CYIL vol. 13 (2022)

MAX HILAIRE CYIL 13 ȍ2022Ȏ experience: mutual respect for each state’s sovereign, territorial integrity, non-intervention in the internal and external affairs of states, non-aggression, equality, and mutual benefit, peaceful coexistence, and anti-hegemonism/anti-colonialism. 36 These principles which were adopted at the Bandung Conference of Non-Aligned Nations in 1955 formed the core of these principles. Chairman Mao withdrew China from participation in the international legal order so he could consolidate his political power and make China a communist state. Millions of Chinese citizens were starved to death, murdered, or perished. Mao conducted a policy of ethnic cleansing by sending millions of intellectuals and ordinary citizens to rural villages to be “re-educated.” The Cultural Revolution left China in isolation and poverty. For Mao, international law was considered “Bourgeois Law,” and a direct contradiction to the goals of the Cultural Revolution. 37 However, it would be a mistake to assume China did not comply with international norms. Under Mao, China complied with the international law that advanced the communist ideology of the regime or sustained the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in power. But China also refrained from taking drastic measures to reverse its existing international legal obligations which it deemed unfair. China honored many of the commitments the Kuomintang government signed with foreign governments. At the same time, China continued its opposition to certain international norms that it saw as unfair, or favorable to European states. China honored the treaties that ceded parts of its territory to Britain and Portugal. After the U.S. officially recognized the People’s Republic of China in 1978, the Chinese Communist regime replaced the Government of Taiwan in the Security Council as the legitimate representative of China. China insisted on a “One China” policy and conducted extensive diplomacy to get states to sever diplomatic relations with Taiwan, and for international organizations to terminate Taiwan’s membership. China remained ambivalent about some international laws but saw the benefits of working from within. China knew if it wanted to be fully integrated into the European states’ system, it had to play by the rules of that system. China also realized it had certain legal obligations to the international community as a Permanent Member of the Security Council. As a Permanent Member of the Security Council China was granted veto power, which it could invoke to block decisions of the Security Council it did not agree with. To be clear, China has had its version of law based on Confucian teachings. 38 But it was vastly different from the European concept of the rule of law. Confucian legal philosophy advocated obedience and submission to authority. The European version of the law, which was incorporated in the Peace of Westphalia, was based on the principles of sovereignty, sovereign equality of states, and non-intervention in the internal and external affairs of states. Westphalia excluded China and other non-western nations from participation in the European-based legal order and did not recognize non-western nations as equals. The Chinese conception of the rule of law placed China at the center of the universe, with all other 36 CHEN TIQIANG, “The People’s Republic of China and Public International Law,” 8 Dalhousie Law Journal (1984), p. 8. 37 YUEH, T. “Preliminary Criticisms of Bourgeois International Law,” 3 Journal of International Studies (1959), p. 1. 38 CHAN, M. “Rule of Law and China’s Unequal Treaties: Conceptions of the Rule of Law and Its Role in Chinese International Law and Diplomatic Relations in the Early Twentieth Century,” 25 Penn History Review (2019), p. 15.

10