Ting Zhang's formidable study of the “production, circulation, and reception of legal knowledge in Qing China” (p. 6) constitutes a valuable contribution to the burgeoning field of Chinese legal history. It is based mainly on official and commercial editions of the Qing Code, litigation handbooks, community lecture manuals, and other publications that informed readers about the law. Zhang's empirical research is impeccable and on its own would make this an important book; her interpretive claims are interesting and provocative, even when they are not entirely persuasive.

The first two chapters review the publishing history of the Qing Code. Zhang shows that official publication was inadequate to meet demand, even within the bureaucracy: far too few copies were printed, and production was so slow that official editions were obsolete by the time they appeared in print. Hence the opportunity—indeed, the necessity—for commercial publishers to step in; without them, magistrates charged with enforcing the law would not have known what it was. This finding may be the book's single most important contribution; it fits a larger pattern of the Qing state operating “on the cheap” by outsourcing various aspects of governance. Book merchants incorporated new laws into easy-to-use editions of the code, in a standardized format that included commentaries, case precedents, and cross-referencing along with the laws themselves. Magistrates increasingly relied on this unauthorized supplementary material for understanding and applying the code. Private legal advisors played a leading role as compilers of commercial editions, and their influence and status grew accordingly. As the marketplace became the main purveyor of legal knowledge, Zhang suggests, the imperial state lost its monopoly over the substance of the law.

In chapter 3, Zhang argues that Qing officials received far more legal education than we have realized—and that they had to know the law, given the “legally sophisticated bureaucracy and society” that they faced (p. 92). Zhang cites a number of measures ordering (or encouraging) officials to study the code and to be examined on it; but most of her examples postdate the Taiping Rebellion. Moreover, magistrates’ handbooks exhorted new officials to study the code, implying that there were no formal mechanisms to ensure that they had done so before assuming office.

Zhang's boldest—and least convincing—claim is that “ordinary people” were “quite familiar with the law” (p. 4). In chapters 4 and 5, Zhang argues that they acquired legal knowledge from the handbooks of litigation masters who provided legal advice behind the scenes, and from the “community lectures” that local officials were expected to offer on a regular basis. Despite prohibition, litigation handbooks circulated widely, enhancing “the common people's access to and understanding of the law” (p. 113). The handbooks advised how to draw on the text of the Qing Code in crafting a plaint, to increase its chances of being accepted, and Zhang cites local case records as evidence that “litigants manipulated the law” and were “clearly aware of the laws” (pp. 136–38). But most people acquired legal knowledge by listening to community lectures which, according to lecture manuals, included specific, accessible information about the code. Zhang cites various sources to suggest that the lectures succeeded in widely “disseminating orthodox ideas, moral principles, and legal knowledge” (p. 155), but I am skeptical whether such texts are reliable evidence of the lectures’ actual reception or impact.

Zhang never defines “ordinary people,” but the vast majority of people in Qing China were peasants, and, as she knows, it is unlikely that any of them could read the books she analyzes—hence her emphasis on the community lectures. I have read thousands of Qing legal cases, and for what it's worth, I have never encountered any mention of the supposedly ubiquitous community lectures. In contrast, I have seen many references to markets, festivals, lineage activities, local opera, and so on. I suppose that proves nothing, but I find it hard to believe that community lectures had the profound influence Zhang claims.

Nearly all plaints were written by licensed official scribes at the yamen, who would listen to a plaintiff's story and reduce it to writing in conventional language on a printed form bearing the scribe's seal. This process involved a certain give-and-take between plaintiff and scribe, and presumably the effort put in by the scribe depended on how much he was paid. It seems likely that whatever specialized knowledge appears in plaints reflects the knowledge of the scribes who wrote them rather than the plaintiffs.

Zhang cites several examples of what she believes to be litigants’ knowledge of specific statutes: a husband's belief that if he caught his wife in adultery, he was entitled to kill her and her partner; a mother's belief that it was against the law for her son to scold and beat her; and a peasant's belief that it was against the law to destroy another family's ancestral graves. These beliefs conform to the Qing Code, but in none of Zhang's examples did the protagonists refer explicitly to the code, let alone quote the relevant laws. Her examples involve extreme violations of widespread kinship norms, and in these instances, the code may simply reflect those norms. To murder adulterers is the sort of “honor killing” that unfortunately is considered righteous in many patriarchal societies; China was no exception. And one doesn't need the Qing Code to know that it is wrong to beat up one's mother, or to desecrate graves—presumably, such behavior would be taboo in any society.

Further research will be needed to prove whether Zhang is right about the legal knowledge of “ordinary people.” In closing, let me emphasize once again the value of her book, which should be required reading for any student of Chinese legal history.