The Supreme People's Court (SPC) convened a meeting of the Leading Party Members Group on Dec 31 to discuss measures to further enhance the work of people's assessors, emphasizing the commitment to promoting whole-process people's democracy and fully leveraging the role of people's assessors in judicial process. 

Zhang Jun, secretary of the Leading Party Members Group and president of the SPC, presided over the meeting, where participants were briefed on the current status and progress of the work of people’s assessors.

The meeting’s participants underlined the importance of understanding the system of people’s assessors from a political standpoint, emphasizing that it is part of the socialist judicial system with Chinese characteristics and implementing the system is putting whole-process people’s democracy into practice.

It was stated at the meeting that a problem-oriented approach should be adopted to further advance the implementation of the people’s assessor system. Efforts should be made to conduct broader research, gather opinions from various sectors, and resolve prominent problems hindering the implementation of the system, the meeting noted.

It is important to summarize and promote good practice and experience in implementing the system of people's assessors in various courts, and to select and publish exemplary cases of people's assessors' participation in the adjudication of cases, the meeting’s participants said. 

The People's Assessors Law, which was promulgated in 2018, aims to ensure citizens' lawful participation in judicial activities and promote judicial justice. Over the past six years, the people's courts, judicial administrative departments, and other organizations have worked in collaboration to implement the law, improve associated systems, and ensure the smooth and orderly selection of people's assessors and their participation in judicial activities. 

Currently, there are over 340,000 people's assessors nationwide, and they have participated in assessing over 14 million cases. Many of these people's assessors have played an active role in promoting the substantive resolution of conflicts and disputes, as well as handling cases of significant social impact.

The system of people's assessors has become an important mechanism to ensure orderly participation in and effective oversight of the judiciary by the people, serving as a powerful guarantee for the people's courts to promote judicial democracy, enhance judicial transparency, uphold judicial justice, and strengthen judicial credibility.