Why China still lacks an animal cruelty law despite growing public pressure

analysis East Asia Why China still lacks an animal cruelty law despite growing public pressure Two high-profile pet cases have reignited calls for a national animal protection law. While the scale of the public reaction adds pressure on the authorities to act, significant obstacles remain, say analysts. SHANGHAI: A man in Chongqing allegedly obtained puppies by posing as a pet adopter, then abused and even killed some of them. Meanwhile, Chutou, a celebrity border collie with more than a million online followers, was stolen from his owner's farm in central Henan, sold to a dog-meat dealer for 180 yuan (US$25) and slaughtered. The two recent cases, mere weeks apart, have triggered an outpouring of public anger. In Chongqing, more than 100 people protested outside the suspect’s home earlier in June, while the Chutou case in May became a rallying point on social media for pet owners demanding greater protections. Yet the calls for justice have come up against a familiar obstacle. Despite years of debate, repeated legislative proposals and a rapidly growing pet-owning population, China still has no dedicated national law against animal cruelty. "China is the only major country in the world that does not have an anti (animal)-cruelty law,” Deborah Cao, a professor at Griffith University who has written extensively on Chinese animal law, told CNA. The reason, analysts said, has less to do with public sentiment - which has shifted markedly in favour of legislation - than with competing economic interests and bureaucratic caution. Yet some experts believe the scale of the public reaction - from rare public protests to online mobilisation - could increase pressure on authorities to revisit the issue. "Animal cruelty is not a trivial matter - it's a matter of social stability, political stability, even regime stability,” said Peter Li, a professor of East Asian politics, animal policy and law in China at the University of Houston-Downtown. PETS AS PROPERTY China does have laws that protect certain categories of animals. The Wildlife Protection Law covers protected wild species, while the Animal Husbandry Law regulates livestock production. But when it comes to household pets, the picture is strikingly different. There is no national law that specifically criminalises cruelty to a companion animal kept as a pet. China’s Civil Code treats pets as personal property, allowing owners to claim damages when they are stolen or killed. Courts have also, in some cases, applied a legal provision allowing compensation for emotional damages when "objects of personal significance" are destroyed through intent or gross negligence, including in disputes involving companion animals. In practice, that means a person who kills their own dog is not committing any recognised offence. A person who kills someone else's dog can be prosecuted - but for damaging the owner's property, not for harming the animal itself. As a result, authorities often end up prosecuting the surrounding conduct rather than the abuse itself. In the Chongqing case, the local Public Security Bureau on Jun 10 placed the 39-year-old suspect under administrative detention. He had "falsely claimed adoption to obtain dogs, then inflicted harm causing injury or death to the dogs," according to the official notice. On Jun 8, the local police station chief had said investigators initially filed the case on two grounds: high-altitude object-throwing, because the suspect had allegedly thrown dogs' bodies from his balcony, and intentional damage to property, because the animals were classed in law as property. “This is the most forceful response possible within the existing legal framework, based on the available evidence,” the officer said. In the Chutou case, the investigation has focused on theft. Police in Henan have formally placed the case under criminal investigation, with one of the suspects detained and the other under home arrest. In another case last December, a man who poisoned and killed nine dogs in a residential compound in 2022 was sentenced to four years’ jail. The 65-year-old was convicted of using and spreading dangerous substances. This patchwork approach has consistently failed to deter abusers, said Li, who has tracked legislative proposals on the issue for more than two decades. He cited a notable case in 2002, when Tsinghua University student Liu Haiyang injured five bears at the Beijing Zoo with sulfuric acid and caustic soda. The bears survived. After a heated public debate, Liu was convicted of "intentional damage to public and private property", but the court ruled his conduct "non-violent" and his remorse sincere, and exempted him from criminal punishment. He received his degree the following month and went on to do postgraduate study at the same university. Tsinghua University publicly urged people to give him a chance. Abuse under the guise of adoption In the Chongqing case, police said the suspect falsely claimed he wanted to adopt dogs before allegedly abusing and killing some of the animals he took in. Animal rescuers have learned to be wary of this pattern. "In the rescue circles this happens relatively less often, because people have built up experience and become more cautious," said Kong, 56, a rescuer based in Datong in northern Shanxi province. Kong, who was only willing to be identified by her surname, has been working with strays since 2010 and sends rescued dogs to other cities such as Shanghai. “The bigger problem is ordinary people who pick up a stray, can’t keep it, and hand it off to whoever sounds nice. They don’t understand. They think: problem solved. And that’s how the animal ends up in the hands of the abusers,” she said. "In China, this kind of thing is extremely common," Kong added. "There are many cases that don't get discovered. There's no way to speak up for these animals." If a national anti-animal-cruelty law does come to pass, Kong said the pressure on rescuers would be “much lower”. “Abandonment might decrease. The ones we need to rescue would also decrease.” WHY LEGISLATION KEEPS STALLING An anti-cruelty law is long overdue for the world’s second-largest economy, said analysts. “(China remains) the only top industrialised country that does not have an anti-cruelty law," said Li, who is also a China policy specialist at Humane World for Animals, a global non-profit organisation that focuses on animal welfare. "China is 204 