The public interest lawyer in China : A new type of "cause lawyer"? ; L'avocat d'intérêt public en Chine : un nouveau type de "cause lawyer"?

Abstract

My study is about the role of Chinese public interest lawyers in the case of housing demolition of peasants. I want to know if there is a legal profession in China who has some similarity of cause lawyers in America. If there is, considering the reality of Chinese society, what are the same point and the difference between this professional group and the cause lawyers in the liberal democracy? These questions are relatives to the complex relation among the law, the politic, and the social change in chine. To answer these questions, I try to analyse the role of the lawyer in this relation from three dimensions. Firstly, it is necessary to describe the Chinese legal system in which the lawyer shows their characteristics, specially the relation between the law and the politic in China(Chapter 1 and chapter 2). Secondly, on the basis of interviews with the lawyers, observing the activity and the strategy of the lawyer inside and outside of their professional domain, I seek to make a conclusion of the specificity of the Chinese public interest lawyers (chapter 3); Thirdly, I will try to make a comparison with the cause lawyers according to these characteristics of Chinese public interest lawyers(chapter 4). This comparison can answer the question in the beginning of my study and give a good window into the role of Chinese public interest lawyer. ; Cette thèse porte sur le rôle des avocats d'intérêt public dans les procès que les paysans intentent pour défendre leur droit au logement en Chine. Concernant les avocats d'intérêt public en Chine, deux figures sont valorisées dans cette thèse : l'avocat gouvernemental travaillant comme médiateur et l'avocat libéral travaillant comme acteur social. Le premier type d'avocat se compose de deux sous-groupes : les avocats recrutés comme fonctionnaires par le gouvernement local et les avocats libéraux sollicités provisoirement par le gouvernement local dans certaines affaires. Le deuxième type est également divisé en deux groupes : les avocats militants dans les grands cabinets ...