Police Discretion and Restorative Justice in China: Stories from the Street-level Police

• DOI: 10.1177/0306624X20944686
• Published date: 01 March 2021
• Author: Yan Zhang
• Date: 01 March 2021
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0306624X20944686

International Journal of

Offender Therapy and

Comparative Criminology

2021, Vol. 65(4) 498 –520

© The Author(s) 2020

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DOI: 10.1177/0306624X20944686

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Article

Police Discretion and

Restorative Justice in China:

Stories from the Street-level

Police

Yan Zhang1

Abstract

Based on ethnographic data collected from one local police station in China, this

article attempts to examine the use of discretion by Chinese police in three different

restorative justice (RJ) programs. With reference to Wilson’s organizational style of

policing, the hybridity of watch-man, legalistic and service style in Chinese policing

is identified, which can help conceptualize how police decision over mediation work

has been institutionally co-shaped. This article also deploys Lipsky’s street-level

bureaucracy with specific focuses on how the police select cases and facilitate an

agreement between stakeholders. Coping strategies defined by Lipsky are found to

be employed by the police to confront their huge workload and complicated cases.

Overall, RJ in China is primarily promoted as universal top-down national reforms;

meanwhile, police discretion, catalyzed by bureaucratic rationalities and the political

imperative of social order and stability, is conducive to both the divergence and

convergence between RJ in law-books and in action.

Keywords

street-level bureaucracy, restorative justice, discretion, social stability maintenance,

mass line, policing styles, China

Introduction

Restorative justice (RJ) is regarded as a social movement that has changed the way people

understand and respond to crimes and conflicts in diverse communities throughout the

1The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia

Corresponding Author:

Yan Zhang, School of Regulation and Global Governance (RegNet), ANU College of Asia and the Pacific,

the Australian National University, Room 3.26, Coombs Extension Building, Canberra, ACT 2601,

Australia.

Email: ian.zhang@anu.edu.au

944686IJOXXX10.1177/0306624X20944686International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative CriminologyZhang

research-article2020

Zhang 499

world (Johnstone & Ness, 2007). RJ is viewed as philosophically distinct from other jus-

tice responses (“retributive” and “rehabilitative” models) in that it treats crime as a viola-

tion of people and relationships rather than merely a violation of a law (Bazemore, 1998;

Zehr, 1990). In restorative ideals, offenders and victims are empowered to communicate

how to make amends (Johnstone, 2002; Zehr, 1990). It has been argued that China has the

most diverse and largest RJ programs in the world (Braithwaite, 2002; Cloke, 1987).

However, both empirical and theoretical studies on RJ in China are somewhat scarce in

existing literature compared with their western counterparts. The current research attempts

to break this silence with the stories in Chinese local police stations where varied media-

tion programs are facilitated. The local police station is a front-line policing agency which

absorbs a large number of disputes and conflicts in Chinese society every day. It is also the

only institution in China that simultaneously accommodates three mediation programs,

namely people’s mediation, public order mediation, and criminal reconciliation. Therefore,

the implementation of mediation programs in Chinese local police station is a microcosm

which can explicitly depict the “Largeness” and “Diversity” of RJ in China.

To understand the implementation of RJ in Chinese local police station, this research

focuses on police discretion with two specific research questions that in the three media-

tion programs, how Chinese police use discretion to: (a) select mediation cases; and (b)

facilitate an agreement between stakeholders. Theoretically, this article embraced the

conceptual frameworks of Lipsky’s (1980) street-level bureaucracy (SLB) and Wilson’s

(1968) organizational styles of policing. Lipsky’s (1980) SLB is employed to conceptual-

ize the daily mediation work of Chinese front-line police, especially depicting how they

use discretion to make decisions when confronted with huge mediation caseloads and

other complexities which are embedded in the nature of SLB. With reference to Wilson’s

(1968) typologies of policing styles, this research also analyses the “mass line” principle

and the political imperative of “social stability maintenance” which are assumed as the

key to understanding Chinese policing in the party-state and the organizational factors

that influence the decision-making of Chinese police. Based on the interview and obser-

vation data collected in a Chinese local police station in 2016, this paper argues that on the

one hand, the Chinese central government is promoting RJ mechanism in its local police

system which accommodates the hybridity of Wilson’s organizational styles of policing.

From a street-level perspective, Chinese police firmly adhere to the political imperative

“social stability and harmony” as a crucial organizational principle when selecting media-

tion cases; meanwhile, the front-line police have fostered strategic discretion to cope with

complexities (e.g., caseloads and performance assessment) when hosting mediation ses-

sions and facilitating an agreement between stakeholders. Those street-level bureaucratic

rationales thus are pushing RJ reforms in China backward and manipulating stakeholders

participating in RJ programs. This article can enrich the literature of police discretion and

restorative justice in the context of the Chinese authoritarian regime.

Street-level Bureaucracy and Police Discretion

Lipsky (1980) fostered a view that dramatically altered the traditional conception of

public agencies. He challenged the conventional “top-down” wisdom which sees