People's Daily Full-page Discussion: How to Expand New Opportunities for China's Development in the Construction of Rule of Law

　　Editor's words
The world today is undergoing major changes unseen in a century, and the internal and external environment of my country's development has undergone profound and complex changes. In the face of complex situations and arduous tasks, if we want to cultivate new opportunities in the crisis and open up new situations in the changing situation, we must better play the role of the rule of law in ensuring the fundamentals, stabilizing expectations, and long-term benefits. In recent years, China has successively promulgated a series of important laws and regulations, such as the Foreign Investment Law and the Civil Code, to equally protect the rights and interests of enterprises of all forms of ownership in accordance with the law, and strive to create a market-oriented, legalized and international business environment. it has played an important role in cultivating and strengthening new momentum, building a new development pattern, and promoting high-quality development. Several articles in this observation edition discuss topics such as how the construction of the rule of law can expand new opportunities for my country's development, consolidate my country's good development momentum, and create a good business environment.
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 　　Provide effective legal protection for high-quality economic development (People's Watch)
People's Daily (October 30, 2020, 09)
 
The Civil Code makes it clear that all civil subjects have equal legal status in civil activities, and that all forms of ownership have equal access to factors of production, equal participation in market competition and equal protection by law, which provides an important institutional premise for giving full play to the decisive role of the market in the allocation of resources.
By creating a fair and competitive market environment, the Civil Code promotes the free flow and efficient allocation of factors in accordance with market rules, market prices, and market competition, so as to maximize benefits and optimize efficiency.
The Civil Code actively maintains a good market economic order, and strives to create a fair development environment for various market entities, so that the market is both dynamic and standardized.
At present, my country has entered a stage of high-quality development, and the prospects for economic development are improving. At the same time, the problem of unbalanced and insufficient development is still prominent. There are still many shortcomings and weaknesses in achieving high-quality development. Strengthening the construction of the market legal system, especially the compilation of the civil code, is a major measure to complement the shortcomings of the high-quality economic development system. The Civil Code is the basic law of the socialist market economy. It has an important position in the socialist legal system with Chinese characteristics. It is a basic law that is fundamental, stable, and long-term. It can provide a more systematic and complete system for the operation of the socialist market economy. More mature and stereotyped legal rules. The various legal norms established by the Civil Code to adjust economic relations provide an effective legal guarantee for the high-quality development of China's economy. General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized: "The implementation of the Civil Code is an inevitable requirement for the development of the socialist market economy and the consolidation of the basic socialist economic system." With the promulgation and implementation of the Civil Code, the institutional foundation for the prosperity and development of my country's socialist market economy will become more solid, and the prospects for achieving high-quality economic development will be broader.
　　Stimulate the vitality of the main body of the market
The market economy is essentially an economy ruled by law, and the good operation of the market economy is based on good law and good governance. The Civil Code is based on the needs of the development of the socialist market economy, reflects the objective laws of the socialist market economy, and consolidates and improves the legal system of the socialist market economy. In terms of stimulating the vitality of market subjects, the Civil Code clarifies the rights and obligations of civil subjects, and optimizes the system in terms of property rights and contracts, so as to make civil activities more suitable for the needs of high-quality economic development.
The equality of market subjects is a necessary condition for the full functioning of the price mechanism. Only with equal legal status can civil subjects trade freely according to their own wishes, generate effective price signals and improve the efficiency of market allocation of resources. The Civil Code clarifies the basic principle that all civil subjects have equal legal status in civil activities, and ensures that all ownership economies have equal access to production factors, equal participation in market competition, and equal protection by law, which provides for giving full play to the decisive role of the market in resource allocation. An important institutional prerequisite. In addition, the Civil Code also enriches the types of civil subjects in China. The Civil Code creates unincorporated organizations as civil subjects other than natural persons and legal persons, and gives legal qualifications to engage in market economic activities such as sole proprietorships, partnerships, and professional service institutions that do not have legal personality. The Civil Code improves the legal person system and divides legal persons into three types: for-profit legal persons, non-profit legal persons and special legal persons. Among them, for-profit legal persons include companies and other enterprise legal persons, non-profit legal persons include public institutions, social organizations, foundations, social service institutions, etc., and special legal persons include institutional legal persons, legal persons of rural collective economic organizations, legal persons of urban and rural cooperative economic organizations, and legal persons of grass-roots mass autonomous organizations. This classification emphasizes the profit-making attributes of profit-making legal persons such as enterprises, expands the scope of subjects participating in market economic activities, helps to promote all walks of life to participate in market economic activities and release the potential of economic development.
