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• The right degree of pain : imperial China
• The prison regime : republican China
• Trials of terror : war and revolution
• Reform through labor : the communist state.

In a groundbreaking work, Klaus Muhlhahn offers a comprehensive examination of the criminal justice system in modern China, an institution deeply rooted in politics, society, and culture. In late imperial China, flogging, tattooing, torture, and servitude were routine punishments. Sentences, including executions, were generally carried out in public. After 1905, in a drive to build a strong state and curtail pressure from the West, Chinese officials initiated major legal reforms. Physical punishments were replaced by fines and imprisonment. Capital punishment, though removed from the public sphere, remained in force for the worst crimes. Trials no longer relied on confessions obtained through torture but were instead held in open court and based on evidence. Prison reform became the centerpiece of an ambitious social-improvement program. After 1949, the Chinese communists developed their own definitions of criminality and new forms of punishment. People's tribunals were convened before large crowds, which often participated in the proceedings. At the center of the socialist system was 'reform through labor', and thousands of camps administered prison sentences. Eventually, the communist leadership used the camps to detain anyone who offended against the new society, and the 'crime' of counter-revolution was born. Muhlhahn reveals the broad contours of criminal justice from late imperial China to the Deng reform era and details the underlying values, successes and failures, and ultimate human costs of the system. Based on unprecedented research in Chinese archives and incorporating prisoner testimonies, witness reports, and interviews, this book is essential reading for understanding modern China.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• The right degree of pain : imperial China
• The prison regime : republican China
• Trials of terror : war and revolution
• Reform through labor : the communist state.

In a groundbreaking work, Klaus Muhlhahn offers a comprehensive examination of the criminal justice system in modern China, an institution deeply rooted in politics, society, and culture. In late imperial China, flogging, tattooing, torture, and servitude were routine punishments. Sentences, including executions, were generally carried out in public. After 1905, in a drive to build a strong state and curtail pressure from the West, Chinese officials initiated major legal reforms. Physical punishments were replaced by fines and imprisonment. Capital punishment, though removed from the public sphere, remained in force for the worst crimes. Trials no longer relied on confessions obtained through torture but were instead held in open court and based on evidence. Prison reform became the centerpiece of an ambitious social-improvement program. After 1949, the Chinese communists developed their own definitions of criminality and new forms of punishment. People's tribunals were convened before large crowds, which often participated in the proceedings. At the center of the socialist system was 'reform through labor', and thousands of camps administered prison sentences. Eventually, the communist leadership used the camps to detain anyone who offended against the new society, and the 'crime' of counter-revolution was born. Muhlhahn reveals the broad contours of criminal justice from late imperial China to the Deng reform era and details the underlying values, successes and failures, and ultimate human costs of the system. Based on unprecedented research in Chinese archives and incorporating prisoner testimonies, witness reports, and interviews, this book is essential reading for understanding modern China.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• The study of policing in China
• The idea of police
• Origin of communist policing
• History of communist policing
• Police education
• Police culture
• Police reform
• Chinese theory of community policing.

This is the first book in English on the Chinese judicial system and its operations in the Republican era, filling a large gap in the scholarship on modern China, Chinese law, Chinese legal history, and comparative law. It offers a richly-textured analysis of how judicial reform initiatives were envisioned and pursued by the central government from 1901 through 1937, how the various initiatives were, or failed to be, implemented at the provincial and county levels, and how the reform impacted judicial practices and power relationships in local society. Xu sheds new light on the reach of the Chinese state and on the complex interactions between the judicial field and administrative field within the state system, and between them and local society. In that context, he illuminates what judicial modernity actually meant for the Chinese state and society and why irregularities, abuses, corruption, and informal practices continued in spite of the reform.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• 1. Introduction-- Part I. From Qing to Guomindang Law:
• 2. Civil law in the late Qing and the early republic: the revised Qing code--
• 3. Institutional and procedural changes in the late qing and the early republic--
• 4. The Guomindang civil code of 1929-30-- Part II. Qing and Guomindang Civil Justice Compared:
• 5. Dian--
• 6. Topsoil ownership--
• 7. Debt--
• 8. Old-age support--
• 9. Women's choices under qing law: marriage and illicit sex--
• 10. Women's choices under Guomindang law: marriage, divorce, and adultery--
• 11. Conclusion-- Appendix-- References-- Character list-- Index.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

Drawing on archival records of actual cases, this study provides a new understanding of late imperial and Republican Chinese law. It also casts a new light on Chinese law by emphasizing rural areas and by comparing the old and the new. The book asks the question: What changes occurred and what remained the same in Chinese civil justice from the Qing to the Republic? Civil justice is here interpreted to mean not only codified law but also actual legal practice. Since the consequences of court actions frequently differed from the code s intent, this book also addresses the question of how legal practice mediated between code and custom. It aims to track the developing history of the legal system and to discover what it meant in the lives of the Chinese people.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• 1. Introduction-- Part I. From Qing to Guomindang Law:
• 2. Civil law in the late Qing and the early republic: the revised Qing code--
• 3. Institutional and procedural changes in the late qing and the early republic--
• 4. The Guomindang civil code of 1929-30-- Part II. Qing and Guomindang Civil Justice Compared:
• 5. Dian--
• 6. Topsoil ownership--
• 7. Debt--
• 8. Old-age support--
• 9. Women's choices under qing law: marriage and illicit sex--
• 10. Women's choices under Guomindang law: marriage, divorce, and adultery--
• 11. Conclusion-- Appendix-- References-- Character list-- Index.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

Drawing on archival records of actual cases, this study provides a new understanding of late imperial and Republican Chinese law. It also casts a new light on Chinese law by emphasizing rural areas and by comparing the old and the new. The book asks the question: What changes occurred and what remained the same in Chinese civil justice from the Qing to the Republic? Civil justice is here interpreted to mean not only codified law but also actual legal practice. Since the consequences of court actions frequently differed from the code s intent, this book also addresses the question of how legal practice mediated between code and custom. It aims to track the developing history of the legal system and to discover what it meant in the lives of the Chinese people.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)