China’s Communist Party to evaluate lawyers based on ‘political performance’

China is tightening its grip on the legal sector, with plans for a ­professional standard based to a great extent on each lawyer’s “political performance”.

The Ministry of Justice flagged the new standards in a notice dated late last month but the document only started circulating on social media this week. Shanghai, Inner Mongolia, Anhui and Shaanxi provinces will pilot the scheme.

Under the new system, lawyers will be classified into nine specialist areas, ranging from criminal law to intellectual property law. The system would help people seeking legal services to narrow their search, the notice said.

But lawyers would have to meet four criteria to be listed, the top one being political correctness, followed by record of “integrity”, length of experience and professional skills.

The political performance assessment includes supporting the Communist Party’s leadership and “socialist rule by law”, abiding by the constitution and law, and observing the legal profession’s ethics and discipline.

The integrity criterion would require applicants to have a clean record on party discipline and administrative penalties, such as detention, in the past five years.