Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88

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Habitat International
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/habitatint

Regular pattern of judicial decision on land acquisition and

resettlement: An investigation on Zhejiang’s 901 administrative
litigation cases
Wenzhang Zhou a, Yi Peng b, Haijun Bao b, *
a
School of Law, Zhejiang University of Finance & Economics, Hangzhou, PR China
b
School of Public Administration, Zhejiang University of Finance & Economics, Hangzhou, PR China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Conflicts in land acquisition and resettlement (LAR) in China frequently occur because of rapid urbani-
Received 3 November 2016 zation and economic development. These conflicts require judicial decisions by law courts at various
Received in revised form hierarchical levels. However, few studies examine the regular pattern of relevant judicial decisions to
5 March 2017
improve the resolution of conflicts related to LAR in China. The current study aims to identify the regular
Accepted 22 March 2017
Available online 30 March 2017
pattern of jurisdiction in the field of LAR in Zhejiang Province by examining 901 administrative litigation
cases. Docking and blocking net, through which determines whether a judge supports plaintiffs in a
nomological basis, is used to investigate these cases. Statistical analysis of jurisdictions, defendants, and
Keywords:
Regular pattern
causes of action was conducted in the study. Results indicate that jurisdictions, executive positioning of
Land acquisition and resettlement (LAR) respondents, and causes of lawsuits are key issues that affect the judgment of the dockingeblocking net.
Winning rate dockingeblocking net Results reveal that the temporal-hierarchical level of jurisdiction is negatively correlated with the
Administrative litigation case plaintiffs' winning rate. The docking and blocking mechanism system of high-level courts within a
China jurisdiction likely provides adverse referees to plaintiffs. The executive positioning of respondents also
Administration litigation case affects judicial results. The plaintiffs’ winning rate deviates depending on the causes of lawsuits. Plaintiffs
and defendants use the three factors to further their own interests as much as possible through affecting
the final judicial decisions of the dockingeblocking net. This study seeks to improve the legitimacy of
executive action, thereby reducing the judicial costs of executive acts. The study contributes to the
prevention of existing administrative and judicial conflicts of LAR by clarifying the weak points of
administrative departments.
© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction 28,674.82 ha in 1999 to 32,026.18 ha in 2012, indicating a growth of

Various forms of land requisition have emerged with the rapid
urbanization and industrialization in China (Shen, Peng, Zhang, &
Wu, 2012; Chen, Wang, & Huang, 2015; Peng, Lai, Li, & Zhang,
2015; Bao, Zhu, Cen, Peng, & Xue, 2017). Existing research
demonstrated that land acquisition in the suburban of Beijing is
usually for developing service and innovation industries, while that
for Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta is the second industry
(Gong, Chen, Liu, & Wang, 2014; Tian, Ge, & Li, 2017; Webster &
Muller, 2002, pp. 6e19). In addition, official statistical records
indicate that areas of illegally used land increased from
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: zwz15869132800@yeah.net (W. Zhou), pengyihz@gmail.com
(Y. Peng), baohaijun77@163.com (H. Bao).
approximately 12% (MLR, 2013). A survey shows that the rapid
growth of illegal land acquisition of local governments in several
cities is more than 90% (Hui & Bao, 2013). Most scholars determine
that illegal land use also causes related legal and social conflicts
(Bao & Peng, 2016; Liang, 2009; Hui, Bao, & Zhang, 2013). Farmers
may experience unfair treatment in illegal land use (Peng, Shen,
Zhang, & Ochoa, 2014, Peng, Shen, Shen, Lu, &Yuan, 2014; Tang &
Chun, 2002). Illegal land transactions cause various social and
environmental problems and further threaten resources and envi-
ronment protection (Chen, Wang, Chen, & Huang, 2015; Peng,
2015; Peng, Shen, Tan, Tan, & Wang, 2013; Tian, 2008). The
misuse of “public interest” by land acquisition departments
threatens the principles of Chinese law (e.g. Xu, 2007).
Judicial decisions are required to solve conflicts related to LAR;
thus, law research is crucial. Existing law research focuses on the

