If we fail, we shall at least have the satisfaction of believing that our work has been honestly done in the interest of the law school and of its alumni.
1 Harv. L. Rev. 35 (1887)
The above quote is not our own, but it could not be a more accurate statement of our feelings towards this enterprise: the Tsinghua China Law Review. The TCLR was created from a desire to provide a new perspective in the global academic discussion of Chinese legal issues and to increase the level of scholarship on Chinese law that is available to an English-language audience. Scholarship published by the TCLR will produce greater understanding and critical examination of Chinese law – a genre that is currently underserved in legal academia. The TCLR will provide a voice to the world for Tsinghua Law School, and contribute to its development as a leading institution for the study of law.
The bold students that are quoted above were the creators of the first student-edited law journal. In 1887, they created the Harvard Law Review, with the primary goal to serve the local legal community with relevant, practical articles of legal analysis. Despite these humble beginnings, student-edited law journals have gone on to become the most important and influential forum for legal academic discussion. We are therefore well aware of the potential for our law journal, and so there is no reason to be bashful about our aspirations. We hope to become a leading global academic journal on Chinese legal issues. We hope to publish articles that have a positive influence on the development of China’s legal system. And we hope to create a greater understanding of the Chinese legal system among the global legal community.
We live in the information age, in which technology has made our world much smaller. Scholars on opposite sides of the world can now work closely, and such communication allows for a global model for law journals, such as the TCLR. We are able to work with authors from many countries, edit articles in Beijing, transmit them to our printer in the US, and from there distribute copies of the TCLR around the world. The international nature of both the process and the people involved give this journal a special character. Our authors for this issue hail from Boston, Washington, Los Angeles, Beijing, Wuhan, and Yunnan. The TCLRBoard of Editors – a collaborative effort between foreign students in the LLM Program in Chinese Law and other Tsinghua Law School students – is also very diverse by nationality. Nearly half of our student editors are from China, and the others are from Australia, England, France, Korea, Panama, and the US. This staff allows us to draw on skills and substantive knowledge developed in many different legal systems. We hope that the value of this cross-cultural and cross-jurisdictional staff is evident in the quality of the TCLR.
Tsinghua Law School was the first Chinese law school to establish an LL.M. program in English for foreign law students and lawyers, and thus is in a unique position to be able to form a team of student editors for an English-language law journal. We feel very fortunate to have had the opportunity to work on such a unique project and feel that it is our responsibility to use our abilities and the resources to create a greater understanding of the Chinese legal system throughout the world. Ultimately, the goal of all of those in legal academia should be to not only understand legal systems, but to improve them. By providing a forum for critical dialogue, the TCLR will play a positive role in the ongoing improvement of China’s legal system. It was not terribly long ago that Western scholars were proclaiming that Chinese society was incompatible with the concept of law, disseminating beliefs that "[t]he Chinese notion of Order excludes, in all aspects, the idea of Law." While such theories are no longer en vogue in academia, among the global legal community at large many popular misconceptions regarding Chinese law persist. This is undoubtedly due, in part, to a lack of exposure to scholarship on Chinese law. We hope that the average law student that notices, for the first time, a law journal from China on the shelves of their library and decides to skim our pages comes away with a more informed conception of Chinese law. Perhaps they will find that Chinese law is more sophisticated than they expected, or find elements of Chinese law are similar to their own country’s laws, or conversely find ways in which laws are unique to China. Regardless of their impression of Chinese law, they will surely come away more informed on Chinese law and perhaps with a newfound interest to learn more.
As Professor Chen Weizuo has told us on many occasions, "well begun is half done." We hope that this first issue is only the beginning of a long and distinguished future for the Tsinghua China Law Review. We, the editors of the first issue, have done our part, and we pass the torch to the next class. To future classes, we ask that you evaluate our work objectively. Learn from our successes, and, most importantly, improve on our shortcomings. There is so much potential in this law review and we hope that you seize opportunities to expand its scope—case reports, judicial interpretations, legislation updates, a commentary section, symposium issues, etc. 加油!
The Board of Editors would like to recognize those individuals whose contributions have made the TCLR possible. The support of the Tsinghua Law School Administration has been incredible. Dean Wang Zhenmin and former Dean Wang Chenguang believed in our vision when the TCLR was only a proposal on paper, and they not only gave their approval but also pledged the law school’s resources, including valuable office space. We cannot express enough gratitude to the authors of the first issue, who took a leap of faith in choosing to publish in a new law journal. We thank our Faculty Advisory Board, Prof. Chen Weizuo, Prof. Cui Guobin, and Mr. Zhang Libin, for their advice and support. We also received valuable advice from Mr. Michael Page of Cornell Law Review, and Mr. Chad Eggspuehler of Ohio State Law Journal. We would like to thank the staff at our printers, Joe Christensen, Inc., and in particular Suzi Otradovsky. We also would like to thank our support staff at the law school, especially Ms. Liu Jieying, who handles our administrative matters, and Ms. Liu Haiying, who manages our website.
To our readers, we hope that you enjoy this first issue and come back to read future editions of the TCLR. We hope that you not only subscribe but also submit articles. We certainly welcome your comments and feedback.
