Hosted by the Youth League Committee of the School of Law at Renmin University of China, and jointly organized by the Graduate Student Union of the School of Law at Renmin University and Shanghai Yingdong Law Firm, the 16th Interdisciplinary Doctoral Salon was successfully held on March 21, 2020 through Tencent Meeting.
The COVID-19 pandemic is bringing in opportunities in a crisis. It can be regarded a timely “health check” on the country’s governance system and governance capabilities. It creates a rare strategic opportunity window to accelerate the improvement of the governance system and capabilities. It also provides an unprecedented opportunity for orchestrating a “community with a shared future for mankind”. With the backdrop of COVID-19 prevention and control, the theme of this salon was "Modernization of National Governance System and Governance Capabilities in a Pandemic", which consisted of three sessions - "Community with a Shared Future for Mankind in a Pandemic", "Improving Mechanisms and National Governance System", and "Emerging Technologies Assist Pandemic Control and Social Governance". Tianming LONG, Anna, Xinyu XU, and Yeshuai ZHANG from the Law School of Renmin University served as the moderators.
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In the opening speech, Yan ZHANG, Deputy Dean of the School of Law at Renmin University, first expressed his warm congratulations on the opening of the 16th Interdisciplinary Doctoral Salon on "Modernization of National Governance System and Governance Capabilities in a Pandemic" on behalf of the School of Law.
At present, the COVID-19 pandemic is sweeping across the country, seriously affecting people's lives and health, and causing severe losses. The pandemic has brought about new opportunities and challenges to the country's governance capabilities and system. Three perspectives are raised amid these new challenges. The first perspective comes from we being accustomed to observing and judging from idealized standards, which was applied on the reality at the beginning of this pandemic. As the pandemic spread across the world, we started to take a second perspective - a comparative perspective. Based on how the other countries control the pandemic, we reflect on China’s governance. Combining these two perspectives, it’s more likely to identify effective ways of national and social governance that fit China's conditions.
The third perspective is the angle of the mankind sharing the same destiny. A community with a shared future does not only suffer together, but also to share the future and experience. This is a true globalization perspective, which is the world view that our country holds when going global.
When our country is undergoing such a serious pandemic, everyone here, especially our young doctoral students, is tracking the progress and hot issues, and discussing major issues of common concern to the Chinese and the world at large, which fully demonstrates your global vision and great vitality.
Finally, I would like to wish this salon a complete success.
In his speech, Zihong ZHOU, Managing Partner of Shanghai Yingdong Law Firm, believes that we are now going through an era from great navigation to globalization. Thanks to a large population and the Communist Party’s leadership, China has developed to an economic power in the world, second only to the United States. This pandemic creates an important opportunity to review the outcome of China’s reform and opening up. All walks of life across the country are facing an examination. Every Chinese has an unprecedented sense of mission, and we are united to overcome the difficulties.
At present, there are many difficulties to be solved urgently, but how to optimize the national governance system and capabilities is fundamental. Emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data and the Internet of Things have brought huge changes to the governance structures and systems. However, technological progress must go hand in hand with institutional evolution, to fully advance the human society.
During the war against the pandemic, Yinghe Law Firm and Shanghai Yingdong Law Firm have made great contribution, including: providing public welfare legal services; raising nearly RMB 1-million donations; and delivering medical supplies to epic centers, and etc.
I hope that all the experts, scholars and students present today can leverage your own discipline as well as other disciplines to generate ideas, making our contribution to the pandemic control.
I would like to wish this salon a full success!
Session 1: A community with a shared future for mankind in a pandemic
Mankind share a common destiny, thus requiring international cooperation. So far, there is no conclusion on the origin of the Covid-19 virus yet. This global pandemic is evolving rapidly with rising uncertainties and risks. To safeguard people’s health, safety, economic and social development in all countries, and to jointly cope with global public health challenges, we need all-round cooperation.
