Unfortunately, this is not something that can be done quickly. The Chinese parliament's website still says nothing about when they will pass a bill stipulating a reduced number of legal grounds requiring the death penalty.
The bill was submitted to the members of parliament for consideration on August 23, and specific results were expected this week. Subsequent comments implied that such a serious motion required at least three readings. The Chinese parliament frequently witnesses serious clashes, and so anything is possible.
At the same time, we already know what the Chinese public thinks about the death penalty issue, and where the Chinese stand on the current global discussion about it. China backs the United States, rather than the European Union, when it comes to the death penalty. It is common knowledge that criminals are executed in the United States, and that this situation will continue for a long time to come. In the past, criminals were publicly executed on the scaffold or guillotined in European cities. However, Europeans no longer like the death penalty. Although the residents of China, the world's most populous state, say they would feel unsafe without it, their mood is changing. Moreover, the subject of a possible future abolition of the death penalty does arise in public debate. Prime Minister Wen Jiabao has also addressed the issue, noting that the country is not yet prepared to abolish it.
While the parliamentary discussion is in progress, Renmin Ribao (People's Daily), the official newspaper of the Communist Party of China, cites sociologists from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) as saying that up to 90% of the population supported the death penalty several years ago. A recent opinion poll of Internet users in China shows that 67% of respondents back the death penalty. Eleven percent of those polled would like the government to abolish capital punishment in line with an EU-style scenario. Another 22% believe that convicted criminals should be executed, although with the caveat that the grounds for applying the punishment should be reduced from the current 68 clauses warranting capital punishment.
Chinese society is ruled by consensus, rather than the majority, and prefers compromise to confrontation. In effect, local political debates prioritize consensus over the victory of one sector of society over the other. The Chinese government has applied this principle since time immemorial. The shift in Chinese public opinion on the death penalty means that, rather than abolishing the punishment, the government will start moving in that direction.
It is worth recalling Chinese traditions in relation to this. In China's lengthy history, there have been periods when executions and sadistic but effective torture methods were banned. According to Buddhist beliefs, during the Tang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.) criminals could only be beaten with sticks. Nevertheless, China has had a long-standing tradition of executions dating back to the Shang Dynasty (circa 1700-1046 B.C.). Later, in the 19th and 20th centuries, executions were a festive occasion for entire towns and cities. Then, condemned criminals had to shout bravely at the crowd, behave proudly and wear a sign listing all their crimes. The most notorious criminals, including drug traders, were reportedly executed by firing squad in Chinese stadiums not so very long ago.
In June 2010, the Chinese Supreme Court ruled that evidence obtained through threats and torture could not be used during trials. Since 2007, the Supreme Court has been reviewing all death penalty verdicts by lower courts. Before 1996, all convicted criminals were executed by firing squad. Lethal injections which are gradually becoming an alternative death penalty option cannot be administered at stadiums.
There are now plans to revise 13 out of 68 Chinese Criminal Code's death penalty clauses. Large-scale corruption, so disliked by the Chinese, is still punishable by death. The parliament is reportedly debating this clause, taking due account of the fact that Chinese society has not yet developed alternative punishments, such as life-time imprisonment. Those found guilty of smuggling religious artifacts or forging VAT-payment slips will no longer be executed but will have to serve time in prison.
As a rule, specific penalties are first abolished, and this law-enforcement practice is subsequently formalized in criminal codes. China is gradually renouncing the death penalty for crimes such as forged documents and religious artifacts contraband.
The reduction in the number of clauses warranting the death penalty is part of extremely complicated processes, namely, the creation of a new Chinese society. There could be no other alternative after the smooth but steady market reforms of the past 30 years. China has changed: It now requires new courts and different kinds of punishment.
This old-fashioned judicial system has no future in the country at a time when the residents of China's southern coastal provinces, including the famous Shenzhen economic zone, have an annual income of $13,000. The parliamentary committee on financial and economic issues has recently published a report on the distribution of the national income. The document notes that the middle class should become the largest strata of Chinese society now comprising 1.3 billion individuals. The upcoming census is bound to increase their number.
Then there is also the wealthy class. The report says the number of people living off invested capital soared 20% in the period 1978-2005. At 0.47 the famous Gini coefficient, a measure of statistical dispersion developed by the Italian statistician Corrado Gini in 1912 and reflecting the gap in the incomes of 10% of the wealthiest and 10% of the poorest population strata, has exceeded what's seen as the safe level of 0.4. This implies continued social stratification, although not on the same scale as in Russia. There are also "gray incomes," and the Chinese government is trying to reveal the extent to which private individuals' actual wealth exceeds statistical records. They say an average urban family is 90% wealthier than the authorities believe.
China is a large and important country. That's why domestic social changes are not entirely an internal affair. The number of Chinese tourists visiting Japan and South Korea will reach one million and 1.2 million, respectively, by late 2010. Consequently, the permanent presence of members of China's rapidly changing and increasingly more affluent society in neighboring countries is an inevitable fact.
RIA Novosti political commentator Dmitry Kosyrev
The opinions expressed in this article are the author's and do not necessarily represent those of RIA Novosti.
