受訪者：Professor Yu-Jie Chen 陳玉潔教授

採訪者：Professor Mab Huang 黃默教授

Paraphrased by Yu-Zhe Huang 黃于哲

採訪日期：2022年5月3日

本專題採訪獲「 國家科學及技術委員會人文社會科學研究中心」 補助

Abstract

This is the second time Professor Yu-Jie Chen was invited to reflect upon her multifaceted career: researcher, teacher, and activist. In 2014, she primarily focused on her doctoral thesis: how Taiwan’s practice of human rights treaties as a non-UN member state and how it honors the notion of local-global co-ownership. Now, as an Assistant Research Professor at Institutum Iurisprudentiae of Academia Sinica, she and Professor Mab Huang had a more wide-ranging discussion on her research projects which include (1) China’s authoritarian political and legal system and its influence on the international human rights regime and (2) how Beijing governs the relations with Hong Kong as well as between China and Taiwan.

I. Introduction

In May 2022, Professor Mab Huang was honored to invite Dr. Yu-Jie Chen to discuss her multifaceted career since the first interview took place 8 years ago. At the time, the first talk was primarily on her research on Taiwan, that is, how Taiwan introduces international human rights regime into the island republic, and how Taiwan is moving along with writing national reports, inviting international experts to come to Taipei to review the reports. During that period of time, Professor Chen participated in those to a great degree. The second time Professor Huang began by indicating how Professor Chen has done well in her researches and activities over the years. To start with, our viewer will learn about her colorful background, study, training, and important publications.

Professor Chen said that she was trained in Taiwan and also received training in the United States later. She studied law in Taiwan, at National Chengchi University (國立政治大學), undergraduate and graduate school. And then she went on to practice law as a commercial lawyer.

At the time, Professor Chen felt that she wanted to study more and to switch her track from private practice to more public-interest-oriented matters. As such, she decided to go abroad and studied law at NYU School of Law. She graduated there and went on to work at an NGO called Human Rights in China, which is based in New York.

And then, she worked there on human rights issues regarding China, doing mostly international (human rights) advocacy, meaning Chinese legal research, as well as writing NGO reports on human rights issues in China, and presenting them to the United Nations and human rights agencies.

That really sparked her interest in international human rights issues and in China as well, of course. Then, she went to U.S.-Asia Law Institute, based at NYU School of Law. She did research with Professor Jerome Cohen for a number of years, before she really decided to do a Ph.D. in law. So that’s sort of the track of her education, and she is delighted to say it’s been a great journey for her.

She learns so much about her education about international law, international relations, and human rights issues in the context of China and Taiwan. And, now, her research focuses mainly on these issues, with special attention to China and cross-strait relations, and more recently on Hong Kong as well. Before she came back to take this position as assistant research professor at Academia Sinica, Law Institute, Professor Chen was in Hong Kong University for most of the year 2019 to 2020.

And, that really was a special experience, and also helped her realize that she needs to expand her research on Hong Kong as well.

On that note, Professor Huang asked, how you kind of sort out that, how much attention you pay to Taiwan, the human rights situation in Taiwan, the development of the legal system, and the courts in Taiwan? And how much time and effort to spend on China and then Hong Kong? Can you make that kind of estimate or does that make sense to you?

Professor Chen said, “I don’t think I can juggle all of the things at the same time. I do them poorly, so I would never suggest anybody to do that. I try to focus on one thing at one time. As my friend always said, one step at a time. But, of course, as a scholar, you are sort of pushed and motivated to expand your expertise always, always.”

When she first studied at the JSD program at NYU School of Law, she focused mostly on Taiwan and the international human rights regime, and how Taiwan is trying to be seen as a member — a de facto member of the human rights regime, although Taiwan cannot be recognized by the United Nations.

Her research track really started there. But, meanwhile, she was also working at that time at the U.S.-Asia Law Institute. She also has to do part-time research on China-related issues and especially, regarding their legal reform and human rights lawyers. So, that was gradually becoming her focus, once she did her Ph.D. thesis on Taiwan.

