On Limited Inheritance System

As a very advanced system, the purpose of beneficial inheritance system is to protect the legitimate rights and interests of creditors and heritage successors. Either in common law countries or civil law countries, the systems were effectively designed to achieve this purpose. In the early 1980s, china's succession law borrows the system from the former Soviet Union and East European socialist countries. It abolished the traditional concept that"the father debt son also", which has rooted in people's mind for the past thousands of years. The system was undoubtedly of important political and practical significance at that time and played an important role in promoting economic development. However, we have only adopted the" beneficial inheritance" concept and not sucked the essence of the complete system. Therefore, it can't adapt to china's present situation. Since entering the 21st century, China has undergone tremendous changes in social and economic life. Private properties have increased quickly and resulted in the problem that the inheritance property issues have become more complex than before, when he or she was dead. Our inheritance of unconditional limited inheritance system cannot be put into effects. It can neither be adjusted to the relation of succession effectively, nor protect the legitimate rights and interests between creditors and the estate heirs on equal foot. Particularly in judicial practice, it seems extremely feeble on the protection of the interests of creditors. Therefore, to conduct research into the system is of great practical significance because it can not only provide the reference to revise or improve the present provisions, but also provide theoretical guidance to judicial practice. The paper consists of four chapters, with a total of about 38,000 words.Chapter One: the summary of beneficial inheritance system.In the first part, I will introduce the concept, time of prescription, methods and the effectiveness and the relevant rules of beneficial inheritance system. I elaborated on its history and purpose of beneficial inheritance system. We can get a more complete and accurate understanding by comparing the beneficial inheritance system with the universal succession system.Chapter Two: The present situation and shortcomings of beneficial inheritance system in china.Confined by the poor economic condition, improper guiding ideology and infantile research, the law of succession, which was enacted in 1985,only stipulated the principle of beneficial inheritance system. Lacking of operational measures, current provisions no longer meet the needs of the socialist market economy.And there are several shortcomings in the system: Firstly, the system of the heirs and creditors heritage protection mechanisms is imbalanced by permitting unconditional inheritance;Secondly, it rejects the absolute succession; Thirdly, it lacks of operational measures. Finally, there are no special procedural requirements for the creditors who want to liquidate the inherit property.Chapter three: the comparison between the civil law and common law systemIn civil law countries, which adopt beneficial inheritance system, the protection of the interests of creditors and the estates to heirs is mainly taken through liquidation methods and procedures. However, in the common law countries, which adopt universal inheritance system, there was a set of legal administrator to allot the residuary estate to the heirs after paying off the debt to creditor at first. Comparing the procedure with the liability of each one in co-heir, we can easily come to a conclusion that common law heritage administration system is more reasonable. But the high cost of justice is suitable to our current situation. However, There are three types of beneficial inheritance procedures in the civil law system, which play the similar function as universal inheritance in the common law system. But the degree of involvement of the courts is not so intensive, from which we can learn something.Chapter four: The conceptualization of improving our beneficial inheritance systemCompared with other country's succession legislation, there are so many deficiencies in our beneficial inheritance system that our law should be improved in the following aspects: Firstly, we must change the unconditional beneficial inheritance into a conditional one, set up a set of heritage administration system, and establish the separation of property and heritage inventory system to improve our law; Secondly, we must stipulate a clear succession acceptance or disclaim period, and stabilize the property rights of inheritance as soon as possible; Thirdly, we must implement universal inheritance system, as a complementary system to balance the interests of creditors and the estate heirs in a more scientific way. In the end, we must establish the heritage debt liquidation procedures to resolve the property dispute between heritage creditors and the estate heirs or other related parties.