Academics call for more legislative reform

China passed legislation offering better protection of private property Friday but domestic analysts argued that a host of further reforms are necessary to push the country towards a more market-based system. "There is a disjunction between law and actual reality," said Han Xu, a political scientist at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, AFP reported. "A law can promulgate a principle but it takes time and additional rules to implement it in actual real life." Yan Jirong, a professor at Peking University's School of Government, said tougher rules were needed to govern monopolies as large parts of the economy remain dominated by state-owned enterprises that reap unfair profits thanks to their unchallenged positions. Other academics called for further legislation on China's social and political life, such as a law guaranteeing freedom of association. Further criticism was made of the legislators themselves, with Hu Xingdou, an economist at the Beijing Institute of Technology, claiming that most of China's 3,000 lawmakers weren't up to the job.