Chinese Law Prof Blog

The Proview vs. Apple dispute over the iPad name in China

The right to use the letters IPAD (regardless of upper- or lower-case) has been the subject of recent litigation and enforcement actions in China in which Apple is (so far) losing. I am by no means an IP expert, but I recognize sound analysis when I see it, and so recommend that any one interested check out the series of posts on this topic by Stan Abrams at the China Hearsay blog. Just go to the blog address and search for "Proview", then start from the earliest post. For the back story, first see these two stories (first | second) from the Financial Times.

Brief takeaway: This is not a story about China's failure to protect intellectual property. It's much more likely a story of bad lawyering and careless due diligence on Apple's part. (Likely, but not definitely - we don't know all the details yet.)

Summer internships at the CECC

The Congressional-Executive Commission on China is looking for summer interns; application deadline is March 1. Here's the announcement. More details available here.

Yale China Law Center seeks research associate for Beijing office

It's a one-year position and begins this summer. Here's the announcement.

Ford Foundation seeks program officer for law-related initiatives in China

Here's a terrific opportunity for the right person; the current program officer, Ira Belkin, is moving to New York to take up the position of Executive Director at NYU Law School's US-Asia Law Institute.

Here's a summary:

• Job title: Program Officer, Reforming Civil and Criminal Justice Systems – China | Equality and Justice Unit | Democracy, Rights and Justice (Ford Foundation)
• First sentence of summary description:  The Program Officer will be responsible for developing, monitoring, and coordinating grant making in support of China’s national efforts at legal reform and establishing a society under the Rule of Law.
• Application deadline: March 14, 2012

Here's the full text of the announcement, including contact information.

The company we keep

There is a certain type of person who likes to criticize the arrogance of "the West" or "us" or "the U.S." in always lecturing China and being unwilling to consider what the lecturer might learn from China. (I've always found this line of argument annoying because it insists that when I open my mouth, I must be speaking for some larger collectivity instead of just myself, and then believes me adequately refuted if some weakness in the collectivity's case can be shown.) I see that at least in the realm of solitary confinement of prisoners, the United States, and in particular the Commonwealth of Virginia, has confounded these critics by going China one better.

New blog on Chinese intellectual property

I'd like to announce a new blog on Chinese intellectual property. It's authored by Mark Cohen, who has had a long and distinguised career in the field. Here's the address: chinaipr.com.

PhD positions at Amsterdam Law School

Amsterdam Law School has ten (salaried) PhD positions open, and applicants interested in China with excellent legal and language skills are encouraged to apply. You would have the privilege of working with Benjamin van Rooij, author (among other things) of a terrific book on Chinese environmental law that combines unique fieldwork with theoretical sophistication.

Details here.

Do judges have a duty to speak Mandarin in court?

Ultra-nationalist Peking University professor Kong Qingdong (孔庆东), who boasts of being a direct descendant of Confucius, stirred up a controversy the other day with televised insults to the people of Hong Kong - mocking their accent, calling them dogs (he later claimed he only meant some of them), and declaring that all Chinese had a duty to be able to speak Mandarin. (Here's a video of his remarks and the Hong Kong subway incident that prompted them.)

I want to look particularly at his claim that all Chinese have a duty to speak Mandarin. Here's what he said, in the original and in translation: "说普通话的人没有义务、没有必要掌握任何一种方言。中国人有义务说普通话。. . . 当你遇到一个人，他所操的方言跟你不一样的时候，怎么办？双方都应该说普通话。故意不说普通话是什么人？王八蛋！" ("People who speak Mandarin have no duty and no need to speak any other dialect. Chinese have a duty to speak Mandarin. . . . When you meet with someone and his dialect is different from yours, what should be done? Both parties should speak Mandarin. What kind of person would deliberately not speak Mandarin? A bastard!")

This is where Prof. Kong may get himself in trouble, and not just for his un-Confucian way of expressing himself, which would seem more suited to a Legalist book-burning. In the trial of Li QInghong (黎庆洪) just conducted in Guiyang, the presiding judge decided on the third day of proceedings to stop speaking in Mandarin and began instead to speak on in local Guiyang dialect, making it difficult for Li's lawyer to understand the proceedings. When Li's lawyer objected and said that the judge was required under relevant law to speak Mandarin, the judge said that it was his right to use Mandarin or Guiyang dialect as he pleased. But perhaps Prof. Kong will surprise me and denounce the presiding judge as a bastard.

Thanks for Flora Sapio for bringing this interesting aspect of the Li Qinghong case to my attention.

Simon Leys (Pierre Ryckmans) on Liu Xiaobo

Here's Leys's review of a newly-published collection of Liu Xiaobo's writings in English translation in the New York Review of Books.

