One night in late 2018, a woman suddenly fainted and fell to the ground in the eastern Chinese province of Jiangsu. Unsure how long it would take an ambulance to arrive, and unable to arrange alternative transportation, her husband, surnamed Chen, decided to drive her to the hospital, despite having consumed alcohol earlier that evening.

Before the pair could reach the hospital, Chen’s car was pulled over by traffic police on suspicion of drunk driving. Despite the extenuating circumstances, the local prosecutor’s office eventually filed misdemeanor criminal charges for reckless driving.

The decision to file charges was almost a given from the moment Chen’s car was stopped, as China has taken an increasingly strict stance on misdemeanors in recent years. But what came next was more surprising: In late 2019, a local court ruled that Chen’s behavior constituted an “emergency necessity,” and as such, he did not bear criminal responsibility for his action. Prosecutors dropped the charges — the first time a misdemeanor reckless driving charge had ever been dropped in that province.

The court’s decision pushed Chen’s case to the center of an ongoing debate in China about the country’s attitude toward misdemeanors.

According to data released by the Supreme People’s Procuratorate — the country’s highest prosecutorial body — the number of serious violent crimes has fallen in recent years, even as the number of reported misdemeanors has risen. The proportion of cases ending in sentences of three years or less increased from under 55% in 1999 to over 85% in 2022. Misdemeanors are now the main focus of China’s criminal system.

This shift is in part the result of China’s overall improved economic situation, as well as the emergence of new technologies and policing practices. For example, theft had long been the most frequently prosecuted crime in China. But in recent years, the rise of electronic payments has led to a decline in the number of people carrying cash, while the installation of surveillance cameras in almost every public space has made it harder for thieves to operate unnoticed.

Meanwhile, the number of chargeable misdemeanors has risen steadily since the last revision of China’s Criminal Law in 1997, from 79 to 106 today. Of these, 23 have been added since 2015 alone, including reckless driving, abetting online criminal activity, and impersonation.

This new focus on misdemeanor offenses has dovetailed with judicial organs’ longstanding emphasis on punishment over prevention, which has had a number of unintended consequences. For instance, courts across China, especially at the grassroots level, are faced with staffing shortfalls, even as the number of minor offenses they must deal with has gone up. Judges, saddled with heavy workloads, have had a harder time ensuring timely, equitable trials.

And because misdemeanor criminal convictions are entered into offenders’ permanent criminal records, they are effectively marked for life. At present, there is no unified standard for the treatment of job applicants with criminal records in China, meaning that even misdemeanors can result in the offender being fired or prohibited from employment in certain sectors. In some cases, a misdemeanor conviction can even impact their family members’ military or civil service applications.

This creates a situation in which the severity of the punishment does not match the crime: A minor conviction may not only make it impossible for the offender to return to normal society, but also make life difficult for their entire family.

The growing awareness of this problem in recent years has spawned a variety of solutions, typically focusing on giving prosecutors greater flexibility in the charging process.

In December 2023, the Supreme People’s Court, together with the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, the Ministry of Public Security, and the Ministry of Justice, issued a new national standard for the treatment of drunk driving cases. These bodies also stipulated that for reckless driving, if the circumstances are not severe, prosecutors and judges could choose not to prosecute, sentence, or otherwise punish the offenders. Instead, cases could be handled in accordance with the administrative Road Traffic Safety Law.

More recently, the term “misdemeanor governance” was included in a Supreme People’s Procuratorate work report for the first time in 2024, suggesting that the SPP backs a less punishment-heavy approach to misdemeanors.

For minor offenses, the application of criminal law should be a last resort, rather than prosecutors’ first choice. More attention needs to be paid to prevention, rather than punishment, something that will require the participation of both society and the justice system.

Translator: Matt Turner.

(Header image: Visuals from CSA-Printstock/VCG, reedited by Sixth Tone)