China Overview
The judicial system in use in China is based on a mixture of customary rules and written laws. The judicial authority is personified by elective People’s Courts, established at different levels and culminating in the Supreme People’s Court, which is accountable to the National Assembly for its actions. This body elects the Supreme Prosecutor every 5 years. The death penalty is in force in the country, widely applied even if, since 2007, the death sentences imposed by local courts require confirmation by the Supreme Court. The defense of the state concentrates all military functions in the People’s Liberation Army. To this armed force is added a public security corps and a civilian militia. For organizational reasons, military service is selective and only 10% of the recruits are actually enlisted; the duration of the draft depends on the weapon in which it is carried out (three years in the army, four in the navy and in the air force). The education system, organized for two millennia according to Confucian principles, was modified after the constitution of the Republic (1912), coinciding with the breakdown of the country’s cultural isolation, which reorganized its life and its educational system on Western models. Fundamental milestones of this process were the replacement of the classical literary language with the spoken one (in order to participate more widely in culture among the immense masses of the country), the extension of literacy to the total population (starting from 1949), the new approach given (sixties of the twentieth century) to educational programs from the political line inaugurated with the Cultural Revolution, with the pre-eminence accorded to the political training of students, the widespread intervention of the party in the direction of school bodies and teaching methods, the revaluation of manual labor. After Mao Tse-tung’s death, architect of the Cultural Revolution, the school system has undergone a sort of turnaround, aimed at favoring the professional contents of the preparation as well as recognizing the fundamental importance of intellectual work.
From a formal point of view, the Chinese education system is structured in kindergartens and kindergartens, in primary schools lasting 6 years, in secondary schools divided into two microcycles of 3 and 2 years. Education is compulsory. There are also numerous higher education institutes (above all with a technical-scientific and linguistic address) and about a thousand universities which in some cases guarantee quality standards aligned with Western ones. Visit mcat-test-centers for vocational training in china. Among the latter, the University of Xiamen, in the city of the same name (Fujia, 1921), the University of Peking, in the capital (1898), the Sun Yat-sen University in Canton (Guangdong, 1924), the Futan University of Shanghai (Jiangsu, 1922), the Nankai University of Tianjin (Hebei, 1919), the University of Nanjing (Jiangsu, 1902), those of Sichuan in Chengdu (Sichuan, 1927) and Shanxi in Xi’an (Shanxi, 1937). The private education sector, reserved for the elite, is also booming. According to official data, the elementary schooling of children has now reached 100%, while the illiteracy rate in the country still concerns about a tenth of the population (in 2007 it was 6.7%). those of Sichuan in Chengdu (Sichuan, 1927) and Shanxi in Xi’an (Shanxi, 1937). The private education sector, reserved for the elite, is also booming. According to official data, the elementary schooling of children has now reached 100%, while the illiteracy rate in the country still concerns about a tenth of the population (in 2007 it was 6.7%). those of Sichuan in Chengdu (Sichuan, 1927) and Shanxi in Xi’an (Shanxi, 1937). The private education sector, reserved for the elite, is also booming. According to official data, the elementary schooling of children has now reached 100%, while the illiteracy rate in the country still concerns about a tenth of the population (in 2007 it was 6.7%).
PREHISTORY
The oldest human remains in China are probably the two incisors of Yuanmou, attributed to Homo erectus, for which there is a dating, however questioned, of 1.7 million years. The archaeological sequence of northern China, according to some Chinese authors, begins with the site of Gongwangling, where a fossil skull similar to that of Lanthian was found; follow the site with fauna and scarce lithic industry of Chenjiawo, in the Shensi, the locality n. 1 of Chu ku’tien, whose paleolithic levels with human fossils are between 500,000 and 200,000 years ago, and the skull found in Tali (Shensi) dated to ca. 200,000 years ago. Industries similar to the more archaic ones of Chu ku’tien are also found in Kehe in a filling referring to the Middle Pleistocene. From the site of Mapa (late middle Pleistocene – early upper Pleistocene) comes an incomplete human skull, attributed to the Asian groups corresponding to the Neanderthals. On the plateau of Ordos (Inner Mongolia), various findings refer to the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic, similarly to the industries of Sjara-osso-gol and of the locality 13 of Chu ku’tien. Copious are the remains of settlements from the Neolithic period whose diffusion was favored by the vast fertile plains of Löss, especially of the northern territories rich in waterways. The economic basis of many of these cultures will be the cultivation of millet, rice and barley, and the breeding of cattle, pigs, sheep, dogs and silkworms. To name a few, we recall the cultures of Cishan (VI millennium), of Hue (V-III millennium), of Hongshan and of Sungari (IV-III millennium), of Liangzhu (second half of the IV millennium-III millennium), of Yangshao (6th-2nd millennium) and Lung Shan (3rd-1st millennium). With the Bronze Age, the appearance of writing heralds the protohistoric times. The cultures of Erlitou (1500 BC), Erligang (Erlikang) and Anyang (1300-1030 BC) are remembered from this period.
