Innovating law-making and enforcement to enter a new era

In order not to miss the development opportunities, bringing the country into a new era, an era of the Vietnamese people's rise, closely following the profound instructions of the General Secretary and the Party and State leaders in recent times, it can be seen that it is very ripe to promote fundamental innovation in the work of building and enforcing laws.

That is the assessment in the article "Strongly innovating the work of building and enforcing laws so that the country can steadily enter the new era" by Dr. Nguyen Hai Ninh - Member of the Party Central Committee, Secretary of the Party Committee, Minister of Justice. Vietnam Law Newspaper respectfully introduces the article by the Minister.

General Secretary To Lam takes a souvenir photo with the Party Committee of the Ministry of Justice. (Photo: Phuong Mai)

In the general achievements of the Renovation process, there are important contributions from the work of building and enforcing laws.

1. In the thousands of years of building and defending the country, our ancestors have worked hard to build a legal system with its own identity, worthy of pride with famous laws of the Ly, Tran, Le, Nguyen dynasties. Together with "leniency and strength for the people", "respect for the law", "respect for discipline and order", "respect for talented people" have become national governance strategies that have been passed down forever.

2. On the journey to find a way to save the country and the people, Nguyen Ai Quoc - Ho Chi Minh - the genius leader of our Party and people was very aware of the importance of the Constitution, the law, and the "divine rule of law" for "preserving the territory" and "building the nation". Immediately after gaining independence, in the conditions of the revolution "hanging by a thread", President Ho Chi Minh still gave top priority to holding a general election so that the people could enjoy freedom and democracy, establish a people's government and promulgate a democratic and progressive Constitution on November 9, 1946, which was also the day later chosen as "Law Day of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam".

Dr. Nguyen Hai Ninh - Member of the Party Central Committee, Secretary of the Party Committee, Minister of Justice.

3. After a long and arduous journey, in 1975 the country was unified and in 1986, our Party launched the great renovation process, gradually perfecting the development model to be more suitable to the country's reality. The need to build a synchronous legal system, change the management and operation method from mainly based on administrative and bureaucratic orders to based on laws and compliance with market rules is becoming increasingly urgent.

Since then, our Party has had many important guidelines and policies on building and perfecting the Vietnamese socialist rule-of-law state in general, building and perfecting the legal system in particular, and improving the effectiveness of law enforcement, which are reflected in: Resolution of the mid-term National Delegates' Conference in 1994; Platform for national construction in the transitional period to socialism in 1991 (supplemented and developed in 2011); Resolution No. 48-NQ/TW dated May 24, 2005 of the Politburo on the Strategy for building and perfecting the Vietnamese legal system until 2010, with a vision to 2020; Resolution No. 49/NQ-TW dated June 2, 2005 of the Politburo on the Judicial Reform Strategy to 2020, especially Resolution No. 27-NQ/TW dated November 9, 2022 of the 6th Conference of the 13th Party Central Committee on continuing to build and perfect the socialist rule-of-law State of Vietnam in the new period.

On that basis, with the efforts of the entire political system, we have built a legal system that regulates most areas of social life, ensures human rights, civil rights, creates a legal foundation for socio-economic development, ensures security and national defense, ensures the leadership role of the Party, the management of the State, and promotes the mastery of the People. In the common achievements of the Renovation process, there are important contributions from the work of building and enforcing laws.

Need to fundamentally innovate thinking in law making

4. However, the practice of socio-economic development in our country in recent times has shown that there are still limitations, inadequacies and institutional "bottlenecks" as General Secretary To Lam pointed out. For example: The quality of law making and improvement has not met the needs of practice, some newly issued laws have had to be amended, many regulations still cause difficulties and hinder implementation, have not created a truly favorable environment to attract resources from domestic and foreign investors, and to unlock resources from the people; administrative procedures are still cumbersome; the organization of law enforcement and policies is still a weak link...

5. In order not to miss development opportunities, bringing the country into a new era, an era of the Vietnamese people's rise, striving to successfully complete the country's goals of 100 years under the leadership of the Party, 100 years of founding the country, turning our country into a developed country with high income in the socialist orientation, on the basis of the Party's guidelines in Resolution No. 27-NQ/TW dated November 9, 2022 of the 6th Conference of the 13th Party Central Committee, closely following the profound instructions of the General Secretary and the Party and State leaders in recent times, it can be seen that the time is ripe to promote fundamental innovation in the work of law making and enforcement, in which it is necessary to focus on the following key solutions:

Firstly, it is necessary to fundamentally innovate the thinking of law-making, considering this as a “breakthrough of breakthroughs” in perfecting the development institution. In the new era, the law must truly be the foundation of development, serving development and promoting development; “taking people and enterprises as the center and subject”. The work of law-making must apply a realistic and practical approach; ensure that it is consistent with the actual conditions of the country, solve problems in life and find a development path from practice. At the same time, selectively absorb international experience in law-making and law enforcement, keeping up with the trend of the times. To meet this requirement, the law must: (i) remove legal “bottlenecks”, promptly put stagnant social resources back into operation; (ii) both ensure the requirements of state management and encourage innovation, liberate all productive forces, and mobilize all resources for national development; (iii) creating a legal basis for the formation of new growth drivers, new production relations and productive forces, new service sectors and new industries.