The property rights system is the cornerstone of the socialist market economy, and the protection of property rights is an inevitable requirement for adhering to the basic socialist economic system. If the property rights of market subjects are effectively protected, there will be an inexhaustible motive force for development. The Civil Code stipulates that the property rights of civil subjects are equally protected by law, and gives civil subjects more kinds of property rights, which enriches the object of market transactions and is conducive to the prosperity of the market economy. The Civil Code recognizes that civil subjects enjoy property rights, claims, intellectual property rights, equity and other investment rights in accordance with the law. Among them, the real right is a more common and common property right. The Civil Code of Property Rights divides property rights into ownership, usufructuary rights, security rights, etc., specifies in detail the types, contents, modes of exercise and means of protection of property rights, and reduces transaction costs, including information search costs, and improves transaction efficiency through registration and other property rights publicity systems. The Civil Code divides usufructuary rights into land contractual management rights, construction land use rights, homestead use rights, residence rights, and easements. Such a system design fully reflects Chinese characteristics and is important for stabilizing the expectations of right holders and promoting the rational use of land resources. significance. In addition, the Civil Code fully reflects the inherent requirements of promoting high-quality economic development in the era of knowledge economy. The scope of intellectual property objects stipulated in the Civil Code is wider, covering works, inventions, utility models, designs, trademarks, geographical indications, trade secrets, layout designs of integrated circuits, new plant varieties and other objects stipulated by law, expanding the depth of intellectual property protection and greatly stimulating the innovative and creative activities of market subjects.
　　Promote the effective allocation of factors of production
The equal use of production factors is the inherent requirement of perfecting the socialist market economic system, and good rules can promote the equal use and optimal allocation of production factors. The Civil Code plays an important "catalyst" role in promoting the free flow and optimal allocation of various factors of production, ensuring equal access to factors of production by different market subjects by creating a market environment of fair competition, and promoting the allocation of factors to maximize benefits and optimize efficiency in accordance with market rules, market prices and market competition.
With the development of digital economy, data resources represented by big data have become an important factor of production. Together with land, labor, capital and other factors of production, they are integrated into the process of creating social wealth, which is of great value to improve social productivity. The Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Building a More Perfect Institutional Mechanism for Market-based Allocation of Factors, released this year, includes data in the scope of factors of production and calls for accelerating the cultivation of the data factor market. In response to the needs of the development of the digital economy, the Civil Code has incorporated the new factors of production that have emerged as a result of technological innovation into the legal system of the market economy in a timely manner, and for the first time in the form of a code to provide for data and network virtual property as the object of property rights, confirming that the property rights of data and network virtual property are protected by law. This has laid a rule foundation for promoting data element trading and accelerating the cultivation of data element markets.
The Civil Code also has many innovations in promoting the free flow of factors of production. For example, to implement the top-level design of the central government on the "separation of three rights" of rural land, the Civil Code enriches the connotation of land contractual management rights, and allows land contractual management rights holders to independently decide to transfer land management rights to others by leasing, shareholding or other means in accordance with the law. Create institutional conditions for cultivating and building a market for land management rights and promoting large-scale, intensive, standardized, and green production of agriculture. In order to expand the types of security interests and the scope of collateral, the Civil Code provides for the scope of mortgaged property by enumerating and covering the form, which can be used as collateral as long as it is other property that is not prohibited by laws or administrative regulations. These provisions enable more factors of production to establish mortgages, further broaden the financing channels of market entities, and are of great significance to active market activities and stimulate market innovation.
In order to promote the full use of factors of production, the Civil Code has also improved the market trading system and created some new trading mechanisms. For example, on the basis of improving the design of typical contract rules and risk arrangements in contract law, the Civil Code Contract Code adds several types of typical contracts, such as guarantee contracts, factoring contracts, property service contracts, partnership contracts, etc., to provide clearer trading rules for the free flow of factors of production. The Civil Code expands the forms of contract formation. The parties may conclude a contract in the traditional way of offer and commitment, or in other ways, including new digital contracting methods, to provide greater convenience for the normal conduct of the transaction. The Civil Code also embraces trading habits, allowing them to be applied under certain conditions. To a certain extent, this encourages the development of industry autonomy and industry trading habits, and promotes the factor allocation process to be more in line with industry characteristics and the special needs of specific markets, thus promoting the further release of market vitality.
