Perhaps China's leaders merely want to tune up the instruments of repression in anticipation of the increasing social instability brought on by the country's economic downturn. Or perhaps recent events have convinced them that their long-sought 'harmony' cannot be achieved without new measures to curb the widely resented arbitrary power of police, prosecutors and judges.
Whatever the reasons, the Politburo recently turned its attention to 'judicial reform'. On November 28, it adopted 'in principle' an 'opinion' from the Central Party Political-Legal Committee that controls all legal institutions. Consistent with the secrecy that too often shrouds the mainland's version of the 'socialist rule of law', the text has not been made public. Yet, as Communist Party and government officials seek to put flesh on its bare bones, its ripple effects are gradually coming into view.
One important change seems definitely in the offing. Responsibility for financing the expenses of the country's more than 3,000 local courts, which now rests with local governments on the same level, is to be elevated to the provincial and central levels. The hope is that this will restrain excessive spending for court buildings in the prosperous coastal areas while assuring adequate budgets for courts in underfunded central and western areas.
This overdue reform should also diminish, but not eliminate, the notorious 'local protectionism' that frequently biases judicial decisions in favour of powerful local political and economic interests. Budgets for police and prosecutors are also expected to be decided at higher levels in order to strengthen central rule.
A second improvement reportedly calls upon local procuratorial offices to prosecute fewer ordinary offenders while focusing on those who threaten the nation's security or commit other major crimes.
Too many people, it is said, are unnecessarily stigmatised as criminals and sent to prison or labour camp when more lenient measures would suffice. The current practice of indicting virtually all suspects whom investigators recommend for prosecution, which usually leads to conviction and incarceration, often turns essentially good people into hardened criminals and arouses popular resentment against the government.
Although details have yet to be agreed on, apparently a decision has been made to alter or abolish 're-education through labour'. Since 1957, when the party ended the brief 'let a hundred flowers bloom' period by wielding this weapon to detain hundreds of thousands of 'rightists', this supposedly 'non-criminal' administrative sanction has been an invaluable instrument of the police.