scholarly journals Legal Reform: China's Law-Stability Paradox

Daedalus ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 143 (2) ◽  
pp. 96-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin L. Liebman
Keyword(s):  
Legal System ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Legal Reform ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
Rule Based ◽  
Regime Legitimacy ◽  
Citizen Complaints ◽  
The Law ◽  
Party State

In the 1980s and 1990s, China devoted extensive resources to constructing a legal system, in part in the belief that legal institutions would enhance both stability and regime legitimacy. Why, then, did China's leadership retreat from using law when faced with perceived increases in protests, citizen complaints, and social discontent in the 2000s? This law-stability paradox suggests that party-state leaders do not trust legal institutions to play primary roles in addressing many of the most complex issues resulting from China's rapid social transformation. This signifies a retreat not only from legal reform, but also from the rule-based model of authoritarian governance that has contributed much to the resilience of the Chinese system. The law-stability paradox also highlights the difficulties facing efforts by China's new leadership to reinvigorate legal reform.

Lawyers against the Law

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 26-42
Author(s):  
Joakim Parslow
Keyword(s):  
Legal System ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
Effect Change ◽  
Cause Lawyering ◽  
Legal Activism ◽  
The Law

Despite increasing subordination of the judiciary to executive authorities, Turkish cause lawyering associations are more assertive than ever in their defiance of forced closures and legal persecution. Why would activist lawyers ‘play the game’ of law when the legal system is being undermined? Focusing on the historical genesis of Turkey’s oldest activist lawyering association, the Çağdaş Hukukçular Derneği (ÇHD), I argue that Turkish legal activism results from not just clashing political causes but also the strategies attorneys are forced to adopt to effect change within an authoritarian-corporatist structure designed to constrict their activities. The ÇHD and similar groups are not merely extensions of the formal juridical order; they also constitute a grassroots engagement with the law that refuses to conform to the categories, narratives, procedures and ends of the state’s legal institutions.

Lawlessness in Russia? Rethinking the Narratives of Law

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathryn Hendley
Keyword(s):  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Legal System ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
The Law ◽  
Fundamental Value ◽  
Soviet Russia ◽  
Willingness To Use ◽  
At Will

This book examines how ordinary Russians experience the law and the legal system. Russia consistently ranks near the bottom of indexes that measure the rule of law, an indication of the country's willingness to use the law as an instrument to punish its enemies. The book considers whether the fact that the Kremlin is able to dictate the outcome of cases seemingly at will—a phenomenon known as “telephone justice”—deprives law of its fundamental value as a touchstone for society. Drawing on the literature on “everyday law,” it argues that the routine behavior of individuals, firms, and institutions can tell us something more about the role of law in Russian life than do sensationalized cases. Rather than focusing on the “supply” of laws, the book concentrates on the “demand” for law. This introduction discusses the perceived lawlessness in Soviet Russia and the dualism that lies at the heart of Russians' attitudes toward law and legal institutions. It also provides an overview of the book's chapters.

Legal Elites in Afghan Society

1980 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-57 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. G. Weinbaum
Keyword(s):  
Legal System ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
New Concepts ◽  
Ideological Commitment ◽  
The Law ◽  
And Performance

Afghanistan's Khalq leaders who seized power in April 1978 inherited a mixed legal system and a bifurcated legal elite. In theirn ideological commitment to revolutionary chanfe, the Marxist government sought to employ legal institutions to further far-reaching social and political aims. The ruling group intended to curb the power of local jurists and the authority of Islamic legal reasonin through secularizing administration of the law. These policies testified for many to the regime's underlying hostility toward religion, and its determination to displace autonomous provincial leadership, both motives for rebellion by tribal insurgents and Islamic nationalists in 1979. This essay, which was researched and written before the fall of the Daoud government, examines Afghanistan's legal cadres, their education, recruitment, and performance. The persistance of Islamic influences in these processes, along with the adoption of modern practices, should convey the depth of traditionalism in the nation and also the capacity of the Afghans to accommodate new concepts not hastily or callously imposed.

