Online Seminar: "The Application of the Proportionality Principle by Chinese Courts" Finnish China Law Center (University of Helsinki; 20 June 2023)

 

 I am delighted to pass along information about the upcoming Online Seminar--The Application of the Proportionality Principle by Chinese Courts. Sponsored by the Finnish China Law Centre, the online  seminar will be held on 20 June 2023 at 10:15-11:45 Helsinki time (9:15-10:45 CEST / 15:15-16:45 CST).

The event is chaired by the marvelous by Björn Ahl, Professor and Chair of Chinese Legal Culture at the University of Cologne and President of the European China Law Studies Association.  Speakers include  Xiaohong Yu (Tsinghua University) and Shiling Xiao (City University of Hong Kong).

The seminar programme can be found here.

The seminar is free and open to all. Zoom link for the event will be sent to registered participants. The organizers kindly ask interested persons to register by 18 June by completing the following electronic form:

https://www.lyyti.in/The_Application_of_the_Proportionality_Principle_by_Chinese_Courts_4133 

 

The Program and Concept Note()including speaker bios) follow.

The Application of the Proportionality Principle by Chinese Courts

PROGRAM
Time: 10:15-11:45 Helsinki time (9:15-10:45 CEST / 15:15-16:45 CST)
Date: Tuesday 20 June 2023
Venue: Zoom
 

10:15 Helsinki time (9:15 CEST / 15:15 CST)
Opening of the Seminar
BJÖRN AHL, Professor and Chair of Chinese Legal Culture at the University of Cologne and President of the European China Law Studies Association
 

10:20 Helsinki time (9:20 CEST / 15:20 CST)
Strategic Application of the Principle of Proportionality in China
XIAOHONG YU, Associate Professor at Department of Political Science, Tsinghua University
 

10:50 Helsinki time (9:50 CEST / 15:50 CST)
State-centric Proportionality Analysis in Chinese Administrative Litigation
SHILING XIAO, Post-doctor Research Fellow at the School of Law, City University of Hong Kong
 

11:20 Helsinki time (10:20 CEST / 16:20 CST)
Discussion
 

11:45 Helsinki time (10:45 CEST / 16:45 CST)
End of Seminar

 

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Background of the presentation

Strategic Application of the Principle of Proportionality in China

[abstract will be update shortly]

State-centric Proportionality Analysis in Chinese Administrative Litigation

This article examines the application of proportionality in Chinese administrative litigation over the last two decades, and argues that courts in administrative litigation that serve the party-state and tend to uphold state/collective interest have altered proportionality to be state-centric. It finds that the courts invoked proportionality in a negligible portion of all administrative litigation judgments and had inadequate emphases on protecting individual rights. Proportionality has not appreciably assisted the courts in enhancing their oversight of governmental power and protection of individual rights. This article suggests that this is attributed to the restricted function of administrative litigation in China’s party-state governance structure and owing to the country’s long-held belief that public interest takes precedence over individual rights. Administrative litigation, which China’s ruling party employs to resolve principal-agent issues, is seriously constrained. The courts are expected to review the formal legality of executive actions, but not their substance. Informed by the Chinese human rights belief, which favors collectivism over individualism, the courts are skewed toward public interest in the balancing analysis when applying proportionality.

About the speakers

Dr. Xiaohong Yu is Associate Professor at Department of Political Science, Tsinghua University. Before joining Tsinghua, Dr. Yu was An Wang Postdoctoral Fellow at Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University in 2009. Dr. Yu holds Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University. She is also a graduate from Renmin University (M.A. in Political Science, B.A. in Political Science). Her primary research interests include Chinese law and politics, comparative judicial politics, and theories of democracy and democratization.

Dr. Shiling Xiao is a Post-doctor Research Fellow at the School of Law, City University of Hong Kong. He obtained his PhD in law from HKU, MPhil in international and comparative law from the University of Macau, and LLB from the Southwest University of Political Science and Law. He was a practising lawyer in Mainland China and was called to the bar in 2018. His research interests embrace comparative public law, human rights law and judicial review. His publications appear in International Journal of Constitutional Law, Hong Kong Law Journal, Journal of Comparative Law and others.