A research team led by Zhang Jun, president of the Supreme People’s Court (SPC), visited courts in Shanghai from Sept 8 to 9, calling on the city’s courts to make greater contributions through innovation and exemplary practices and provide replicable experience for courts nationwide.
During the research tour, the team visited the Shanghai Financial Court, the Changning Primary People’s Court and the Jing’an Primary People’s Court in the city, as well as the Jing’an district comprehensive governance center.
Zhang Jun, president of the Supreme People’s Court, leads a research team on a visit to the Shanghai Financial Court. [Photo/court.gov.cn]
The Shanghai Financial Court has established mechanisms including a full-process dispute resolution model combining representative judgments, professional mediation and judicial confirmation, providing useful experience for courts nationwide in handling financial and other cases fairly and efficiently. The court also regularly studies issues reflected in financial cases and works with relevant authorities to prevent legal risks and address disputes at their source.
Zhang called on the court to further strengthen its role in promoting the governance of the financial sector, improve relevant rules through high-quality adjudication, and ensure a sound start to the 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026-30). He also stressed the need to strengthen adjudication management, uphold a problem-oriented approach, and improve the fairness, consistency, as well as authority of judicial decisions.
A research team led by Zhang Jun visits the Changning Primary People’s Court in Shanghai. [Photo/court.gov.cn]
A research team led by Zhang Jun visits the comprehensive governance center in Jing’an district, Shanghai. [Photo/court.gov.cn]
The Changning court, once designated as a relatively under-performing primary court, has improved its performance by using technological innovations, including artificial intelligence, to enhance the quality and efficiency of adjudication and enforcement.
The Jing’an court has established a circuit adjudication site at the district comprehensive governance center. By impartially handling one inheritance dispute, the court helped prevent similar disputes from occurring in the community for six months, demonstrating how adjudicating one case can help improve governance in a wider area.
Zhang noted that the primary courts are key to implementing judicial policies and an important source of innovative practices. He urged them to pursue reform and innovation, explore new approaches, and contribute more experience to courts nationwide. He also called for deeper integration of court services into the standardized development of comprehensive governance centers and more effective performance of courts’ statutory responsibilities in guiding mediation and resolving disputes.
A research team led by Zhang Jun holds a symposium at the Jing’an Primary People’s Court in Shanghai. [Photo/court.gov.cn]
At a symposium held at the Jing’an court, Zhang exchanged views with officials from the Shanghai High People’s Court and presidents of intermediate and primary courts. He said that in recent years, courts in Shanghai have earnestly performed their primary responsibilities in adjudication and enforcement with the aim of serving high-quality economic and social development. He added that they have remained among the leading courts nationwide in terms of function performance and produced several landmark judgments and innovative practices, providing valuable experience and serving as examples for courts nationwide.
Zhang urged the courts to make greater efforts to advance innovation and establish exemplary practices in supporting the development of Shanghai as international centers for economy, finance, trade, shipping, and scientific and technological innovation, serving as references for courts nationwide.
He called for more efforts to prevent and resolve disputes at the source. Courts should deepen their engagement in the standardized development of comprehensive governance centers, work with relevant parties to prevent and resolve disputes at an early stage, and improve integrated management of litigation, adjudication, enforcement, and petition-related matters, he noted. He also called for greater emphasis on judicial research and encouraged courts in Shanghai to leverage the pilot program for AI-assisted adjudication systems to study emerging issues and provide experience for courts nationwide in adapting to advances in information technology.
He stressed the need to strengthen adjudication management in line with the laws governing judicial work. Courts should further optimize their evaluation systems, focus on quality while taking efficiency and effectiveness into account, and integrate adjudication management with performance evaluation, he said. Zhang also stressed that evaluation indicators should serve as a means of assessing judicial work rather than becoming the sole basis for evaluation, and that practices such as pursuing data for its own sake should be firmly corrected.
He called for stronger foundations for building the court workforce. Leading officials should fulfill their responsibilities, set an example, and ensure that responsibilities for Party building and professional work are properly implemented. He noted that courts should strengthen political development, professional competence, and work ethics of their workforces in an integrated manner, continuously improve their capabilities and conduct, and strengthen supervision, management, and care for them. Greater efforts should also be made to support the development of young officials and build a competent and responsible court workforce, he added.
Deng Xiuming, executive vice-president of the SPC; Hua Yuan, a member of the Standing Committee and secretary-general of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC); Jia Yu, president of the Shanghai High People’s Court; and Zhang Lei, executive deputy secretary of the Commission for Political and Legal Affairs of the CPC Shanghai Municipal Committee, participated in the research.
