In late June, China’s top legislature, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC), overhauled the Public Security Administration Punishments Law (PSAPL) – a statute that defines close to 200 “public-security violations.” Prototypical offenses include street brawls and petty thefts, but the law also covers conduct that the public tends to find more reprehensible, such as drug use. Although public security violations can result in up to 15 days of detention, they, by definition, are less serious than and thus are not considered “crimes.” 

In fall 2023, the draft PSAPL revision made headlines because of a later-abandoned ban on publicly wearing clothing that “hurts the feelings of the Chinese people.” As the revised law is about to take effect next year, it was recently back in the spotlight, after official publicity campaigns created an unexpected online firestorm surrounding a once-obscure provision.

The controversy began on Douyin. On November 27, a Xinjiang drug rehab center’s account posted a short video highlighting Article 136 of the law, though not without editorialization. Article 136 is a new provision requiring the police to seal – that is, prohibiting them from disclosing – the records of all PSAPL violations, unless the relevant state or private entities otherwise have lawful authority to make inquiries. Drug offenses are obviously covered, but so is each of the other 100-plus offenses under the law. This did not prevent the rehab center from singling out the former, however. 

The account of a local tourism bureau then asked in the comments, “So which young master was using?” (哪位少爷吸了), insinuating that Article 136 is designed to shield the drug-abusing offspring of the rich and powerful from public exposure. This comment instantly went viral, generating a torrent of backlash against the record-sealing requirement.

Besides predominantly substantive criticisms of Article 136, social media users also objected to how it was adopted in the first place. They targeted leading legal professionals who had written or spoken in support of sealing PSAPL records, particularly Professors Zhao Hong and Lao Dongyan. Some netizens accused academics of pushing their insidious agenda into law by exerting outsized influence over the legislative process. The topic “controversy over Professor Zhao Hong’s bill to seal drug records” (赵宏教授吸毒史封存法案争议) even briefly trended on Weibo before censors took it down. 

Relatedly, others criticized the absence of consultation on the draft in which Article 136 first appeared in its final form, implying procedural manipulation by bad actors inside or outside the legislature.

The first charge amounts to a conspiracy theory. The second correctly notes the lack of consultation on that particular draft, but the NPCSC acted by the book (such as it is) in this case and did nothing untoward. In our view, the controversy over Article 136 nevertheless exposed a more alarming problem: The Chinese legislature’s public engagement mechanisms – meant to both inform and consult the public about its legislative activities – may not be functioning effectively.

The PSAPL Revision........

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