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.habitatint.2017.03.013
0197-3975/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
80 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88
relationship between illegal land use and China's land legislative
recommendations. Tian and Ma (2009) asserted that some public
authorities work with the private sector to illegally transfer lands in
their control. Liang (2009) investigated the effects of promotion
incentives and concluded that illegal behavior under departmental
interests in the fiscal decentralization mode is strengthened
because of the lack of good governance. Koroso, Molen, Tuladhar,
and Zevenbergen (2013) found that significant problems in the
land market are related to inequity, which is caused by corruption
in dealing with land acquisitions. Thus, the central government
implemented a series of reforms to prevent corruption in urban
land sales. Xu, Yeh, & Wu (2009) proposed that amending the law is
only part of the ongoing efforts to develop a “law order” following
the aim of the central government. Researchers also suggested
legislative actions on land use in China. Ding (2007) argued that the
local government should consciously regulate the conflicts of LAR
in accordance with the law. Jin, Shi, and Yu (2010) noted that rules
must be enacted to obtain a fair bargain on land acquisition, which
will help resolve conflicts. Rao, Tan, and Luo (2014) emphasized the
monitoring and control of the behavior of local governments to
solve land problems effectively. Research on the problems of illegal
land use must be improved with solid evidence (Zhou, Xu, & Wang,
2015).
However, existing research has certain limitations. Studies on
laws usually focus on whether the results of charges are legal. Other
studies are administrative result-oriented and explain the behav-
ioral effect of land acquisition and the corresponding management
strategies of local governments. However, the logical basis of
administrative result-oriented research is the behavior of admin-
istrative departments rather than judicial departments. In the
Chinese legal system, the judicial branch, instead of the executive
branch, makes the final verdicts on administrative actions. When a
bill that involves LAR becomes a law, a judicial decision from the
judicial department connects the administrative action and the bill.
However, few studies have examined the regular pattern of rele-
vant judicial decisions to improve conflict resolution of LAR in
China.
This study aims to identify the regular patterns of jurisdiction in
the field of LAR in Zhejiang Province by examining 901 adminis-
trative litigation cases. Docking and blocking net, which determines
whether a judge supports plaintiffs in a nomological basis, is used
to investigate these cases. This paper is organized as follows: Sec-
tion 2 presents the context of LAR, and relevant operation of judicial
decision on the resulted conflicts through an in-depth review.
Section 3 briefly introduces the research methods and data sources.
In Section 4, a statistical analysis of the written judgment docu-
ments of 901 administrative litigation cases related to LAR in
Zhejiang Province is conducted. Section 5 presents an in-depth
discussion on the findings. The final section summarizes the
research with specifying the future research directions.
2. Literature review
2.1. Conflicts resulting from LAR
Land conflict related to LAR is a global problem. Developing
countries in Europe, Asia, and Africa are facing various forms of land
conflicts (Jokhadze, 2006; Müller, 2008; Yucer, Kan, Demirtas, &
Kalanlar, 2016). Land conflicts pertain to the personal loss and
property loss in land disputes, acquisition, and resettlement
(Alston, Libecap, & Mueller, 2000). Various forms of land conflicts
exist in different countries. Land conflicts in Kenya are mostly on
water use (Campbell, Helen, Mwangi, & Chege, 2000). Simmons
(2004) pointed out that land conflicts in Brazil are related to
valuable timber and farmland. In a large number of developing
countries, such as China, the number of conflicts resulting from LAR
is substantial and accompanied by disputes on land ownership and
the right of use (Bao, Ye, & Xu, 2014; Muzondo, Barry, Dwar, &
Whitetal, 2007; Tan, 2008).
In Asia, the main reason for these conflicts is two-fold. The first
has to do with the question of what is “public purpose”, which is
usually required by the land management law in some countries. In
India, constitutional debates on “public purpose” in land acquisi-
tion continue because land acquisition stands at the political fault
line of a changing India, which is undergoing significant political,
economic, social, environmental, and spatial transitions. Since
1824, India's legislation has not established a good definition of
public interest to prevent the abuse of land expropriation rights.
Under the administrative system of the Chinese government, LAR is
determined by “public purposes” (Clarke, 2014). However, China
has its own specific national condition. Lieberthal and Lampton
(1992) studied Chinese politics in the post-Mao era and
concluded that at the middle reaches of the rural hierarchy, the
relationship between the basic government and expanding rural
settlements demonstrates the continuing role of bureaucratic au-
thority as a determinant of resource allocation. Thus, China's bu-
reaucracy controls the definition and implementation of “public
purpose” (Zhang, 2009). As a result, China's executive authorities
will most likely control the arbitrary power of citizenship through
their power of interpreting the term “public purpose” (Li, 2008). By
establishing the definition of public interest, China's local govern-
ments abuse the right of land expropriation to threaten the rights of
local people; collective land owners, as well as the holders. The land
owners cannot easily safeguard their legitimate rights and interests
through legal collective land expropriation procedures. In the end,
abuse of administrative actions on land expropriation caused a
large number of conflicts resulting from LAR (Li, 2008; Zhang,
2009).
Second, who are the beneficiaries? The Indian state arrogated to
itself substantial legal powers to exercise the right of eminent
domain. Yet the efforts to establish a legal regime that guarantees
the right to resettlement and rehabilitation for displaced groups are
unsuccessful (Levien, 2011). Zhang (2005) believes that local gov-
ernments in China abuse their power on expropriation compen-
sation; compensation standards in the process of collection are
excessively low, which has a serious effect on the constitutional
rights on expropriation and has sparked intense social conflicts. Mo
(2008) conducted a practical study and posited that the behaviors
of local governments, such as the simplification of allocation ap-
proaches and inadequate social security, violate the basic principles
and legislative intention of land expropriation and seriously
threaten farmers’ property rights. Zhu and Prosterman (2007)
analyzed land rights in China and determined that various land
conflicts occur because farmers who lose their land typically
receive minimal or even no compensation. Unjust expropriation
compensation legislation will intensify the dissatisfaction of the