Serial killers in China

Here's a fascinating article on the subject from the Danwei blog. Among other things, it discusses the case-cracking incentives faced by police. Non-political offenses are rarely the subject of central government attention; crimes like serial murder are generally left to local police, who get no points for solving crimes committed in someone else's jurisdiction, and may indeed have to pay the cost of feeding and housing the suspect until he is sent back (also at their expense) to the jurisdiction that wants him.

Wheelchair-bound threat to the people's democratic dictatorship

Fresh from its triumph over the dark forces of Hollywood in their attempt to topple the state by shaking the hand of a blind man, the people's democratic dictatorship has now set its sights, once again, on Ni Yulan, already crippled by earlier police beatings. Apparently she and her husband have been "picking quarrels" and "disturbing public order", both criminal offenses. The New York Times story is here. Apparently the leaders have not been reading books about how China is destined to take over the world. They seem extraordinarily unconfident and fearful.

Gao Zhisheng (apparently) found

Chinese prison authorities have apparently notified Gao Zhisheng's brother that he is being held in a prison in Xinjiang. Here's the report from China Aid Association (I added the link about the alleged probation violation):

China Aid Association

(Washington, D.C. – Jan. 1, 2012) For the first time since his most recent forced disappearance 20 months ago, the whereabouts of human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng were confirmed on Sunday.

ChinaAid learned that Gao Zhisheng’s older brother, Gao Zhiyi, received written notification on Sunday of Gao’s incarceration in Shaya Prison in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in far western China.  The notification was signed and dated on Dec. 19 by the prison.

Gao disappeared into police custody in April 2010, the most recent in a series of forced disappearances since his 2006 conviction on a subversion charge.  On Dec. 16, just days before his five-year probation period was to have ended, the Chinese government announced that it was sending him to prison for three years for violating his probation.  It was the first word that he was still alive, but no information of his whereabouts or condition was released.

Shaya (Xayar) Prison is located in Aksu Prefecture, about 1,130 kilometers (700 miles) southwest of the Xinjiang capital of Urumqi.

"Gao's internal exile reminds the world of how former Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov was cruelly treated in Siberia in the 1980s," said ChinaAid founder and president Bob Fu, a friend of Gao. “The Chinese government can use this remote jail to prevent concerned people from visiting Attorney Gao, but just like Sakharov, Gao's courageous voice can never be silenced by the four walls of his prison cell."

Gao Zhiyi is planning to visit Gao Zhisheng as soon as he gets a physical address of the prison.

The prison’s mailing address is : Shaya Prison, Shaya county, Aksu  Prefecture, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, Postal code: 842208
Prison phone number: +86-997-8402100.

Gao Zhiyi’s phone number: +86-151-9198-5726

Larry Ribstein, RIP

I was shocked and very saddened to hear of Prof. Larry Ribstein's sudden death (apparently from a stroke) on Dec. 24th. In addition to teaching Chinese law, I also teach business associations, and so was familiar with Larry's name and fame before actually meeting him when we were both visiting professors at NYU Law School in 2007-08. You can get a sense of Larry's personality by reading his voluminous writings and blog posts - his style is crystal clear and highly readable, his ideas original and important. But I needed to meet him in person to get a full sense of the man and to realize what a cool guy he was.

As I read others' remembrances, one term keeps cropping up that is one of the first things I noticed, too: intellectually honest. Larry was not afraid to follow his ideas where they led him, but never mischaracterized opposing ideas in order to refute them more easily. He had very strong ideas (in addition to deep learning) on many subjects, but I can think of few people with whom it was more fun to discuss things.

Larry's scholarly productivity is the stuff of legend - lots of it, on a wide range of topics, and all of it top-notch. I once asked him how he managed to do it. His answer: "I don't need a lot of sleep."

So broad is Larry's impact that it even reaches the field of Chinese law. He had been to China and was consulted on the drafting of (what else?) China's Partnership Law.

It is truly sad that such a terrific scholar and colleague has been lost to us.

Here's the announcement from the University of Illinois, and here's a remembrance from Geoffrey Manne (collecting other remembrances as well).

Gao Zhisheng welcomes revocation of probation, looks forward to prison beatings

Gao Zhisheng welcomes revocation of probation, looks forward to prison beatings

DATELINE: Somewhere in China, Dec. 16, 2011 -- Noted Chinese dissident Gao Zhisheng today welcomed the news that his probation had been revoked and that he would be going back to prison. “I’ve gotta admit, life on the outside has been a bit tougher than I expected,” he said through clenched teeth, as his broken jaw had been wired shut. “But at least I’ll know where I am.”

Speaking from an undisclosed location, Gao also said that he looked forward to meeting his new cellmates and to being beaten by them daily. “Hey, I can handle daily,” he said. “It’s two or three times daily that gets a little wearing.” He added that another advantage of prison life was that because cigarettes were scarce, they were used mostly for smoking.

