Hear the Current State of Court Reform in China from the Experts

Over the past year China has announced and begun to implement the most important reforms to the legal system in years. On April 23, the Beijing Center was honored to bring to local community three top experts in the field of China's legal studies to discuss the current development of court reform in China. The discussion focused on efforts to increase transparency, reduce external interference in the courts, and professionalize the judiciary.

April 17, 2015

Over the past year China has announced and begun to implement the most important reforms to the legal system in years. On April 23, the Beijing Center was honored to bring to local community three top experts in the field of China's legal studies to discuss the current development of court reform in China. The discussion focused on efforts to increase transparency, reduce external interference in the courts, and professionalize the judiciary.

Panel Discussion:
Current State of Court Reform in China

April 23 – Beijing
Columbia Global Centers | East Asia

6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

To register, please click here.

 

Speakers

Benjamin L Liebman
Robert L. Lieff Professor of Law; Director, Center for Chinese Legal Studies, Columbia Law School

His current research focuses on Chinese tort law, on Chinese criminal procedure, on the impact of popular opinion and populism on the Chinese legal system, and on the evolution of China’s courts and legal profession.

Professor Liebman’s recent scholarship includes, “Malpractice Mobs: Medical Dispute Resolution in China,” Columbia Law Review (forthcoming January 2013), “Toward Competitive Supervision? The Media and the Courts,” China Quarterly (Dec. 2011); “A Return to Populist Legality? Historical Legacies and Legal Reform,” in Mao’s Invisible Hand, (Elizabeth Perry and Sebastian Heilmann, eds.) (Harvard University Asia Center 2011); “A Populist Threat to China’s Courts?” in Chinese Justice: Civil Dispute Resolution in Post-Reform China (Mary Gallagher & Margaret Woo, eds.) (Cambridge University Press 2011); “Changing Media, Changing Courts?” in Changing Media, Changing China (Susan Shirk ed., forthcoming Oxford University Press 2010); and “Reputational Sanctions in China’s Securities Markets” (with Curtis J. Milhaupt), Columbia Law Review (2008).

Prior to joining the Columbia faculty in 2002, Professor Liebman was an associate in the London and Beijing offices of Sullivan & Cromwell. He also previously served as a law clerk to Justice David Souter and to Judge Sandra Lynch of the First Circuit. He is a graduate of Yale, Oxford, and Harvard Law School.


Li Xiao
Columbia Law School '02 LL.M
Senior Judge, Research Division, Supreme People's Court

Wang Xixin
Vice Dean and Professor of Law, Deputy Director, Constitutional and Administrative Law Center, Peking University Law School
Visiting Professor of Law, Columbia Law School, Fall 2014
Visiting Scholar, Columbia Law School, 1998-99

 

RELATED LINKS

Professor Ben Liebman at White House to Discuss China Legal Reforms

Discusses Legal Reforms in China Prior to U.S. Visit by Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping

New York, Feb. 24, 2012—Professor Benjamin L. Liebman, the Robert L. Lieff Professor of Law at Columbia Law School, met with Vice President Joe Biden and senior White House advisers on Feb. 8 to discuss human rights and legal reforms in China. Liebman, a leading expert on China’s legal system, was the only scholar invited to the White House for the gathering.

“Vice President Biden made his view clear that developing a society that provides robust protections of basic rights is in China’s interest both politically and economically,” said Liebman, director of Columbia Law School’s Center for Chinese Legal Studies. He added that there is a growing awareness that human rights issues in China must go beyond high profile cases and address the rights of average Chinese citizens.

Read full story here.