Living in China, police are always around. But can you tell apart the different types of Chinese police and their duties? Even many Chinese can’t teel the difference:Let’s do some learning:
Living in China, police are always around. But can you tell apart the different types of Chinese police and their duties? Even many Chinese can’t teel the difference:Let’s do some learning:
Unlike American cops, who seem to do “all kinds of jobs”, Team America World Police!
Chinese police officers are classified according to their duties. The most common are:
1. Security Police (治安警察), who patrol beats and mediate in normal civil disputes. Like the Police Constable in Hong Kong, they walk the streets to keep social safety.
2. Criminal Police (刑事警察), who only get involved in cases of theft, murder, human trafficking, and so on. Their jobs are similar to officers at Criminal Investigation Department in Hong Kong.
3. Special Police (特种警察), who are trained through the military, and are often armed with advanced weapons. They are called on to deal with incidents involving riot and terrorism, and patrol the streets on some occasions.
Security Police, Criminal Police, and Special Police belong to the administration of Ministry of Public Security of the People’s Republic of China (MPS).
MPS is the department of police in China, a branch of the Chinese government.
4. All kinds of police wear the blue uniforms with different arm-badges. Except the Armed Police (武装警察), who are in green uniforms. Different from the police who are under the administration of MPS, the Armed Police are controlled by Central Military Commission of the People’s Republic of China.
They undergo strict training by the military, and have a strong sense of duty to their people and their country.
To save hostage
To extinguish fire
To save lives from earthquakes
5
Chinese police look awesome all the time! But there is one type of “special” police that are not favored by street vendors. We call them “Chengguan(城管)”.
The Chengguan are managed by Urban Management and Law Enforcement (UMALE). They are responsible for the hygiene and cleanliness of a city.
Chengguan work requires little education and most jobs are only temporary. They are more like ‘inspectors’ than actual police, and have no right to use violence to enforce the law. They do, however, often use traditional police-style enforcement to deal with minor abuses of ordinances.
There are other categories of Chinese cops, including Traffic Police(交通警察), Narcotics Police (缉毒警察), Air Police (空中警察), Coast Guard (海警), Railway Police (铁路警察), etc.
Do Foreigners Feel Chinese Cops Weak?
From the view of the different principles of law and order, few Chinese police have guns and aren’t quite known for arresting people who refuse to cooperate. The common perception is that police in the west are quite lenient in dealing with minor offences, and that the citizenry are accustomed to following the law, respecting the police and accept what some consider “brutal” consequences if they do not.
Instead of thinking of Chinese police as weak or powerless, Chinese people tend to be more respectful of their elders and live in a social environment with less daily exposure to violence, certainly not seeing any kind of aggressive action as an accepted form of behavior.