One of the problems that an authoritarian leader will face is that of power sharing with regime insiders; there is a dilemma in when and how much power is shared. This paper explores the institutionalization of judicial function as a solution to this problem through the case of the Administrative Procedure Law (APL) in China revealing how the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) institutionalized the “democratic” function of the People’s Court to control regime insiders. Previous work has explained that the CCP aimed to normalize the relationships between the Party and the government, and between the upper and lower government, by installing the APL which has often been recognized as a fire-alarm system. However, the benefits of such a system cannot be expected under the CCP’s political system. The specific research question here is why the CCP focused on judicial function to supervise the administrative organs of government. As such, this paper first considers the political circumstances of the CCP when it began to develop the APL. Under Deng Xiaoping’s policy of “Democracy and Legality” from 1978, the CCP encouraged regime insiders to develop a legal sensibility with the idea of supervising them by judicial means. The CCP particularly emphasized the supervision of the administrative organ by the citizen which required the “democratic” function of the People’s Court. Second, this paper explores the personnel administration of the Political-Legal Committee to analyze how the CCP worked to establish an environment that avoided conflict with regime insiders during the law-making process. For example, the Committee started evaluating a person who held a position in the legislature or judicial branch therefore it reflects to weakening the influence of public security. Third, the paper explains the legislative process of the APL as an example of how the CCP resolved conflict with regime insiders. The CCP constantly claimed that the administrative branch must follow the law and emphasized the role of the People’s Court; this attitude was summarized in the APL which regime insiders could not refuse because the CCP stressed supervision from the citizenry. According to the paper’s analysis, it is concluded that the CCP, in developing the APL, was attempting to obtain control of regime insiders while emphasizing the “democratic” function of the People’s Court to avoid or resolve conflict.

Neibu Cankao (NC) is widely recognized as one of China’s classified internal bulletins, yet little is known about its functions and how it shaped the central-local relations in the country. NC began its publication by the Xinhua News Agency in 1949 as a daily bulletin, documenting sensitive domestic topics which were not suitable for public release, such as riots, cases of corruption, accidents, and outbreaks of infectious disease. Its circulation was limited, with only senior cadres of the CCP being granted access. Despite its similarity with the Soviet bulletin system, NC was a product of the CCP’s own attempt at solving the information dilemma of its dictatorship, and thus served as an important tool for gathering information. It also played a crucial role in the supervision of lower cadres, while at the same time providing the central committee of the CCP—and more importantly, Mao Zedong, with a way to exert influence on policymaking. However, the full realization of its functions faced several challenges. First, the Xinhua journalists responsible for NC were often mistrusted, as most of them were highly educated young people, who lacked revolutionary experience and came from bourgeois families. Second, NC’s independence was hampered by the increasing inferences of local party committees. Though the journalists could criticize local party committees and were backed by Hu Qiaomu (or more precisely—by Mao), in 1953 Liu Shaoqi granted the committees with permission to review NC manuscripts, because he believed them to be more trustworthy. These local interventions put journalists in a very risky position, especially when they disagreed with local authorities or made critical comments on local issues. This led to NC’s becoming a mouthpiece for local party committees, rather than a political tool of the central party committee. Finally, Mao used to constantly send instructions on policymaking to senior cadres via NC, reminding them of what they should focus on. This forced journalists to shift their attention from issues they considered important to what were essentially Mao’s concerns. In sum, NC was stuck between the pressures from both the central and the local committees of the party, which ended up putting it at a constant risk of disfunction. Ultimately, the plight of NC was a reflection of the structural problems in the CCP’s rule.