Sep. 14, 2013

University of San Francisco students learn about Asian law

University of San Francisco School of Law professor Thomas J. Klitgaard shared memories of practicing law in China with students during a lecture Monday. The professor, who is also of counsel at Dillingham & Murphy LLP, explained that students could understand the motivations behind the Chinese legal structure by analyzing the differences between the laws of Macao and Hong Kong, two territories that were temporarily owned by Portugal and the British Empire, repectively. Klitgaard said the two territories were reincorporated into China around the same time and provide good case studies for comparison. He said the laws of Macao, reincorporated into China in 1999, were markedly vaguer than the laws of Hong Kong, which rejoined two years earlier. He said contracts in China are read in an extremely literal light and the government learned from its mistakes writing the Hong Kong law to give itself more leeway in imposing its will in Macao. The Klitgaard family has a long tradition of working in China. The professor's grandfather was a trader who ingratiated himself with the local community by the way he handled the death of a Chinese sailor. Klitgaard's forebearer refused to bury the man at sea, instead turning his boat around and returning to port so that the sailor's family could give him a traditional resting place. The professor said this demonstration of respect greatly improved his grandfather's business interactions in a society that was known at the time for being extremely exclusionary to foreigners. — Joshua Sebold