Yu Keping, Bottomline of State: Justice and Rule of Law, Central Compilation and Translation Press, October 1, 2014

The just concluded fourth plenary session of the 18th CPC Central Committee endorsed the rule of law as one of the top priorities in state governance. In fact, appeals for the rule of law have kept growing in recent years, particularly in the public discourse on the Internet. However, public debates about the concept of the rule of law and how the principle should be put into place have caused conflicts and even raised the risks of swaying society's belief in the rule of law.

The document released after the plenum gives the direction of how the ruling party plans to boost the rule of law, and the official narrative has managed to establish the orthodox interpretation of the rule of law in line with China's realities.

The rule of law is not a brand-new concept to Chinese society, but the reiteration by the ruling party is a landmark event, especially because China's reform, after over 30 years of vicissitudes, is now touching the core.

It can be anticipated that in Chinese academia, both theoretical and practical research on the rule of law will thrive, and the vision will become increasingly clear as the research goes deeper.

As a well-known political scientist and deputy director of the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau, Yu Keping gathered the wisdom of several Chinese experts into a book entitled Bottomline of State: Justice and Rule of Law, in which their thoughts put up a basic framework and propose useful paradigms for further research.

One sentence on the book cover reads "give the country a certain future in this uncertain age," implying that the rule of law will work as a beacon to point out where China should head.

As Yu writes in the foreword, "being a human being needs a bottom line, so does running a state. Justice and the rule of law are the bottom line for a modern state."

Yu's arrangement of the book's layout shows his determination not to evade tricky questions. He puts "The Rule of Law and the Rule of Constitution" as the title of the first chapter, as there have always been tricky and relentless debates about xianzheng, or constitutionalism.

Constitutionalism has been regarded by some Chinese people as a philosophy that serves only Western political systems.

But this book holds to the universalism of constitutionalism, which should be applied to every government, regardless it is elected or not.

The book argues that the recently hotly discussed question "whose authority over the country is paramount, the ruling party, or the law, or more specifically, the Constitution?" is unworthy of discussing.

As the book puts it, the party that runs the country deals with the question of who gives power to the government; while the rule of law focuses on whether all social entities can abide by the law.

The book argues that historical records have revealed that abuse of power is not necessarily connected with dictatorship or democracy. Without the rule of law, "democracy will also fall victim to corruption and autocracy." "Constitutionalism and the rule of law are more fundamental than democracy," the book says.

This book provides valuable academic insights into how China defines its own rule of law, and how the leadership of one ruling party can be sustainably combined with the rule of law.

As Yu says, although socialist countries have not managed to actually make this coexistence real, China needs to pave a new road to make it happen. We should have confidence this can happen.