Social Sciences in China (Chinese Edition)

No. 3, 2025

Colonial Discourses and Anglo-American “Jurisdictional Politics” in Modern China

(Abstract)

Qu Wensheng

The “discourse of legal Orientalism” functioned as a system of representation employed by colonial empires such as Britain and the United States to usurp “consular jurisdiction” and “unilateral extraterritoriality” in modern China. While these two colonial powers sought to establish extraterritorial authority in China, their internal competing jurisdictional arrangements created a fragmented legal landscape where multiple authorities and courts exercised competing powers. Consuls, judges, and ministers to China engaged in protracted power struggles over the allocation, control, and coordination of jurisdiction, ultimately shaping an Anglo-American jurisdictional framework characterized by “trial by consuls.” This extraterritorial system comprised three distinct types of courts—consular courts, specialized courts, and mixed courts—all of which competed jurisdictionally. The history of colonial empires exercising extraterritorial jurisdiction in modern China should not be obscured by the so-called “l(fā)egal pluralism” promoted by some overseas scholars.