We often get emails from readers asking us to write about a particular topic. There are two topics on which our China attorneys frequently receive emails and on which we virtually never write. Proposed laws and China diplomatic meetings with foreign countries.
Just about every time there is a rumor of a major new Chinese law, one of our China lawyers will get an email from someone asking us to write about it. This happened most recently regarding the news that China would soon be requiring all computers sold within China to come with built in web filtering software.
We do not like writing about proposed Chinese laws for the following reasons:
1. There are so many laws already on the books and being enforced that need coverage more. Laws on the books will impact you right now. Proposed laws may or may not ever come into being.
2. China has a habit of saying it will institute a new law and then never doing so. It floats new laws to gauge reaction. If the reaction is negative, the law oftentimes never comes into being.
3. China has a habit of instituting new laws and then never enforcing them. This often happens when the new law is negatively received
We are thrilled our readership is so internationally diverse, but this also means our China lawyers often receive emails from people wanting us to cover their country’s diplomatic relations with China. We never do this because China is always engaging in diplomatic meetings with some country somewhere and this is not really big news. The press virtually always describes these meetings as positive and they almost always seem to end with a comment on how both countries expect increased trade and how some economic/business/aid package has been agreed to. This does not warrant analysis. This is mutual public relations. Move along.
This is not a blanket rule and we reserve the right to cover some future major China diplomatic breakthrough. But for now, we will leave these stories to others.
Are we off base here?