Li Chen (University of Toronto) has posted Rethinking the Chinese Legal Tradition: Ideological Formations and Their Disputed Legacy (Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
After reviewing prior scholarship and recent debates on the Chinese legal tradition, this paper suggests an interdisciplinary, alternative framework for reexamining the judicial practice, juridical field, and legal culture in late imperial China.
And from the introduction:
In a Confucian society like Qing China (1644–1911 CE), how often did people turn to the formal legal system to resolve disputes? To what extent did the empire become a “litigious society” despite the Confucian moral suspicion toward litigation? How did local officials and their legal advisors actually handle civil and criminal disputes in practice? And what do these practices reveal about the relationships among law, ideology, and governance in late imperial China?
Recommended!
To receive new posts from Legal Theory Blog by email, get a free subscription to Legal Theory Stack.
Lawrence Solum