New Developments in Law in the People's Republic of China (original) (raw)

The Role of Law in China's Economic Development

China's Great Economic Transformation

The Role of Law in China's Economic Development 379 mushroomed. The role of the courts has expanded considerably, and at least in the cities the salaries and benefits enjoyed by judges have been enhanced greatly through court fees. 5 Perhaps most symptomatic of the change in the role of law has been the change in the role of lawyers. In 1983, five years into the reform era, China had only 8,600 full-time lawyers (Chen, 2004). By 2005, that number had increased to well over 100,000, 6 and the year 2004 saw over 40,000 new LL.B. graduates (China School Net, 2005). There is no reason to doubt that this is a supply response to income opportunities, which in turn suggests that what lawyers do has much more value than before. Of course, some of this work may be old-fashioned "fixing." But it is fixing within an increasingly dense web of rules that barely existed at the outset of reform. Just as Naughton (1995) has characterized the economic reform process as "growing out of the plan," so may the process of legal reform be described as growing out of the system of administrative directives. Unlike in the states of the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, in China the planned economy was not suddenly abolished. Within the Chinese state sector, the replacement of administrative directives with legal methods of supervision and control has been very gradual. Even today the senior management of enterprises in which the state has an important stake are selected and vetted through the Communist Party personnel system, with the board of directors merely supplying legitimacy. 7 Yet the operations of state enterprises are increasingly subject to legal instead of administrative regulation. For example, contract disputes with nonstate suppliers and customers cannot be resolved administratively, because there is no common superior. The great expansion in the number and importance of economic actors that are not core parts of the traditional state system reinforced the process of growing out of the system of administrative directives. Privately owned enterprises have had to rely largely on the legal system for organizational vehicles 8 and remedies for wrongs suffered. Early on, the legal system did not provide much, but over time it became more responsive. For example, article 31 of the 1986 General Principles of Civil Law (GPCL) requires a written agreement for a partnership. However, just one year 5 As of 2004, for example, an experienced senior judge in Shanghai could have annual earnings of 110,000 yuan (Gechlik, 2005). 6 The exact number depends on whom you count. There were more than 103,000 full-time lawyers in law firms, but another 16,000 working part-time or in government, the military, companies, or legal aid services (Ministry of Justice, 2005). 7 In November 2004, for example, the Chinese government undertook a remarkable reshuffling of top executives in its majority-owned, but ostensibly independent, telecommunications companies, with the executive vice president of China Mobile becoming the president of China Telecom, the executive vice president of China Telecom becoming the president of China Unicom, and the president of China Unicom becoming the president of China Mobile (Financial Times, 2004). 8 By contrast, state-owned enterprises, for example, existed for decades before the promulgation in 1988 of a law providing for their existence and organization.

In search of Chinese jurisprudence : does Chinese legal tradition have a place in China's future?

Qut Business School School of Accountancy, 2009

Over the last few decades economic reforms have been the primary policy objective in Asia, legal reforms were however treated as a by product. If China wishes to create a uniquely modern economy, commercial laws should be economically conducive as well as culturally receptive. However, Chinese legal tradition and philosophies are quite different from those of Western counterparts. So can Chinese jurisprudence, if there is such a thing, be adapted for a rapidly growing economy in a globalised world? This article will attempt to tackle these challenging issues and offer some tentative suggestions. Introduction: Over the last few decades, economic reforms have been a key policy objective in Asia. Legal reforms were however treated as a by product. Legislators and regulators in Asia did not appear to give much thought to consider the compatibility of new commercial laws with their cultural heritage and social norms. The People's Republic of China (China) is a prime example. Many new commercial laws such as company law, securities law, and antimonopoly law were recently introduced. These laws were transplanted primarily from the US and European Union as Chinese officials assumed that if it worked in those countries it would work in China. What the Chinese authorities failed to realise is that the fundamental values and rights attached to these Western laws are entwined in the Western legal traditions. Hence, the embedded ideological and cultural contradictions with Chinese culture and heritage have not been addressed. Undoubtedly, China needs to move with the times to enact commercial laws that are in line with international investors' expectations. Yet, the lack of experience of Chinese authorities means that the government does not have much option apart from drawing inspiration from Western countries.

Paradigm Shift in Chinese Legal Studies

Hua S. (eds), Paradigm Shifts in Chinese Studies. , 2022

This chapter aims at offering a brief sketch of the changed and ever-changing paradigms in contemporary Chinese legal studies. The authors identify here two general paradigm shifts across the legal scholarship and academia of legal studies in the post-1978 China which are: de-Sovietization and de-Marxization, on the one hand, and legalization of market economy and Westernization of law, on the other. Since legal science is rather a comprehensive area of research which can be further divided into many sub-areas, the authors choose to develop the central theme of paradigm shift around the three broad sub-areas of law that are: legal theory/jurisprudence, public law, and private law. Finally, the authors also advise to adopt a realistic lens to observe and reflect the subtle process of paradigm shift in Chinese legal studies and to closely observe the ongoing development of legal scholarship “with Chinese characteristics” today.

Chinese Legal Reforms: Transformations in a Decade

2024

This book explains the details and underlying thinking of many major reforms to Chinese law and legal practice that have taken place since 2013. It draws widely on laws and regulations, policies, cases, official statistics as well as the latest Chinese and foreign literature. The informed analysis answers intriguing questions such as why China runs the world’s largest database of court judgments without recognising any precedent, or why the number of judges was cut by 40% despite a more than doubled caseload. Ultimately it offers a new approach on how to understand Chinese law and legal reforms in the contemporary world.

The Fall and Rise of Law and Social Science in China

This article traces the three waves of law and social science studies in contemporary China and examines the current status of this rapidly differentiating interdisciplinary field. While the first two waves of studies subsided without generating a nationwide law and society movement, the most recent wave is changing the landscape of the Chinese legal academia through empirical research. Four emerging subareas of Chinese sociolegal studies are reviewed in detail: (1) law in rural society, (2) legal profession, (3) courts and dispute resolution, and (4) criminal justice.

Law and Politics in Modern China, Cambria, 2009

It is an interdisciplinary study of Chinese law, its language, and political institution. It portrays modern China in terms of historical consistency and interprets modern Chinese politics within the historic context of its native language rather than from the limitations of “universal” (often Western oriented) sociological or developmental theories.