Liebman, Benjamin L. “A Populist Threat to China’s Courts?,” in Chinese Justice: Civil Dispute Resolution in Contemporary China. Edited by Margaret Y. K. Woo & Mary E. Gallagher, pp. 269-313. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (2011). Summary: Is the Chinese party-state too responsive to public opinion? In the case of the courts, this may be the …
Hualing Fu, “Building Judicial Integrity in China.” Hastings Int’l & Comp. L. Rev, vol. 39, no. 1 (2016): 167-181. Summary: Since the late 1970s, the Chinese judiciary has undergone a continuous reform process of professionalization and institutionalization. Despite the political constraints, there are sufficient opportunities and incentives to continue China’s judicial reform so as to enhance …
Tom Ginsburg. “Administrative Law and the Judicial Control of Agents in Authoritarian Regimes,” in The Politics of Courts in Authoritarian Regimes. Edited by Tom Ginsburg and Tamir Moustafa, pp. 58-72. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Summary: One reason that dictators empower courts is to monitor and discipline lower-level administrative agents. This chapter applies a version of …
Björn Ahl, “Retaining Judicial Professionalism: The New Guiding Cases Mechanism of the Supreme People’s Court.” The China Quarterly, vol. 217 (2014): 121–39. Summary: In 2011 and 2012, the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) published its first “guiding cases.” Guiding cases serve as decision-making models that must be taken into account by lower courts when deciding similar …
Bjorn Ahl, “Judicialization in authoritarian regimes: The expansion of powers of the Chinese Supreme People’s Court.” International Journal of Constitutional Law, Volume 17, Issue 1 (January 2019): Pages 252–277 Summary: Over the past two decades courts in China have undergone tremendous changes as they developed into more professional and efficient institutions for solving legal disputes. …
This article critiques the ethical assumptions underlying liberal legal professionals’ engagement with authoritarian regimes, particularly through the lens of modernization theory, which once promised that economic development would naturally lead to democratization.
Tamir Moustafa. “The Politics of Domination: Law and Resistance in Authoritarian States,” Chapter. In The Struggle for Constitutional Power: Law, Politics, and Economic Development in Egypt. 19–56. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Summary: The thought of judicial institutions in authoritarian states typically conjures up the image of state security courts with no standards of due process, handpicked …
This article critically examines American assumptions about the development of the legal profession in China.
This article explores the dynamics of legal mobilization under authoritarian regimes, using post-colonial Hong Kong as a case study.
This article explores the political positioning of lawyers in Hong Kong, challenging conventional theories in the sociology of professions that focus on status and market control.