In this session, Zheli CHEN, PhD candidate from the University of Tokyo, Xudong ZHANG from Junhe (Shanghai) Law Firm, and Chenliang HOU from Queen Mary’s College at University of London gave keynote presentations, while Xiongfei ZHANG, Director of Fujian Yingkun Law Firm, and Dr. Min LI, Lecturer from the Law School of Central University of Finance and Economics, Doctor of Law of Peking University made comments.
Keynote Presentation
Chen Zheli, PhD candidate in Law from the University of Tokyo, gave a presentation on the theme of "Commonalities and Differences among China, Japan and South Korea in a Pandemic". Japan, South Korea and China have shared great commonalities in handling this pandemic, which is clearly different from European and American countries at both the government level and the society level. He believed that these commonalities are grounded in these three East Asian countries’ national spirits and cultural heritage that are different from the West. There are more commonalities than differences among the three countries, while the interaction at the government level and the society level are becoming increasingly positive and active. We look forward to a deepening regional integration of East Asia after the pandemic.
Xudong ZHANG from Junhe (Shanghai) Law Firm made a presentation on "Pandemic and Sino-US Trade Policy", in which he made an in-depth analysis of relevant Sino-US trade policies and positive measures during the pandemic, as well as improvement opportunities. He believed that the issue of the pharmaceutical supply chain should be the focus for today’s international community. Human society is a community with a shared future. Cooperation is more important than excessive restrictions or control.
Chenliang HOU, a Master of Laws from Queen Mary's College, University of London, gave a presentation on "Global Pandemic: a Battle for the Mankind Community with a Shared Future", in which he discussed the impact of the pandemic on the development of the mankind community from the perspective of international assistance. Under the threat of the pandemic, governments, organizations, enterprises, and citizens around the world have spontaneously united and cooperated beyond traditional nationalities and ethnic differences. This is the first international resonance to the concept of a community with a shared destiny for mankind. The pandemic is an opportunity for the international community to put aside political prejudices and carry out international cooperation to deal with different human crisis in the future.
Open discussion
Yanqin HUANG, a PhD candidate at Renmin University, believed that whether people have a sense of security during a pandemic is an important criterion in measuring how modernized the governance system and capabilities are. Advanced pandemic control technologies and managerial experience must be applied to improve the national governance chain and procedures. Therefore, he put forward four pieces of suggestion: first, prevention goes first; second, strengthen government's emergency management information basis; third, clarify major goals and tasks across different stages in emergency management; fourth, accelerate building an emergency management network for health incidents.
Tingting ZHU, a PhD candidate at Renmin University, mentioned a report published by Imperial College London on March 16. This report shows that the death toll would soar if the British and the U.S. governments continue to adopt an appease strategy, as the outbreak is posing severe pressure on their health-care systems despite of a more advanced medical level.
Expert comments
Two experts from Fujian Yingkun Law Firm and Central University of Finance and Economics made impressive comments and shared their thoughts.
Xiongfei ZHANG, a management committee member and senior partner of Fujian Yingkun Law Firm, and the deputy director of the Criminal Practice Committee of Yinghe Law Firm:
With a backdrop of globalization today, how the pandemic evolves in Japan is closely relevant for us in East Asia, especially as Japan originally planned to host the Olympic Games. From Zheli CHEN’s speech, we learned that: first, the relationship between the Japanese government and the civil society is relatively similar to ours; second, East Asian citizens generally trust their governments, as affected by our culture heritage and farming civilization. This also made us relatively optimistic about pandemic control or international cooperation in Asia, especially East Asia.
Lawyer Xudong ZHANG's topic was Sino-US trade policy, which is a wide topic to be interpreted by all sectors. He took masks as a special starting point to analyze trade policies and laws, which is relatively novel and unique. It’s very impressive.
Min LI, lecturer at the School of Law, Central University of Finance and Economics, and PhD candidate at Peking University:
Pandemic prevention and control is relevant to everyone. None measure can be effective without full support behind. For example, strict control measures to prevent pandemic affect small and micro business, which are vital to employment, taxation, and social stability. Small and micro business have funding needs as they resume. However, as they are generally under-served by policy banks and traditional commercial banks, they rely heavily on the inclusive financial service from Internet banks, who leverage advanced risk control technologies to lower NPLs.
