Victims, Perpetrators, and the Role of Law in Maoist China

The relationship between politics and law in the early People'sRepublic of China was highly contentious. Periods of intentionallyexcessive campaign justice intersected with attempts to carve outprofessional standards of adjudication and to offer retroactive justicefor those deemed to have been unjustly persecuted. How were victims andperpetrators defined and dealt with during different stages of theMaoist era and beyond? How was law practiced, understood, and contestedin local contexts? This volume adopts a case study approach to shedlight on these complex questions. By way of a close reading of originalcase files from the grassroots level, the contributors detailprocedures and question long-held assumptions, not least about theCultural Revolution as a period of "lawlessness."