people who were expropriated and cause conflicts related to LAR
(Shan, Yu, & Wu, 2017), which in turn will affect social stability and
economic development. Thus judicial decision is usually unavoid-
able to solve such generated conflicts.
2.2. Judicial decision on LAR
Two factors that result in frequent conflicts of LAR can be
attributed to the defects of China's legal system. Studying and
improving the legislative and judicial system of land expropriation
and demolition are crucial to resolving relevant conflicts. In the
ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) region, a series of
complex issues, including political, economic, and social problems,
which lead to judicial or non-judicial redress. Thus, it is difficult to
 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88
protect the rights of involved parties in conflicts caused by LAR
(Kemp & Owen, 2016). India is a good example. Although “law
struggles” are collective actions for the protection of rights
conferred by law, parties involved in conflicts caused by LAR pro-
mote legislation and judicial redress to safeguard their own in-
terests and achieve positive results (Kumar & Kerr, 2012; Nielsen &
Nielsen, 2015).
Various Chinese legal scholars have examined the systems of
judicial redress and judicial remedies on the conflicts caused by
LAR. China's judicial remedy to land acquisition disputes is two-
fold. At the macro level, the judicial department issued the “guid-
ing case”, “judicial approval”, and other documents to guide na-
tional court decisions for judicial resolutions (SPC, 2012; SPC, 2014).
At the micro level, unlike general cases, courts solve land acquisi-
tion cases spontaneously for courts to make decisions for judicial
resolutions. Based on the case study, scholars believe that the two
factors, namely, legislative loopholes and illegal government,
interfered with judicial decisions to resolve conflicts related to LAR.
Liu (2012a) analyzed the existing “two rules for examination and
approval (liang sheng pi)” in the administrative decision system. By
using the imposition of the administrative lawsuit in Xuzhou as a
case study, the author believes that the loopholes in existing
administrative expropriation system left a leeway for illegal land
expropriation and increased the pressure on the justice system. Liu
(2007) compared the Kelo v. City of New London with “anti-mover”
cases in Chongqing City. The author found that Chinese land
legislation has problems on unfair compensation standards, unjust
progress, and the lack of judicial protection of the parties of LAR. In
the Administrative Litigation Law of the People's Republic of China,
the judiciary branch does not have the right to amend unjust leg-
islations, thereby increasing the burden on judicial bodies to
resolve conflicts. Liu (2012b) analyzed several cases and concluded
that the executive branch illegally interferes with the operation of
the judiciary branch, resulting in a large number of LAR conflicts.
Existing research in China shows that judicial decisions and reso-
lutions on LAR are affected by various factors. Therefore, this study
aims to investigate the regular pattern of judicial decision on LAR
through Zhejiang's 901 administrative litigation cases.
3. Research methods
3.1. Research design
This study uses case statistical research of legal documents as
suggested by Jin to identify the regular pattern of judicial decision
on LAR (2015). This approach can be employed to analyze verdicts,
journal articles, papers on law and policy, academic works, and
other relevant documents to discuss legal problems and draw
conclusions. Textual information was used to examine the process
of judicial decisions in courts when deciding a verdict. Data from
official sources were utilized because of their quality and reliability,
which help ensure comprehensiveness. The nomological basis of
this paper is summarized in the following sub-section.
3.2. Nomological basis
Nomological basis is necessary to establish the model for anal-
ysis (Jeffrey Harold, & Liu, 2012). In modern jurisprudence, the
judicial model is used to study judicial decisions, which are affected
by various factors. Institutional models (Schubert, 1967) describe
and forecast court decisions within the existing judicial system
(such as institutions, laws, constitutions, and rules of judicial pro-
cedure). The system model assumes that the legal dispute is a kind
of input mechanism, the judge is a type of conversion unit, and the
judgment is a kind of output mechanism in the judicial system
81
(Sheldon, 1970). The factors in the system interact with each other,
and result in the final decision being made. Group models hold that
interaction relationship between the court and the members of
society determines the final judicial judgment; therefore, several
factors (political parties, interest groups, enterprises, workers, and
minorities) must be considered in the judicial judgment (Sheldon,
1970). The recent attitude model analyzes the judicial decisions
of the Supreme Court of the United States, which claim that justices
attempt to hear the cases in accordance with their own policy
preferences and value judgments (Jeffrey et al., 2012). In this paper,
the researchers will analyze judicial decisions by establishing the
judicial model. In this model, judicial decisions are categorized as
either docking or blocking. In the process of reviewing and
assessing the administrative action of an administrative depart-
ment, the judicial department will choose to dock administrative
action (assessing the legality of an administrative action) or block
(evaluating the violation of an administrative action) for compre-
hensive assessment. Docking means judicial authorities approved
the administrative action of an administrative department in the
final judgment and will use forcible power to carry out a judgment.
Blocking means the judicial department denied administrative
actions and will also use law enforcement to implement the
blocking of a referee when necessary. In the normative and prac-
tical considerations of the large system, the line of docking and
blocking will gradually become a complex 3-D docking and block-
ing net, as shown in Fig. 1, which allows final judicial judgments to
move from theoretical neutrality to both ends of the spectrum.
Judicial decisions of the docking and blocking net can be obtained
from the public documents of verdict. Therefore, the key factors
considered by judicial departments in the cases of LAR can be
identified by examining the docking and blocking net characterized
in such verdict documents.
3.3. Data source
Disputes on LAR occur frequently because of rapid urbanization
in the coastal province of Zhejiang. The documents involved in this
study are written judgment, which are open accessed and con-
taining sufficient information. Other types of legal documents, e.g.
reconciliation agreement, are excluded due to their incompleteness
and difficulty to access. In addition, existing studies find that the
Judicial decision
trial
Cause of lawsuits
Temporal- Other
hierarchical judicial Behavior of
setting defendants
Case facts
Fig. 1. Docking and blocking net model of this research.
82 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88
