Socialist Country Under the Government By Law

Building a socialist legal system with Chinese characteristics and building a socialist country ruled by law is the overall goal of comprehensively governing the country by law. Governing the country by law is the basic strategy for the Party to lead the people in governing the country. It is an essential requirement and important guarantee for upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics, and an inevitable requirement for modernizing national governance system and governance capabilities. The proposal and implementation of the strategy of governing the country by law has gone through a tortuous historical process. In 1954, Mao Zedong led the formulation of the first constitution of New China. The resolution on political reports passed by the Eighth CPC National Congress in 1956 stated that “the state must gradually and systematically formulate complete laws according to needs”.

However, due to various reasons, the correct policy put forward at the Eighth CPC National Congress was not consistently adhered to. The “Cultural Revolution” destroyed the socialist legal system. After the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh CPC Central Committee, in order to adapt to the new requirements of Reform and Opening-up, the leaders of the Party and the state placed great emphasis on and attached importance to the construction of the legal system. In 1996, the “Ninth Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development and the Long-Term Goals for 2010” formulated at the Fourth Session of the Eighth National People's Congress pointed out that, by the beginning of the next century, a socialist country ruled by law should be initially established. In October 1997, the Fifteenth CPC National Congress established governing the country by law as the basic strategy for the Party to lead the people in governing the country and put forward the historical task of “governing the country by law and building a socialist country ruled by law”.

The constitutional amendment passed at the Second Session of the Nineth National People’s Congress in March 1999 officially incorporated the basic strategy of governing the country by law into the Constitution. In November 2002, the 16th CPC National Congress emphasized the organic integration of upholding the leadership of the Party, guaranteeing the position of the people as the masters of the country, and governing the country by law. In October 2007, the 17th CPC National Congress further emphasized the need to adhere to the basic strategy of governing the country by law, establish a socialist concept of the rule of law, realize the legalization of various national work, and protect the legitimate rights and interests of citizens. In November 2012, the report of the 18th CPC National Congress put forward the strategic thinking of comprehensively governing the country by law.

In October 2014, the 4th Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee made a decision on a number of major issues concerning comprehensively advancing the law-based governance and put forward the overall goal of building a socialist rule of law system with Chinese characteristics and a socialist country ruled by law, embarking on a new journey for the road of socialist rule of law with Chinese characteristics. To achieve this general goal, we shall, under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, adhere to the socialist system with Chinese characteristics, implement the theory of the law-based governance with Chinese characteristics, and form a complete legal norm system, an efficient law-based enforcement system, a strict law-based supervision system, and a powerful law-based guarantee system, form a sound inner-Party legal system, adhere to the joint advancement of law-based governance of the country, law-based exercise of state power, and law-based administration of government, adhere to the integrated construction of a law-based country, a law-based government, and a law-based society, realize scientific legislation, strict law enforcement, judicial justice, and observance of law by all, and promote the modernization of the national governance system and governance capabilities.