Environmental litigation in China : a study in political ambivalence / / Rachel E. Stern.

• Author: ProQuest (Firm); Stern, Rachel E.
• TeilnehmendeR: ProQuest (Firm)
• Year of Publication: 2013
• Language: English
• Series: Cambridge studies in law and society
• Physical Description: ix, 300 p. :; ill.

"This is a book about the improbable: seeking legal relief for environmental pollution in contemporary China. It is a story involving judges, lawyers, and international groups as well as the individuals who file civil environmental lawsuits, people such as the village doctor who spent well over a decade suing a local chemical plant. The book offers a close-to-the-ground account of everyday justice and the factors that shape it. In a country known for tight political control and ineffectual courts, Environmental Litigation in China unravels how litigation works: how judges make decisions, why lawyers take cases and how international influence matters. Conceptually, the book illustrates how litigation can contribute to social change in China and, by implication, other authoritarian states. Even in a country where expectations would be that law wouldn't much matter, environmental litigation can provide a limited opportunity for legal professionals to explore new roles and, in so doing, probe the boundary of what is politically possible"-- Provided by publisher.

Table of Contents

Machine generated contents note: 1. Post-Mao: economic growth, environmental protection, and the law; 2. From dispute to decision; 3. Frontiers of environmental law; 4. Political ambivalence: the state; 5. On the front lines: the judges; 6. Heroes or troublemakers? The lawyers; 7. Soft support: the international NGOs; 8. Thinking about outcomes.