Individual Corruption

There are still incidents where citizens who had contact with the judiciary report to having paid a bribe, as confirmed in Transparency International’s Global Corruption Barometer 2010. According to the same report, the surveyed households perceive the judiciary to be corrupt, while more than one-tenth perceive it to be ‘extremely corrupt’.

Business Corruption

According to the US Department of State 2010, companies have experienced irregularities in dispute settlement in China, both in the form of corruption and in the form of government interference. Companies should be aware that well-connected local businesspeople are often favoured by the courts over foreign investors, and can use their connections to evade prosecution for illegal acts committed against their former foreign partners. Furthermore, the US Department of State 2011 also reports that corruption may influence local court decisions and local officials may disregard the judgments of domestic courts. 

Political Corruption

There are numerous corruption cases which implicate the judiciary. For example, the former head of Chongqing’s justice department, Wen Qiang, was accused of taking bribes of more than CNY 12 million, in return for shielding criminals. In July 2010, Wen was executed after being found guilty of several charges, including bribery. Several other high ranking corrupt judges were arrested in Chongqing, as part of the city campaign in cleaning up organised crime, according to two 2010 news articles by The Wall Street Journal and Financial Times.

The prosecution of the former Vice President of China's Supreme People's Court (SPC, in Chinese) is said to be the highest ranking judge to be convicted for corruption since 1949, according to a 2010 news article by BBC News. Huang Songyu was convicted of accepting bribes amounting to approximately USD 570,000 during his tenure as the SPC’s vice president. He was also convicted of embezzling CNY 1.2 million in government funds during his tenure as president of a lower-level court in Guangdong. Huang received a life sentence as a consequence of his crimes.

Frequency

The World Bank & IFC: Doing Business 2012:
- To enforce a commercial contract by filing a lawsuit, companies need to go through 34 procedures, while the process takes 406 days at a cost of 11% of the claim's value.

World Economic Forum: The Global Competitiveness Report 2011-2012:
- Business executives give the Chinese judiciary's level of independence from influences of members of government, citizens, or companies a score of 3.9 on a 7-point scale (1 'heavily influenced' and 7 'entirely independent').

- Business executives give the efficiency of the legal framework for private companies to settle disputes and to challenge the legality of government actions and/or regulations a score of 4.3 and 4.0 respectively on a 7-point scale (1 being 'extremely inefficient' and 7 'highly efficient').

Transparency International: Global Corruption Barometer 2010:
- 13.5% of households surveyed consider the judiciary to be 'extremely corrupt'.

- 13.9% of households who had contact with the judiciary in 2009 report to have paid a bribe.

- Citizens give the judiciary a score of 3.0 on a 5-point scale (1 'not at all corrupt' and 5 'extremely corrupt').