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Q: Why do police arrest street vendors?
I've seen police steal all the stuff from vendors, and I've seen them simply giving them a warning. As soon as police are gone, the vendors come right back.
What's the point? Why do they arrest them, and why do they go and do a half-assed job of it? Whole thing just seems pointless to me...
12 years 35 weeks ago in Health & Safety - China
They get arrested/warned because they don't have permits to sell the goods and are therefore illegal. The law prhibiting street vendors from selling goods was actually only introduced in 2006 and it prohibits vendors from occupying pedestrian roads, overpasses and other public spaces with their stalls.
The reason why they handle each case differently is because they actually have to follow a certain protocol: the first step of which is issuing a warning. Their main roles is to persuade peddlars to get a license; punishing them by confiscating their goods is the last resort. I think it's illegal for them to beat up the peddlars but this seems to happen a lot, hence the bad image of the Chengguan (urban management officials) in China.