PILnet seeks country director for China

Here's the job announcement.

An interesting take on China's solar subsidies

Here's an interesting take on China's solar subsidies from Bronte Capital: whether they exist, their WTO legality, whether the Chinese manufacturers can survive without them, etc. These subsidies are now the subject of a US antidumping and countervailing duty investigation.

China: A Decade in the WTO - conference papers

Here's a link to the papers from a conference on "A Decade in the WTO: Implications for China and Global Trade Governance".

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ABA Rule of Law Initiative seeks deputy country director for China

Here's the announcement. They are looking for someone with (1) a Juris Doctor or equivalent law degree; (2) at least five years of practical legal experience, with a minimum of one year working on donor-funded international legal reform programs, preferably in China; (3) demonstrated planning, management, analytical, and writing skills; (4) fluency in English; (5) proficiency in both written and spoken standard Chinese (Mandarin); (6) excellent oral communication and interpersonal skills; and (7) familiarity with the Chinese legal system, as well as the current political and cultural context.

The position is available immediately; they are looking at applications on a rolling basis, so hurry! (On the other hand, are there many people out there who have those qualifications?)

Pu Zhiqiang on Ai Weiwei's tax case

Noted lawyer Pu Zhiqiang represents the Beijing Fake Cultural Development Company (北京发课文化发展有限公司) in its tax case. The government claims that Fake has tax problems and that Ai Weiwei is responsible for them. Here is Pu's analysis of the situation, in Chinese and (courtesy of the Siweiluozi blog) English. It's useful reading for those who still manage to believe that this is just a tax case.

Incidentally, "Fake" is just the romanization of the characters in the name; possibly it is a cute pun on the English word "fake".

NOVEMBER 21 UPDATE: A friend informs me that he has it on good authority that the characters 发课 (fa ke) are actually a pun on a four-letter English expletive. As this is a family blog, I will say no more.

An independent candidate's story

Qiao Mu (乔木), an associate professor at Beijing Foreign Studies University and the director of its Center for International Communications Studies, recently ran (maybe "attempted to run" would be more accurate) as an independent candidate for the Haidian district people's congress. This is the only level of people's congress where candidates are directly elected; delegates to higher-level congresses are selected by lower-level congresses. And this is of course all done under the guidance of the Party. The election was on Nov. 8th. Here's his account:

As an independent candidate, I did not win the election, but got the second largest votes (1300 ballots) after one month campaign with my voluntary supporters, which shaped democracy in my university-community and brought many positive changes in the campus management and people’s mind.

I had NO intention to challenge the ruling party and the political system in the grassroots election. What I cared was the voter’s (faculty and students) opinion, livelihood and rights. However, I encountered increasingly enormous pressure and oppression from the very beginning. My voluntary students were forced to quit the campaign. Many organized spreading rumors and political lies in SMS to defame my personality, motives and actions (mostly on social media), i.e., my campaign was a conspiracy and sponsored by the west media, and I was manipulated by the US embassy, and I will leave the university it is useless to vote for me.

I was shocked to find, in the last week before the vote day, all my social media ( weibo/micro-blog on sina.com, blog, renren and my election video on tudou/56 were closed.) I tried to register new one many times on sina.com and renren.com, but all were closed for a short while. Things went beyond my imagination. All my mobiles and phones were monitored. I was followed by two securities in the campus and two secret agents outside. Many students and faculty members involved were forced verbally to quit me. Some students were required to identify my supporter on CCTV, some parents were asked to come to Beijing to persuade the students to stop.

The Big Brother was watching us.

We did nothing wrong. All we did was in the track of China’s constitution and election law. But I was told there were policy and regulation, which were more important and measurable.

On the vote day of Nov 8, there were numerous banners and flags in the campus, which said to carry on socialist democracy and enhance the rule of law, and to vote gloriously. Many securities and secret agents walked around. People outside of the campus were not allowed to entered for three days.

I was not among the two officially nominated candidates. My name was not in the ballot. However, the voter could write down my name if they voted for me. I got 1296 votes among 8035 turn-outs, the second largest winner, much more than an official candidate. The No.1, a vice presidents of my university, passed the half line only with 117 more votes. If no those 117 votes, the election would be a runoff. He and I, the first two, will be voted another day. In that case, my name will be written on the ballot. Who knows the result?

Farewell to my 10 weibo (Microblogs on sina.com), 4 blogs with 100 articles,  and 1 paid Renren ID with twenty thousand followers, most of them were my university (vote zone) contacts.

My social media can be closed, but I will neve close my  mouth and my writing will never stop.

Qiao Mu (Michael)