China's Laws and Flaws
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.2007.00676.x |
| Published date | 01 November 2007 |
| Date | 01 November 2007 |
| Author | Tim Murphy |
REVIEWARTICLE
China’s Laws and Flaws
Tim Mu rphy
n
Will Hut ton, The Writing on the Wall: China and the West in the 21st Century,
xii þ431pp i nc index hb d20.00, London: Little Brown, 2007
TheWestand its values are understood in China by the Chinese who have studied
abroad. It is not a closed societyanymore,and less closed perhaps than some of its
neighbours like Viet Nam. Such people, manyof whom work in ce ntral govern -
ment or administration, know something or a lot about Western notions of
accountability, the rule of law, democracy and freedom.Whether and if so how
local o⁄cials understand these themes is more di⁄cult to discern.
This review article prefaces a summary and appraisal of Will Hutton’s book,
The Writing on the Wall, with some general observations, mainly in the form of
questions, about China. It then proceeds to focus on the question/slogan of
‘democracyand the rule of law’which, as we will see, is critical to Hutton’s argu-
ment.Thematically, I will emphasise, ¢rst, the way Hutton(who is in good com-
pany here) uses China as a foil of ‘otherness’ to examine our own (Western)
contemporary condition. Here the problem is the prism. This concern links
directlyinto the currentWestern assumptionthat China is now capitalist but lacks
the institutionalapparatuswhich has accompanied the consolidation of capitalism
in theWest.
1
My second theme, elaborated below, concerns the use of democracy
and the rule of law in the context of China. In particular, I wish to distinguish
between what Westerners mean when they deploy these terms i n their analysis
and/or critique of the Chinese ‘system’ and the way the Chinese elites use these
terms themselves. Analysis of this is made quite di⁄cult because Chinese elites
and top leaders are attu ned to the rhetoric of theWest and adopt it to some degree
for theirown reasons. But, as I will suggest brie£yhere, we should not forget that
this is not just rhetoric and the feeling that it is is largely a consequence of not
understanding that democracyand the rule of law can have quite concrete mean-
ings in the Chinese context. That these meanings are not our meanings is our
problem not theirs if our desire is to understand rather than preach to China.
n
Professorof Law, LSE. I amgrateful to Kong Xiang Bo,Li Yong, Zhang Shitai, Li Guoming, Zhang
Qi, XuTing, Liu Han,Julia Zhu and Jason Hao for their comments and help.The views expressed are
of course my own.
1 I elaborate on these issues and the co nfusions embedded in them elsewhere. For now, against the
background of the 10th anniversary of the reuni¢cation of Hong Kong with the ‘motherland’,
I simply point out that the Chinese leaders, when elaborating on ‘one country two systems’,
expound without embarrassment upon the di¡erence between capitalism (Hong Kong) and soci-
alism (the mainland). It wouldbe precipitate, even foolish, to dismiss these leaders and their speech-
writers as stupid or deluded.
r2007 The Author.Journal Compilation r2007 The Modern Law ReviewLimited.
Published by BlackwellPublishing, 9600 Garsington Road,Oxford OX4 2DQ,UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA
(2007) 70(6) 1008^1022
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