China rewriting basic laws

After Mao's passing in 1976, a growing number of liberal legal scholars proposed removing his name from the Constitution, but those calls were silenced after the Chinese Army opened fire on pro-democracy protesters here 10 years ago.

Instead, the party now plans to add the "theories of Deng Xiaoping," who launched China's capitalist reforms 20 years ago but also ordered the Army's 1989 attack on Beijing, as guiding principles in the Constitution.

Andrew Nathan, an expert on Chinese law at Columbia University in New York, says the conflicting goals of ensuring China is ruled by law and following Deng's political theories represent a "battle of slogans" between reformists and conservatives. Even if the rule-by-law amendment is adopted, he adds, the party's power to date has been "neither grounded in popular consent nor limited by laws."

Democracy before rule of law

Jiang Peikun, a professor at People's University in Beijing, says, "Only when China becomes a democracy will its rulers ensure the supreme role of the legal system."

Professor Jiang, whose son was killed in the Army's 1989 march on Tiananmen Square, adds that "the government recently signed the UN's covenants on political and social rights, and all those rights should be incorporated into the Constitution."

The political rights treaty guarantees freedom of speech, assembly, and political participation. But since it signed the treaty last fall, Beijing has continued to arrest everyone from underground church leaders to the founders of the would-be opposition China Democracy Party.

"For several thousand years, we Chinese have lived under a rigid, imperial system and did not develop a sense of individual rights and freedoms," says Professor Jiang. Yet Beijing's opening to the world and market reforms are for the first time in Chinese history creating an "expanding class of citizens who are aware they must struggle to protect their rights and interests," he adds.

Time to end limits on speech

Indeed, a growing number of educated Chinese ranging from professionals to police to liberal officials say they are embarrassed or angry over the ongoing arrest of peaceful dissidents. Many say it is time for the party to end its limits on speech and opposition.

Mr. Cao says the government "should begin a gradual transition to parliamentary democracy by making the Constitution a supreme law that cannot be violated by anyone - no matter how high his position."

Under China's current system, all three branches of government are dominated by the party, and there are no checks and balances to ensure the leadership obeys its own laws.

Even with the party's proposed changes, Cao says, "the current Constitution can't protect us if a second Mao launched another Cultural Revolution."

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