On Procuratorial Authority And Its Social Basis

Procuratorial authority refers to the authority with coercive power (or deterrent force) conferred to the procuratorial organ by law. The social basis for procuratorial authority refers to the social conditions for generation, existence and development of procuratorial authority and it consists of economic conditions, political conditions, ideological and cultural conditions, social organization conditions, civic values and so on. Generation, existence and development of procuratorial authority in China are tightly pinned to the Chinese society constituted by Chinese politics, economics, culture and social organizations. In the meantime, procuratorial authority reflects and reacts upon the society. It works on the whole society, with the capability to boost social development and likewise take control of the society.This paper consists of five chapters.Chapter I An Overview on Procuratorial Authority in ChinaIn this chapter, it focuses on defining "procuratorial authority" and discusses the components and value function of procuratorial authority in China. Procuratorial authority contains the meaning of both "authority" and "power". Procuratorial authority features as follows:it's the combination of authority and power; it's the combination of national mandatory and voluntary obedience; it's the combination of legal conferring and traditional inheritance; it protects the governor's interest and national interest, and also protects private interest and individual interest. The basic constitutive elements of procuratorial authority in China include legitimacy and independence of procuratorial power, integration of procuratorial work, professionalism of procurators and effectiveness of supervision over procuratorial power. Procuratorial authority in China is provided with the major value functions including maintaining the legal system, restricting power, protecting democracy, assuring human rights, developing legal belief and so on.Chapter II The Main Social Basis for Procuratorial Authority in ChinaThis chapter mainly discusses the political, economic, values and social organization basis on which the procuratorial authority in China relies for existence. The objective reality that China exercises a unitary system of centralization of authority determines the necessity to ensure normal execution of civil rights in China by virtue of procuratorial authority; that China implements a economic system of socialist public ownership determines the necessity to ensure normal performance of the executive power in the economic sector of China by virtue of procuratorial authority; that China follows monism of values with Marxism culture as its core determines the necessity to ensure implementation of the laws and regulations concerning the cultural and ideological field in China by virtue of procuratorial authority; that social organizations are highly administrative in China determines the necessity to ensure lawful and regulated running of social organizations in China. From the founding of the People's Republic of China to implementation of the reform and opening-up policy in1978, China fixed the system of people's congress of our state's fundamental political system and exercised a political party-state system in terms of power operation; China exercised a system of socialist planned economy under the guidance of the Theory of Scientific Socialism founded by Marx and Engels and with public ownership playing the dominant role in respect of economic system, and the way of economic development was featured by the extensive form, introversive type, quantity and scale expansion, extension, great investment, high consumption, great accumulation, low spending, external demand-driving, priority of heavy industry, high value on speed and ignorance of efficiency; China seemed to advocate revolution, worshiping leaders and collective first in respect of social values; China showed an evident authority colorism in respect of the structure of social organizations.Chapter III Generation and Features of the Procuratorial Authority in ChinaAfter all, the generation and development process of the procuratorial authority is exactly the generation and development process of the procuratorial systems. In this chapter, I clarify the origin and development of procuratorial systems, as well as the formulation and development of the procuratorial system in China. Modern Procuratorial System originated in France. On a global scale, there are roughly four major types of Procuratorial System, respectively the power-oriented Procuratorial System in common law countries, the power-oriented procuratorial system in civil law countries, the supervisory power-oriented Procuratorial System in socialist law countries and the socialist Procuratorial System with the Chinese characteristics. China's modern procuratorial system is based on the Legal Supervision Thought of the theory of the people's democratic dictatorship and Lenin's thoughts for legal supervision and took shape by absorbing and drawing on the essentials of the Soviet socialist procuratorial system and the ancient Chinese censor system. It differs from the Western procuratorial system, the Soviet socialist procuratorial system and even the ancient Chinese censor system. The main duties and powers of the Chinese procuratorial organs include the duty crime detection power, approval or decision of the power of arrest, Prosecution Right, Litigation supervision right and other duties and powers. China's procuratorial system has such basic features:first, in view of the constitution positioning, China's procuratorial organs are independent of administrative organs and judicial organs; Second, in view of the power attribute, the power exercised by China's procuratorial organs is the power of legal supervision; third, in view of the leadership system, China's procuratorial organs adopt the dual