Professor Chen also spent some time in China during that period. She would go to China for two to three weeks for meetings after meetings, while being privileged to have that opportunity thanks to the U.S.-Asia Law Institute. “We would meet as a group, me and my colleagues at NYU and also beyond NYU. We would travel as a group and we would go to different cities in China,” she said.  

She was fortunate enough to participate in those meetings before China kind of closed down. Right now, it’s really difficult to have that kind of frank exchange of ideas with her Chinese counterparts and her Chinese colleagues.

Sometimes, she thinks, the difference in the political positions also makes it quite uneasy to have a friendly dialogue. But she was very glad that she did have those precious opportunities to talk with Chinese colleagues, scholars, and students during that time.

So, when she had that chance to go to Hong Kong, she was so excited. She had the chance to go there in 2019 as a post-doctoral global fellow at Hong Kong University Law School. And, as known, 2019 was an important year for Hong Kong — the Anti-Extradition Bill Movement was really just on the rise in the summer. So, when she got there in August, she really had the privilege to witness the protest on the street, and in the campus, just, you know, the first-hand experience with watching how the students thought about their actions, and how the protesters thought about their actions, and what the government, the Hong Kong government did in response to the protest.

All was very dramatic, as you can imagine. And, unfortunately, she thinks, the position by Beijing of the national security law on Hong Kong in June 2020 really put an end to this Hong Kong spirit for their, you know, struggles to have freedom, have a democratic system. All of hopes kind of were dashed at that point. It was also a little bit heartbreaking to see all that happen.

II. Professor Chen on Her Important Publications

Professor Huang asked, “Now, I have referred to your publications. If you have to choose a few of the articles you have written, sort out your representative work, what are some of the articles you have chosen?”

“Actually I love all of what I do,” Professor Chen said. “It’s gonna be a hard pick. But, I will have to pick, (it would be) those articles on China and the international human rights system — That’s onestrand of my research.It’s very important for me. And, I believe, it’s very important for the current international legal system.”

Professor Chen said she also would pick another area, which is, the law in cross-strait relations, because she does think, it is in need of research. Many people look at China-Taiwan relations, for sure. But, but not many people look at it from the perspective of law. That’s where she feels she can make a contribution.

Professor Chen also pointed out that she doesn’t have any illusion about the significance of law to influence cross-strait relations. “I think Xi Jinping has his agenda, and the Taiwan government also has their own politics to play in terms of domestic, political competition,” she said.

But, on the other hand, she doesn’t think we should give up the role that law can play in regulating cross-strait relations. We still need to insist that it (cross-strait relations) should be a rules-based order, including all the cross-strait agreements that the two governments signed through their proxy organizations. Those cross-strait agreements are legal documents, and they should be binding on the two governments. So, it’s not all about politics.

So, that’s why Professor Chen chooses this area, because she does think we, as legal scholars, can make more contributions to the political and diplomatic discussions between the two governments.

III. Professor Chen on “Authoritarian International Law in Action”

“Now, to begin with, so, you think about your series of articles on China and the international human rights standards, as your, were the best contributions, if I can put it, but, your articles are all very good,” said Professor Huang.

Professor Huang asked, “When it comes to your article on ‘Authoritarian International Law in Action’ that you criticized Beijing’s behavior in the Human Rights Council; Do you think what you referred to as the ‘Tribal Politics,’ what you referred to as the ‘Authoritarian International Law in Action,’ is this going to be a passing affair or it is going to, we’re going to live with that for many years, if not decades, to come?”

Professor Chen thinks that authoritarianism is on the rise, not only in world politics but also in the legal system that we can see inside the U.N. and beyond the U.N. So, the focus should not just be narrowed or limited to the U.N.-related agencies.

