While the Chinese system may incorporate some of the Western legal tradition, it does not solely influence the Chinese law. The western counterparts are tweaked into the Chinese legal system to create its own tradition – the Chinese legal system. China has a socialist market economy which co–exists with a larger part of the public sector in the economy. Moreover, the state, unlike other Western countries and legal traditions, is seen as both the policymaker and the regulator to an extent which may go beyond the law, putting into the question the sense of separation of powers. All this may distinguish the Chinese legal tradition from its Western counterparts. In this essay, the main distinctive features of the Chinese legal tradition shall be emphasized and discussed. One cannot argue that Chinese law is unjust, although it may appear different to us in its context and tradition, it is still fair and it is still just. Both characteristics are features of the rule of law. Everyone is equal in front of the law, a principle, which revolves around modern day legal systems. Chinese law is accessible and open to everyone who seeks it, even though the way it is written may be argued to be intellectually challenging to the average person. This therefore creates a problem within the system and erodes the principle of the rule of law as is understood in western context. In the article by ‘Ignazio Castellucci’, he defines the term rule by law rather than the western rule of law1. As
There are many similarities between China’s population law and the population law in Among the Hidden. One big similarity is that they both limit people because there wasn’t enough food. In Among the Hidden you can only have two children and in China you could only have one. Now in China, you can have 2, but not many people want to because of time, money, and food. Another thing they have in common is that you could pay a fine for the children. In the book, however, they had to either hide or get a fake ID usually, because the fine was too much, whereas in China they didn’t have to hide and it didn’t even make much of a difference in rural areas. Another similarity is how the shadow or black children weren’t given certain rights. In
Legalists are in favor of an authoritarian state that is ruled by force. It claims that the supreme ruler is much more important than the ruled and that individuals must conform to standards of the authority. During the Qin Dynasty, which ruled China from 221 B.C.E. to 207 B.C.E, Qin Shi Huangdi was able to unite China after the Warring States Period by adopting legalism as a ruling philosophy. “Qin Shi Huangdi was a brutal ruler of China, but effective
To be sure, modern laws are made to express the general will, a will that aims at the common good. This means that laws in most cases intend to protect every social member’s rights under the principle of justice and fairness. For telling examples one need to look no further than American judicial system. The access to the two courts systems, one federal court and one state court, provides citizens with the greatest potential to have their legal problems
He enforced the thought system of Legalism which rewarded the good and punished the bad (Media Censorship: Good or Bad?). Shi Huangdi was a harsh and an unfair leader and as result of this, his leadership did not benefit the citizens in society (Media Censorship: Good or Bad?). Today, China’s government seems to follow Shi Huangdi’s methods of rule. The practical style of
The word constitution means fundamental law, law determining the fundamental political principles of a government. The U.S Constitution is the fundamental law for the United States, which means the Texas Constitution the fundamental law for the state of Texas. Most constitutions for the states are back up by the U.S Constitution, which means the two constitutions have similarities and differences. First, Texas constitution was written in 1827 and was rewritten six times until the Texas constitution of 1876 was passed down. There are many similarities and differences when comparing and contrasting the constitutions of Texas and New York constitutions.
The rule of law is whereby the government and all those who govern are bound by the law and everyone must follow the law. Rule of law is also known as nomocracy. Government individual officials are not entitled to make any decision which is not in accordance to the law (Paulsen, Calabresi, McConnell & Bray, 2013). All the citizens are governed by the law including those who make the laws. A. V. Dicey has highly advocated for rule of law in modern times and has popularized it. In history the idea of rule of law can be traced back to the ancient civilizations like China, Mesopotamia, and Rome among others.
