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Table 4: Supply of Legal Services

Year Law Firms Lawyers Law Firms Lawyers (Units) (Individuals) (% Increase) (% Increase)

1997 8441 98902 1998 8946 101220 6.0 2.3 1999 9144 111433 2.2 10.1 2000 9541 117260 4.3 5.2 2001 10225 122585 7.2 4.5 2002 10873 136684 6.3 11.5

Avg Growth 4.3 5.5

Source: 中国法律年鉴 (2002:1253; 2003:1335).

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• Legal profession– State supervised—not self-regulating

• Ministry of Justice– Administers bar exam, certifies lawyers, licenses firms– Exercises supervision of lawyers

• Bar associations (often headed by MoJ officials)Note: fight in Beijing Bar Association 2008

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China lawyers call for more open bar association

The Associated Press Friday, September 12, 2008 BEIJING: A splinter group of Chinese lawyers, frustrated by official interference in their work, is pushing Beijing's government-controlled bar association to hold open elections, complaining that the organization doesn't safeguard their rights.The disaffected lawyers have in recent days circulated petitions online, sent text messages and letters, and tried to mobilize their colleagues to urge the Beijing Lawyers' Association to hold free and fair elections for senior officers later this year.Their campaign faces long odds. Only 56 out of Beijing's 16,000 lawyers have so far signed up.But their struggle highlights the growing assertiveness of lawyers in a legal system tightly controlled by the communist government. Activist lawyers have in recent years been at the forefront of the fight to use the law to press for civil liberties and combat abuses of power. At least one other association has already started to have more open elections."I think it's indicative of these larger battles just for the bar associations themselves to become more autonomous, more professional, and more representative of the lawyers' interest," said Randy Peerenboom, a law professor at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia.Lawyers engaged in cases considered politically sensitive have been harassed and intimidated and sometimes had their licenses revoked. Last year one noted rights attorney in Beijing, Li Heping, was forced into a car by unidentified men who then beat him with electric batons.Tussles between lawyers and authorities are made worse, lawyers and rights activists said, because bar associations often act in the government's interests or at least are powerless to intervene on behalf of their members.In Beijing, lawyers say the association is generally secretive about its proceedings and is beholden to the city's Justice Bureau.

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• Supply of lawyers and litigious cultures– Cultural or institutional? – Peng (2000:32) Japan, Taiwan, S. Korea “lawyerless

wonderlands”– China—2002 per capita income US $ 960 – Korea—2002 per capita income US $11,280– China—one lawyer for every 9,510 people – Korea—one lawyer for every 9,383 people.

– In 2004, Shanghai alone had more than 6,000 lawyers in 592 law firms, while Korea had 6,273 lawyers in 258 law firms nationwide

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• Consulting a lawyer significant factor in “escalating” a dispute, e.g. litigating (Landry, RDI)

• Contrast Michelson: lawyers as gatekeepers– “Students of contemporary China have

uncritically assumed that lawyers open courtroom doors… Why are so few grievances transformed into legal claims?”

Approach to Dispute Resolution for Respondents with Land Disputes (N=89)(Percent of respondents attempting any given action)

No action 31.5Direct negotiation 50.6Mediation 43.8Petition for government intervention 28.1Court 6.7Local People's Congress 3.4Protest 6.7Media 2.2

Results from 2007 survey of 638 rural households in Hunan Province (Whiting, et al)

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Lawyers as a force for social change

– Public interest lawyers

• Supreme People’s Procuratorate

– Encourage local procurates to bring pilot cases in the “public interest”

» Henan: loss of state-owned assets, environmental pollution, market, industrial and administrative monopolies and the destruction of natural resources or public facilities

» arguably at odds with the standing requirements for civil litigation as stipulated in the Chinese Civil Procedure Code, but the procuracy and courts agreed to overlook

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Lawyers as a force for social change

– Public interest lawyers

• Individual lawyers (Qiao Zhanxiang v. Ministry of Railways )

– train price ticket increases during the Spring Festival, the biggest travel holiday on the Chinese calendar, were in violation of the Price Control Law

– hosted a local talk show answering callers’ questions on traffic law

– Qiao lost his cases in Beijing Intermediate and High Courts, but won his case in the court of public opinion. During the subsequent Spring Festival, the Ministry of Railways held a hearing on contemplated price increases.

– case selected to highlight the need for transparent administrative processes

• NGOs (Beijing Univ. Law Dept’s Center for Women’s Law Stds and Legal Services

C. David Lee, “Legal Reform in China: A Role for Nongovernmental Organizations,” Yale J. of Int’l Law Vol. 25 (2000

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• Lawyers as a force for social change

– Lawyering in repressive states• Jane Winn (UW) and Tang-chi Yeh, “Advocating Democracy: The Role of Lawyers in

Taiwan's Political Transformation,” Law & Social Inquiry, Vol. 20, No. 2. (Spring, 1995), pp. 561-599.

– Civil law vs. common law system—fewer opportunities– Turn to opposition political party

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• Legal Aid– Regulations on Legal Aid by the State Council in 2003

• Duty of county-level governments• Narrow scope for qualifying for legal aid• No recourse for denial of legal aid• Private lawyers de facto compulsory provision of legal aid

– foreign donor activity • educated the National Legal Aid Center, the organization

charged by the Ministry of Justice with formulating legal aid policy, about legal aid systems in other countries.

– Non-governmental legal aid centers—Ford Fdn funding (as with Women’s Center, above)