The unique part of Chinese law is the lack of judicial supremacy or "rule of law". The party has supremacy over legal system interpretation as part of the '3 Supremes' order of precedence, with workers also coming ahead of the law.

In the US system, there are still miscarriages of Justice, but there is judicial supremacy and separation of powers.

The powers aren't as separated as say the French justice system, but most would say the US judicial system is mostly independent of the other branches of government.

> The party has supremacy over legal system interpretation as part of the '3 Supremes' order of precedence, with workers also coming ahead of the law.

Very few people are aware about this. The party is supreme and institutions like PLA are answerable to the party, not to the people.

I always find the terminology strange.

If there is only one party permitted, and that one party is supreme, then how is that a party? It looks like government to me. Maybe the translation to English is just wrong. The "party" isn't a party by any reasonable definition.

The real parties would be factions within the so-called party. I don't know if they have names more descriptive than "Xi supporters" and "Xi opponents".

US institutions also answer to the US government...

Judges don’t answer to the government. They can be impeached, but that effectively never happens.

So they answer to no one?

We trust them to answer to SCOTUS, who we in turn trust to interpret the constitution that a majority of us have agreed to keep. Basically a group of people whose entire job is to interpret the actions in terms of law, constitution, and human rights - a marrying of theories on social contract, natural rights, and separation of powers that we've seen emulated (and improved upon) across the free world :)

Overall, I particularly enjoy this system over one that is accountable to a single entity.

They can be overruled by higher courts, and in some localities they’re forced to run for election.

Yes, and those leading the government are elected by the people every few years.