What are the four elements of criminal law?

The four elements of criminal law are as follows:

1. The criminal subject

refers to the person who commits the crime. Every crime must have a criminal subject. Some crimes are committed by one person, and the criminal subject is one person. Some crimes are committed by several people, and the criminal subject is several people. According to the provisions of the criminal law, any crime committed by a company, enterprise, institution, agency, or group constitutes a unit crime. Therefore, a unit can also become the subject of the crime.

2. The subjective aspect of crime

refers to the psychological state of the criminal subject regarding the criminal behavior and its consequences. There are two subjective mental states of crime, namely intentionality and negligence.

3. The objective aspect of crime

refers to the specific manifestation of criminal behavior. For example, in the crime of fraud, the offender has the act of fabricating facts and deceiving others; in the crime of drug trafficking, the offender has the act of selling drugs, etc.

4. The object of crime

refers to the social relationship protected by criminal law and violated by criminal behavior. The object of crime and the object of crime are different. The object of crime is the object directly targeted by the crime, while the object of crime refers to the social relationship that protects citizens' personal rights protected by criminal law from illegal infringement.

Legal Basis

Article 13 of the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China: Any crime that endangers national sovereignty, territorial integrity and security, splits the country, or subverts the people's democratic dictatorship political power and the overthrow of the socialist system, destruction of social and economic order, infringement of state-owned property or property collectively owned by the working people, infringement of citizens' private property, infringement of citizens' personal rights, democratic rights and other rights, and other behaviors that are harmful to society. Anyone who should be punished according to the law is a crime, but if the circumstances are obvious and minor and the harm is not great, it is not considered a crime.