The annual meeting of China’s National People’s Congress (NPC) is underway in Beijing as part of the politically important Two Sessions.

As the country’s top legislature, the NPC is a supreme organ of power that holds considerable influence over the direction of China and its policies. It can amend the Constitution and make laws. It elects and appoints the Chinese president, premier of the State Council, chief justice of the Supreme People’s Court and procurator-general of the Supreme People’s Procuratorate.

Rather than being a mere “rubber-stamp” body, the NPC has gained more sway in recent years, influencing policy in critical areas such as crime and medical care. Trust and credibility in the NPC has grown, thanks to its active soliciting of opinions from the public to inform policy-making. Between April 2013 and January 2017, the NPC received over 160,000 opinions on the ninth amendment to the criminal law, the largest ever for a single topic.

Nearly 3,000 deputies chosen from grassroots elections in China’s many regions and ethnic groups make up the legislative body. Their geographical origins, genders, ethnicities and professions play an important role in their inclusion.

One such member is Chen Ruolin, a five-time Olympic gold medal-winning diver coming from Jiangsu Province. Among the approximately 80 million residents in her province, more than 50 million voted in the 2012 elections that put Chen in the NPC.

There also are representatives from many of the 55 ethnic minority groups in China. Yang Aidong, an NPC deputy, is from a village in southwest China’s Guizhou Province that is part of the Dong ethnic group. She and other NPC deputies from rural areas were elected from over 40,000 townships nationwide.

The title of the deputy is a privilege not to be taken lightly. Those who abuse the position are held accountable. In recent years, dozens of deputies have been booted for suspected violations.