ABSTRACT
In China, whether or not the courts should be used to achieve political goals remains a controversial issue, but the practice appears to be declining. The number of “counterrevolutionary” cases had dropped to only 0.5 percent of all criminal cases in 1982. Furthermore, some of China’s leaders appear to have been making a serious effort to improve the legal system, which was never viable and was in total shambles by the end of the Cultural Revolution. The expansion of the economy’s private sector has much to do with the increase in civil litigation. Notwithstanding a severe shortage of lawyers, provincial legal advisory offices have been established to assist people in such matters as contractual rights and obligations. There has been discussion of the extent to which foreign legal standards should be allowed to influence China’s legal process.
