Riding the Tiger: Legitimacy and Legal Culture in Post-Mao China

Abstract

Efforts at legal reform in China under the banner of the socialist legal system (shehui zhuyi fazhi) represent an attempt by the post-Mao regime to rest legitimacy in part on an ideology of formal law that complements the regime's efforts at economic reform. While the Party has not abandoned its reliance on the conceit that it represents the forces of historical revolution, the establishment of the socialist legal system is aimed to some extent at addressing a more immediate challenge of retaining legitimacy in the eyes of a populace for whom abstract notions of historical determinacy have little meaning. Proponents of reform have linked these abstract and practical aspects of legitimacy by asserting that legal reform is a requirement of the specific stage of historical development in which China now finds itself.