The history and development of criminal responsibility of young people in Chinese criminal law

Xiaotong Li and Andra Le Roux-Kemp

Chapter 4 in Research Handbook on Youth Criminology, 2025, pp 61-73 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: While literature abounds on youth crime in the context of historical and contemporary criminal law in Western jurisdictions, there is little focus on the legal history of young age markers in determining criminal responsibility or deciding just sentences in Chinese law. However, in Chinese criminal law, young offenders have been treated differently based on their age for a long time, going as far back as 3,000 years ago. The age of criminal liability is an important indicator in tracing such differences in criminal law and its development. Thus, this chapter addresses this by providing a comprehensive legal-historical overview of the recognition and development of young age markers in Chinese criminal law. In tracing this legal history, unique features of Chinese criminal law, with regard to how, when and to what extent the relatively young age of offenders has been and is recognised in the context of criminal legal proceedings, are highlighted.

Keywords: Age; Criminal law; Criminal responsibility; Legal history (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781035300747
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.elgaronline.com/doi/10.4337/9781035300754.00011 (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 403 Forbidden

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:21926_4

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.e-elgar.com

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Chapters from Edward Elgar Publishing
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Jack Sweeney ().