major stakeholders are local government departments and land-
lost farmers. Therefore this research merely considers administra-
tive litigation, in which the local government department is the
defendant. The current study therefore selects relevant judgment
documents from the database of China Judgments Online, which is
open accessed (China Judgments Online, 2016). The keywords
“administrative case”, “Zhejiang Province”, and “land acquisition or
land resettlement” were used to search for relevant verdict docu-
ments. A preliminary 1155 judgment documents were obtained
and 901 judgment documents were finally identified by excluding
all irrelevant and duplicated cases.
The researchers chose three common factors that affect judicial
decisions, namely, jurisdiction, defendant, and cause of action,
which are extracted from the written judgment documents. China's
administrative litigation differs from that in other countries.
Administrative decisions include revocation and partial revocation,
confirmation of the law, remaking, confirmed invalidity, and
rejection. The researchers will define decisions that benefit a
plaintiff as a winning case, whereas the decisions to dismiss the
plaintiffs' claim are referred to a losing case.
4. Findings and evidence
4.1. Statistics of cases according to the temporal-hierarchical
judicial setting
The winning rate of the 901 cases is analyzed according to
temporal-hierarchical judicial setting, as shown in Table 1 and
Fig. 2. The winning rate of administrative litigation cases of LAR in
Zhejiang Province is comparatively higher. For example, the overall
winning rate of the 901 administrative litigation cases of Zhejiang
Province was 16.32%. Yet the plaintiffs' overall winning rate in
administrative litigation cases in the People's Court at all levels in
the entire China was 9.1% from 2010 to 2014 (Wang, 2015). Thus, the
overall winning rate of LAR cases in Zhejiang Province is 179% that
of administrative cases in the entire China. In particular, the first-
instance charge rate is 20.27% for the 901 cases, whereas the
2014 Case Report of Zhejiang Provincial Court of Judicial Review
shows that the first instance of overall administrative cases in
Zhejiang Province was 13.9%, which was lower than 16.32% in the
LAR cases in Zhejiang Province (ZPHP, 2015).
The cases were further classified into three types according to
the hierarchical level of court, namely, basic people's courts, in-
termediate people's court, and higher people's court, according to
the hierarchy of China's administrative judicial system. As shown in
Table 2 and Fig. 3, the distribution of the plaintiffs' winning rate is
uneven. Based on the charge court level, the winning rate in the
basic people's courts is slightly lower than 16.32%, the average
winning rate of the 901 administrative litigation cases. The rate of
cases in the intermediate people's court is higher than the average
winning rate. In particular, the winning rate of the first-instance
cases in the intermediate people's court was higher than the
average winning rate by over two times. The winning rate of the
high people's court of Zhejiang Province is less than half of the
average winning rate.
Table 1
Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases at different system levels.
System-level Winning rate Proportion of case
first charge 20.27% 58.05%
second charge 10.16% 41.51%
retrial 66.7% 0.33%
recharge 100% 0.11%
4.2. Docking and blocking net of the expected behavior of
defendants
Administrative departments involved in LAR are classified ac-
cording to their functions. These departments include all levels of
government and its agencies, departments of land and resources,
housing and urbanerural development, and some enterprises.
Codefendants are involved in this case. Thus, the statistical results
indicate that all defendants were sued more than 901 times.
Table 3 and Fig. 4 summarize the winning rate of plaintiffs
charging against various levels of government and relevant de-
partments, whereas department of Land and Resources, govern-
ment, and Department of Affordable Housing and Housing
Authority account the largest three number of cases. The number of
lawsuits filed against the departments of Land and Resources is
466, among which the city bureau of land and resources accounts
the largest part. The winning rate varies at the level of department
of land and resources. In total, 42 lawsuits were won against the
department of land and resources. Lawsuits were not filed against
the provincial department of land. Plaintiffs won in 15 cases filed
against the city bureau of land and resources. In addition, 80 law-
suits against the land reserve center, a special department in China,
were filed. The plaintiffs won 13 cases against the land reserve
center.
The total number of cases filed against the government at all
levels is 285, among which the county and district government
accounts the largest part. It should also be noticed that the winning
rate of plaintiffs varies at the level of government. Among these
cases, the number of lawsuits that supported the plaintiffs is 69.
Lawsuits against the Zhejiang provincial government to support
plaintiffs have not been charged. Moreover, plaintiffs won in 7
lawsuits filed against municipal governments, 42 lawsuits filed
against county and district governments, 12 lawsuits filed against
district government-dispatched institutions (sub-district office and
other units), and 10 lawsuits filed against town governments.
A total of 133 lawsuits were filed against the Department of
Affordable Housing and Housing Authority. Among these cases, 123
cases were against city bureau of affordable housing and housing
authority, and 10 cases were against the office of city apartment
and rural housing. The number of winning lawsuits against the
Department of Affordable Housing and Housing Authority is 17.
Cases against the office of city apartment and rural housing were
not filed in support of the plaintiffs.
Besides to the mentioned three largest defendants, the project
headquarters, a temporary organization, were sued as co-
defendants of the Department of Land and Resources and the
housing sector in 91 cases. The number of winning cases was 16. A
total of 19 cases were filed against various standing offices of
project headquarters. Plaintiffs won eight of the cases.
In summary, if the cases are classified according to the admin-
istration hierarchy, the statistics can be found in Table 4 and Fig. 5.
The lawsuits against the county and district level take the largest
part, following by sub-district office and town level. This is common
as the county and district level administration organizations
implement most of LAR in practice. The winning rate, however, is
different from the number of cases. The winning rate against the
sub-district office and town level is the highest with 36.07%, which
is followed by that against county and district level with 25.51%.
Yet, the winning rate against municipal level and provincial level is
much lower than the average winning rate of the 901 cases.
4.3. Statistics of causes of lawsuits
From the perspective of litigation practice, different adminis-
trative actions and the same administrative actions at different
 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88 83