Penerapan Hukum Wakaf Uang di Indonesia Perspektif Legal System Theory

2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
Masdar Masdar
Keyword(s):  
System Theory ◽  
Law Enforcement ◽  
Legal System ◽  
Legal Culture ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Law Enforcement Agencies ◽  
Muslim Society ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Government

Cash waqf in Indonesia has been long enough implemented based on some rules enacted by government and other rules defined by The Waqf Board of Indonesia (BWI). However, the implementation of cash waqf has not reached the level of success. Therefore, this article studies the application of cash waqf law in Indonesia according to Friedman’s legal system theory. The legal system theory of Friedman firstly looks at the substance of the law, which is the rules or regulations; and secondly it examines the structure of the law, encompassing the law enforcement agencies, such as judge, prosecutor, police and legal counselors. And lastly the theory examines the element of legal culture, which is a response from Muslim society. The first two examinations indicate that there is nothing to be a problem. But from the last examination there is a problem regarding the trust from Muslim society. From the legal culture point of view, the implementation of cash waqf by the government, which is performed by BWI, needs attracting society’s credentials in order to improve and maximize the performance of cash waqf in Indonesia.

Preclusion of the Right to Submit New Facts and Evidence According to the Law on Contested Procedure in Kosovo

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 84
Author(s):  
ARTAN QERKINI
Keyword(s):  
Market Economy ◽  
Legal System ◽  
Practical Implementation ◽  
Relevant Evidence ◽  
Legal Provisions ◽  
The Law ◽  
Legislative Amendments ◽  
The Right

The market economy and changes within Republic of Kosovo’s legal system, which imposed the need of legal changes within the field of contested procedure also, have caused this procedure to become more efficient vis-à-vis legal provisions which were in force until October 6th 2008. Through the Law on Contested Procedure (hereinafter “LCP”), the legislator has aimed, inter alia, to make the contested procedure more concentrated, and thus, more efficient. In this regard, the Kosovar legislator has determined that it is mandatory for the parties to present any and all relevant evidence for resolving the dispute until the preparatory session, and in the event that one was not held, until the first main hearing session. As an exception, the parties may present relevant evidence even after this stage of proceedings, provided that their failure to present said evidence no later than at the preparatory session, respectively first main hearing session, was through no fault of their own. I consider that these legislative amendments are vital to ensuring practical implementation of the principle of efficience in the contested procedure.

Punishment

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark McClish
Keyword(s):  
Legal System ◽  
State Violence ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Right

In Indic thought, the daṇḍa (“staff”) represented the king’s use of violence for the purpose of governance. His right and obligation as daṇḍadhara (“wielder of the staff”) to punish those deemed deserving of punishment under the law defined the king’s role in the legal system. In this sense, daṇḍa represented the legalization of domination, in which state violence was reckoned as just punishment. But the king was not the only one with a recognized right to punish. This chapter explores how daṇḍa was used to articulate and legitimize relations of domination within the legal imagination of Dharmaśāstra. It asks, in particular, who is conferred the right to punish and how much?

On the Artifactual—and Natural— Character of Legal Institutions

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Corrado Roversi
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Legal Positivism ◽  
Legal Institutions ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Legal Realism ◽  
Natural Law Theory ◽  
The Law ◽  
Theory Of Law

Are legal institutions artifacts? If artifacts are conceived as entities whose existence depends on human beings, then yes, legal institutions are, of course, artifacts. But an artifact theory of law makes a stronger claim, namely, that there is actually an explanatory gain to be had by investigating legal institutions as artifacts, or through the features of ordinary artifacts. This is the proposition explored in this chapter: that while this understanding of legal institutions makes it possible to find common ground between legal positivism and legal realism, it does not capture all of the insights offered by these two traditions. An artifact theory of law can therefore be necessary in explaining the law, but it will not suffice to that end. This chapter also posits that legal artifacts bear a relevant connection to certain conceptions of nature, thus vindicating one of the original insights behind natural law theory.

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