the educational statutes of the Chinese Constitutions, and the rulings issued by the State Council and the Ministry of Education aimed at shaping the country's educational landscape.

Over the past three decades, China's Constitution has experienced a dramatic and fundamental transition that is beyond conventional knowledge. Legislation has overtaken both constitutional amendment and interpretation and has been instrumental in helping the Constitution evolve over time. Through statute-making, both the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee have enriched and changed the definition of both vertical and horizontal governmental relations, as well as created new rules and principles for interregional relations. As a result, the overall state power structure has become more decentralized, diverse and balanced. Such an evolutional route is by no means a unique Chinese story, but rather reflects a common theme for constitutional changes in the world. While this relatively flexible model seems realistic for China, a sustainable constitutional structure demands an operational constitutional review system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing studies about the 1975 constitution in the English literature, mostly conducted shortly after its announcement, are primarily interested in how the document differs from the constitutions of 1954 and 1978. The current study is instead primarily interested in the dynamics and process of drafting the 1975 constitution. Although the document reflects the radicalism of the Cultural Revolution, it was also the result of political compromise. The roles of Mao and the party, the concept of 'dictatorship of the proletariat,' and the belief in communist internationalism were all toned down because of the preceding events that occurred. The fate of the 1975 People's Republic of China constitution was closely linked to Zhang Chunqiao, the key person in charge of drafting the document. Although many of Zhang's ideas as reflected in the 1975 constitution were communistic, the way that the politics was conducted then was not. Unlike the more commonly used method of textual analysis from a comparative perspective, this study used materials that emerged after the Cultural Revolution to document the dynamics of drafting the constitution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the constitution and the rule of law in China highlighting the strengthening of the socialist legal system in the country to deliver its modernization goals and notes the importance of rule of law to restore order and promote development in the Chinese society.