years behind … (it) cannot wait anymore," said Li, referring to Britain's 1822 Cruel Treatment of Cattle Act, also known as Martin's Act, which is widely regarded as the world's first modern animal welfare law. Cao from Griffith University said the absence of legislation is no longer compatible with where Chinese society stands. "It is not compatible with the popular sentiment and public opinions among ordinary Chinese people today, and it is incompatible with China's status as a major and important country in the world, and incompatible with Chinese cultural tradition and philosophical ideas that value all forms of life - including both human and non-human lives,” she said. The pressure for reform has also grown alongside China’s pet boom. Urban households now keep around 126 million cats and dogs, driving a pet economy worth 312.6 billion yuan in 2025 and projected to grow to 405 billion yuan by 2028, according to the 2026 China Pet Industry White Paper. So what’s holding back the Chinese government from enacting an anti-cruelty law? Economic considerations are a key factor, experts said. “China still attaches greater importance to economic development. The government is afraid that legislating animal protection against cruelty would cause a rise in the cost of animal production - livestock, dairy - and this could cause consumer reaction,” Li said. That fear extends to the broader animal-use economy. "The business interests involved in animal production - livestock production, wildlife breeding, the zoo industry, the entertainment industry using animals - these industries form a coalition that always watches out for any effort in the animal protection area," said Li. "They will always be the first to voice concerns and opposition against efforts at animal protection." Another challenge lies in how animal welfare is viewed by parts of society. "Some people in society still believe the government should focus on improving people's livelihood, as if animal welfare would compromise human welfare,” Li said. “There is still some educational work to be done to tell people that these goals are complementary to each other." Over the past decade, efforts to introduce animal-protection legislation have made little headway. In late 2025, when the Ministry of Justice solicited public suggestions for its 2026 legislative agenda, a netizen-organised online poll for an anti-animal cruelty law drew more than 4.1 million votes in support. When the National People's Congress Standing Committee and the State Council published their 2026 legislative work plans on May 11, neither included an anti-cruelty law or any legislation focused on companion animal welfare. Zhao Wanping, a three-term National People’s Congress deputy and deputy director of the Anhui Academy of Agricultural Sciences, has tabled animal-protection-related bills almost every year since 2017. His latest proposal in March 2025, co-signed by 31 fellow deputies, called for a Companion Animal Protection and Management Law. The proposal noted that China's existing laws on companion animals were "fragmented", leading to "frequent incidents of abuse, abandonment and illegal trading”. Yet none has resulted in national legislation. A local experiment fared little better. In March 2026, Sanming in Fujian province published China's first local draft regulation defining cats and dogs as "companion animals”, banning abuse and abandonment, and proposing trap-neuter-vaccinate-return management for stray cats. Violators would face administrative detention or fines under existing public-order law. Within weeks, before the public comment period had even ended, the draft was withdrawn from official platforms. While the local authorities never publicly explained why, critics had argued it “lacked basis in superior law” - meaning it had no clear foundation in existing national legislation. Chinese legal commentators have flagged the same structural gap. "This case reflects not only the boundaries of legal application in individual cases, but also the inadequacy of China's animal protection legal system in terms of regulatory provision," the Zhonghao law firm wrote in a legal analysis of the Chongqing case. "When animal abuse occurs, there is a significant gap between the existing legal penalties and the social harm and public sentiment caused by the behaviour." Beijing-based lawyer Lin Feiran, commenting on the Chutou case, noted that China “has no separate legislation for domestic pets", meaning the case "can only be prosecuted as theft, calculating the dog's own value." Lawyer Zhou Zhaocheng, who also weighed in on Chutou, said the case should drive legislative reform. "Pets are not only the property of their owners but also family members who accompany us … it is hoped that the ‘Chutou’ case can awaken more people's legal awareness and promote the further improvement of animal protection legislation in (China), so that these voiceless lives can also receive legal protection." IS THIS MOMENT ANY DIFFERENT? While it remains uncertain if an anti-animal-cruelty law is on China’s immediate agenda, analysts believe the recent cases could create fresh pressure on authorities because of the public reaction they have generated. In the Chongqing case, rare ground protests erupted. Videos and photographs that were later removed from Chinese social media platforms appeared to show confrontations between protesters and police officers outside the suspect’s residential complex, with some demonstrators being escorted away. "The protests will put pressure on the authorities, or at least will wake up the authorities to the connection between animal cruelty and social unrest," Li said. In Chutou’s case, his owner has continued to press the case. He has filed a police report and presented evidence of the dog’s value, hoping it will meet the threshold for criminal prosecution. Li pointed out that Chutou’s owner has framed efforts as a fight for all pet owners rather than a personal grievance. "What he says has nothing radical, and it can resonate with a lot of people - including a lot of policy elites in the Chinese government who have companion animals at home,” he said. "I hope it's a tipping point." Meanwhile, Li said the realistic path forward for China is not a sweeping anti-cruelty law, but a narrower companion-animal protection law that would draw less opposition from the broader animal-use industries. "Let's focus on companion-animal protection. That's more achievable."