But she takes the U.N. human rights council as the window of observation, and see, try to observe what China is doing there, and what it is promoting about its human rights ideas. And, the articles are a critique of China presenting the idea of “Human Rights under Socialism with Chinese Characteristics (中國特色社會主義人權)”

She tried to trace this idea’s origin, and then, also read Beijing’s narratives about it, and see what it is currently promoting in the Human Rights Council. “You can see they have been quite consistent in their view of human rights, although we might not agree that their human rights ideas are a human-rights-based approach,” said Professor Chen.

In fact, in her articles, she argues that those idea promoted by the Chinese government is actually a departure from the fundamental principles that are valued in the international human rights system.

But, in any event, if we just take their concept as given and think about it, basically, they are saying two things, two things that are very important to Beijing, in terms of their human rights ideas. One thing is the state-centered view of human rights, which is to say it should be human rights cooperation or human rights dialogues between states. And, these (human rights) issues should not be “confrontational,” as they often say.

And, they, when she says “they” it’s Chinese officials who often accuse western democracies of being hypocritical or having double standards. Since 1989, the June 4th massacre, Beijingdoesn’t like to be criticized. Since 1989, it’s often been a target of criticism in the U.N. Commission on human rights (the predecessor of Human Rights Council).

After the Human Rights Council was established in 2006, Beijing has rallied a group of like-minded countries to form this loosely organized coalition in the Human Rights Council, called the “Like-Minded Group.”

Therefore, Beijing currently does have significant support in the Human Rights Council to push its own agenda. And, so, the first agenda it is pushing is a state-centric view, meaning that no state should be confronted by individuals. It is a state-led human rights approach. State should take control. It’s very opposite of the conventional view that we have in the human rights system, which is sort of individual-based and autonomy-based approach. So, that is the first on their agenda.

And, the second is the development: It’s development, development, and development, meaning that they think of human rights in terms of development as the priority. And the logic behind this is, well, if we feed so many people, if we prevent so many people from hunger, then, that’s a human rights contribution.

“And, to this question, I would say, yes, I know; yes, it’s very important to have people fed and have themselves be able to sustain their lives,” said Professor Chen.

Professor Chen went on to say, “But it’s more than that. Human rights is more than that. Beijing’s approach is more top-down rather than bottom-up, meaning that it’s a state-led development program. The civil society doesn’t really have that much of voice in terms of advocating their rights to adequate living standard, to housing, to the right to health, etc. So, there’s a crackdown on civil society in recent years, even on NGOs that are working on social, economic, and cultural rights.”

She wouldn’t believe that a development-oriented program (in Beijing’s view) is a human rights program, because a lot of things that the Chinese government does in practice go against with the spirit of international human rights principles.

In terms of the authoritarian expansion in the international legal system, it’s not just, you know, physical aggression, but the expansion of their norms, their ideas, to influence the operation of the international human rights system.

“It is indeed pushing harder because of the economic power and military power it’s having now. Authoritarianism cannot have been more apparent. It’s very different from twenty years ago. So, you do see a rise in China’s activism in pushing its goals in different organizations,” said Professor Chen.

Because her area is human rights, so she takes the Human Rights Council as an example. But China is doing a lot of international engagement, not only in human rights, but in a lot of other areas too. Some of them are constructive to the multilateral international order. Some of them, including human rights, are not so constructive in her view — it’s trying to reshape the rules in the international human rights regime.

If Professor Huang’s assumption of asking that question is that “authoritarianism, maybe, is here to stay,” then she does think so. Professor Chen believes that some years ago we were talking about “democratic backsliding.” Nowadays, we are talking about “authoritarian expansion,” and we’re even talking about this idea of “authoritarian international law.”

Professor Chen said, “I want to say that this term is not my invention. It’s an article and now turned into a book by scholar Tom Ginsburg, who is very famous, very outstanding scholar on Constitutionalism, and international law as well. He has raised this question of whether the international law accommodates authoritarian countries and autocracies. If so, then how are these countries going to shape the form of international law? And I think it is a fascinating question and it is a practical question, because that’s something that we are currently confronted with.”

