Wrongful Convictions with Chinese Characteristics

Economics of Transition and Institutional Change

41 Pages Posted: 20 Jun 2022 Last revised: 21 Jul 2023

See all articles by Peiyuan Li

Peiyuan Li

Duke Kunshan University

Wei Li

Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business

Date Written: June 14, 2022

Abstract

This paper investigates how the imbalanced judiciary affects the generation and correction of wrongful convictions in China. We focus on the role of the Political and Legal Affairs Commissions, which are tasked by the Communist Party to control judicial authorities. Based on 335 wrongful convictions during 1990-2010, we find that if secretaries of provincial PLACs held office as chiefs of police, more wrongful convictions would be made. The mechanism is that this arrangement destroys checks between judicial authorities, and we discover that a province would prosecute 251 additional people under it. In 81% of our sample, the correction of a wrongful conviction came after the secretary of the provincial PLAC, who had oversight of the court that handed down the sentence, was no longer in office. Furthermore, even after the culpable PLAC secretaries left their spots, if successors used to be their subordinates, wrongful convictions were still less likely to be reversed. Our findings provide persuasive evidence in favor of judicial independence.

Keywords: Wrongful Convictions; Judicial Independence, the Political and Legal Affairs Commission; China

JEL Classification: K14, K42, P26, P37

Suggested Citation

Li, Peiyuan and Li, Wei, Wrongful Convictions with Chinese Characteristics (June 14, 2022). Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4136862 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4136862

Peiyuan Li (Contact Author)

Duke Kunshan University ( email )

No. 8 Duke Avenue
Kunshan, Jiangsu 215316
China

Wei Li

Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business ( email )

Oriental Plaza, Tower E3
One East Chang An Avenue
Beijing, 100738
China

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