Ancient China’s Legal Tradition and Legal Thought

Abstract

中国古代法制历史经过4000多年的发展而从未中断。在这个漫长的过程中, 形成 了特有的法律传统, 比如重农主义的法律传统、重刑轻民的法律传统、重伦常的伦理 法传统、多元一体的民族法传统、德礼为本的儒家化的法律传统, 等等。这些法律传 统是以深厚的法文化的积淀为基础的, 体现了中华民族的智慧和创造力。同时也受到 中国固有国情的影响—农业为主导的经济结构、专制主义的政治体制、多民族的国 家结构、儒家思想的统治地位、政治经济文化发展不平衡的社会状态等, 也都给中国 古代的法律传统打上了深刻的烙印。 关键词: 以农立国 专制主义 伦理法 血缘地缘关系 法文化 China’s pre-modern legal system enjoyed a continuous history of more than four thousand years. In the course of this long process, it developed distinctive legal traditions, including a tradition that prioritized agriculture, a stress on criminal law at the expense of civil law, an ethiSIMcal orientation that stressed the five Confucian relationships, an approach to the legal traditions of different ethnic groups that embraced diversity in unity, and a Confucianized legal system based on virtue and ritual. These legal traditions were all based on the accretion of a deep-rooted legal culture which embodied the wisdom and creativity of the Chinese people. At the same time, they bore the stamp of China’s national conditions: an economic structure dominated by agriculture, an autocratic political system, a multi-ethnic national structure, the preeminent position of Confucian thought, the uneven development of politics, culture and the economy, etc.