A Study On The Jurisdiction System Of Divorce Cases In China

As the basis for a foreign country to hear an international divorce case, the jurisdiction is of vital significance in the international divorce proceedings. Jurisdiction system of international divorce embodies the equality of state sovereignty. Jurisdiction of international divorce clears the specific range of right that State Court accepted and heard, which is of great significance. However, the current legislation of international divorce cases is far from perfect, and there is not enough direct measures to solve the problem. This article is write to learn the foreign experience about the jurisdiction system of international divorce and develop a characteristic system for our country. The article consists of four parts.The first part is an overview of the jurisdiction of international divorce cases. The author defines the concept of the jurisdiction, make feasible analysis, and introduce personal jurisdiction, territorial jurisdiction, exclusive jurisdiction and contractual jurisdiction. This part especially underlines jurisdiction conflict and its solution.The second part is the current situation of legislation in the jurisdiction of international divorce cases. From the angle of direct jurisdiction and indirect jurisdiction, the author gives a review and analysis on the legislative development of jurisdiction of China’s international divorce cases. Meanwhile, the article also introduce and analyze the relevant laws and regulations in the Anglo American Law system countries（regions） represented by United States and Hong Kong of China, and also in the Germany and Switzerland on behalf of the Civil Law system countries. All the analysis above also lays the foundation for the comparison and reference of the third part.The third part is an analysis of the plight in the international divorce jurisdiction system. The author raises issues in China’s jurisdiction system of international divorce from both legislative shortcomings and judicial practice perspective. The issues include the weak jurisdiction system, the overlap, conflict and ambiguity of legislation, unreasonable rules of personal jurisdiction and territorial jurisdiction, abuse of parallel jurisdiction and unclear parallel litigation. The author makes an analysis and argumentation to the current problems above combining relevant cases.The fourth part is the perfection of the jurisdiction system of the international divorce cases in China. On the basis of the advanced experiences of foreign countries, the author puts forward suggestions on how to consummate the legislation of China’s international divorce cases jurisdiction system, including perfecting parallel litigation response mechanism, implementing the unified legislative standards and guidelines, expanding the scope of jurisdiction, introduce the doctrine of court received first and the principle of non bis in idem, and establishing the internal and external coordination of jurisdiction system. Faced with difficulties in the judicial practice, the author proposes that we should, on the foundation of sticking to the principle of protecting national sovereignty, strengthen international communication and coordination, flexibly use the principle of mediation, and construct jurisdiction information query system, so as to really avoid the conflict in international divorce jurisdiction, protecting the legitimate rights and interests of all parties concerned.