Transforming the mindset of law-making must start with a resolute change in perception, breaking down all barriers, group interests, and local interests of sectors, localities, organizations, and individuals in law-making. Focus on cutting and simplifying administrative procedures, reducing compliance costs, eliminating the “ask-give” mechanism; creating a healthy and favorable investment and business environment.

Resolutely abandon the mindset of “if you can’t manage it, then ban it”, well implement the principle of “citizens can do everything that the law does not prohibit”, state agencies, cadres, civil servants and public employees must properly perform their duties according to the Party’s regulations and the State’s laws; strictly implement the requirement of the 2013 Constitution “Human rights and civil rights can only be restricted according to the provisions of the law in necessary cases for reasons of national defense, national security, social order and safety, social morality and public health”.

Second, strongly innovate the law-making process associated with improving the quality of legal documents. The law-making process must ensure professionalism, science, timeliness, feasibility and efficiency, associated with clear division of labor and responsibilities of each subject in each stage of the legal document-making process.

More clearly define the policy-making process, linked to the responsibility of the policy-making agency, especially the head. Policies must be specific and clear, avoiding generalities and confusion between State policies and Party policies. Activities of summarizing, surveying practices, studying foreign experiences, collecting information, assessing policy impacts, and selecting policies must be carried out carefully and seriously.

Clearly distinguish the policy-making and policy-regulatory stages; research the organization of agencies drafting legal documents in a centralized manner, ensuring professionalism, science, and consistency and unity of the legal system. Clearly distinguish the legislative process and the process of drafting sub-law documents.

Focus on assessing the actual impact of policies; build an effective mechanism to receive and explain comments from affected subjects, especially people and businesses; do not make it difficult for people and businesses to design policies and legal regulations. The authority of the law-making entity must be based on the functions and tasks stipulated in the Constitution and laws on organizational apparatus; study the Government and the Prime Minister's promulgation of legal documents on specific mechanisms, pilot to remove and thoroughly and promptly resolve difficulties, obstacles and new issues arising in practice.

Focus on perfecting the legal system in conjunction with restructuring the apparatus in the political system, ensuring "refinement, compactness, strength, efficiency, effectiveness and efficiency"

Third, focus on perfecting the legal system in conjunction with restructuring the apparatus in the political system, ensuring "streamlining, compactness, strength, efficiency, effectiveness, and efficiency", promoting decentralization and delegation of power with the motto "locality decides, locality acts, locality takes responsibility". The Central Government, the Government, and the National Assembly strengthen institutional perfection, play a constructive role, and strengthen inspection and supervision.

Perfecting the legal system to ensure the best operation of the relationship between "Party leadership, State management, People mastery".

Promote the role and effectiveness of the law to contribute to social management, maintain political stability, economic development, international integration, and ensure human rights and civil rights. Urgently build a legal framework for new issues and trends, especially those related to artificial intelligence, digital transformation, green transformation, etc. Have a breakthrough mechanism to attract domestic and foreign talents. Promote research and selectively refer to international experience in law-making on the basis of the Party's principles and orientations, serving deep international integration.

Focus on controlling power, tightening discipline, resolutely fighting against negativity and group interests in law-making. Laws must fully, correctly and promptly institutionalize the Party's policies and guidelines, and be a bridge to bring the Party's resolutions into life. Consider the leadership in embodying the Party's policies and guidelines into laws as a central and regular task in innovating the Party's leadership methods.

Fourth, build a strict and consistent law enforcement mechanism, ensuring respect for the Constitution and the law. Improve the effectiveness of legal dissemination and education; build a culture of law compliance, making law compliance a social norm of conduct.

Regularly monitor, review and evaluate the effectiveness of laws after promulgation, apply technology in receiving, responding to and handling feedback and recommendations from people and businesses related to law implementation, identify errors in legal documents for timely completion.

Early completion of laws on law enforcement; completion of regulations and mechanisms for guiding, explaining and applying laws in the direction of promulgating principles, criteria and bases for explaining and applying laws, to ensure the vitality of legal regulations instead of frequently changing laws. Promote the application of digital technology and ensure financial resources for propaganda, dissemination and enforcement of laws.

Fifth, pay attention to developing human resources for legal work, commensurate with the nature of one of the three strategic breakthroughs. Pay attention to training, fostering, and developing human resources for legal advisory work with strong political will, good ethics, professional proficiency, and practical experience, in which a part of the staff is ready to participate in multilateral institutions and international organizations to protect the interests of the nation, people, and Vietnamese enterprises.

Research and promulgate specific financial mechanisms for law-making work, appropriate policies and regimes so that cadres and civil servants working in law-making and legal affairs can work with peace of mind and dedication. Focus on investing resources to strongly implement digital transformation, apply digital platforms and artificial intelligence in law-making and enforcement work, and build specialized databases to connect, interconnect, and enrich the National Population Database.

6. Adhering closely to the Party's policies, strictly implementing the instructions of the General Secretary and other Party and State leaders with a spirit of urgency, determination, great effort, and outstanding efforts, the work of building and enforcing laws will and must be strongly renewed to contribute to the development of the country in the new era, the era of the Vietnamese people's rise.

(Source: Vietnam Law)

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