China’s Legislation Law uses the word biantong as a legal term. Under Article 85, as amended in 2023, the autonomy regulations and separate regulations of ethnic autonomous areas may make biantong guiding, adapted provisions, to laws and administrative regulations, “according to the characteristics of the local ethnic groups.”
The adaptation has limits. It may not violate the basic principles of the law. It may not adapt the Constitution, the Law on Regional Ethnic Autonomy, or provisions made specifically for ethnic autonomous areas.