Document Type : Original Article

Author

• Seyed Hossein Tabatabaei

Assistant Professor, International Law Department, Faculty of Law, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

The current Constitution of the People’s Republic of China, adopted in 1982, has been amended five times. A significant portion of these amendments may be understood as reflecting prior economic and social developments, while another portion indicates the future direction intended by China’s governing authorities. Employing a descriptive-analytical approach, this article examines the transformation of the economic order of the People’s Republic of China through a comparative analysis of the 1982 Constitution and its five amendments. The central research question concerns changes in the status of the state-owned economy, the private sector, and the institutional framework for supervising economic activities. The findings demonstrate that the transformation and reform of China’s economic order have proceeded through a gradual, cautious, and incremental process. The private sector, recognized in the first amendment merely as a supplementary component of the economy, was elevated in the third amendment to the status of a major component of the economic order and, in the fourth amendment, became the subject of explicit state support and encouragement. The constitutional language also narrowed the conceptual scope of the socialist economy, thereby facilitating the expansion of market mechanisms and greater autonomy for economic entities. This development, however, should not be understood as a necessarily linear progression. The express constitutional affirmation of the Communist Party’s leadership and the establishment of supervisory commissions at the national and local levels indicate a strengthening of political and institutional control over China’s economic and administrative structures. Taken together, the five amendments reveal that the approach of the People’s Republic of China is based on the simultaneous acceptance of market mechanisms and political control, rather than on a transition toward a liberal economic and legal order. Understanding this arrangement requires attention to the Chinese understanding of order and the guiding role assigned to the political center.

Keywords

• People’s Republic of China
• constitutional amendments
• economic order
• private sector
• socialist market economy

Main Subjects

• International Law & Organizations in Asia