China has a low crime rate, although pickpockets target foreigners at sightseeing destinations, open-air markets, airports and in stores, often with the complicity of low-paid security guards. Violence against foreigners, while rare, is on the increase. There is, furthermore, a rather serious problem with organised crime or the so-called triads. China has the death penalty and it is used at a relatively high rate compared to other countries.

Chinese law is one of the oldest legal traditions in the world and traditionally inspired by the Confucian philosophy of social control through moral education. Remnants of this still exist in the modern Soviet-style legal system. English speaking laywers and attorneys are difficult to find outside Shanghai and Beijing.