On 24 December 2024, the ‘70th Anniversary of the Establishment of Law Publishing House and the 10th Anniversary of the Founding of China Law Review Authors’ Exchange Meeting’ was held in Beijing, with Zhang Wenxian, member of the Party Group of China Law Society, Huang Wenyi, editor-in-chief of China Law Magazine, Chen Rouxue, editor-in-chief of Law Studies, Lin Wei, president of Southwest University of Political Science and Law, Shanghai Normal University Professor Wang Jian, Deputy Director of the Research Office of the Supreme People's Procuratorate Yu Haisong, and Professor Zheng Ge of Shanghai Jiaotong University Kaiyuan Law School attended the meeting. Tian Wenchang, Honorary Director of King&Capital Law Firm, was invited to participate in the conference and make a speech.
Tian Wenchang firstly congratulated the Law Publishing House, saying that the Law Publishing House and the China Law Review have grown rapidly and made brilliant achievements, and that they have made great contributions in the process of building the rule of law in China, and their role should not be underestimated.
Tian Wenchang and the law publishing house for many years, most of the works published by the law publishing house, and has been published in the first issue of the China Law Review also published articles.
Tian Wenchang said, his legal road and the construction of the rule of law in China is synchronised forward, his academic road also accompanied by the rule of law process. Therefore, he published a collection of selected essays and a selected collection of defence speeches and proxies in the Law Publishing House, and the book was named Walking with the Rule of Law. ‘In a sense, my academic career and the Law Publishing House also go hand in hand and jointly participate in and witness the development process of the rule of law.’
Tian Wenchang concluded his speech by expressing two ardent hopes for the Law Publishing House and the China Law Review, the first of which is that books and articles published in the future should focus on innovativeness, and the second on readability.
Regarding innovativeness, Tian Wenchang emphasised that the most important thing in learning nowadays is not knowledge but innovativeness. At present, core journals are still fixated on a standard that a certain number of citations are necessary to publish a paper, and for this standard, many teachers have been hindered in evaluating their titles. Quotations do not reflect academic standards, but innovation is rare, and this standard should be considered for revision.
Regarding readability, Tian Wenchang mentioned that there is a trend in the academic world that the more obscure the vocabulary and the more new concepts in an article, the deeper the learning. According to Tian Wenchang, true learning is something that anyone can understand. For example, the best speech of a lawyer in court should be one that can be understood by those who neither know the law nor are uninformed. ‘What is the value of talking about a bunch of concepts that other people don't understand?’
Therefore, it is hoped that the Law Publishing House and the China Law Review will focus on the innovative and readable nature of the books and articles.
