The discussion reinvigorated a debate about various proposed changes to the laojiao system that lawmakers have discussed at annual meetings of the National People's Congress in the past several years.

Ying Yong, president of Shanghai High People's Court, is one of them.

He noted in a proposal submitted during this year's NPC session, held in March in Beijing, that the system has contributed greatly to social order and improved economic development. Even so, the country finds itself amid different circumstances than were present 50 years ago and has established a legal system. Laojiao should therefore be modified, he said.

Because the penalties under laojiao can exceed even the six-month minimum penalty for criminal offenses, Ying said, that undermines the notion that laojiao is imposed on suspects whose deeds have been not serious enough to constitute crimes.

He said the system should have been modified after the Administrative Coercion Law went into effect in 2017.

That law, which regulates administrative power and protects civil rights, lists several compulsory measures that administrative organs can take and that can lead to people losing their freedom. Laojiao is not one of them.

Questions:

1. What is being discussed by prominent lawyers in China?

2. What is laojiao?

3. How long has China used this system?

Answers:

1. Reform of the controversial laojiao system.

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