The latest rules issued on the Guiding Cases are now available in English translation online.  

Five years after the Supreme People’s Court of China (“SPC”) established the groundbreaking system of Guiding Cases (“GCs”), the highest court finally issued a new set of rules which provide, among other things, the following directives: 

(1)  if a pending case is, in terms of the basic facts  (“基本案情”) and application of law (“法律适用”), similar to a GC, the deciding court should, in its judgment, quote the GC as a reason for its adjudication.  In particular, the court should quote the GC number and the “Main Points of the Adjudication” (“裁判要点”) of the GC (Articles 9-11).

(2) if a party relies on a GC to support his case, judges handling the case should, in providing their reasons for the adjudication, respond as to whether they referred to the GC in the course of their adjudication and explain their action (Article 11).

This further detail is welcome, but these new rules also leave open many issues for SPC clarification.  Two examples:   

(1) Can facts provided in the original judgment upon which a GC is based be used to determine whether a pending case is similar to a GC?  Because GCs are only summaries of select original judgments with only a brief description of facts, it is critical to know whether or not parties can turn to the original judgment.

(2) Given the importance of the “Main Points of the Adjudication”, how are they prepared?  Shouldn’t their content be restricted to the scope allowed by the facts of the GC?  Practice suggests otherwise: quite a few GCs have “Main Points of the Adjudication” that address issues beyond the facts of their original judgments (see CGCP commentary, Guiding Case No. 5, Monopoly in Salt Industries, and Amendments to the Legislation Law and the Administrative Litigation Law, forthcoming June 30).

For more discussion on the new rules on GCs and their implications watch our website in the coming months for the next issue of Guiding Cases Analytics™.

It has been a busy spring for the CGCP.  We recently co-sponsored a China law and business event hosted by ACG Silicon Valley and Dr. Mei Gechlik gave a speech entitled Rule of Law with Chinese Characteristics: Why Guiding Cases? Why Now? at the Stanford China Law & Policy conference.  The CGCP was also featured in an interview with the Chinese-language publication, World Journal.  For more, check out our News and Events page.

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