Development of Chinas legal system and its difficulties and challenges Essay

Development of Chinas legal system and its difficulties and challenges - Essay Example These changes are occurring because of the fact that in order to strengthen the rule of law it is foremost necessary to place emphasis on a large number of elements, both from inside and outside of the country. Also the structure of the domestic law of the country is facing several transformations in the face of growing international trade and globalization. The legal systemis undergoing the most radical changes since their inclusion within the World Trade Organization (WTO). The country has largely been dependent on ideological reasoning and facts. But recently policy makers have suggested that in order to cope with international standards of respectable community, the country must follow specified globally accepted norms and regulations, irrespective of the fact that these norms and regulations are generated by the United Nations Human Rights Conservation or by the WTO (Bruun & Jacobsen, 2000, p. 251). Accordingly the country’s law and legal system have had to be changed and modified. The Republic of China is now initiating these changes or modifications with the most radical occurring in the areas of economic reform and changes in the nature of the administration process. This paper will attempt to evaluate all of these developments and will mark the difficulties or the challenges that china has been facing as a direct result (Alexandroff, Ostry and Rafael Gomez, 2003, p. 154). Philosophy: The Asian legal system appears to be different in many respects from the legal systems of therest of the world. Major reasons for this include spiritual variations and differences in intellectual thought. Religion plays little part in Chinese law-making but perhaps the most influential form of thought is Confucianism (Glenn 2007, pp. 318-319). The core of Confucianism is Humanism and is based on various levels of honesty. According to Confucian thought, with the use of the logic of humanity one can examine the world in the simplest possible manner. An ethical philosophy that is to be practiced by all the members of this society is the primary foundation and function of this thought. For almost a thousand years the legal system of China was dominated by Confucianism. The principles of Confucian ideology were the main driving force behind the evolution of the ancient legal system. Not only that, it also helped in developing the legalism, traditions, and moral aspects of life for the an cient Chinese people. This ideology mainly focused on astrict governmental hierarchy. Along with this the ideology marked its view regarding the fact that people need to internalize all the granted rules and norms and just take appropriate or necessary actions. According to this view, it has been argued that the law should be preserved only for those who try to do something out of pure self-interest at the expense of the interests of society as a whole. Hence, the law of the country has been modified to include harsh punishments with the aim of achievingand maintaining an appropriate social order withmaximum social welfare. In this regard China’s legal systemdiffers significantly from that of the West