Legal Act in Chinese

In addition, the national broadcaster CCTV operates a «television university», which has a distance learning programme. At the provincial level, there are post-secondary judicial colleges or undergraduate colleges that provide legal training, particularly for young employees of legal institutions. This Code of Criminal Procedure of China (中华人民共和国刑事诉讼法) regulates all stages of criminal proceedings. This differs from the system of administrative sanctions (including several years` imprisonment) and proceedings governed by a separate system of laws and regulations. [7] The Code of Criminal Procedure governs the conduct of investigations, including pre-trial detention, interrogation, surveillance, prosecution (by an institution known as the «prosecutor`s office»), and the conduct of trials and defense of the accused. [8] However, the independence of the courts and institutions involved in investigating, prosecuting, and prosecuting crimes in China continues to be challenged by the structure of the PRC`s government and its organs. An example of structural obstacles to the independence of the courts is the system of the Political and Legal Committee of the Communist Party of China, whereby «the Party has the power to direct, supervise or review the courts with regard to certain decisions of individual cases or categories of cases that attract the Party`s attention.» [9] In 1986, the National People`s Congress adopted the General Principles of Civil Law of the People`s Republic of China, which helped clarify the scope of civil law. Article 2 of the document stipulates that civil law governs personal and property relations between natural and assimilated persons. It covers a wide range of topics, including general principles, matrimonial law, property law, contract law, copyright and trademark law. From the perspective of some researchers, business law, such as corporate law, bankruptcy law, insurance law and the law of negotiable instruments, differs from civil law. In the early 1850s, there was resistance to excluding Chinese migrant workers from immigration because they provided substantial tax revenue that helped close California`s tax loophole. [7] The Chinese emperor at the time supported exclusion, citing his fears that Chinese immigration to America would result in a loss of labor for China.

[8] But towards the end of the decade, the financial situation improved, and as a result, attempts to legislate on China`s exclusion were successful at the state level. [7] In 1858, the California legislature passed a law prohibiting any person «of Chinese or Mongolian race» from entering the state; However, this law was repealed by an unpublished notice of the state Supreme Court in 1862. [9] China`s law and legal education institutions are divided into law faculties, law universities, and judicial colleges; and specialized judicial and vocational training centres. After their victory, the communists established a formal Soviet-style judicial system, but ideological conflicts between legal scholars and cadres led to the collapse of the system. In the «three anti» (sān fǎn) and «five anti» (wǔ fǎn) movements of 1952, mass public trials with masses of spectators shouting criticism led to the execution and imprisonment of hundreds of thousands of «counter-revolutionaries» without enforcing the formal legal system. During the Cultural Revolution, the judicial system was completely abolished and laws were no longer promulgated. As a result, municipal mediation systems have become increasingly important. The People`s Liberation Army was tasked with monitoring the assessment of cases.

Red Guard brigades often forced individuals into self-criticism and sent people to re-education camps because they were «reactionary.» Currently, there are more than 11,000 law firms in China with more than 118,000 lawyers. Legal practice has also gradually penetrated into new areas such as finance, real estate and, to a lesser extent, human rights. Overall, however, the size of China`s legal profession is still too small to meet the demands of growth and modernization. In addition, lawyers still cannot play an important role in sensitive cases and defend their clients freely. Some of them were even tried for perjury as punishment. The nature of the delegates to the selection of the AFN means that the public`s contribution to legislation at this level is very limited. Since delegates come from different fields and backgrounds, only some of them are lawyers or practitioners. Without formal legal training or knowledge, only a few of the delegates can make proposals or give opinions on legislation. This gives a fairly broad cross-section of the party and government the opportunity to contribute, both at central and local level. The NPC Legislative Affairs Commission (法制工作委员会 fǎzhìgōngzuò wěiyuánhuì) is the main body responsible for drafting laws. Since the 1990s, academics and experts have been increasingly mandated by the NPC Legislative Affairs Commission to form drafting groups to prepare the first draft of the Basic Laws (this was the case for the Contracts Act (1999), the Rights in rem Act (2007), the Tort Act (2009) and the Law on Foreign Civil Relations of the PRC (2010)).

The legislative act is, in a sense, a game of interest groups. As in imperial times, dispute resolution in China relied heavily on community mediation rather than litigation within a formal court system. Although a large number of disputes in China are still resolved informally through community mediation, nowadays lawsuits are increasingly being brought by ordinary people to resolve their differences. Courts are overburdened in many parts of China (for example, judges of the Basic People`s Court of Chaoyang District and Haidian District in Beijing have an average number of cases of 300 to 400 per year). Traditionally, the emphasis has been on compromise, maintaining social harmony and establishing order. But unlike previous eras, especially in the first half of the communist era, there were mass show trials and public criticism to enforce the party line, establish party dominance and give examples of certain values of society.