MY Bank, for example, plays an important social role as it helps small and micro business to recover in a pandemic. However, Internet banks also have increasing difficulties in funding when they try to expand credit business with limited funding sources, as they do not have access to many financial vehicles. We need to think about how to open and optimize our financial regulation system while identifying and controlling financial risks, so as to solve real social needs.
Session 2: Improving Mechanisms and National Governance System
The COVIC-19 pandemic unveiled many weakness in our pandemic prevention system and public health emergency management system. We have relatively sound governance system, with improvements to be made in areas such as wildlife protection, public health, and emergency management. It is necessary to fix blind spots and loopholes in these areas to prevent potential risks.
In this session, Tianming LONG, Wuqing DU from Renmin University, Mohan QIU, Hao RONG from Beijing Normal University, Yang HAN from Law School of Peking University, and Yang LI from Southwestern University of Finance and Economics made presentations. Sha HU, lecturer of Guangzhou University, Turui XIE, senior partner of Shanghai Yingdong Law Firm, and Liang ZHANG, assistant researcher of Law Institute of Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences made comments.
Keynote Presentation
Tianming LONG, a PhD candidate in Criminal Law at Renmin University of China, gave a presentation on "Functional Positioning and Norm Application of Crimes Impairing the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases — Introducing the New Interpretation of Dogmatic of Criminal Law in the Transition of National Governance.” He believes that the study of precedent law is important in the research of the administrative criminal law. Impairing the prevention and control of infectious diseases is a crime of negligence and nonfeasance. Based on the principle of the unity of law and order, both the source of obligation and the source of duty of care lie in the lawful administrative actions arising from authorized norms. Acts based on illegal administrative acts or notification-type administrative facts can only constitute the crime of negligence causing danger against public security.
Wuqing DU, a PhD candidate in Criminal Law at Renmin University, presented on the topic of "Quarantine Measures in the Chinese Public Health Legal System: Normative Analysis and System Improvement". He believes that while the quarantine measures in the public health legal system are important to the prevention and control of infectious diseases, it also affects many basic rights such as citizens’ personal liberty and labor rights. Issues such as unclear authority of applying quarantine measures, vague definition of "close contacts", hasty quarantine procedures and missing systemic relief for the quarantined urgently need to be put on the agenda of academic reflection.
Mohan QIU, a PhD candidate in law at Beijing Normal University, gave a report on "Local People's Congresses in a Pandemic - Preventive and Control Decisions across Regions as an Example". She believes that local Standing Committee of People’s Congresses launched prevention and control decisions that provided a sound basis and guidance for lawful disease prevention and control. However, their supervisory role was not in a full play, which should be fully utilized in national governance to make better use of our institutional advantages.
Hao RONG, a PhD candidate in criminal law at Beijing Normal University, presented the topic of "Criminal Law Governance of Malfeasance in Major Public Health Incidents". He believed that mediocrity is a behavior out of evil. Modern criminal law should hold officials’ nonfeasance accountable, which is the obligation of preventive criminal laws.
Yang LI, a PhD candidate from the School of Law of Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, made a presentation on "Meta-regulation: New Ideas for Governing Public Crisis during Pandemic". He highlighted a way of targeted meta-regulation in areas where traditional regulation is less effective, which transfers regulatory responsibilities partially to individuals to reduce governance costs, and be more responsive to changes and real demand of optimizing a governance system. Shaping governance should focus on two aspects: on the one hand, external constraints and internal incentive mechanism should be better linked; on the other hand, legal behavior and expectation should be modeled for the public, while authority and collaboration of regulators in pandemic prevention and control must be strengthened.
Yang HAN, a PhD candidate of School of Law of Peking University, presented on the topic of "Information Flow Management and Control in Pandemic Prevention and Control: the Text". He believed that there was a lack of positive information incentives. He proposed a waiver system for non-willful misreport, instead of a pure reward and consequence mechanism with negative connotation. A certain fault tolerance mechanism is required to encourage active reporting of pandemic information.
