... Chapt. 1: The difficulties and crisis of Taiwan's current constitutional politics Chapt. 2: The legitimacy of making a new constitution for Taiwan Chapt. 3: The features of a new constitution for Taiwan in the 21st century Chapt. 4: Lessons from other countries for drafting a new Taiwanese constitution.

With a special place among the world's important trading countries, Taiwan presents the international practitioner with its own particular legal issues and problems. Among the world's most many-sourced legal systems, the law of Taiwan sustains major elements from Chinese and Japanese sources as well as its own indigenous and traditional rules and strong influences from both civil and common law traditions. This convenient guide, written by a scholar-practitioner who is both Dean of Law at the National Taiwan University and a panelist in the World Trade Organization's Dispute Settlement Body, is an ideal introduction and practical handbook for anyone involved in a transaction that raises issues in Taiwanese law. After detailed summaries of Taiwan's system of government, its court system, sources of law, and administrative law and procedure, the author covers practice and procedure in such fields of legal activity as the following: contracts; torts; consumer protection; property rights; family law; law of succession; alternative dispute resolution; intellectual property law; trade; government procurement; labor law; and criminal law and procedure. International lawyers will find all the legal situations most likely to arise in the course of transactions connected to Taiwan covered expertly and knowledgeably in this very useful book. It is also valuable to students and scholars for its special insights into issues of comparative law.

This book tells a story of Taiwan’s transformation from an authoritarian regime to a democratic system where human rights are protected as required by international human rights treaties. There were difficult times for human rights protection during the martial law era; however, there has also been remarkable transformation progress in human rights protection thereafter. The book reflects the transformation in Taiwan and elaborates whether or not it is facilitated or hampered by its Confucian tradition. There are a number of institutional arrangements, including the Constitutional Court, the Control Yuan, and the yet-to-be-created National Human Rights Commission, which could play or have already played certain key roles in human rights protections. Taiwan’s voluntarily acceptance of human rights treaties through its implementation legislation and through the Constitutional Court’s introduction of such treaties into its constitutional interpretation are also fully expounded in the book. Taiwan’s NGOs are very active and have played critical roles in enhancing human rights practices. In the areas of civil and political rights, difficult human rights issues concerning the death penalty remain unresolved. But regarding the rights and freedoms in the spheres of personal liberty, expression, privacy, and fair trial (including lay participation in criminal trials), there are in-depth discussions on the respective developments in Taiwan that readers will find interesting. In the areas of economic, social, and cultural rights, the focuses of the book are on the achievements as well as the problems in the realization of the rights to health, a clean environment, adequate housing, and food. The protections of vulnerable groups, including indigenous people, women, LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) individuals, the disabled, and foreigners in Taiwan, are also the areas where Taiwan has made recognizable achievements, but still encounters problems. The comprehensive coverage of this book should be able to give readers a well-rounded picture of Taiwan’s human rights performance. Readers will find appealing the story of the effort to achieve high standards of human rights protection in a jurisdiction barred from joining international human rights conventions. This book won the American Society of International Law 2021 Certificate of Merit in a Specialized Area of International Law.