First charge

Average winning rate 20.27%

of the whole sample

0 10.16 Second
100%
Recharge % % charge

66.7%

Retrial

Fig. 2. Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases at different system levels.

Table 2 stages will be charged as a case. Among the 18 types of adminis-

Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases charged at different levels of courts.
Court hierarchy
basic people's courts
intermediate people's court
higher people's court
Fig. 3. Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases charged at different levels of courts.
trative actions recorded in case files, seven types of specific
Winning rate Proportion of case administrative actions and three kinds of special administrative
15.2% 45.17%
actions are included in the statistical analysis. The seven types of
18.72% 46.84% specific administrative actions include administrative licensing,
5.56% 8.10% administrative coercion, administrative adjudication, administra-
tive compensation, administrative expropriation, administrative
confirmation, and administrative penalty (He, 2011). The three
kinds of special administrative actions include breach of legal
duties, administrative reconsideration, and information disclosure.
Administrative recognition, administrative approval, administra-
tive announcements, administrative commitment, administrative
registration, administrative response, administrative orders, and
other administrative acts are also included in the statistical anal-
ysis, as shown in Table 5 and Fig. 6. Among different causes of
lawsuits, administrative adjudication, administrative licensing, and
information disclosure takes the largest three parts of the cases.
The number of lawsuits against administrative adjudication is
345. Revocations of illegal administrative adjudication or requests
to declare illegal administrative adjudication is 327 with a winning
rate of 11.93%. The number of cases that require the admissibility on
administrative adjudication is 13 with a winning rate of 15.38%. It is
noticed that the winning rate of lawsuits against administrative
adjudication is lower than the average winning rate of the 901
cases. A total of 167 lawsuits were filed against administrative

Table 3
Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases with different administrative departments.