　　Maintain the stability of the order of the socialist market economy
The effective operation of the market economy is inseparable from the stable order. A good market economic order can create a fair development environment for all kinds of market subjects, so that the market and society are full of vitality and standardized and orderly. To stabilize the market economic order, it is necessary to protect the civil rights and interests of market entities, as well as to promote contract performance and ensure transaction security. In this regard, the Civil Code has made corresponding institutional arrangements.
Comprehensive protection of legitimate civil rights and interests. The Civil Code provides comprehensive protection for civil rights and interests. This omni-directional is reflected not only in the full protection of general civil rights such as personal rights and property rights, but also in the detailed provisions on the liability for some specific torts. For example, it is stipulated that the use of the Internet to infringe upon the civil rights and interests of others should bear tort liability, and make a targeted response to the tort in the Internet era. In order to protect the innovation vitality of market subjects and promote the wisdom and strength of the whole society to gather towards innovation, the Civil Code provides for a punitive compensation system for intellectual property infringement. The comprehensive protection of civil rights and interests in the Civil Code is conducive to enhancing the confidence of market entities in the protection of their own rights and interests, so that market entities can invest and operate with peace of mind, and accumulate strength for economic development.
Encourage honesty and compliance. The socialist market economy is a credit economy and an economy ruled by law. The awareness of the rule of law, the spirit of contract and the concept of compliance are not only the important qualities of entrepreneurs, but also the important value orientation of modern economic activities. Only when the contract is generally fulfilled as promised can the normal operation of the market economy be guaranteed. The contract code of the Civil Code further improves the liability system for breach of contract, integrates the forms of breach of contract such as inability to pay, delay in payment and partial payment, and also allows the claim of liability for breach of contract while claiming compensation for moral damage, so as to promote the performance of legal and effective contracts. This will help to cultivate and carry forward the contractual spirit of market entities that "contracts must be kept and breaches must be investigated", strengthen the awareness of rules that dare not break promises, cannot break promises, and are unwilling to break promises, promote the formation of a stable and orderly market environment, and promote the whole society Concept of integrity.
Protect transaction security. The Civil Code stipulates that when civil subjects engage in civil activities, they should follow the principle of voluntariness and establish, change and terminate civil legal relations according to their own will, thus establishing many conditions such as freedom of transaction and freedom of operation to ensure the development of the market economy. At the same time, the Civil Code appropriately restricts the freedom of transaction of civil subjects through the mandatory provisions of laws and administrative regulations and public order and good customs, so as to maintain social public order, prevent abuse of freedom of transaction, and ensure the healthy development of the market economy. The Civil Code establishes the agency system, which enables civil subjects to carry out civil legal acts through agents, and facilitates the promotion of market transactions. The Civil Code of Contracts provides for 19 typical contracts, such as sales contracts, gift contracts and loan contracts, and provides detailed, reliable and safe trading rules. When the parties do not agree on the relevant transaction conditions or the agreement is unclear, these rules can be applied to reasonably allocate the rights and obligations of both parties and effectively avoid common transaction risks, which can not only save transaction costs, maintain transaction security, but also activate market transactions.
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 　　Expanding new opportunities for institutional openness (ideas)
People's Daily (October 30, 2020, 09)

　　With the further development of economic globalization, commodities and factors flow freely around the world, and the division of labor in global value chains is profoundly adjusted. For a long time, the regional and multilateral rules that coordinate international economic and trade relations are mainly aimed at the flow of commodities and factors. In the face of the accelerated progress of science and technology and the in-depth adjustment of the division of labor in the global value chain, some traditional international rules are becoming more and more unsuited to the development and changes of the situation and are in urgent need of reform. At present, international economic and trade rules pay more attention to promoting institutional opening up, that is, promoting the continuous improvement of the level of opening up through trade and investment facilitation, optimizing the business environment, and strengthening the protection of intellectual property rights. This change has brought new opportunities and challenges to emerging market countries and developing countries in economic globalization. Recently, the trend of anti-globalization has been on the rise in the world, and individual countries have undermined globally recognized trade concepts and rules for their own selfish interests, causing serious harm to the multilateral trading system. China firmly upholds the multilateral trading system, resolutely opposes unilateralism and protectionism, promotes trade and investment liberalization and facilitation, promotes the establishment of a fair, reasonable and transparent system of international economic and trade rules, and promotes the development of the global economy in a direction conducive to the common prosperity of mankind.
