Civilization of Administrative Procedures in China: A Legal Theoretical and Legal Cultural Analysis

Author: Yang Yin
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-11-01
Features: In early February 1994, during the severe winter in Beijing, driven by curiosity and hope, I reluctantly left the Graduate School of China University of Political Science and Law to pursue my PhD at the Faculty of Law, University of Melbourne in Australia. Upon arriving in Australia, an urgent question arose: could I successfully complete my PhD thesis and defense in a language other than Chinese within more than four years in a country with a different cultural and legal system? Therefore, I conservatively positioned my research topic in the field of Chinese administrative law, which I had been engaged in for many years. I was one of the few PhD students from mainland China at the Faculty of Law, University of Melbourne, facing a pioneering situation. This led me to strengthen communication and cooperation with my supervisor while everything else had to be carried out through self-reflection and exploration. Fortunately, my legal research experience had once been self-taught, so the "solitary struggle" in Australia not only did not demoralize me but also allowed me to appreciate the spirit of PhD research in a foreign country. However, to be honest, cultural ties were indeed a "heartache" in my long-term overseas research. First, why would I travel thousands of miles to another country in the Southern Hemisphere to write a thesis on Chinese administrative law? From the perspective of Chinese literature to the grasp of legal practice development, Chinese researchers studying Chinese law overseas do not have an advantage over their domestic counterparts. Therefore, my research and thesis must go beyond the confines of Chinese administrative law and must be conducted from a comparative law perspective, or in other words, I must leverage my strengths as an overseas researcher while avoiding the shortcomings of being far from mainland China. Otherwise, I might hesitate to publish my research results in Chinese in the future. Second, even if my thesis is constructed from a comparative law perspective, its focus remains on Chinese issues. It is often said that Chinese scholars, when working from within, may overlook their own problems, while Western scholars, including Chinese living abroad, can offer unique insights. This argument has some merit, as I have indeed benefited greatly from many critiques of my thesis by Western scholars. However, the situation where a thesis on Chinese social issues must be corrected and judged by several Western "mentors" can still be unsettling. Some argue that from the perspective of mutual understanding and refinement between China and the West, the research achievements of Chinese scholars in foreign languages are a valuable asset for Westerners studying China. Upon reflection, this makes sense. Imagine if Chinese scholars could now invite Westerners to conduct Western research in Chinese—wouldn't the level of "Western learning advancing eastward" rise by leaps and bounds? After much deliberation and hesitation, it took four years to complete this work. Since I began writing it a few years ago, I have resolved to publish it in Chinese without hesitation in the future. This not only allows domestic scholars to know that there are also researchers working on Chinese law and society in overseas settings but also, as far as I see, there are very few PhD theses on Chinese society completed overseas and published in Chinese, and even rarer are those on Chinese law. Therefore, I hope this publication can inspire more colleagues with similar experiences to share their hard work in overseas research to fill this gap. This book is based on my English PhD thesis, which has been refined. The original title of the thesis was: "Jursprudential and Cultural Perspectives on the Implementation of Procedural Justice in Administrative Law in the People's Republic of China." Due to the change in readership, this book has made appropriate adjustments in content and format compared to the original thesis (see the "Introduction" for details), and the title has been determined as: "The Rule of Law in Chinese Administrative Procedure—An Analysis of Jurisprudence and Legal Culture." At the time of publication, I would like to especially thank my mentors, Wang Mingyang, Luo Haocai, Ying Songnian, Zhu Weijiun, and others, who have greatly benefited me in terms of professional cultivation, character, and research on the thesis topic, as well as providing me with immense encouragement.