You nailed it. The CCP produced a document that attempts to appease human rights activists while at the same time reserving THEIR right to deny the citizenry of those very same constitutional rights. These are the same people that designated three areas for public protest during the Olympics and turned down all 77 applications. They also pledge ‘no first strike’ in the event of nuclear conflict. Very comforting.

“Article 51. The exercise by citizens of the People’s Republic of China of their freedoms and rights may not infringe upon the interests of the state, of society and of the collective, or upon the lawful freedoms and rights of other citizens.”

i.e. you can exercise your rights as long as it does not interfere with state interests. Actually according to this article, even if the CCP wasn’t in charge, whoever was in charge of the “state” could legally ride roughshod over any exercise of individual rights that they found in conflict with state interests.

So it’s not that the current government isn’t following the constitution, its that the constitution was written terribly with a very clear contradiction in terms of the rights of the individual vs. the rights of the state. (a contradiction that is not very surprising given the Chinese penchant for “rational” thinking). Even if you had an independent judiciary, this clause makes it very difficult to protect citizens rights.

Thanks for putting these up!

I suppose I could mollify the fenqing by saying that others’ constitutions are also lacking in a meaningful content that citizens can believe in. But I’ve decided not too.