Since joining the World Trade Organization, my country's market economy legal system has continued to develop and improve. Company law, contract law, tax law, and anti-unfair competition law have created a good legal environment for foreign-related economic development. At present, China has established nearly one million foreign-invested enterprises, and the actual utilization of foreign capital has exceeded 2 trillion US dollars. It has become the world's largest exporter, the second largest importer, and the second largest foreign capital inflow country in the world. The improvement of the level of opening up to the outside world and the improvement of the foreign-related legal system have laid a solid foundation for promoting institutional opening up.
Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, we have adhered to the basic national policy of opening up to the outside world, implemented a proactive opening strategy, and promoted the formation of a new pattern of comprehensive opening up. The 2018 Central Economic Work Conference proposed that it is necessary to adapt to the new situation, grasp the new characteristics, and promote the transformation from commodity and factor flow opening to institutional opening such as rules. In 2019, the Second Session of the 13th National People's Congress passed the Foreign Investment Law, a basic law for foreign investment. This law summarizes the practical experience in the use of foreign capital since the reform and opening up, adheres to the principle of consistency between domestic and foreign investment, and reflects that my country's foreign investment legal system keeps pace with the times in terms of market access, investment environment improvement, and intellectual property protection. Opening to the outside world and creating a world-class business environment provide a strong legal guarantee. The promulgation and implementation of the Foreign Investment Law is an important step in promoting institutional openness in China.
Foreign-related laws and regulations, represented by the Foreign Investment Law, grasp the development and changes of international economic and trade rules, applicable conditions and institutional innovation, pay attention to docking with multilateral investment protection agreements, improve diversified dispute resolution mechanisms, and fully reflect the inclusiveness of the system. For example, in terms of foreign investment access, it is clearly stipulated that the pre-access national treatment plus negative list management system shall be implemented for foreign investment, and the requirements for equal treatment of domestic and foreign investment outside the negative list shall be implemented. On January 1, 2020, the Regulations on the Implementation of the Foreign Investment Law came into effect, providing a more precise, detailed and operational rule basis and institutional guarantee for the continuous optimization of the foreign investment environment and the promotion of a higher level of opening up to the outside world.
Institutional openness is based on a systematic, standardized, and legalized domestic rule system, effectively connects with the advanced international economic and trade rule system, serves the new round of economic globalization, and can provide impetus for the high-quality development of my country's economy. In recent years, China has made great efforts to optimize the business environment, promote institutional openness in rules, management and standards, strengthen the construction of the rule of law related to foreign affairs, and promote the docking of rules, which provide favorable conditions for us to seize the opportunities of a new round of economic globalization. As China enters a new stage of development, the construction of foreign-related rule of law will further promote China's institutional opening up, promote the construction of a new open economic system, promote the construction of an open world economy, and better safeguard the rules-based multilateral trading system.
At present, my country is advancing the construction of free trade pilot zones and free trade ports in many places, insisting on high-start planning and high-standard construction, actively adapting to new trends in the reconstruction of international economic and trade rules, closely following system innovation, and taking new steps in expanding opening up. It is necessary to give full play to the pilot role of free trade pilot zones and free trade ports, and form replicable and popularized experiences in rule docking, rule innovation and rule opening. Our country has become a huge gravitational field that attracts international commodity and factor resources. Actively promoting institutional opening up, fully releasing institutional dividends and competitive advantages, constantly improving the system of foreign-related laws and regulations, and promoting the construction of foreign-related rule of law, will further consolidate the institutional foundation for China to comprehensively improve the level of opening up to the outside world.
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Stimulate the innovation and creativity of enterprises and optimize the business environment by means of the rule of law (seeking truth from the right situation)
　　People's Daily (October 30, 2020, 09)

The pros and cons of the business environment, to a large extent, affect the enthusiasm of market entities and the release of market vitality. At present, in response to the profound and complex changes in the development environment at home and abroad, it is urgent to make greater efforts to break down the deep-seated institutional and institutional barriers, comprehensively improve the level of opening up to the outside world, and create a market-oriented, legalized, and international business environment. let the vitality of enterprise innovation and creation fully burst out. General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed: "the rule of law is the best business environment." In recent years, the level of the rule of law in my country's business environment has been continuously improved, and the business environment has been continuously optimized, which has boosted the development of market entities with stronger vitality and more motivation, and has nurtured opportunities and provided guarantees for the realization of high-quality economic development.
