Kazushige Sakaguchi

Graduate School of Law and Politics, Osaka UniversityAssociate Professor*Profile is at the time of the award.

2018Inamori Research GrantsHumanities & Sociology

Research topics
Empirical research on the Role and Position of Basic Level Legal Service Worker in Chinese Formal Legal Service Provision
Keyword
Summary
Since the 1980s, China has instituted a number of acts to regulate their people’s rights and obligations. It is not easy for the common people to exercise their rights on their own, so they seek help from legal consultants, especially from lawyers. Still, legal fees are far from affordable, and many legal professionals are based in urban areas, preventing ordinary people from using their services casually. Amid such a situation, “basic legal service providers” (hereinafter, “Legal Service Providers”) offer the potential to be the best advisors for the common people. While the scope of their services overlaps with that of lawyers, they charge less than lawyers do and can be found in many places outside of urban areas. For some types of services, they are even comparable to lawyers in terms of the number of cases they handle. Nevertheless, not much has been done to study this profession in China, let alone in Japan. Thus, this proposed research is intended to make a comparison between the Legal Service Providers and lawyers and explain what kind of services the Legal Service Providers are actually involved in, and to what extent.

Message from recipient

It is indeed more than an unexpected joy for the proposed research to have been selected for the Inamori Research Grants Program. In an attempt to meet expectations, I will deepen the objective and fair recognition, analysis, and inquiry of the present situation to reach new insights.

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Humanities & Sociology