Administrative organs Winning rate Number of cases

governments 24.21% 285

departments of land and resources 9.01% 466
department of Housing and UrbaneRural 16.24% 117
department of affordable housing and housing authority 12.78% 133
headquarters 17.58% 91
office 72.73% 19
84 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88

Governments

Office 72.73% 24.21% Departments of land

and resources

Average winning rate

of the whole sample 9.01%
0%

17.58% 16.24%
12.78% Department of Housing and
Headdquarters
Urban-Rural

Department of affordable housing and

housing authority

Fig. 4. Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases with different administrative departments.

Table 4 licensing is lower than the average winning rate of the 901 cases. A
Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases with different levels of administrative total of 126 cases involved information disclosure. Among these
departments.
cases, 90 cases required re-disclosure with a winning rate of
Administrative hierarchy Winning rate Number of case 22.22%. The number of cases on the revocations of non-disclosure is
Provincial level 0% 17 36 with a winning rate of 25%. Unlike that of cases against
Municipal level 8.37% 79 administrative adjudication and administrative licensing, the
county and district level 25.51% 648 winning rate of information disclosure is much higher than the
sub-district office and town level 36.07% 370
average winning rate of the 901 cases. This figure kind of represents
the progress of information disclosure pushed by the people.

licensing. The number of revocations of permits or requests to

declare illegal permits (majority are permits to LAR) is 82 with a
winning rate of 1.18%. The number of revocations of permit ex-
tensions or requests to declare illegal extensions of permits (ma-
jority are permits to LAR) is 85 with a winning rate of 14.63%. It is
reminded that the winning rate of lawsuits against administrative
5. Analysis and discussion
5.1. Effects of the temporal-hierarchy judicial setting
To fully understand the effects of temporal-hierarchical judicial

Provincial level

Average winning rate

of the whole sample

Sub-district office 36.07% 0% 8.37%

and town level Municipal level

25.51%

County and district level

Fig. 5. Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases with different levels of administrative departments.
 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88 85

Table 5 docking and blocking net of the first-instance will be made even
Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases with different causes of lawsuits. without a charge. Therefore, this practice does not usually support
Administrative actions Winning rate Number of case plaintiffs because losing in a first-instance case usually implies
administrative licensing 7.78% 167
weak legitimacy in the normal judicial process.
information disclosure 23.02% 126
administrative coercive 46.88% 32 5.2. Effects of expected behavior of the defendants
administrative reconsideration 3.49% 86
administrative adjudication 12.17% 345
administrative compensation 35.71% 14 A high uneven winning rate of plaintiffs against different de-
administrative acquisition 45.45% 22 fendants was observed. The average winning rate of the 901
administrative confirmation 43.48% 23 administrative litigation cases is 16.32%. The winning rate of cases
administrative penalty 20% 15
against high levels of the government and the public sector is lower
breach of legal duties 27.02% 37
than the average winning rate. By contrast, the winning rate of

Administrative
coreive
Administrative
Information
reconsideration
diselosure

46.88%

Administrative Administrative
licensing 23.02% adjudication

Average winning rate 3.49%

7.78% 12.17%
of the whole sample
0%
27.02% 35.71%
20% Administrative
Breach of
compensation
legal dutles
45.45%
43.48%

Administrative Administrative
penalty acquisition

Administrative
confirmation

Fig. 6. Comparison of winning rate for 901 cases with different causes of lawsuits.

