Professor Jerome A. Cohen discusses the political, legal, and economic ramifications of the present situation in the South China Sea, and analyzes the drivers of geopolitical competition in the region.
Carl Minzner, professor at the Fordham University School of Law. discusses the Fourth Plenum and its implications for the development of China's legal system and governance.
The National Committee was delighted to welcome Zhang Jingjing to a roundtable discussion held on March 19, 2009. Ms. Zhang, an environmental litigator, first came to the United States in 2005 as a participant in a National Committee program on strengthening the work of legal aid centers in China; she reported that the program had […]
In 1989, after the National People's Congress adopted legislation that permitted Chinese citizens to sue their government, the National Committee invited a delegation of seven Chinese legal experts — responsible for drafting legislation guiding government liability — to study the American legal system.
In 2002, a consortium that included the National Committee, The Asia Foundation, and Worldwide Strategies, Inc. was awarded a multi-year contract by the U.S. Department of Labor to run a set of programs to improve Chinese labor laws. The overall goals were to help strengthen the Chinese government's capacity to develop laws and regulations to implement internationally recognized standards of workers' rights, to promote greater awareness of labor law among Chinese workers and employers, to strengthen industrial relations, and to improve legal aid services to women and migrant workers. The National Committee's mandate was to work on legislative and labor inspection issues.
China has made great strides in introducing a modern body of law and legal institutions over the course of the past 30 years. In the process, it also has raised the legal awareness and expectations of its citizens. Yet the country still faces major hurdles in enforcing laws, ensuring an independent judiciary and facilitating the access of ordinary citizens to the legal system.