Comprehensive protection of property rights to enhance confidence. The complete content of property rights and the ability to be effectively protected are an important basis for market entities to continue to participate in competition and actively innovate and create. The Civil Code stipulates that the equal legal status and development rights of all market subjects are guaranteed, and the property rights of the state, collectives, private individuals and other right holders are equally protected by law, thus providing a solid legal basis for the equal protection of property rights and independent management rights of all kinds of market subjects in accordance with the law. The adoption of the Civil Code and the formulation and revision of a series of relevant laws have made China's civil and commercial legal system more mature and stereotyped, making the property rights and interests system, including property rights, creditor's rights, intellectual property rights, equity and other investment rights, more scientific and complete, and more refined and optimized. At the same time, rights remedies such as property claims, liability for breach of contract, and tort liability have been further improved, property rights protection has been further strengthened, and property rights incentives have become more effective. The various property rights and interests of market entities are more comprehensively recognized and fully protected by law, and the inherent momentum of innovation and creation is stronger.
Improve the market mechanism to ensure fairness. Fairness is the basic condition for market players to actively participate in competition, give full play to their vitality and realize the survival of the fittest. Fairness means that all kinds of market subjects have equal legal status, equal rights protection and equal development opportunities. In recent years, various market access barriers have been gradually broken, and key industries such as communications and energy have gradually introduced market competition mechanisms. A fair and unified market supervision system has been established and gradually improved. Focusing on improving the property rights system and the market-oriented allocation of factors, the construction of the rule of law emphasizes the promotion of effective incentives for property rights, the free flow of factors, flexible price response, fair and orderly competition, and the survival of the fittest, more respect for the general laws of the market economy, and minimize the government Direct allocation of market resources and direct intervention in microeconomic activities. In particular, with the full implementation of the national unified market access negative list system, unreasonable restrictions on enterprises are decreasing day by day, and the pattern of fair and just participation in market competition by market entities of different ownership is becoming more mature, and the confidence of market entities in innovation and creation is more firm.
The open market system stimulates vitality. To give full play to the decisive role of the market in the allocation of resources, all kinds of production factors are required to enter the market as much as possible, fully flow, and maximize benefits. At present, with the reform of market-oriented allocation of factors as the focus, the construction of a unified and open market system with orderly competition is being accelerated. The property rights system of natural resource assets has become more complete, the rural collective operating construction land entering the market system with the same rights and prices, smooth circulation, and income sharing has been established, and the formation of a unified urban and rural construction land market has accelerated; the reform of the "three-rights separation" of rural land has been deepened, The circulation of land management rights and mortgage financing have become possible in the system; the three-dimensional and hierarchical establishment of land and sea area use rights, the systems of the right to use sea areas, the right to use uninhabited islands, the transfer of mining rights and the concession of natural resource assets in nature reserves are becoming more and more perfect. The construction of the capital market infrastructure system has been continuously promoted, the reform of the stock issuance registration system with information disclosure as the core has been implemented, and the supply of financial services for small and micro enterprises and private enterprises has been gradually strengthened. In response to the development trend of deep integration of the Internet and various economic and social fields, data and network virtual property protection have been written into the Civil Code, the boundaries between data and personal information have been further clarified, the level of open sharing of government data has been greatly improved, and the channels for data to enter the market as a factor of production have been broadened. The market-oriented allocation of various production factors has been realized in a more comprehensive and in-depth manner, providing unprecedented development space for various new industries and new formats.
Improve service levels and optimize the environment. Deepening the reform of "release, management and service" and optimizing the business environment are important measures to stimulate the vitality of market players and develop endogenous power. With the accelerated transformation of government functions, some long-standing problems such as emphasis on approval, light supervision, and weak services have been significantly improved. The business license matters related to enterprises continue to be streamlined, and the time limit for various types of approval, registration and filing has been greatly reduced. Online processing and "running at most once" have promoted investment and transaction facilitation, significantly reduced institutional transaction costs, and made market entities more comfortable to operate. Supervision during and after the event has been strengthened, administrative law enforcement has become more stringent and standardized, and the market supervision system has been straightened out. All kinds of market entities and the broad masses of the people have personally experienced the convenience and benefits brought about by the reform of "decentralization, management and service. We should further consolidate the achievements of the reform, gradually upgrade the effective and long-term sustainable practices to institutional norms, better maintain a level playing field by means of the rule of law, and continuously release the vitality of market innovation.

Source: People's Daily