Conclusion
The drafting and adoption of a new PRC Constitution between September 1980 and December 1982 was a process that closely reflected the ongoing massive changes occurring at the time in Chinese politics and society.
This was the case even despite the ultimate decision to produce a relatively conservative document that, in Peng Zhen's words, ‘didn't change anything that didn't need changing’, stuck to goals ‘that could be accomplished now', and in large measure returned to the key features of the 1954 Constitution. Initially hotly debated ideas, such as the introduction of a Senate-like upper chamber for the NPC to provide a check on arbitrary or misguided use of state power, fell by the wayside. On the other hand, such features were to a certain extent transposed to the intra-Party realm.Indeed, the provisions for increased intra-Party democracy as well as an enhanced role for collective decision-making were to play a major role in ideological struggles of the 1980s. By 1983, officials on the Party's left including Hu Qiaomu and Deng Liqun had convinced Deng Xiaoping of the need for a campaign to counter trends of ‘bourgeois liberalisation' that were being promoted by liberal intellectuals associated with Hu Yaobang and his policies. By the end of the decade, there would emerge a growing consensus on the need to further bolster the provisions of the Constitution providing protections for the private market economy, but not on issues of political liberalisation. The popular protest movement of 1989 that gathered pace after Hu's death that year, and its suppression leading to a major change in the composition of the Party leadership, would further entrench this posture.
Meanwhile, some features of the 1982 Constitution also influenced the process of determining the future constitutional frameworks for Hong Kong and Macao. The notion of an ‘upper house' of representatives from various sectors of society, for example, was soon to make a kind of reappearance in the form of ‘functional constituencies' in the legislature and a powerful Election Committee, both of which were first articulated in 1984.
While these drew on multiple influences, the public early 1980s discussions over a ‘Social Chamber' in the NPC served as a precedent; indeed, Xu Chongde and some others who had worked at the CRC Secretariat would also play significant roles in the drafting of Hong Kong's Basic Law.The subsequent history of the PRC Constitution has largely reinforced its character as a major pillar of what is usually referred to as ‘law-based governance', as well as stably functioning state institutions, supporting an orderly and extensively marketised society. These features were reinforced over the course of subsequent amendments in 1988, 1993, 1999, 2004, and 2018, of which the content has mostly focused on the ever more explicit denotation of legal protections for private property ownership - although the most recent amendments of 2018 were instead directed to a range of issues including, eg, the creation of a new anti-corruption supervision body as well as a migration of ‘the leadership of the Communist Party' from Peng Zhen's Preamble to the main constitutional text. The two-term limit introduced for the State Chairman office, meanwhile, was removed.
The overall importance of the Constitution to both state governance and Party ideology was strongly asserted over the course of 2013-14, in the early period of Xi Jinping's first term. The opening of a national debate on constitutional matters was announced, with various views articulated in the public sphere although, on the whole, the officially endorsed conclusions ruled out any transformation of the Constitution into a judiciable source of law. Nonetheless, the Xi era has been associated with a number of strong affirmations of the 1982 Constitution itself as well as of many of its most notable features. These include the empowerment of the NPC Standing Committee, which remains the sole authorised interpreter of the Constitution and, since, 2018 has had one of its special committees explicitly designated as the ‘Rule of Law and Constitutional Affairs Committee', tasked with ensuring that prospective legislation is in accordance with the Constitution.
In adopting this approach rather than any empowerment of the judiciary as constitutional interpreter, the 2018 amendments could be seen as consistent with Deng and Peng's constitutional vision.Another recent move was the introduction of the annual ‘National Constitution Day' holiday on 4 December, the anniversary of the Constitution's adoption in 1982. A major example of a pufa, or ‘law popularisation' activity that intends to spread social consciousness about legal norms and institutions, as well as their proper uses and relation to the state apparatus, the holiday has been associated with state-organised events and celebrations each year since 2014. On the whole, celebration and affirmation of the PRC Constitution has reached a new high point during Xi's administration, mirroring a general approach that places heavy emphasis on ‘socialist legality' as well as law and order issues.
The 1980-1982 constitutional drafting process is rightly seen as a major political and ideological turning point, and indeed one that represented not just changes in the state, but also the reassertion of sectors of Chinese society that had been systematically excluded from public life under previous political arrangements. Even though the process by which the Constitution was adopted could not be said to be one based on unfettered and non-hierarchical open debate, it did generate a document enjoying a broad sense of social legitimacy - independent intellectuals, activists, and even dissidents have not infrequently turned to the Constitution for support, if usually unsuccessfully. That such consensus-generation can occur even in the absence of judicial enforcement underlines the pragmatic impacts of constitutional documents and ideas outside as well as within the courtroom.
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