Seminar: Frédéric CONSTANT
01 MAY 23
IMH-EFEO Lecture Series
“French Historical Research and the Modern Era”
2022-2023 - People(s), State(s) and Citizens in Crisis
Speaker:
Prof. Frédéric Constant
Université Côte d’Azur, Nice / EFEO
Title:
Gambling and Local Administration of Justice in 19th Century China
Date:
Friday, May 12, 2023 at 3:00 pm
Venue:
Conference Room 2, Archive Building, Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica
Abstract:
The talk will discuss the everyday operating of justice related to gambling by confronting different categories of sources and documents which display the diversity of understandings and interests the protagonists of justice may have developed. The interplay between these actors and their somehow contradictory strategies framed the way gambling cases were administered in justice. My study will focus on China in the 19th century, spanning from the Jiaqing era (1795-1820) to the Tongzhi era (1862-1875). Gambling cases are representative of the ordinary disputes that were examined on a regular basis in courts. They then provide information about local conflictuality, even though archive documents reflect only a part of the complex social background and the stakes that decided a plaintiff to enter into the judicial process. We will see what information can be extracted from the complaints to reconstruct the social background of the gambling cases. These cases are also useful to understand the nature of the interactions between state courts and ordinary persons. Gambling cases illustrate the complex interplay between law and society. Statutory law, mostly devised as a tool of government, did not address the social demand for an institutional resolution of private conflicts. Plaintiffs who wanted to have their case heard in justice had to reframe their dispute according to extant legal categories and bureaucratic practices. Accusation of gambling was thus often used to draw the magistrate's attention on a dispute which would otherwise have been disregarded.
The talk will be chaired by Prof. Chang Ning, Research Fellow, Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica
The talk will be given in Chinese. Registration is not required.
lecture
“French Historical Research and the Modern Era”
2022-2023 - People(s), State(s) and Citizens in Crisis
Speaker:
Prof. Frédéric Constant
Université Côte d’Azur, Nice / EFEO
Title:
Gambling and Local Administration of Justice in 19th Century China
Date:
Friday, May 12, 2023 at 3:00 pm
Venue:
Conference Room 2, Archive Building, Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica
Abstract:
The talk will discuss the everyday operating of justice related to gambling by confronting different categories of sources and documents which display the diversity of understandings and interests the protagonists of justice may have developed. The interplay between these actors and their somehow contradictory strategies framed the way gambling cases were administered in justice. My study will focus on China in the 19th century, spanning from the Jiaqing era (1795-1820) to the Tongzhi era (1862-1875). Gambling cases are representative of the ordinary disputes that were examined on a regular basis in courts. They then provide information about local conflictuality, even though archive documents reflect only a part of the complex social background and the stakes that decided a plaintiff to enter into the judicial process. We will see what information can be extracted from the complaints to reconstruct the social background of the gambling cases. These cases are also useful to understand the nature of the interactions between state courts and ordinary persons. Gambling cases illustrate the complex interplay between law and society. Statutory law, mostly devised as a tool of government, did not address the social demand for an institutional resolution of private conflicts. Plaintiffs who wanted to have their case heard in justice had to reframe their dispute according to extant legal categories and bureaucratic practices. Accusation of gambling was thus often used to draw the magistrate's attention on a dispute which would otherwise have been disregarded.
The talk will be chaired by Prof. Chang Ning, Research Fellow, Institute of Modern History, Academia Sinica
The talk will be given in Chinese. Registration is not required.
lecture