Yueduan Wang. “The Legality Trap: Legal Cooptation Under Authoritarianism.” American Journal of Comparative Law (forthcoming), (2025): 1-36.
This study explores how legal advocacy in authoritarian China shapes environmental social movements by channeling their efforts into less radical, more state-aligned paths. It shows that China’s discriminatory legal opportunity structure allows the judiciary to serve as a powerful advocacy platform but restricts access and affordability to actors who demonstrate loyalty to the state. By permitting environmental NGOs to pursue public interest litigation under tight regulations, the party-state encourages these groups to self-censor, deepen their dependence on the state, and create divisions among themselves. This dynamic illustrates how authoritarian regimes strategically design legal institutions to coopt social movements, limiting their potential for transformative change.