684 The China Quarterly,191,September 2007,pp.675-695 assets have become more complicated,often making difficult the task of dividing the estate upon divorce.28 One probable result of this increasing complexity is that negotiation between the parties for securing division of the matrimonial estate is the preferred form of decision-making.While a negotiated outcome should be lawful,and not contravene the interests of third parties,serious power imbalances will nevertheless often affect the decision-making process.There is a real danger that the rights and interests of divorcing wives are insufficiently safeguarded. Some protection is offered by Article 47 of the revised Marriage Law,which provides that a party who is discovered to have concealed or alienated the property,or to have created false debts,will receive,inter alia,a smaller share of the matrimonial estate (Article 47). The changing circumstances also stimulated vigorous debate on a number of key issues:for example,should the intellectual property rights of one spouse be included in the matrimonial estate to be divided at divorce,or excluded on the basis that this will be an incentive for originality and creativity?The revisions to the 2001 Law are a compromise,with earnings from intellectual property rights characterized as joint spousal property,but the ownership of the property rights themselves remaining under the individual ownership of the inventive spouse. These provisions are now contained in Article 17 of the revised Law,and that and the following Article together with the relevant sections of the two judicial interpretations of the Marriage Law now offer a significantly reformed system. Thus,the 2003 Interpretation now provides explicit rules on the often difficult 28 Custody is not considered to require new regulation so that the provisions in the Marriage Law and the 1993"Zuigao renmin fayuan guanyu renmin fayuan shenli lihun anjian chuli zinu fuyang wenti de ruogan juti yijian"("Several concrete opinions of the Supreme People's Court on the problems of bringing up children in divorce cases handled by the Supreme People's Court"),3 November 1993 remain the main source of rules.The fundamental principle is found in Article 36 of the revised Marriage Law (Article 29 in the old version of the 1980 Law)which provides that after divorce ordinarily the mother is awarded custody of a child that is still being breast-fed (in the 1993 Opinions the wording is a child who is under two years of age).For older children,custody is a matter of agreement between the two parties.However,if they are unable to reach an agreement and a dispute arises,the court is expected to award custody on the basis of the child's interests,the circumstances of the divorcing spouses,and in cases in which the child is ten years old or above,the wishes of the child (Article 36 of the revised Marriage Law,and Articles 3 and 5 of the 1993 Opinions).The 1993 Opinions at Article 3 envisage a range of circumstances in which custody might be awarded to the father rather than the mother.Although neither the revived Marriage Law nor the 1993 Opinions deal with the issue of access for non-custodial parents,the Opinions do allow for joint custody (Article 6).Child support payments for children up to the age of 18 are a function of the child's needs,the financial circumstances of the parents and local cost of living.but ordinarily will not exceed 30%of a parent's fixed income (Article 7).For a more detailed analysis of custody provisions at divorce see Michael Palmer,"Women to the fore:developments in the family law of the PRC."in A.Bainham (ed.).Annual Survey of Family Low:1994 (Dordrecht:Kluwer (for The International Society on Family Law),1996),pp.155-79. Suffice it to say that court awards of custody to women continue to suffer from problems of enforcement,especially in rural areas.The revised Law at Article 38 does,however,confirm the rights of non-custodial parents to visit their children.These are in the first instance a matter of negotiation between the parents and only if they are unable to agree should a court make an order.If visitation by a non-custodial parent leads to a decline in the wellbeing (include mental health)of a child,then the court may order a cessation of the visits until such time as the child's wellbeing is restored.       $   %     %           0, #          !                                % A        $            $                 %                                  
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