On The Perfection Of The Process Of Civil Retrial

Civil retrial procedure is one of the special remedial processes initiated by the grieved party against a legally effective judgment, ruling or mediation in order to start a new trial and also the procedure of re-opening a trial for the court to follow.There is an agreement that the new stipulation of the retrial system in 1991 Civil Procedure Law played a significant role in facilitating the application for a new trial by the parties and the judicial supervision by the procurator ate as well as in rectifying judicial error and maintaining social justice. But the present retrial system is based itself mainly on that of the former Soviet Union, its operation in China gives rise to more state intervention than individual disposal, and the norm itself is not perfect, etc. These finally bring about "numerous applicants, unlimited lapse of time, high frequency, confused jurisdiction, unmethodical causes of action".These defects are caused by the influence of the former Soviet Civil Procedure, Chinese historical tradition and the once popular legal concept that "judicial mistakes must be eradicated".As one of the special remedial processes, all nations have established civil retrial procedure so as to rectify judicial errors from first to final trials. The diversity of these names owes its origin to the different histories, cultures and conditions of states. In France, grave mistake in a judgment could be rectified by the "extraordinary Appeal" which lies to ordinary or Supreme Court or maybe lodged by a third party; In Germany, the Law of Civil Procedure provides that the related party could lodge an appeal for retrial against a final judgment; The Japanese Law of Civil Procedure, modeled after German law, also provides that the seriously affected party to the judgment with exceptionally grave error is allowed to voice opposition by lodging an appeal for retrial.The author concludes that the various states have adopted a prudent attitude...