Expert comments
Three experts from Guangzhou University, Shanghai Yingdong Law Firm and Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences made impressive comments and shared their perspectives.
Dr. Sha HU, Lecturer in Criminal Law, the School of Law of Guangzhou University. She summarized some common characteristics among the presenters (Tianming LONG, Wuqing DU, Mohan QIU, Hao RONG, Yang HAN, Yang LI). Firstly, They all focused on in-depth and detailed interpretation of legal terms with dogmatic research methods. Secondly, they manifested the charm of speculative philosophy as they stated the evil of mediocrity and meta-regulation professionally. Thirdly, the presenters are majored in public laws, while private laws should be considered in national governance as well. Finally, each presenter was problem-oriented and practice-oriented, which was highly consist with China's legal education system. Later, Dr Hu used Gou's case to share her thoughts on the system of criminal laws.
Turui XIE, senior partner of Shanghai Yingdong Law Firm: Wuqing DU's presentation paid special attention to the lack of relief measures in a pandemic, which is highly valuable given a background of prioritizing life protection over anything else. Mohan QIU's presentation was the missing role of local People's Congresses in pandemic prevention and control. Pressed by the pandemic, local governments introduced many "hard-core" preventive and control measures such as lock-down and restrictions on personal freedom, with little attention to the protection of civil rights. I think Qiu's sharing is very valuable! Finally, Hao RONG's presentation is highly consistent with the concerns of the public. From the outbreak until now, aside from conspiracy theories, malfeasance of some officials deteriorated the pandemic, which largely triggered negative sentiment in the public. I agree with Rong here.
Researcher Liang ZHANG from the Institute of Law of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences made a systematic summary of the presenters. He recognized the researches done by PhD candidates, especially the systematic introduction of meta-regulation theory.
Session 3: Emerging technologies help pandemic prevention and control and social governance
Different from the 2003 SARS, a large number of information technologies is applied with a full participation of Internet companies in combatting COVID-19. For example, Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Guangdong and many more provinces use big data analytics to accurately locate key populations with pre-warnings. Health codes are used as companies resume working. IoT technologies are deployed in medical supplies. Big data is applied in medicine and vaccine R&D.
During this session, the presenters were Dr. Sisi ZHU, 2019 postdoctoral fellow from ICBC, PhD from the School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University, Dr. Qinglan WANG, researcher of Shenzhen-Hong Kong Industry-University-Research Base, postdoctoral fellow in computer science and technology, Chao ZHANG, PhD candidate from Peking University, and Wu Zongze from the University of California at Berkeley. Afterwards, Zhou Xin, a distinguished associate researcher of the School of Law of Sichuan University, and Xiang CHU, deputy dean of the School of Intellectual Property of East China University of Political Science and Law, made comments.
Keynote Presentation
Sisi ZHOU, a 2019 postdoctoral fellow at ICBC and PhD from the School of Economics and Management of Tsinghua University, made a report on "Highlights and Difficulties of Commercial Banks in Helping Pandemic Prevention and Control and Work Resumption". She believes that the pandemic brings both opportunities and risks to commercial banks. On the one hand, the difficulties of small and micro enterprises are directly linked to commercial banks; on the other hand, new financing opportunities emerge with the companies in medical materials and equipment, vaccines, pharmaceutical production and sales. At present, commercial banks have increased their support for small and micro enterprises and reconstructed the traditional labor-intensive financial service model. However, China’s commercial banking mechanism is less flexible and innovative, with little fault tolerance. A regulated sandbox mechanism was proposed to grant certain degree of flexibility and innovation to on-line small and micro financing products.
Qinglan WANG, a researcher from the Shenzhen-Hong Kong Industry-University-Research Base, a postdoctoral fellow in computer science and technology, and a doctor of law, shared the theme of "Thoughts on Improving the Resilience of the National Public Health Information System". She believed that current public health information system are in data silos. Emerging technologies such as blockchain provide transformational opportunities for large-scale public health data collection. System resilience with a distributed network can be better impact-proof in emergencies. She also pointed out the improvement potentials of the public health information system. She emphasized that building a public health information system is both organizational and technological evolution. System resilience relied on organizational resilience. Reforms in administrative concepts, disease control systems and legal systems are required. Otherwise, advanced technology is useless.