IV. Professor Chen on Russo-Ukrainian War

Professor Huang asked, “Now, what happened seems the Ukraine War, that we like, say, the international community has been making a move, how far they can go, we are not quite certain. For example, like say, that the General Assembly is putting some pressure on the Security Council, saying that whatever the Security Council’s decisions, you must explain, you must give an adequate explanation. Of course, this is not going to happen next week.”

But, here, he senses, there is this pressure on the Security Council. The reform of the Security Council, of course, has been going on for decades and decades, and nothing happened. And, then, there is this idea of putting Putin on trial for war crime.

He went on to say that, “I don’t know, if I am going too far, too fast, that can we say that, the international community has been moving in a direction of coming to terms with, what the Biden administration has referred to as, ‘the rules-based international order.’ If you care to comment on that, or if you think I am talking nonsense, say so.”

Professor Chen said, “No, no, no, no. Never nonsense from Professor Huang. I think the divide between the democratic countries and the authoritarian countries nowadays is real.”

“It is going to impact the international order for decades to come. I don’t think it’s a good development. I think this confrontation is escalating. I think it makes sense to most of the people who would think of the Ukraine War, as, you know, (a result) under the framework of the competition or the clashbetween the democratic countries and authoritarian countries. But, if you change the framing, it will be a little bit different,” she said.

Professor Chen pointed out that it’s actually about whether you want to maintain a rules-based international order or not because Russia’s attack on Ukraine is a violation of international law on so many levels. A lot of western countries are pushing back, but not all of them.

So, if you think about it, it’s actually not a confrontation between democratic countries and authoritarian countries. Because you see, still, some democratic countries, including India and Indonesia, are reluctant to sort of be tough with Russia, right?

But, you can frame it as a confrontation between whether you want an international order of protecting yourself or not, and, if you would agree with Russia’s attack, (it would) mean that we would agree with a violation of international law against the aggression — it’s ok.

Then, as a country, one day you might suffer that consequence if China were to invade, or other authoritarian countries were to invade another country’s territory — it’s ok. Because, you know, if you don’t think an international order is important, you would see a world order that is different, that is not rules-based, that is not regulated by any principles. It’s just a dog-eat-dog world.

“I don’t think a lot of countries would want to see that. I think it is in their interest to abide by international law, because most of the countries are not major powers that can just say ‘we are gonna use our nuclear weapon to protect us,’” said Professor Chen.

A lot of middle-size and small-size countries do have a great interest in keeping this international order, and to say that “no, even though you are a nuclear power, you cannot invade our territory; this is a violation of international law.”

Professor Chen would agree that authoritarianism is here to stay, but maybe the question can be shifted to talk about the rules-based international order instead ofdividing (the world) into democracies or authoritarian countries.

V. Professor Chen on 1992 Consensus

Professor Huang raised, “Let me turn to your very delightful article that you and Professor Cohen coauthored, dealing with the Taiwan and China relations, the 1992 Consensus.”

“It is a very delightful article that you come to the conclusion that really there is not a legally-binding 1992 Consensus. Both sides have been acting, and really, here I quite agree with you. I think that through the ages that the Chinese people are fairly good at acting.”

“On that basis, they go on to agree on more than a dozen of practical measures. And that did help. Now, of course, that, in the 80s, quite a bit has been going on between the two sides, and not, in academic exchange, and then, during the Ma Ying-jeou administration, these agreement on practical measures.”

“Do you expect that, at sometime, this can be picked up again or that probably again for many decades to come that two sides would be fairly hostileto each other? And, what you have in mind?” asked Professor Huang.

Professor Chen said these are fantastic questions.

First of all, when she talks about that article, she wants to say this out front, because there’s a lot of people who would think that “oh, you’re just against the 1992 Consensus,” or “you are against the KMT” or whatever (other similar) accusations.

