Mar 12 2009
court cases on the rise says china’s top judge
It’s been busy at work, but its awfully hard to not post something like this when I see it. The American Lawyer ran an article (free suscription required) called “ China Gets Litigious” and it actually sounded interesting. (yes, I think I am a litigator at heart still…) Wang Shengjun, the president of the Supreme People’s Court laid out the statistics before the National People’s Congress. (and provided to Xinhua… not that I am surprised):
Litigation activity in China is growing at a rapid pace, according to a report issued Tuesday by the nation’s top judge.
Wang Shengjun, , described the increase in court cases in a speech to the National People’s Congress. Highlights of Wang’s remarks were provided beforehand to the official Xinhua news agency.
The actual statistics after the jump.
Chinese courts handled 10.71 million cases of various types in 2008, up 11 percent from the year before. Of these, 768,130 were criminal cases; 159,020 individuals received sentences of more than five years, life imprisonment or death.
There were 1.14 million cases involving various financial disputes, a 15 percent increase from 2007. Fraud cases, statistics for which include both embezzlement and the production of substandard food and drugs, were up 13 percent from last year.
Not that I am terribly surprised at the increase of lawsuits. Especially with the food and drug issues that China has been facing. (think Sanlu) It’s even gotten to the point where the Courts are saying that they will accept melamine cases. Of course, like Prof. Clarke, I have strong doubts that this will actually happen. Its already been nearly six months and nothing has happened. (see my prior post on this)
But on the whole, this is very encouraging news that there has been an uptake of litigation at 15%. Hopefully that means that courts are getting better at deciding cases and the people will feel more empowered to use the law. (The cynic in me also points out: when the economy is sour, expect more lawsuits. But I’ll have to wait until 2009 numbers to see if that really happened or not.) I am all for the rule of law and increased of the use of the judicial system as a means of control. I hope its happening.
Even greater increases were seen in labor disputes, which jumped 94 percent to 286,221 cases, and disputes involving health care, housing and consumer rights, which were up 45 percent to 576,013 cases. Intellectual property cases were up 33 percent, with Chinese courts concluding 27,876 of them.
In some cases, the increase in activity is likely tied to changes in the law. For instance, China introduced a new labor law last year. The tainted-milk scandal also called public attention to the courts, though suits filed against the offending dairies were not accepted by the courts until last week.
And again, a down economy, I expect more labor disputes. 94% labor dispute increase however–that’s pretty unprecedented. I do agree that the labor law affects a lot, but can it simply be that much? Or is it (1) the employees are using the courts to clamp down on a lot of terrible employment practices, or (2) that China is quite happy to use the court system against foreign companies doing business in China? I prefer my options, particularly the latter… and perhaps a combination is the most appropriate: maybe the people don’t mind using the courts against foreigners. I don’t have the numbers, that would be a very interesting study indeed.
I am slightly disappointed about the 33% increase in IPR enforcement cases. We all know IP is an issue here. And the fact that it grew that little tells me that there is still much before Chinese people and China get serious about intellectual property. It may be happening at a small scale now, but I was looking for more.
China still has a ways to go before catching up to the level of litigiousness in the United States. According to figures cited by Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Chief Justice Margaret Marshall in a speech last month before the American Bar Association House of Delegates, some 47.3 million cases were filed in U.S. state courts last year, not including traffic offenses, with another 384,000 hitting the federal docket.
Of course, who wants China to be as litigious as the U.S.? I was a litigator and I don’t even want to see that happen. I think litigation is a very good force for social change, but too much can be annoying. I have friends who can’t even post an honest food review on Yelp without getting lawsuit threats… so the U.S. is slightly overboard. But if China can find a happy medium where the courts increase public safety and compliance, without being a hindrance to development, then they found the sweet spot indeed.
