1st Edition

Obligations and Property Rights in China

Edited By Perry Keller Copyright 2012
    542 Pages
    by Routledge

    This volume concerns the rights and obligations of the individual in three critically important contexts: employment relations, family relations and the ownership of immovable property. The development of these legal institutions has helped to transform economic and social relations in contemporary China. In this volume, the articles illustrate firstly a shift away from close state control towards greater freedom for enterprises to use human and natural resources to achieve economic growth and for citizens to pursue their personal lives. More recently, the government has responded to public demands for greater security in employment, home ownership and agricultural land rights with new primary legislation, including the Employment Contract Law and Property Rights Law. Yet, as this volume also shows, the Communist Party has been reluctant to allow empowerment of the individual to threaten other public policy goals, such as the state's ultimate control over the conditions of employment or land use.

    Contents: Introduction; The latest developments in the codification of Chinese civil law, Zhang Lihong; Making Chinese labor law work: the prospects for regulatory innovation in the People's Republic of China, Sean Cooney; Measuring progress under China's labor law: goals, processes, outcomes, Hilary K. Josephs; China's new labour contract law: responding to the growing complexity of labour relations in the PRC, Sean Cooney, Sarah Biddulph, Li Kungang and Ying Zhu; From contracts to compliance? An early look at implementation under China's new labor legislation, Virginia E. Harper Ho; Re-examining the impact of the 1950 marriage law: state improvisation, local initiative and rural family change, Neil J. Diamant; Shaping citizenship: Chinese family law and women, Margaret Y.K. Woo; Law, development, and the rights of Chinese women: a snapshot from the field, Margaret Y.K. Woo; Transforming family law in post-Deng China: marriage, divorce and reproduction, Michael Palmer; Routinization of divorce law practice in China: institutional constraints' influence on judicial behaviour, Xin He; Land disputes, rights assertion, and social unrest in China: a case from Sichuan, Eva Pils; Securing land rights for Chinese farmers: a leap forward for stability and growth, Zhu Keliang and Roy Prosterman; China's (post-)socialist property rights regime: assessing the impact of the property law on illegal land takings, Matthew S. Erie; Chinese property law as an image of PRC history, Eva Pils; The new Chinese property rights law: an evaluation from a continental perspective, Gebhard M. Rehm and Hinrich Julius; Name Index.

    Biography

    Perry Keller is Senior Lecturer in Law at King's College London, UK