Law and Development in Asia Edited by Gerald Paul McAlinn and Caslav Pejovic (review)

If the law and development movement were human, it would have spent its life on the psychiatrist’s couch. Few academic endeavours are riddled with as much self-doubt. Despite renewed academic interest after Trubek and Galanter’s 1974 obituary, the discipline has struggled to establish its identity. Trubek, in the Introduction to Law and Development in Asia, declares that “the hoped-for academic field of law and development never materialized” (Trubek and Galanter 1974, p. 2). In his view, the subject generates significant interest within the context of related disciplines, but cannot stand independently. For a field that may not exist, a great deal of enlightening literature has been generated, to which this book adds.

Law and Development in Asia reflects the broader issues facing law and development. In their Preface, the editors elaborate a lofty goal. The volume, which grew out of the papers presented at a 2008 Kyushu University conference, will explore whether there is “an Asian alternative to universal approaches to law and development” (p. xiv). The difficulty of this task is that if Trubek is correct, then it is hard to argue that there is a commonly accepted theory of law and development to which the Asian experience can be compared. That, by itself, is not fatal to the editors’ quest. Despite the absence of a standard of comparison, one might discern from the volume’s twelve essays an Asian approach that can serve as a model to other less economically developed countries. Certainly, there are numerous bright spots that will interest students of discrete aspects of East Asia’s remarkable growth. The reader, however, will finish the book without a coherent view of the role of law in Asian development which the individual chapters can be said to elucidate or to illustrate. In this respect, the volume’s ambitious reach exceeds its grasp.

Two chapters address most closely the collection’s primary aim. Ohnesorge in his thoughtful contribution, “Law and development orthodoxies and the Northeast Asian experience”, traces the course of the law and development movement from its origins in the 1950s and 1960s into the new millennium. Concurring with Trubek that no universal approach to law and development can be discerned, he persuasively suggests that important lessons can be drawn from the study of Japan, South Korea and Taiwan rather than attempting to reduce their experiences to a “template, to be imposed on today’s developing countries” (p. 33). In a complementary chapter, Ginsburg’s “Japanese law and Asian development” considers the Japanese colonial legacy’s impact on the approach to the role of the legal system in Taiwan and Korea. He cites the creation of a “set of institutions” that he calls the “Northeast Asian Legal Complex” characterized by an “insulated administration, a miniscule legal profession, and a relatively high-quality judiciary with a formalist approach” (p. 68). They stand in contrast to the more conventional structures found in many other developing nations.

Ohnesorge’s approach in seeking commonalities rather than “templates” most closely parallels the study of the East Asian developmental state. The developmental state model elaborated by Johnson (1982) with respect to Japan and subsequently applied to analyses of South Korea (Amsden 1989) and Taiwan (Wade 2004) is mostly concerned with the relationship between governments focused on economic growth and the private sector. As Wade noted in his examination of Taiwan, as theories go, the developmental state “is not, however, much of a theory” (Wade 2004, p. 26). Rather, it identifies a recurring approach to the challenges of growth that has been influential throughout the region.

Other chapters provide ample food for thought, but are less closely related to the book’s theme. Three contributions from a quartet of National University of Singapore professors stand out. Harding’s “The politics of law and development in Thailand: seeking Rousseau, finding Hobbes” provides a valuable addition to the attempt to identify an Asian approach to law and development. His synthesis of 125 years of...