A lot of other readers or audiences would misunderstand what she and Professor Cohen was trying to say in that article, which is that, you know, for the two governments to be able to negotiate with each other, there’s got to be some diplomatic maneuvers.

Always, there is always a lot of diplomacies involved, and trying to come up with something that both sides can agree on, and then, move on to discuss with other practical matters, such as trade investment, judicial assistance, tourism, direct flight, etc.

“So, our point is really that the 1992 Consensus was artificial. But a lot of things in diplomacy are artificial, because they are created by man, they are created to sort of give room, to every party on the table to say that somehow they can be on the same page, and then they can move on to talk about other things, right?” said Professor Chen.

“The 1992 Consensus is a smart maneuver that gave both the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party somewiggle room to say what they wanted tosay. And, then, say: ‘yeah, although we don’t quite to see eye to eye on a lot of things, but, maybe, we can just use this very ambiguous consensus as the basis of our cooperation.’ So, I think that was the intention of the creation of the consensus invented by Su Chi (蘇起) in 2000.”

“The 1992 Consensus was intended to be ambiguous. It gave the KMT some room to say that the consensus for us means 一中各表‘One China, Respective Interpretations.’ And the Chinese Communist Party can use that formula to say that ‘Taiwan is part of China’ and ‘China, of course, is the People’s Republic of China.’ But, for the KMT, of course, ‘One China’ is the Republic of China. So, even though they have this disagreement, they can still try to keep the ambiguity, and say: ‘regardless of this disagreement, we are going to sign cross-straits agreement, and we are going to cooperate.’”

She went on to say that “I think this flexibility is really ruptured when Xi Jinping started to insist that the 1992 Consensus no longer allows the KMT to have different interpretations. Although Beijing in the past never acknowledges KMT’s interpretation, I think it was kind of not trying tochallengeKMT’s interpretation.”

“When Xi Jinping came to power, and said the 1992 Consensus means ‘One Country, Two Systems’ for Taiwan, all that changed for the KMT. Because it is hard for the KMT to insist that the formula means what the KMT intends to say,” she said.

“And so this, once you changed, youlimited the ambiguity of this formula, you made it rigid, right? You made itnot very maneuverable, for both parties. And, that’s when things all went downhill. Because when President Tsai Ing-wen does notagree to the 1992 Consensus, Beijing is not willing to talk.”

Professor Chen then went further to say that if Beijing would be able to agree to a similarly ambiguous formula, allowing Taiwan to say what they want to say and also allowing Beijing to claim what they want to claim. There is still some wiggle room there.

But, at this point, the problem is there is no such flexibility whatsoever. Beijing is not willing to relax its insistence on the 1992 Consensus, meaning “One Country, Two Systems” for Taiwan. And Taiwan, of course, cannot accept this. Tsai Ing-wen’s Democratic Progressive Party cannot accept this. The majority of Taiwanese people cannot accept this. If you look at the polls, it consistently shows that the majority of Taiwanese people, they are very adverseto “One Country, Two Systems,” especially, after Hong Kong happened.

So, at least, from our current government’s point of view,especially from the DPP’s view, it’sdone whatever it can to offer to say that: “we are open to dialogue, but we cannot accept the 1992 Consensus, which would mean that we will have to admit that Taiwan is part of China, and we cannot admit that.” “I think that’s most of Taiwanese people want,” said Professor Chen.

VI. Professor Chen on Transitional Justice in Taiwan

Professor Huang asked, “Let me pick up the third article, that is, about your [in] 2019 article you coauthored with Chang Liao Nien-chung (張廖年仲), the article on transitional justice in Taiwan.”

“So that you are indeed doing research on China, on Taiwan, on cross-strait, relation, and now we return to Taiwan. And, in this article, you say a few things fairly, you say a few things fairly straightforward, if that is the word, that you think the part of the problem is that to entangle transitional justice with identity politics.”

