Sending Law to the Countryside

Based on empirical investigation and an interdisciplinary approach, this book offers a crucial theoretical work on China’s basic-level judicial system and a masterpiece by Professor Suli Zhu, a prominent jurist on modern China. Its primary goal is to identify issues – ones that can only be effectively sensed and raised by China’s jurists because of their unique circumstances and cultural background – that are of practical significance in China’s basic-level judicial system, and of theoretical significance to juristic systems in general. Divided into four parts, the book begins with a discussion of the systematic and theoretical problems in China’s basic-level judicial system at the macro-, meso- and micro- scale. In the second part, it examines the technology and knowledge to be found in the basic-level judicial system, so as to make the traditionally “invisible” technology and knowledge of trial judges available for general theoretical analyses. The third part focuses on the judge and other legal personnel in the judicial system, while the last part discusses the value of legal sociology surveys as powerful resources. This book not only presents essential features of China’s judicial system by precisely describing key issues in its basic-level judicial system, but also offers well-founded content that accentuates the significance of social management innovation.