Chao ZHANG, a PhD candidate in Economic Law at the School of Law of Peking University gave a presentation on "Application of Blockchain Technology in Pandemic Prevention and Control". Today, digital governance is limited within a certain area. It is difficult to cross over sectors and regional boundaries to share data. Blockchain can build a cross-system, cross-organization, cross-business, and cross-regional data sharing mechanism, which better handles emergencies. At the same time, blockchain helps establish a credible data governance system with robust privacy protection, which accelerate the digital transformation of all walks of life in the society. As new economic formats are growing exponentially, Blockchain plays an irreplaceable role in the transfer and application of ownership, the right to use and benefits.
Xuetao LIU, a PhD candidate in School of Law of Central University of Finance and Economics, reported on the topic of "Balance the COVID-19 Control and the Protection of Personal Information". He pointed out that the risk involved in COVID-19 is dynamic, with balancing between COVID-19 control and the protection of personal information as an important part. First, the information collectors must be legitimate under the legitimacy principle. Second, personal information must be processed in a transparent way with the properness principle. Finally, collection and use of personal information must be controlled within the boundary of protecting public safety.
Zongze WU from School of Law of University of California, Berkeley, gave a presentation on "Exploration of Technology Enabling Innovation in Network Public Sentiment Governance". He proposed that technical means should be applied in on-line public sentiment governance. Technologies such as big data and AI can greatly improve the coverage and accuracy in identifying security risks with pattern forecast and sentiment analysis. However, the "technology-enabled governance path" complements, rather than replacing, the existing governance path. It must work with the government to build a public sentiment governance paradigm led by government, supported by NGOs and media agencies.
Free discussion
Changhao LIU, a PhD candidate in Economic Law at Renmin University, shared three perspectives. First, each country’s coping strategy against COVID-19 is related to its culture. Second, China's model has pros and cons, which should be refined to build a comprehensive system with the rule of law. Third, the relationship between the government and the market should be considered in the Chinese context. Chinese thinking of moderation and unity of opposites may provide intellectual support for building an economic law system with Chinese characteristics.
Kelin CHEN, a PhD candidate in Economic Law at Renmin University, continued to elaborate the government-market relationship, and proposed that it shouldn’t be the case that governments only take corrective actions when market failure occurs. Instead, there should be a cooperative relationship on top of the basic regulatory relationship. Specific cooperation still depends on the role of the government. Business environment and marketization are essentially about making government's decision-making more market-driven. In addition, affected by COVID-19, many private enterprises and self-employed individuals may file bankruptcy. Individual bankruptcy may emerge.
Expert comments
Two experts from Sichuan University and East China University of Political Science and Law made insightful comments and shared their opinions.
Zhou Xin, a distinguished associate researcher at the Law School of Sichuan University, pointed out that data is no longer simply limited to a certain field. Data-related problems may emerge in digital economy and across different sectors, which can be solved better by focusing on data. We shall also adhere to our confidence in China’s path and culture.
Xiang CHU, deputy dean of the School of Intellectual Property of East China University of Political Science and Law, talked about the relationship between the rule of law and morality in the new era. The rule of law is the foundation of a stabilize society, while morality can truly unite people of the country, fixing a lack of righteousness caused by a pure market mechanism. Professor Calabresi, American legal scholar in Economics of Law, proposed that moral cost should be an important factor in the study of Economics of Law. Although China takes strict prevention and control measures at a high economic cost, it generates corresponding moral benefits for the future.
Finally, Xinyu XU, head of the Doctoral Student Service Team of the Graduate Student Association at Renmin University, delivered a closing speech:
Although the pandemic stops us from physically getting together, it gives us a chance to gather on-line, sharing opinions and exchanging thoughts in this unique way. The Graduate Student Association of School of Law of Renmin University will continue to innovate and advance to help building the country in this magnificent era!
The salon ended successfully.