The 2018 Constitutional Amendments : Significance and Impact on the Theories of Party-State Relationship in China

The 2018 constitutional amendments in China have attracted strong criticism both at home and abroad. This paper first uses contextual, historical, and empirical analysis to examine whether the three major amendments are as bad as widely perceived, and whether or not they will have a significant impact on actual constitutional practice in China. The paper then analyses how the constitutional amendments may challenge the two existing theories on Chinese constitutionalism, The paper argues that although none of the constitutional amendments will have any practical importance, they do send out a very negative signal, and that the trend of a constitutionalised fused system demands at least revision of the existing theories and possibly a new theory, for the purpose of not only justifying Chinese constitutional practice but also leading China towards at least a thin rule of law.