“Now, would you care to, well, I think you have said quite enough there, that, given what you said there, what would that do for the future turn of the democratic movement, of the rule of law in Taiwan?” he said.

Professor Chen said this is such a complicated question. She doesn’t have a good answer. Transitional justice process in Taiwan is very uneasy, with a lot of people’s grievances against the past regime.

This process in Taiwan, it’s been troubling to the victims, and it’s been troubling to a lot of scholars who study the experience of other countries’ transitional justice, and say that, “we, Taiwan, have not done enough. We have not been following South Africa’s model of Truth and Reconciliation Commission. And we are not punishing the perpetrators.”

“We even have some politicians currently serve in the government who in the past took part in the crackdown against the victims and dissidents. So, yeah, there’s definitely a lot of criticisms,” said Professor Chen.

Professor Chen went further to add that “The so-called「在台灣至少有一萬多個受害者，可是沒有任何一個加害者。」[‘Taiwan (as) a case with ten thousand victims but not a single perpetrator.’] is not to say that ‘there are no perpetrators.’ There are perpetrators. And we know who was in charge at that time, right? So, many people should have been punished and should have been responsible. And some of them are still alive — they should take up their responsibility.”

“At least, we have not done enough in terms of making sure that those who committed crimes are properly punished and receive justice (Professor Huang: Yes. We have not done that.) So, I think the phrase is very catchy because it really grabs your attention to this important issue, ‘how are we gonna deal with this?’ she said.

“When you have politicians running for politics, do we wanna look at his or her background, and see whether they have anything to do with the uglypast? If they have done anything wrong to assist the authoritarian regime to persecute the dissidents, I think we do need to discuss these questions. But, no, I don’t think they have been discussed in our society.”

Professor Huang added that “You are absolutely right. Are you going to pursue your study on transitional justice in Taiwan?”

“That’s an article coauthored with my good friend Nien-chung Chang Liao (張廖年仲), who is the assistant research professor at the Political [Science] Department, at the Academia Sinica,” said Professor Chen.

She added that “I will certainly still keep a close eye on what’s happening with our government practice......the regular report on human rights issues. And, so, all of them, I think, it would continue, but it will not be as attention-grabbing as the commission on transitional justice.”

“I think this is something that as scholars or, you know, from NGO’s point of view, they don’t want this issue to just disappear into another bureaucratic organization. And I think how to keep this momentum — how to keep this issue on the front (burner) is gonna be a challenge for Taiwan as a whole,” said Professor Chen.

VII. Professor Chen on “Socio-Legal Approach”

Professor Huang asked, “Now, let me turn to your approach, or I don’t know, should I refer to as your ‘research methodology’? Do you think you need to give your approach or your methodology a name? And where the important influence come from?”

“The latter part of my question, I think, should be very obvious. I think Professor Jerome Cohen apparently has exercised a great influence on you, am I right?” he said.

He went on to say that “in your Doctor of Jurisprudence project, you refer to your approach as ‘Social Learning Theory.’ And in your study on China, generally speaking, you refer to as the ‘socio-legal approach’ So, rightly, is it fair to say that you are of the Social-Legal School? Am I fair to say so?”

Professor Chen said she doesn’t try to define herself at this point, because it’s so hard to doempiricalresearch in China nowadays. And she’d like to also expand a little bit on what she can do. So, “socio-legal research” is definitely something that she has a great interest in. And she has been working on that in her dissertation as well as some other publications. She guesses other pieces of the research picture are still quite scattered.

“I am open to studyingthe institutional design or the structure of how the Chinese Communist Party organizes its government,” she said.

She went on to say that, “I am quite open to doing any research that is interesting and is socially meaningful. My approach, as you mentioned, is really quite, in large part, oriented to socio-legal research, meaning, I am trying to use social science methods to study law.”

