Implementing Rule of Law Concept in the Digital Sphere: China’s Experience

Abstract

The paper provides a discussion of the policies pursued by the Chinese government in implementing the concept of the rule of law through the use of digital technologies. China’s recent achievements in creating the digital infrastructure and developing the digital economy are discussed. The paper explains how the Chinese government use the Internet, big data, artificial intelligence and other technologies to promote legal governance and achieve a synthesis of information technologies and the rule of law in public governance in terms of process and method. Since China is a country with an extensive territory and large population where improving the access to and quality of justice is problematic, policies are pursued to actively introduce modern digital technologies to digitize justice. Judicial institutions across the country also have a varying degree of experience of promoting smart justice. In 2021 and 2022, the Supreme People’s Court of China published one by one the following three major rules for online activities of courts: Rules for Online Justice; Rules for Online Mediation; Rules for Online Operation, to make online judicial operations across the board well-regimented. Guided by these three rules, Chinese courts have made certain progress in recent years to make their operations digital and smart. Since promoting the digital rule of law means the cultivation of talent, an enabling political environment was created to improve legal skills and cultivate specialists with competencies in the area of artificial intelligence, big data or cloud computing. The problems faced by China in promoting digital justice are currently experienced by many countries worldwide. The author aim is to explain the Chinese regulatory model to share this experience with other countries.