The Ch’in Dynasty had a strong, totalitarian, central government that was very structure and provided structure for the people. Legalism was very beneficially effective in the way that it ended the Warring States period by using their powerful government to rid China of feudal lords and feudal states and taking all of the land back from them because they had all taken advantage of both each other and the land. During the period of their strict rule through legalism, the Ch’in accomplished starting and building 1,845 miles of the Great wall of China to keep out invaders from the north, helping to protect their people, and building over 400 miles of roads and irrigation systems for their people. However, legalism also negatively impacted the lives of the people of China during the Ch’in Dynasty in multiple ways. In order to make the people believe that Legalism was best, the Ch’in burned books on history and Confucianism, and killed Confucian scholars who refused to give up their beliefs. Those who did something that the government did not like were punished. All of the people’s actions had consequences, both good and bad. The Ch’in forced people to work for them for months on end without having any guarantee for them or their families of knowing when they would be home, if they would ever return, or if they would die working. This violated the basic human rights of the people who were forced to work for the government on projects such as the Great Wall of
Legalism is an ancient Chinese philosophy of administration that believes that humans are more inclined to do wrong than right because they are motivated entirely by self-interest. Shi Huangdi was the founder of the Qin dynasty. After conquering the seven kingdoms in ancient China, he halted the Warring States Period and took the throne as the first emperor of the unified Chinese nation. He ruled on the basis of Legalism. To prevent criticism of his rule, Shi Huangdi ordered that all books that seemed to be useless or against him be burned. This included all poetry from the Chou dynasty and all books written by Confucian scholars. The only books from previous eras that Shi Huangdi let off were the practical ones about medicine and farming. Focusing on the issue of media censorship, the current Chinese government governs in a similar way to the way Qin Shi Huangdi once governed. China still blocks and monitor citizens access to several social media services and shuts down media entertainment programs during government events. While some may see this as an extreme form of censorship, we must consider the fact that several other countries have similar policies in place.
In both China and the United States, the judicial system is composed of courts that contain several different levels. However, there is a basic structural difference between the Chinese and American legal systems. In America, the three branches of government are supposed to be separate, so that the court system is supposed to be beyond party politics and partisan antics. This separate system of checks and balances does not exist in China. On the contrary, the judicial branch is not independent. It is meant as an extension of the government, and therefore of the single political party with any power in China. The distinction between American judicial independence and Chinese judicial dependence may be one of the most critical differences between the two systems because the American judicial branch is meant to act as a check and balance with the other systems, while China's three-part system has the same branches but lacks the same independence.
Secondly, legal system also is essentially important in government base. The Qin and the Tang implemented rather different penalties on crimes. Above all, the Qin was well-known for its harsh laws and extremely fearful punishment. The leading philosophy in government during the Qin dynasty was legalism. Therefore, Qin Shi Huang Di accepted many advice from the legalists. By reference to the document, Legalist Teaching, I notice that these legalists argued that a strong government had to depend on strong rules and stern punishment because that people would be motivated by self-interest to do criminal offenses (Ebrey 32-37). Therefore, Li Si, a famous legalist in Qin dynasties, helped Qin Shi Huang Di create the Qin Law Code to rule people. However,
The central idea of legalism was to provide absolute power to the person in charge and the supremacy of authority. Legalists like Han Fei Zi
In order to centralize power and remove the threat posed by Manchu nobility, the Qing emperor gradually integrated the nobility into the bureaucracy by removing the Manchu lords’ political power. Struggles created from the consolidation of the emperor’s power continued until the end of the imperial rule in China. Under a web-like structure, the judicial procedure was very different from that in the provinces. Both legal identity of the parties involved with a cases and the nature of the case (e.g. as a land case) determined its judicial procedure.
“Rule of Law”, said Dicey in 1885, means “the absolute supremacy or predominance of regular law as opposed to the influence of arbitrary power and excludes the existence of arbitrariness, of prerogative ,or even wide discretionary authority on the part of government.” (THE LAW OF CONSTITUTION 198 (8th ed.)
The rule of law is a difficult concept to grasp and proves elusive to substantive definition. However, the following work considers the attempts of various social and legal theorists to define the concept and pertinent authorities are considered. Attitudes and emphasis as to the exact shape, form and content of the rule of law differ quite widely depending on the socio-political perspective and views of respective commentators (Slapper and Kelly, 2009, p16), although there are common themes that are almost universally adopted. The conclusions to this work endeavour to consolidate thinking on the rule of law in order to address the question posed in the title, which is at first sight a deceptively simple one.
And so it helps the Government in formulating suitable laws. In pursue its economic and social policies for e.g. law and legal propositions are not find or absolute. They are in the state of becoming. Accepted norms or principles whether statutory or as principle of justice, equity and good conscience are applied again and again to test its voracity or