With the closing of the bimonthly session of the National People's Congress's Standing Committee on Saturday, lawmakers officially abolished the controversial reeducation through labor system, known as "laojiao".

China first suggested it would abolish the system at the key session of the CPC Central Committee in November. The Standing Committee resolution annuls a 1957 regulation and its supplement approved in 1979.

Those currently serving laojiao penalties will be set free after the abolition and their remaining terms will not be enforced. Across China, many prisoners have already been released and labor camps have been "rebranded" as drug rehabilitation centers.

The move to end reeducation through labor reflects recognition by Chinese leaders of growing anger about the system. Under the program, police can detain people for minor crimes, such as petty theft, prostitution, and drug possession, for up to four years without trial.

Academics and legal experts have been debating the constitutionality and necessity of laojiao as far back as 1996. As China's legal system has developed, what was initially seen as an efficient form of punishment became ripe ground for abuse of power by the police.

Past proposals for reform have stalled, such as a Rehabilitation Law that would have replaced the laojiao system as early as in 2005, after no consensus could be reached on which authority — the police or courts — would oversee the new program. The police also had a vested interest in keeping the system, which had a large budget and employed many people, in place.

But several recent cases have attracted national attention and led to public outcries against the system. In one case last year, Tang Hui, the mother of a kidnapping and rape victim in Yongzhou, Hunan Province, was sentenced to a labor camp for repeatedly petitioning for harsher sentences for her daughter's attackers. Tang was released within a week under social pressure.

But with the abolition of reeducation through labor, the question remains on how to fill the void that is left behind.

"Previously, a petty theft would be punished with a [fine] for a first-time offender," said Wang Gongyi, a former chief editor of Justice of China magazine. "The second time he is caught, he would be subject to laojiao. Now, with laojiao gone, he may just get fined every time he is captured."

Or an offender could face harsher penalties, such as criminal punishment.

"It [the abolition of reeducation through labor] may save citizens from laojiao, but using the Criminal Law to punish petty crimes will affect their lives, jobs and return to society thereafter," said Lin Wei, a professor at China Youth University for Political Sciences. Lin said he expects criminal laws to also be amended soon.

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