Essentials of Insurance Law and Guidance on Basis

Author: Wei Yingning
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2006-01-01
Features: The content of the manuscript shows that the compilers of this series started from the needs of readers and put in significant effort. Although there are still shortcomings in areas such as "Essential Topics," "Expert Opinions," and "Basis Guidance," this new-structured legal book series provides a basic framework for legal professionals to quickly find relevant materials, truly serving as a helpful reference. It is hoped that the publisher will continue to organize this series and continuously revise and improve it in the future. — Li Guoguang, Former Vice President of the Supreme People's Court
Law is a highly applied science. Law students need more than just studying legal principles; they must familiarize themselves with the adjudicative basis of relevant legal fields either during their studies or after entering the workforce. In this sense, this series is an appropriate textbook for pre-job training. — Chen Guangzhong, Lifetime Professor of China University of Political Science and Law
During our exchanges with foreign lawyers, we learned that the legal books they commonly use are index-based. These books typically do not contain lengthy discussions but instead present questions and inform users where to find related materials or cases and the basis for such issues. This may be related to the advanced information technology in foreign countries. The expert tips and basis guidance combined in this series not only draw on the writing methods of similar foreign books but also consider the practical needs of Chinese readers, making it worth recommending to lawyers. — Gao Zongze, President of the All-China Lawyers Association
I know many of the authors of this series. As their academic peer and colleague, I am delighted to see them complete such a demanding yet meaningful task in their spare time. — Jing Hanju, Vice President of the Hebei High People's Court
A prudent client usually seeks preliminary opinions from the target lawyer on legal matters before hiring them to decide whether to engage the lawyer. This is a test for the lawyer, and to win the case, they must prepare thoroughly in a short time. The "Senior Legal Professionals' Assistant Book Series" can provide such assistance. — Li Ping, China Regional Leader of Baker McKenzie
A senior judge of the Supreme People's Court once said that in a civil law country like China, the process of judges making judgments is essentially one of finding legal basis and interpreting the law through legal reasoning. Many legal experts deeply agree with this. In fact, whether it is judges or other legal professionals, the most important thing when encountering specific legal issues is, on one hand, to determine the nature and category of the issue in legal theory, and on the other hand, to find relevant legal basis and apply legal reasoning to apply the law and solve the problem. In this sense, current legal textbooks and theoretical works on law are not closely aligned with the practical needs of legal professionals. Other legal practice-related books also face similar issues: either they provide simple interpretations of legal provisions or simply compile laws and regulations, failing to meet the deep-level needs of legal professionals.
Based on this understanding, we held two expert workshops attended by senior judges and lawyers to fully understand the practical needs of legal professionals. Organizing nearly 100 legal experts into 18 expert groups based on different legal fields, we spent two years writing this "Senior Legal Professionals' Assistant Book Series." Considering the breadth of coverage and key and difficult issues in judicial practice, the first batch of this series selected 18 commonly used legal fields for separate writing.
The series organizes the arguments for each legal field into two parts: "Essentials" and "Basis Guidance." The "Essentials" topics are problems set based on current legal documents (main purpose of provisions) and other difficult issues that may arise in judicial practice. On the surface, these topics do not seem as targeted as question-and-answer or case-based questions, and some even resemble dry terms. However, these topics are the "points" of each legal field, and any issue in practice can be categorized under these "points." The content of the topics is not written in the long-form style of academic monographs or papers but in the form of expert opinions, concisely explaining legal principles and pointing out issues to be noted in judicial practice.
The "Basis Guidance" section lists as comprehensively as possible the specific legal basis related to the topics. The legal basis in our country is multi-layered, including laws formulated by the National People's Congress and its Standing Committee, administrative regulations, departmental rules, and normative documents passed by the State Council and its departments, as well as judicial interpretations issued by the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate. Among these bases, laws naturally have the highest legal effect. However, some legal provisions are relatively general, and the understanding and handling of many specific issues in practice require supplementary basis from administrative and judicial departments. Therefore, the "Basis Guidance" section clearly lists the names, issuance dates, and issuing departments of all the above bases and appends the specific provisions applicable to the essential topics (for some larger topics that require referencing the full basis or involve uncommon specialized issues, to save space, we only note the name, issuance date, and issuing department of the basis, omitting the specific provisions, which readers can find in the specific topics or other legal compendiums).
With the clear framework of the "Essentials" topics, the authoritative opinions of experts on legal principles, and the detailed and specific legal basis, the complete structure of each legal field in the series is formed. We believe that this innovative format for legal books can largely meet the practical needs of legal professionals and become their convenient and practical reference.
It should be noted that due to the wide range of legal fields covered by this series, the workload of writing is substantial. Some of the authors come from judicial practice departments, while others come from teaching and research departments, belonging to different industries and professions. Although we strive for uniformity in the writing format, there are still obvious differences in language style and expression among different books. Additionally, the cutoff date for the materials used in this series is November 2004. For the issues mentioned above, we hope experts and readers engaged in legal practice will provide us with valuable feedback so that we can revise and correct them in time for future editions.