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Reasons for the Preventive Shift of Chinese Criminal Law REASONS FOR THE PREVENTIVE SHIFT OF CHINESE CRIMINAL LAW USING THE EIGHTH AMENDMENT AS A CASE STUDY by Ying Ji B.A., Nanjing University, 2007 M.A., Nanjing University, 2010 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE AND POSTDOCTORAL STUDIES (Law) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) December 2015 © Ying Ji, 2015 Abstract This dissertation concerns reasons for the preventive shift in Chinese criminal law; that is, the social, legal, and political rationales of the shift. It is inspired by the eighth amendment of Chinese criminal law in 2011 which amended several penalties related to road, drug, and environmental safety. The eighth amendment stemmed from a series of nationally-known incidents that triggered widespread public dissatisfaction with the rules and functions of the Chinese criminal justice system. This dissatisfaction would eventually result in a crisis of the government and the legal system. Based on John Kingdon’s theory of the multiple streams (“problems, policies and politics”), this dissertation seeks to explain the origins of the legislative process and its outcomes by examining the role of public opinion, policy experts, and political actors in the making of Chinese criminal law. It also uses practices of the UK and the US as references. The dissertation claims that in authoritarian China, the prominence of risk control through criminal justice methods is a state response to uncertainties generated through reforms under the Chinese Communist Party’s leadership. This shift is the result of Chinese criminal law making, driven by the policy of pursuing public security. Under the influence of such policy, the legislation not only acts quickly in response to public emotion, but also to the social control demands of the police. It also gains more support through the responsive and inclusive process of legislation, even though most of the time it remains a consultation with the elites in the framework set by the CCP. In China, the current legislation of criminal law enhances the CCP’s legitimacy. However, compared with the West, how to restrain the expansion of criminal law is a more critical issue for consideration for the authoritarian state like China. ii Preface This dissertation is original, unpublished, independent work of the author, Ying Ji. iii Table of Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... ii Preface ........................................................................................................................................... iii Table of Contents ......................................................................................................................... iv List of Tables .............................................................................................................................. viii List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... ix List of Abbreviations .................................................................................................................... x Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................... xi Dedication ................................................................................................................................... xiii Chapter 1: Introduction ............................................................................................................... 1 1.1 The Chinese Landscape ................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Literature Review ......................................................................................................... 10 1.2.1 Chinese Scholarship .............................................................................................. 10 1.2.2 Western Scholarship ............................................................................................. 18 1.3 Methodology ................................................................................................................ 25 1.4 Dissertation Structure ................................................................................................... 33 Chapter 2: Recent Reforms in Chinese Criminal Law and Their Implications ................... 40 2.1 Conceptualization of “Crime Prevention” ................................................................... 40 2.1.1 Crime Prevention in the Chinese Context ............................................................. 40 2.1.2 Crime Prevention in the Western Context ............................................................ 44 2.2 Three Case Studies: Based on 2011 Eighth Amendment to Criminal Law ................. 49 2.2.1 Three Offences in Chinese Criminal Law ............................................................ 51 iv 2.2.1.1 Crime of Drunk Driving ................................................................................. 51 2.2.1.2 Crime of Manufacturing and Selling Fake Medications ................................ 55 2.2.1.3 Crime of Environmental Pollution ................................................................. 57 2.2.2 Similarities among the Changes ............................................................................ 59 2.2.3 Weak Constraints of the Law ................................................................................ 62 2.3 Analytical Framework of Risk Society and Its Limitations ......................................... 66 Chapter 3: The History of Lawmaking and Reasons for Applying the Multiple Streams Approach ..................................................................................................................................... 73 3.1 Legislative Initiative, Bill Passing and Final Amendments ......................................... 74 3.1.1 Amendment on the Crime of Drunk Driving ........................................................ 74 3.1.2 Amendment on the Crime of Manufacturing and Selling Fake Medications ....... 77 3.1.3 Amendment on the Crime of Environmental Pollution ........................................ 80 3.2 Applying John Kingdon’s Theory into the Chinese Context ....................................... 82 Chapter 4: Problem Stream for Chinese Criminal Law Making ........................................... 94 4.1 Studies of Nationally-known Cases as Focusing Events ............................................. 95 4.1.1 Three Case Studies ................................................................................................ 96 4.1.2 The Public, the Media and the Government ....................................................... 100 4.2 Opinions of Netizens on Focusing Events and Chinese Criminal Law ..................... 104 4.2.1 Rapid Growth of the Chinese Internet: Social Landscape .................................. 104 4.2.2 Netizen Opinions on Focusing Events ................................................................ 107 4.3 Public Sense of Security in the Surveys .................................................................... 111 4.3.1 Public Sense of Security: Based on Survey Results ........................................... 112 4.3.2 Reasons for Public Satisfaction and Divergence with Internet Sentiment ......... 118 v 4.4 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 126 Chapter 5: Policy Stream for Chinese Criminal Law Making ............................................. 130 5.1 Roles of the Specialists in the Policy Stream ............................................................. 132 5.1.1 Proposal Drafting Specialists: the Policy Entrepreneurs .................................... 133 5.1.2 Policy Stream: As a Response to Public Opinions in China ............................... 139 5.2 Legal Concerns of the Proposals ................................................................................ 143 Chapter 6: Political Stream for Chinese Criminal Law Making: Role of the CCP and the Bureaucracy ............................................................................................................................... 151 6.1 The Role of the CCP in Chinese Criminal Law Making ........................................... 153 6.2 The Role of Other Participants in the Legislative Process ........................................ 160 6.2.1 The NPC .............................................................................................................. 161 6.2.2 The Judicial System ............................................................................................ 165 6.2.3 The Administration ............................................................................................. 171 6.2.4 The Media ........................................................................................................... 177 6.2.5 The Legal Experts ............................................................................................... 183 6.3 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 189 Chapter 7: The Role of the State in the Criminal Justice System: Through a Comparative Perspective ................................................................................................................................
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