setting, both winning rate and China's Court System must be
analyzed. The winning rate varies with court level because of the
judicial practices. Administrative Litigation Law of the People's
Republic of China stipulates that most basic level government de-
partments are charged in the intermediate court. However, the
winning rate of plaintiffs is comparatively higher than charges in
other levels of courts because of the rooted weakness of legal
administration in the basic government departments. This aspect
will be examined further in the following subsections. Second-
instance cases have a lower winning rate than first-instance
cases. Zhu (2013) found that the winning rate of second-instance
cases that favor the plaintiffs is only 6.4% in China (Zhu, 2013).
According to Article 87 of the Administrative Litigation Law of the
People's Republic of China, second-instance cases will review the
docking and blocking net of the first-instance cases by examining
documents and conducting inquiries. When new evidences are not
included in the second-instance, a final decision based on the
cases against the basic levels of the government and public sector is
higher than the average winning rate. High levels of administration
departments have great administrative power. Thus, the decision of
the docking and blocking net will likely be against plaintiffs. A
judicial referee is related to the behavior of the subject rather than
the subject itself. Thus, we can infer that the anticipation difference
of the dockingeblocking net is caused by the behavioral differences
of the administrative departments. The difference is caused by
various factors. Administrative departments are particularly sen-
sitive to boundaries between legal and illegal actions as well as
boundaries between reasonable and unreasonable actions. Thus,
these departments usually attempt to approach boundaries be-
tween legitimate and reasonable judgments. With substantial legal
resources and knowledge, high-level administrative departments
easily integrate consciousness and behavior to reach decisions of
docking and blocking net. However, this process is difficult for the
basic level administrative departments because of inadequate
86 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88
judicial resources. Moreover, the government's interference and
negative attitude toward judicial departments also increase the
costs in reaching a fair judgment in the docking and blocking net.
The interference and negative attitude affect the entire process of
the judicial system. Therefore, the new “Administrative Litigation
Law of the People's Republic of China” banned such behavior in its
third article. High-level administrative departments are willing to
affect the decisions of the docking and blocking net with effect and
resources. However, the basic level administrative department is
unable or unwilling to do so.
5.3. Effects of the cause of lawsuits
For plaintiffs, the cases can be identified as administrative
coercion, administrative acquisition, administrative confirmation,
administrative compensation, failure to perform government
duties, administrative penalty, information disclosure, adminis-
trative adjudication, and administrative reconsideration according
to the descending winning rate. The winning rate of the first seven
types of cases is higher than the average winning rate of 16.32%.
Administrative coercion cases have the highest winning rate. The
winning rate of administrative coercion cases is 2.87 times higher
than the average winning rate. Administrative reconsideration
cases have the lowest winning rate. The winning rate of adminis-
trative reconsideration cases is only 23.23% of the average winning
rate. The winning rate of cases related to administrative compen-
sation is twice as high as the average winning rate.
The causes of action play an important role in the promotion of
plaintiffs' winning rate. However, different causes of action can be
attributed to various reasons. This result is consistent with the
litigation strategy that uses information disclosure as a means of
litigation. This litigation mode used the loopholes of the “Regula-
tions on government information disclosure” to require the gov-
ernment to frequently disclose information, even when this process
is not timely or does not meet the statutory form (Qin et al., 2015).
Through this strategy, a plaintiff and his or her lawyers force the
government to disclose the required information, thereby facili-
tating the next step of litigation for the parties. These practices can
increase the cost of litigation and lay litigation pressure on gov-
ernment agencies by frequently filing lawsuits and wasting gov-
ernment resources (Gao, 2015). The failure to fulfill government
information disclosure obligation, non-standard governmental in-
formation disclosure, and the lack of administrative litigation
experience for some township governments or land and environ-
mental protection departments significantly increased the failure
rate of such cases (ZPHP, 2015). In the “Ten cases of government
information disclosure” written by the Supreme People's Court of
the People's Republic of China, seven cases were related to LAR
(SPC, 2015).
Judicial decisions are evidently inclined to plaintiffs in cases of
administrative coercion. The first reason for this inclination is that,
in administrative coercive cases, the plaintiffs' appeals are suffi-
ciently clear for the court to reach a general winning result. Evident
problems exist in the government departments, which result in the
winning of the plaintiffs during the process of judicial referees.
These cases are also usually related to previous successful cases,
which provide important evidence that leads to winning results.
The second reason is that plaintiffs increased the government's cost
through mass incidents and petitioning, which indirectly affected
the judicial department's decision on a charge. However, cases that
require the declaration of an act as illegal have a higher winning
rate compared with that of cases that require revocation of the
administrative coercive action because the court's cancellation of
administrative enforcement will entail high losses to the
government.
As a quasi-judicial procedure, administrative reconsideration
