Description
Book SynopsisThe twelve case studies in Chinese Law: Knowledge, Practice and Transformation, 1530s to 1950s, edited by Li Chen and Madeleine Zelin, open a new window onto the historical foundation and transformation of Chinese law and legal culture in late imperial and modern China. Their interdisciplinary analyses provide valuable insights into the multiple roles of law and legal knowledge in structuring social relations, property rights, popular culture, imperial governance, and ideas of modernity; they also provide insight into the roles of law and legal knowledge in giving form to an emerging revolutionary ideology and to policies that continue to affect China to the present day.
Table of ContentsIntroduction: Ways of Rethinking Chinese Law and History Part I. Meaning and Practice of Law Chapter 1. Classifications of Litigation and Implications for Qing Judicial Practice – Jianpeng Deng Chapter 2. Kinship Hierarchies and Property Institutions in Late-Qing and Republican China – Taisu Zhang Chapter 3. Social Practice and Judicial Politics in “Grave Destruction” Cases in Qing Taiwan, 1683-1895 – Weiting Guo Chapter 4. Elite Engagement with the Judicial System in the Qing and its Implications for Legal Practice and Principle – Janet Theiss Chapter 5. “Law Is One Thing, and Virtue Is Another”: Vernacular Readings of Law and Legal Process in 1920s Shanghai – Bryna Goodman Chapter 6. Wayward Daughters: Sex, Family, and Law in Early Twentieth-Century Beijing – Zhao Ma Part II. Production and Application of Legal Knowledge Chapter 7. The Community of Legal Experts in 16th- and 17th-Century China – Yanhong Wu Chapter 8. Marketing Legal Information: Commercial Publications of the Great Qing Code, 1644-1911 – Ting Zhang Chapter 9. Contestation over Legal Knowledge and Limits of Imperial Power in Qing China – Li Chen Chapter 10. Court Case Ballads: Popular Ideals of Justice in Late Qing and Republican China – Margaret Wan Chapter 11. Old Forensics in Practice: Investigating Suspicious Deaths and Administering Justice in Republican Beijing – Daniel Asen Chapter 12. Simplified Legal Knowledge in the Early PRC: Explaining and Publishing the Marriage Law – Jennifer Altehenger
