A Comparison And The Global Trend Of The Personal Bankruptcy Systems

During the last two decades,many countries have experienced dramatic reforms in the area of personal bankruptcy.By and large, the reforms have been adopted with the aim of providing financial relief to the growing number of over-indebted and financially fragile individuals.Nonetheless,conspicuous disparities still exist among countries in their formulation of the fresh start policy and in the utilization level of bankruptcy by individuals.The fresh start policy has now been in existence,In some form or another,for almost 300 years.In its essence,the fresh start policy grants a financially troubled individual an opportunity to begin a new and unencumbered financial chapter in his or her life.A fresh start policy generally includes a provision for debt forgiveness,a provision allowing a debtor to retain basic properties away from the reach of her creditors,and a provision that minimizes various forms of postpetition discrimination against the debtor.A fresh start policy in personal bankruptcy has undergone some significant changes around the world during the last two twenty years.A significant number of countries that traditionally had a rather conservative debt relief regime have recently adopted broad revisions to their bankruptcy laws,dramatically liberalizing their fresh start policies.Countries such as Japan have abandoned their fixation with bankruptcy as a punitive mechanism against a defaulting debtor, or as a creditors' collection tool.Instead,these countries have opted for a bankruptcy regime that is more concerned with a debtor's opportunities for a fresh start.However,these dramatic reform undertaking were not identical in all of these countries.The United States has one of the most debtor-friendly personal bankruptcy vehicles in the industrialized world.At the heart of the American system is the firmly-rooted belief in maintaining the prospect of a fresh start for the honest but unfortunate debtor.Australian bankruptcy law share the same common law roots with American,however,America departed markedly from the England model early in this country's history.The result is a vast divergence between both the basic goals of American and Australian bankruptcy law and the mechanism used to achieve those goal.Japan doesn't share the common law root,but also has inclined to personal bankruptcy and exemption.So,in this article,these three typical countries are chosen as examples to compare their personal bankruptcy systems.This article is divided into six parts.The first part introduces the meaning,the history and the different models of personal bankruptcy,and testifies the origin of the personal bankruptcy.From the second part to the fifth part,four aspects of personal bankruptcy in America,Australia and Japan are studied separately, namely the ability and causes of personal bankrupt,the scope of personal bankrupt property,the rehabilitation and the exemption law.The last part is devoted to the global trend of personal bankruptcy law,from merchant bankrupt to personal bankrupt,from nonexempt to exempt,from liquidation to prevention,from compulsive to voluntary ,from unilateral interest to both sides interest,from individual interest to society interest.In a word,the personal bankruptcy system is more debtor-friendly and more concerned with how to maintain the prospect of a fresh start for the honest but unfortunate debtor.