China Esquire

I am a big advocate for the rule of law, but that shouldn’t come as a surprise to you since I am very American and I wrote about it here regarding legal aid in Xi’an. I had lamented the lack of plaintiff’s attorneys in China in other articles, so I was quite warmed to read this article by the CS Monitor called “How One Man in China Strengthens the Rule of Law”. (Note that I don’t necessarily like how the article title seems almost defiant of the Chinese government because the article is not) But I think news of Chinese attorneys like this gives me much hope for the future of Chinese law.

Here is part of the article ( h/t to China Digital Times):

To most Beijingers, the receipt the attendant gives them for the six cents paid to use the public toilets in the subway is a worthless piece of scrap, quickly crumpled up and thrown away.

To Hao Jinsong, that piece of paper is a seed of Chinese democracy.

It took the 35-year-old law scholar a court battle to force the subway authorities to issue the legally required receipt, and he still treasures the one he sued for. But the chit itself, he says, is not important.

“Behind this receipt is a law that gives people the right to ask for one,” he explains. “If nobody respects the dignity of the law, everybody loses his own dignity. If today you lose your right to a receipt, tomorrow you may lose your right to your land, your house, your freedom, and even your life.”

But it is the very weakness of the rule of law in China that inspires his crusade, he says. If “people don’t use legal recourse to defend themselves because they think it’s useless … the law grows even weaker,” he argues.

“When … people use the law as naturally as they use chopsticks, China will be close to democracy,” he adds.

Hao is a pioneer of public interest lawsuits, a growing trend in a country where they were unknown, or dismissed by judges out of hand, only a few years ago.

He and a swelling band of lawyers like him have attracted less international attention than legal activists whose efforts to defend human rights have earned them beatings, house arrest or jail terms.

But they are achieving prominence in China, and winning plaudits from their peers. “We need someone to stand up and challenge shortcomings of institutions,” says Wu Ge, a law professor at Beijing’s Tsinghua University.

Hao is best known for lawsuits he has brought against the powerful Ministry of Railroads, challenging its refusal to give tax receipts for goods bought on trains, and its ticket pricing policy.

And just like in America, the media has quite a bit of sway over the law, especially with public interest type cases:

Key to such victories has been media coverage and the public debate it provokes. Though Chinese newspapers don’t dare report court cases involving political dissidents, many of them – including the Communist Party’s mouthpiece the People’s Daily – have written approvingly about Hao’s cases.

This would not happen if Hao confronted the government head on over issues such as free speech. Instead, he deliberately restricts himself to less political cases, holding the government’s feet to the fire on a goal it has publicly set itself – the rule of law.

“I would like to say the government and I are going forward together,” he explains. “I don’t want to strip the government of its power, but to curb it.”

A proponent of gradual change, Hao insists that democracy can only be won “at the right pace.

In America, law is often changed little by little, one case at a time. I expect China will follow this familiar pattern.

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