Les Avocats Aux Pieds Nus En Chine, Vecteurs D’accès À La Justice?

The role of China’s barefoot lawyers, or paralegals, working in rural areas, is scarcely addressed in studies of China’s legal reforms, either in China or in the West. This study seeks to identify their contribution to access to civil justice in China. A comparative approach is used. First, the contribution of paralegals elsewhere in the world must be addressed to put China’s barefoot lawyers into context. Similarly, the proposed analysis is retrospective, given the China’s current political environment. Legal reforms in China will therefore be addressed first, with an emphasis on the measures taken by judicial authorities to favour access to civil justice. The second part of this study will address paralegals in general, followed by an analysis of the role of barefoot lawyers in China. When did they emerge? How do they work? What challenges and constraints do they face?