Hui Zhou presented his ongoing research on Chinese litigation; Miguel de Figueiredo commented.

Abstract: Against the backdrop of digital transformation, many countries have enacted privacy laws to safeguard personal information. However, few studies have examined the effectiveness of such legislation in protecting privacy. This article addresses the gap by analyzing 6,370 Chinese court judgments across civil and criminal cases. We argue that in authoritarian legal systems, privacy laws may enable plaintiffs to prevail against individuals or private entities, but serve primarily as window dressing when the public sector infringes on privacy. Using original data collected from China Judgments Online, we find evidence supporting this theory. Plaintiffs are significantly more likely to win civil cases against private entities than against public organizations. The 2021 Personal Information Protection Law substantially improves their win rate in cases involving private defendants, but it fails to produce a significant effect when privacy offenders are affiliated with the public sector. Public actors also appear to hold a slight advantage in criminal cases, and the privacy protection law does not appear to have a meaningful impact in this setting. This study underscores the importance of privacy laws in protecting personal privacy on the one hand, and it highlights the limitations of such laws within authoritarian contexts on the other.

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