Abstract
Since the legislation of the China’s 1991Civil Procedure Law (CPL), which explicitly permits three types of collective actions, multi-plaintiff groups have brought suits seeking compensation. With the high tempo in economy and the social reform, disputes related to collective parties arise rapidly, class rushes to China’s courtrooms. The increasing number of collective actions is one of the remarkable aspects of the civil litigation explosion in resent years in China. Series of “Judicial Interpretations” issued by the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) which show SPC’s hostile attitude to the collective litigation have triggered the fire among the scholars. To release heavy pressure in the collective litigation, the SPC and the local courts turn to alternative resolutions, such as the mediation and the test case device. Attention should be paid to the SPC’s policies and their impact to the multi-plaintiff disputes so as to get a deep understanding about the collective litigation in China. The purpose of this article is to set forth that claimants’ access to collective litigation a very tough work under the SPC’s policies and other related guidelines.
Highlights
As it is in many countries, collective and representative actions have always received much attention, from the legislators and from the courts
About one year after 2002 Notice, the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) eventually on December 26, 2002 issued another judicial interpretation for the lower courts to handle the collective securities compensation, “Several Provisions on Hearing Civil Compensation Cases Caused by False Statements on the Securities Market”(2002 Provisions)(Guanyu Shenli Zhengquan Shichang yin Xujia Chenshu Yinfa de Minshi Peichang Anjian de Ruogan Guiding). Both 2002 Notice and 2002 Provisions ruled out the use of Class Action—the China’s 1991Civil Procedure Law (CPL) Art 55 type of representative litigation —as a mechanism for collective securities disputes arising from false disclosures (Li Guoguang and Jia Wei, 2003, P. 295, 296)
The SPC may not be willing to see the increase of the collective litigation, collective struggle has moved to the courts
Summary
As it is in many countries, collective and representative actions have always received much attention, from the legislators and from the courts. Series of “Judicial Interpretations” issued by the Supreme People’s Court (SPC) are focused on the collective and representative litigation. These interpretations or other kinds of normative guidance by the SPC are binding on all courts across China, which show the judicial policies of the SPC on dealing with collective disputes. Such policies have been the subject of intense debate among the scholars. This article is divided into five parts: Part I provides a brief statutory outline of the collective and representative actions in China. The article concludes with a brief comment on the judicial policy and the importance of the collective litigation to the society
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