Young Researcher Workshop: Legal Education as Empowerment: Chinese Females Going to Law Schools and Their Gendered Battle

Legal Education as Empowerment:  Chinese Females Going to Law Schools and Their Gendered Battle

Speaker: Hongyun Yu, Master of the Science of Law Student, Stanford Law School

In China, the proportion of female law students has grown at an astonishing rate over the past 20 years, surpassing that of most Western countries and other civil law jurisdictions. Surprisingly, even though the proportion of female law undergraduates has grown from 50% to 70% in the past five years, women are still perceived as unsuitable for legal education, lacking leadership, and deficient in the "rational thinking" required in law.

The choice of law as both a major and profession by women is significantly associated with their traditional gender roles, societal, familial, community, and peer gender expectations, and even includes stereotypes. Traditional research suggests that the legal profession and legal education in China, like in other jurisdictions, are generally male-dominated and gender-biased. However, the complexity of legal education also lies in its equality-oriented, value-guided curriculum, knowledge system, and rights discourse, all of which empower women to break and reshape traditional gender roles. Legal education presents an empowering orientation, influencing not only the future career choices of women in the legal profession but also reciprocally reshaping their gender roles and labor division within law schools and the legal industry. A gender war is unfolding starting from law schools, and these institutions, as well as the future legal profession, should pay attention to this process and promote equality through reforms in legal education and law.

This research is an empirical legal study that, through surveys, focus groups, structured interviews, and in-depth interviews at three different law schools in China, explores the following hypotheses: Unlike men, Chinese women have a different gendered narrative in choosing law schools and legal professions; legal education, as a form of empowerment, enhances women's recognition of gender equality and their identity as “legal women”.

This study primarily challenges and expands upon the traditional stereotypes of women as "emotional" and "ill-suited to the rational discipline of law." It deconstructs the notion of "rationality" in law and exposes inequalities embedded in law schools and social structures. The study also challenges the perceived objectivity, gender neutrality, and rational truth of law, arguing that acknowledging these inequalities is crucial for promoting legal reform and equality in the legal profession.

The rise and self-empowerment of women in traditionally higher-status, male-dominated fields, such as law schools, the legal profession, and the judiciary is a global trend. This Chinese study, which crosses educational, gender, sociological, and legal boundaries, can also provide theoretical interconnection and comparative experiences for other legal and social research.

About the Workshops

The SCCEI Young Researcher Workshops are a bi-weekly series of presentations from scholars around campus who are working on issues related to China’s economy and institutions. The aim of the series is to bring together young scholars by providing a platform to present new research, get feedback, exchange ideas, and make connections. Each session features a single presenter who may present a new research plan, share results from preliminary data analyses, or do a trial run of a job talk or conference presentation. The Workshop Series is an opportunity to give and receive feedback on existing research, get to know other researchers around campus who are working on or in China, and be a testing ground for new ideas, data, and presentations.

Workshops are held every other Thursday from 1 - 2 pm. Afternoon refreshments will be provided! 

Visit the Young Researcher Workshops webpage for more information on the content and format of the series and to learn how to sign up to present.