leadership; fourth, in view of the business decision-making mechanism, China's procuratorial organs adopts the mechanism highly combining the prosecutorial committee's democratic centralism with the procurator-general responsibility system. China's procuratorial authority is distinctive as it is an authority integrating the political nature, independence, judicial and supervisory function.Chapter IV Transition of Chinese Society and the Dilemma Faced Prosecutorial AuthorityThis chapter mainly describes transition of political development, economic development and values, growth of the folk society in China and the new requirements thus posed to the procuratorial authority in China. Since implementation of the reform and opening-up policy, China developed and improved the system of people's congress, the system of multi-party cooperation and political consultative conference, the system of regional national autonomy and the system of democracy at the grass-root level, thus, China increasingly introduced in a political party-state-society system in respect of power operation mode; China stepped on the journey to establish and improve the socialist market economic system with Chinese characteristics and the way of economic development in China as a whole featured the extensive form, great accumulation, low spending, extravert type, external demand-driving and acceleration of industrial restructuring; the values of Chinese society witnessed intensive changes and the concepts of value such as democratic concept, the concept of government by law and the concept of opening-up is growing vigorously and well under way; the folk society in China gained robust growth and rising of civil organizations in China has played an important role and will continue to play an important role in political development of China. Thus, the procuratorial authority in China has to respond to the following conflicts:firstly, the objective reality that the changed political basis requires procuratorial authority not only to protect the "central authority", but also to protect "regional innovation" is inconsistent with the mission of procuratorial authority at its establishment only to protect the "central authority"; secondly, the objective reality that the changed economic basis requires procuratorial authority not only to protect "public ownership economy", but also to protect "private ownership economy" is inconsistent with the mission of procuratorial authority at its establishment only to protect the "public ownership economy"; thirdly, the objective reality that the changed basis of values requires procuratorial authority not only to protect "the concept of Marxism cultural value", but also to protect "new cultural values" is inconsistent with the mission of procuratorial authority at its establishment only to protect the "the concept of Marxism cultural value"; fourthly, the objective reality that the changed basis for social organizations requires procuratorial authority not only to protect "governmental social organizations", but also to protect "social organizations of new type" is inconsistent with the mission of procuratorial authority at its establishment only to protect the "governmental social organizations".In effect, the procuratorial practice in China has already found out the typical ways to resolve these conflicts.Chapter V The Trend of the Procuratorial Authority in ChinaThis chapter mainly discusses the orientation of political restructuring, reform of economic system, reform of cultural administrative system and reform of social system in China and makes new requirements on the procuratorial authority in China, and then points out a direction for development and improvement of the procuratorial authority in China. In the next period, China will usher in a new age of democratic political development from the point of view of political development in China and the strategy of government by law will develop both in scope and in depth. So China should improve procuratorial organs with the powers and functions of administrative supervision and litigation supervision and allow full play to the function of procuratorial organs in enhancing law-based government administration, punishment and corruption prevention system building and impartial execution of judicial power; In respect of economic development in China, China will maintain and improve its basic economic system, improve the modern market system, develop a more sound system of harmonious urban-rural development, establish a new open economic system and improve the financial market system. So procuratorial organs should perform the procuratorial function in accordance with the orientation of reform of the economic system and especially they should establish a modern law enforcement philosophy, implement the essence of transparent law enforcement, follow universal international law and consolidate cross-border judicial cooperation to further boost economic development of China; in respect of cultural development in China, China will improve its cultural administrative system, establish and improve the modern cultural market system and build a modern public cultural service system. So procuratorial organs should, in accordance with the orientation of reform of the cultural administrative system, perform the procuratorial function to further boost cultural development of China; in respect of development of the social undertakings in China, the folk society will gain better growth and its regulation on the "government" and "market" will be more standard, rational and effective. So procuratorial organs should, in accordance with the orientation of reform of the social system, perform the procuratorial function to boost development of the folk society. At the same time, China should also boost development of procuratorial authority by deepening reform of the procuratorial system and consolidating self-building of the procuratorial organ.