Dispute Among The People And Reconcilable Matters

In order to standardize, legalize and formalize the victim offender reconciliation, theamended Criminal Procedure Law has limited the scope of application of victim offenderreconciliation on basis of analyzing and summarizing the practical experience. However,the victim offender reconciliation system is far from perfect and provides no detail but ageneral framework, which contributes to its limited guiding role in practice. In particular,given that the specific connotation and scope of the term “dispute among the people” as setforth in Paragraph1of Article277is uncertain, it is difficult to determine the criminalcases resulting from dispute among the people. Since there is no specific provision in thelaw and the understanding on that in the judicial practice differs, the scope of cases that canapply victim offender reconciliation is not clearly defined. That a criminal case resultsfrom dispute among the people is nothing but a cause of the crime, a circumstance forsentencing after conviction, and should not become a limitation on the application ofvictim offender reconciliation. Unclear definition on scope of reconciliation is the primaryfactor affecting the implementation of the victim offender reconciliation. From theperspective of constructing harmonious society and restoring the damaged socialrelationship, the term “dispute among the people” shall be re-defined, so as tocorrespondingly expand the scope of application of victim offender reconciliation andreturn to the original legislative intention.