On May 24, the Law School’s Clarke Program in East Asian Law and Culture hosted an East Asian Lay Participation Roundtable. This day-long event brought together esteemed empirical researchers and experts from East Asian countries to discuss lay legal decision-making systems. China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan all rely on lay citizens to decide some criminal cases, but lay participation takes distinctive forms in these four countries.
I learned a great deal about how lawyers, judges, and policymakers have drawn on experiences in other Asian countries to design and reform their own approaches to incorporating lay citizens into their legal systems.
– Valerie P. Hans
Organized by Prof. Yun-chien Chang, director of the Clarke East Asian Program, and Valerie P. Hans, Charles F.Rechlin Professor of Law, the roundtable featured presentations from leading scholars, including Hiroshi Fukurai, an authority on Japan’s Saiban-in seido, or mixed court system; Yoori Seong, an expert on South Korea’s advisory jury system; Patrick Chung-Chia Huang, and Keng-Wei Fan, both authorities on Taiwan’s lay judge system; and Xin He, an expert on China’s lay assessor system.
“The synergy among the Asian and U.S. participants was excellent,” said Professor Hans. “I learned a great deal about how lawyers, judges, and policymakers have drawn on experiences in other Asian countries to design and reform their own approaches to incorporating lay citizens into their legal systems.