has a closer characteristic to the referee compared with the ordi-
nary administrative behavior. Thus, once reconsideration is made,
these decisions will less likely be changed by the court. In second-
instance cases, for example, good decisions are more difficult to
achieve for a reconsidered case for the plaintiff than a case without
reconsideration. According to the analysis of the judgment of a
subject's expected behavior by dockingeblocking net, the results of
the government's review are more consistent with the net's
expectation than other administrative behavior. Similar to admin-
istrative reconsideration, administrative adjudication has a closer
characteristic of judicial referee compared with the ordinary
administration. Thus, once a referee is made, the referee is less
likely to be changed by the court. The analysis of the judgment on a
subject's expected behavior by dockingeblocking net indicates that
the results of government's referees are more consistent with the
net's expectation than other administrative behavior. Compared
with other cases, cases merely claiming compensation are easier to
achieve in anticipation of the dockingeblocking net, thereby
obtaining support.
The winning rate of administrative behavior directly involves
administrative coercion, administrative penalty, and failure to
perform statutory duties is 1.22e2.87 times higher than the
average winning rate. Disclosure of government information is a
gray area that can easily be illegal, and the winning rate is 1.41
times higher than that of the average winning rate. For cases with
the three lowest winning rates, administrative adjudication is an
administrative act with quasi-judicial concerns, administrative
acquisition involves the interest of many departments, whereas
administrative reconsideration includes both problems. Quasi-
judicial conduct and important interests involved in cases will
enable administrative authorities to examine the legality of actions
carefully. An administrative department will spend more resources
in interfering with the docking and blocking net of judgment.
Statistics show that the winning rate of administrative acquisition
and administrative reconsideration is slightly less than 50% of the
average winning rate.
A plaintiffs' claim must be presented before forming the dock-
ingeblocking net because of the passivity of the judicial referee.
This practice enables the plaintiffs to obtain the first-move
advantage in the lawsuit. For the plaintiff, not all claims are
worth pursuing. However, a plaintiff must make the final judgment
of the dockingeblocking net conducive after presenting claims. Any
litigation entails cost. Thus, a rational plaintiff will choose claims
with high winning rate. Therefore, the rational plaintiff will predict
the judgment of docking-blocking net based on different appeals.
When predictable results tend to be successful, the tendency for the
plaintiff to use this appeal is high. However, when the possibility
that predictable results tend to fail is high, the tendency for a
plaintiff to use this appeal is low. Thus, the high winning rate of
administrative coercive cases is a result of plaintiffs’ optimal se-
lections. The dockingeblocking net will only consider the behavior
of both sides involved in the conduct of the lawsuit. Under this
premise, a plaintiff can pressure an administrative department
through various ways in the litigation process, causing the
administrative departments to be slack in the judicial adjudication
process. This approach would also cause the final judgment of
dockingeblocking net to be inclined towards plaintiffs reasonably
and legally.
6. Conclusions
This study aims to identify the regular patterns of jurisdictions
in the field of LAR in Zhejiang Province by examining 901 admin-
istrative litigation cases. The results indicate a strong correlation
 W. Zhou et al. / Habitat International 63 (2017) 79e88
between the temporal-hierarchical judicial setting and the winning
rate for the plaintiffs. In addition, a high-level administrative
department has an adverse effect on a plaintiff at the final judg-
ment under the docking and blocking net. Moreover, judicial au-
thorities must be discrete with their views on the docking and
blocking net considering the demands of a plaintiff. In reality, a
plaintiff chooses favorable and legitimate claims in proceedings or
engages in a harassing litigation through legal loopholes or by
increasing the cost of the defendant to weaken their willingness by
using non-judiciary means. Hence, a plaintiff will strive to maxi-
mize his or her own interests with the final judgment made by the
docking and blocking net.
The results clarify the factors that affect judicial decisions and
link administrative action and expectation of final decisions.
Administrative action can help reach a relatively stable docking and
blocking net in the expectation of the final judgment and achieve
the purpose of legitimate administration. In practice, the current
study can provide detailed understandings on existing adminis-
tration litigation cases related to LAR in Zhejiang Province. It can
help the plaintiffs choose the best strategy to claim their rights
during the conflicts of LAR. In addition, by addressing the weak
points of administrative departments, administrative organizations
can improve legal administration, further accelerating the con-
struction of the rule of law in the process. Such improvements
would further reduce the judicial cost of an administrative act.
However, only some of the factors affecting judicial decisions on
LAR are considered in this study. Hence, other relevant issues
should also be analyzed in future studies. Cases from different
geographical locations of LAR must also be compared. Unique fac-
tors that affect the docking and blocking net must also be deter-
mined in different participation modes (for example, joint action
and representative litigation).
Acknowledgements
The work described in this paper was jointly supported by Na-
tional Natural Science Foundation of China (Project No.: 41371187;
and Project No.: 71503228), Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang
Province of China (Project No.: LQ16G030006), and “Qianjiang
Talents Program” of Zhejiang Province (Project No.: QJC1602006).
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