After long discussion and much anticipation, the National People’s Congress on June 29 finally passed the Labor Contract Law (LCL). Based upon and rounding out the 1995 Labor Law, which serves as the national-level foundation of China’s labor regulations, the LCL is an attempt to grant greater rights and protections to workers by requiring all labor relationships be defined by a written contract. The LCL has proven a success on at least two levels. The first is its making itself – the process, which included no less than 4 drafts and two rounds of comments, the first of which drew more than 190,000 of them, has been marked by high levels of transparency and participation from all corners of society. The second is the protections it brings China’s workers. While not necessarily going beyond the scope of the rights given to workers in the 1995 Labor Law, the LCL brings greater clarity to a number of areas, including collective bargaining, layoffs, severance pay, and contract length. The rules generally aim to improve the welfare of workers, however in some cases the final draft is less sweeping in its provisions than earlier drafts. This is not surprising, as there was some concern that an overly restrictive LCL may impact job creation, especially among Foreign Invested Enterprises (FIEs) , which is generally under greater pressure to abide to the precise letter of the law than domestic enterprises. Thus, the LCL can be seen as an attempt to strengthen labor rights while not impacting politically crucial job growth. If appropriately enforced, the LCL will help reduce the abuses that are leading to labor unrest such as that which recently resulted in the deaths of migrant workers at the hands of strikebreakers. However, as with so many laws in China, enforcement of laws is far more challenging than enacting them. Only time will tell if the LCL is able to help curb the many problems plaguing labor relations in China. Of course, unscrupulous enterprises will inevitably find ways to work around the LCL, and thus the LCL may not serve as a cure-all to labor abuse woes. However, socially responsible MNCs may in the future find the LCL an additional item in their arsenal to ensure their domestic business partners are also socially responsible, and hopefully widespread use of labor contracts will help make workers more aware of their own rights.