Chinese Legal Culture
We apply a concept of legal culture in order to tackle the challenges of studying Chinese law from an external and comparative perspective. While the context of law is regularly omitted in doctrinal legal research that takes an internal, participant-oriented approach to its object of study, external factors are more relevant for the understanding of foreign law if the people who study such law do not share the same preconceptions and preconceived attitudes as those who create and apply the law. Hence, an approach to the research of Chinese law that is specifically sensitive to the historical, political, economic and institutional conditions of the creation, application and enforcement of law appears most suitable in order to avoid misconceptions and misrepresentations about the meaning and operation of Chinese law.
The European Chinese Law Research Hub serves as a platform to inform about research activities at the Chair of Chinese Legal Culture and beyond. https://blog.uni-koeln.de/eclrhub/
News and Activities
Talk: Chinese Law and Research Security
Talk: Chinese Patent Law
On July 5th, Dr. Daniel Sprick gave a presentation on the system and recent developments of China's patent law at the Forschungszentrum Jülich. He discussed inter alia China's push for higher quality patents, the confidentiality review mechanism for Chinese patents and the different routes for patent enforcement in China.
China Dialog
On 27 June 2024 Björn Ahl was a guest at China Dialog and discussed with Eva Pils, King’s College London, the modernisation of the Chinese legal system. China Dialog is organised by Maximilian Meyer, University of Bonn.
Workshop on China and the Standardization of Digital Technologies
In cooperation-with Dr. Daniel Fuchs (Humboldt University, Berlin), Marianne von Bloomberg and Dr. Daniel Sprick organized an international workshop on the standardization of digital technologies in China. This interdisciplinary workshop brought together experts in the field of law, political sciences, sociology as well as practitioners in the field of standards and law for the purpose of bridging a knowledge gap in
understanding the dynamics of China’s rising standards power and the direct or indirect input of non-state (and non-Chinese) actors in shaping the development and application of standards for digital technologies.
Cologne International Forum: Chinese Law and Latin America
Dr. Monika Prusinowska from the University of Barcelona and Dr. Daniel Sprick team up for an Innovative Tandem Collaboration in the context of the Cologne International Forum with a project on "The Legal Dimension of China’s Presence in Latin America: Opportunities, Risks, and Responses". This Project sheds light on a critical yet under-analyzed aspect of China's growing presence in Latin America: the legal implications. While the economic, social, and political dimensions have received more attention, the complex legal landscape remains underexplored. This Project shall contribute to filling this gap, offering an opportunity to PhD students and young career scholars to deepen their understanding of the impact of Chinese approaches to law and its impact on Latin America as well as their transnational and global implications.
Comparative perspectives on AI regulation at the CPDP, Brussels
At the 17th international conference "Computers, Privacy & Data Protection" in Brussels, Daniel Sprick joined Prof. Julie Cohen (Georgetown), Prof. Fumio Shimpo (Tokyo) and Zoe Kardasiadou (European Commission) for a panel on "Power, Convenience, and Prestige in the Governance and Legal Regulation of AI" and gave a presentation on "China’s Large Legislative Model for AI: Of Guidelines, Regulations and Standards".
Lecture: Economic Crimes and Economic Criminal Law in China
At the invitation of the School of Law and Economy of China at the University Warsaw, Dr. Daniel Sprick held a lecture on "Economic Crimes and Economic Criminal Law in China", discussing cases such as Sanlu or E-zubao as well as China's efforts to fight telecommunication fraud.
Talk: Chinese AI Value Alignment
COIMBRA Group Conference on China
The China Competence Centre of the University of Würzburg (CCCUW) and the Coimbra Group (CG) Global Partnerships Working Group invited colleagues from CG Universities to learn about the current state of EU-China relations among HEIs, to exchange experiences with related national and EU policies, and to discuss ways ahead that allow universities to continue cooperation while raising awareness and mitigating risks.European Universities’ cooperation with China.
Daniel Sprick presented the University of Cologne's Guidelines for Cooperation with China and discused selected issues of Chinese law and legal practice as risk factors for academic cooperation with China.
https://www.uni-wuerzburg.de/en/research/china-competence-centre/events/2024-1/
Publication on Illegal Fundraising in China
Daniel Sprick published a new article on the pocket crime of illegal fundraising in China:
Systemic Convictions: China’s Fundraising Crimes and its Financial System
Abstract
Fundraising crimes are legion in China. And this is not only a criminological observation as the respective provisions of the Criminal Law can be applied in an extremely broad scope of cases, ranging from personal loans or brokering investments for small businesses to platform-based P2P lending operations. Its unclear demarcation produces legal uncertainty that has its root cause not only in vague provisions of the Criminal Law or broad legal interpretations of the judiciary, but also in the systemic function of these crimes. This paper argues that normative analyses about legal (un) certainty and regulatory necessities in the field of illegal fundraising in China need to be widened and additionally include a perspective of political expediency. The financial sector in China is highly dominated by state actors and state-owned banks, which inevitably follow policy directives and form a cornerstone of the regime’s control over the economic system. For the purpose of maintaining this status quo, it is extremely valuable to retain the possibility to criminalize a wide range of financial interactions that would circumvent the state-dominated banking system. Particularly, the crime of “Illegally Absorbing Public Savings” provides the authorities with such a device and should therefore be understood as an important foothold of China’s authoritarian legality in its capital markets. This crime is therefore positioned at the intersection of China’s Leninist notion of ubiquitous control and its market-based economy.
Workshop Chinese Law and Academic Cooperation
On February 19th 2024, Daniel Sprick led a workshop at the RWTH Aachen University on legal dimensions of academic cooperation with China. As part of the ENTRANCE (Expertise & Transfer Network on China & Europe) project, this workshop discussed the Chinese legal system in general and selected issues such as academic freedom, export controls, data security, protection and transfer as well as China's anti-espionage law.