Title: The discipline of international law in Republican China and Contemporary Taiwan
Abstract: This Article examines the evolution of international law as a professional and intellectual discipline in the Republic of China (ROC), which has governed Mainland China (1912–1949) and post-1949 Taiwan. The ROC’s centennial development fundamentally shaped modern China’s course of foreign relations and postwar global governance. The Article argues that statism, pragmatism, and idealism define the major features of the ROC’s approach to international law. These characteristics transformed the law of nations into universally valid normative claims and prompted modern China’s intellectual focus on the civilized nation concept. First, the Article analyzes the professionalization of the discipline of international law. It offers insight into the cultivation of China’s firstgeneration international lawyers in the Foreign Ministry, international law societies, and the Shanghai Mixed Court. Second, it explores the ROC’s approach of assertive legalism in applying international law to advance diplomatic objectives. The nation’s strategic engagement with unequal treaties, the League of Nations, and the United Nations contributed to its Grotian moment. The assertion of legal claims in judicial proceedings and Taiwan’s international standing further reinforced the dynamic dimension of the discipline. Therefore, this Article provides a valuable case study of twentieth century international lawmaking in East Asia. Assistant Professor of Law, Singapore Management University (SMU) School of Law. J.D., LL.M., University of Pennsylvania; LL.B., National Chengchi University (NCCU), Taiwan. E-mail: [email protected]. I wish to thank Professors Dino Kritsiotis, Anne Orford, Mary Footer, Jacques deLisle, John KT Chao, Chun-i Chen, Rao Geping, Li Zhaojie, Kevin Tan, Mark Findlay, Stefan Talmon, Kirsten Sellars, David Llewelyn, Robert Barnidge, Jr., Arnulf Becker Lorca, Timothy Webster, Yip Man, Jure Vidmar, Maartje de Visser, KC Lin, Prabhakar Singh, and participants at the Second Annul Junior Faculty Forum for International Law at the University of Nottingham, the ILAASIL Asia-Pacific Research Forum in Taipei and conferences at the University of Cambridge, the National University of Singapore, Tsinghua University and Xiamen University for their insights and comments on earlier drafts of this Article. I also acknowledge the generous support provided by SMU (C234/MSS12L007) and NCCU Hungdah Chiu International Law Library, as well as the valuable assistance of Jerome Yang, Amanda Shan, and Harriet Chen. 88 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY GLOBAL STUDIES LAW REVIEW [VOL. 14:87
Publication Year: 2015
Publication Date: 2015-08-13
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 2
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