ABSTRACT
What do the liberal clauses mean? Many other provisions of the 1982 constitution, beginning with Article 1, insist that citizens must "support socialism"- which is interpreted to mean rule by the CCP. Several sections, such as Article 24, warn that "the state ... combats capitalist, feudal, and other decadent ideas."5 Article 51 makes all the other provisions moot, because it requires that "the exercise by citizens of the People's Republic of China of their freedoms and rights may not infringe upon the interests of the state, of society, and of the collective."6 These interests are defined by the government, and the thrust of Articles 51 through 54 is simply opposite to the meaning of the clauses about rights. So this constitution can be complaisantly read by either a reformer or a conservative. Different people can see different things in it.