“But given what China is nowadays, which is to really closed downa lot of the exchange channels to outsiders, as an outsider myself, and a lot of my colleagues are also confronted with the situation, which is: it is so hard to go into China, or they are not willing to go into China, because of the risksinvolved. So, when you cannot go to a place to do field research, it is hard to produce high-quality socio-legal research,” said Professor Chen.

She thinks that is going to be a challenge that all of the China scholars, not just the legal scholars, but all of the China scholars are going to facesooner or later. We probably will have to come up with creative ideas for studying Chinese law in the near future, maybe even for decades to come. So, that’s, as a scholar, she feels really sad and pessimistic about this research prospect.

VIII. Professor Chen on “Does It Even Make Sense to Study Chinese Law in Taiwan?”

Professor Huang concluded the interview by raising the last article, “You posed the question, ‘What Is Wrong Studying Chinese Law in Taiwan (在臺灣研究中國法是否搞錯了什麼)’? Are you seeking to have some kind of dialogue with your colleagues, in particular, those colleagues who argued that ‘we don’t need to study Chinese law,’ and ‘it is useless to study Chinese law’? Are you having them in mind?”

“Yes and no. Because Taiwan academia is quite diverse. So, you know, everybody has their own opinion about it,” said Professor Chen.

She went on to emphasize that we are in need of more legal studies on China. Currently, it’s not that we don’t have any legal scholars working on China, but it is just compared to other disciplines, such as politics, which have so many China scholars, or sociology. So, everything is relative, right?

If you compare something to another thing, you kind of feel a want of it. That’s what she is trying to say. If you compare the legal circles to other disciplines, she thinks it is fair to say that we don’t have that many legal scholars on the “contemporary PRC system.” we are in need of legal expertise on the current PRC government, how their party-state functions, how they run their legal system, and what do they mean when they say「依法治國」(“rule the country in accordance with the law”), and if there’s any difference from the concept of the rule of law that is the tradition advocated by many scholars, west and east.

Professor Chen said, “when I wrote that article, I have this in mind. But, then, I thought, yeah, I cannot exclude those scholars studying ancient China, or the legal history because they are also important to understanding current China.”

She went further to say, “The second point is, ..., there are still some scholars or public intellectuals (in Taiwan) who were not convinced that studying China is all that important because, you know, the dismissive attitude is often that ‘Why do we need to study Chinese law? They don’t have the rule of law,’ ‘The law is nothing but a political instrument for the party to crack down on different opinions.’ And, so you can find a line of arguments here that think ‘Why do you take their law seriously?’”

But mostly, she thinks a lot of, at least, colleagues around her, and they all understand very well why we should study China. Especially China’s concept of law, and how the government is using it. These involve so many questions, domestic human rights and justice and international norms-shaping. And China’s behavior is definitely worth of watching and understanding.

So, after she wrote that article, Professor Chen thought: “oh, well, I was kind of preaching to the choir,” because she thinks everybody understands the importance of studying Chinese law, which is why she studies Chinese law in the first place. In any event, that title is made that way because she wants it to be catchy. She definitely wants tospice up some conversations among academics.

“And a very important colleague, after reading the article, pointed out to me that, in the history of contemporary Taiwan’s legal academia, there have been some efforts that were made to have more expertise on China,” she said.

“So, I guess for that article, people should read it with caution. It’s not an article that is designed to look at the history of Taiwan’s efforts on studying Chinese law. But, it’s sort of a lamentation, from my own, to say that ‘we really need more,’ ‘please, everybody, if you are listening, if you are a student, maybe you will have some interest in Chinese law,’ ‘and that’s important, don’t feel shy,’ ‘you should go study if that interests you.’ she emphasized.

For Professor Chen, that’s sort of a call and a lamentation on her part.

“At least I got one reader who wrote back to me saying that ‘you should look at the history of Taiwan’s academia.’ So, that’s good. That’s great! That’s what articles are intended — to really spark conversations,” said Professor Chen.