Study On The Crime Of Forced Labor

The38th Article of the Eighth Amendment to the Criminal Law of the People’s Republic ofChina amended the crime of forcing worker to labor to the crime of forced labor. The newlyamended crime has made improvements on the criminal subject, criminal objective and also thelegally prescribed punishment, which is a step forward taken in the criminal legislation on forcedlabor in China and significant testimony to gradual progress made in China’s human rightsprotection. Nevertheless, the amended crime is by no means perfect. It is somewhat narrow interms of defining criminal objectivity and, coupled with a lack of inclusiveness of the CriminalLaw, therefore would fail to achieve the designed goal of effectively combating actions of forcedlabor. With a view to making contributions to the solving of above-mentioned problemsconcerning the amended crime, the thesis makes the following arrangement in its layout. At first,it gives both the definition of forced labor in legislations of other countries and that given in thelaw of China. Second, it presents relevant international conventions and also legislations onforced labor in other countries to conduct a comparable research on the criminal legislations onforced labor in the United States, Germany, Japan, Thailand and Egypt. The finding is thatlegislations in such countries are more scientific and logical in the crime definition. Third, thethesis, by applying the principle of four essential elements of a crime, makes a comparativeanalysis between the constitution of the crime of forcing workers to labor and that of the crime offorced labor, only to conclude that the amended crime is also disputable. Finally, the authorsuggests a amendment to part of the definition on the forced labor crime by revising the part, i.e,“by means of violence, threat or restriction of personal freedom”into such reading as “by meansof violence, threat, confinement or other forms of restricting personal freedom”. Also,“Crimeof forcing” is also suggested to be added in the criminal law. In short, this thesis works topresent a deeper analysis of crime of forced labor, in an effort to provide a theoretical guidancefor the legislation and judicial practice of crime of forced labor in the future.