The National People's Congress Standing Committee adopted the country's first mediation law during the weekend and it will take effect on Jan 1 next year. This marks a milestone in the development of the country's mediation system in its role in settling civil disputes.

Mediation of civil disputes has been a tradition for thousands of years in China. Behind it is the core value of social harmony. It has proven effective as the first defense in the settlement of civil disputes before they are brought to court.

Statistics from the Ministry of Justice show that mediation organizations nationwide have successfully settled nearly 28 million civil disputes of the more than 29 million cases they were involved in over the past five years.

Their efforts have prevented these minor conflicts of people from different walks of life from developing into bigger cases that have to be brought to court. In this sense, their role in ironing out civil contradictions has not just relieved grassroots courts of a heavy burden. It has also contributed significantly to the building of a harmonious society.

Despite the important role of mediation organizations at all levels, there has never been a law to regulate their practice except for a set of regulations issued by the State Council in 1954.

Given the much narrower range of civil disputes they are involved in, such as conflict between spouses, disputes between neighbors and the minor encroachment on people's rights and interests in the decades before the 1980s, the old regulations could meet the needs of civil mediation practices.

Now with Chinese society becoming increasingly pluralistic, civil disputes and conflicts have become much more complicated and difficult to mediate. The latest law has legalized civil mediation procedures and clarified the right of mediators and the parties involved.

The adoption of this law is just a first step. Further amended may be needed to facilitate the practices of mediation organizations so that more civil disputes in a wider range of fields will be settled by mediation rather than through judicial procedures.