Despite more than 40 years’ legislation to build a ‘law-governed country’ and the Communist Party of China (CPC)'s repeated proclaiming to ‘govern the country according to law’, China still lacks legislation concerning a constitutional matter that is central to its governance, ie, the powers of the CPC to rule. No law specifies its powers, and the CPC's rule is not based on law. Why has such a crucial and apparent loophole not been filled? It is essentially because of the CPC's insistence on supremacy with unchallengeable authority in the governance of China. Specifying in law the Party's powers, and how they should be exercised, would subject its rule to law and set a legal limit on its powers, which is irreconcilable with its goals of maintaining supremacy and absolute authority. Hence, an insoluble dilemma can be observed: while the CPC leadership wants China to become a law-governed country to attain lasting order and stability, they have to rule the country extralegally to avoid legal challenges to the supremacy of their rule. This article not only sheds light on this inherent contradiction, but also offers insight into the nature of the CPC's practice to ‘govern the country according to law’.

International law has ruled out the application of the death penalty on drug offenses. Despite failure to meet the threshold to be categorised as one of the ‘most serious crimes’, the practice of capital punishment for drug offences in many parts of the world continues to dismay human rights activists and practitioners. This article aims to exhibit a dynamic view on drug offences under Vietnamese law. It contends that the nation's understanding of the severity of drug offences has witnessed incremental changes corresponding with international standards, although not completely compatible. Drawing on comparative scholarship, the article then moves on to ask whether there is any room left for the total abolition of capital punishment for drug offences. It suggests that Vietnam's incrementalism towards abolition has reached its bounds. Renovation in the understanding on the severity of drug crimes is very much needed to re-fuel the abolitionist movement in the country.

This article examines the effectiveness of the Consumer Protection Act 1999 in ensuring that Malaysian consumers can make informed decisions and that their interests are adequately protected in modern electronic commerce (e-commerce) transactions. It first identifies the key elements required of a modern consumer protection framework and subsequently uses this model as a yardstick to assess the legal frameworks in two jurisdictions. The first jurisdiction is Malaysia, a common law country that, although considered a potentially important regional player in the development of e-commerce, has a relatively underdeveloped consumer protection framework. The second jurisdiction is England and Wales, which is likewise a common law jurisdiction but one whose consumer protection framework has been influenced by European Union consumer protection policy and legislation that has further provided the impetus for significant legal reform in both offline and online environments. This article examines the extent to which the laws in both jurisdictions provide appropriate protection, considering countervailing issues (eg, protection of commercial innovation and competition) and identifying potential gaps in provision (eg, inadequate regulation of new platforms or business methods). Based on these analyses, the article proposes an ‘evergreen’ consumer protection framework to improve the legal landscape of e-commerce in Malaysia.

Crimes against humanity constitute mass crimes against civilian populations and represent the so-called ‘core crimes’ of international criminal law. Central Asian states have so far abstained from incorporating the corpus delicti of crimes against humanity in their criminal legislation. After a short overview of the current status of crimes against humanity under international law, this article analyses the domestic legislation of five Central Asian countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. It looks at current Criminal Codes to suggest how those could be strengthened by the inclusion of properly formulated crimes against humanity dispositions, taking into account the peculiarities of these national legal systems. The article also offers a brief review of possible factors which might have precluded the states in question from proper implementation. It argues in favour of such implementation, delineating its legal benefits and potential advantages for both State Parties and non-State Parties to the Rome Statute in Central Asia.

Despite being ranked top three countries in the world in the Corruption Perception Index 2018, Singapore has a reputation in sports integrity for being the ‘academy of match-fixers’ in football and home to the leader of ‘the world's most notorious match-fixing syndicate’. It is curious (and somewhat ironic) that Singapore, as one of the world's leaders in managing public section corruption, has been home to sports corruption and match-fixing locally and internationally.

To date, Singapore has not instituted sport-specific laws on match-fixing to specifically combat match-fixing and other forms of manipulation of sports competitions in the country, and primarily relies on its criminal laws on corruption to prosecute match-fixing conduct, pursuant to the Prevention of Corruption Act (Cap 241, 1993 Rev Ed Singapore). This is in comparison to other countries which are home to match-fixing conduct, such as Australia, Germany, and Switzerland.

This article will focus on the discussion on whether it is necessary for countries, with particular focus on Singapore, to enact sport-specific laws on match-fixing in their endeavour to combat match-fixing in their country. This work will conclude that while there are benefits to enacting sport-specific match-fixing laws, there may not be a dire or urgent need for Singapore to enact sport-specific laws on match-fixing. In any event, it may be necessary for Singapore authorities and sport governing bodies to take certain concrete steps to buttress the present regulation of match-fixing and state of players’ contracts in order to mitigate the risks of such sports manipulation activities. One of these steps may include for Singapore to become a Signatory to the Council of Europe Convention on the Manipulation of Sports Competition (Macolin Convention).

English law has become a commodity for developing, resource-rich economies desirous of diversifying their economies. A small number of special economic zones, chiefly in the Gulf, but also elsewhere, have set up entire legal systems predicated to a large or smaller degree on English law. This transplantation is based on three distinct models, namely: (a) wholesale incorporation of statutes; (b) general reference to English law as residual law and; (c) implicitly, on the basis of the common law origin of judges appointed to the courts of special economic zones. The expectation in all these models is that the specialised courts and other stakeholders (eg, legal professionals) will apply English statutory and common law in conformity with other laws applicable in the special economic zones. Ultimately, the practice of the courts and other participants will give rise to a sui generis common law jurisdiction that is in dialogue with the courts and institutions of England and Wales. The article argues that this has already been achieved in the majority of the special economic zones examined here.

This article examines the Federal Constitution of Malaysia through the lens of Hans Kelsen's Pure Theory of Law. It first demonstrates the utility of the Grundnorm in explaining the supremacy of the Federal Constitution within the Malaysian legal system. In particular, this article establishes that despite Malaysia's colonial past, the Federal Constitution is the Kelsenian ‘historically first constitution’ of the present Malaysian legal system because of the Kelsenian ‘revolution’ that had occurred when the Federation of Malaya attained independence from the British in 1957, as well as the absence of a Kelsenian ‘revolution’ during the formation of Malaysia in 1963. The Grundnorm of the Malaysian legal system can thus be expressed as ‘one ought to obey the prescriptions of the Federal Constitution’. However, this article also argues, using the example of the basic structure doctrine controversy in Malaysia, that while the Pure Theory succeeds in elucidating a measure of legal validity for legal norms, it fails to provide any helpful insight when a constitutional dispute relates to the content of a norm rather than the interaction between hierarchically distinct norms.

Despite gains from liberalisation and deregulation in the 1990s, the Philippines telecommunications industry continues to be hampered by poor quality of service, high prices, with high barriers to entry and lack of meaningful alternatives for citizens. This article argues that liberalisation of the telecommunications industry is insufficient in facilitating economic growth and improving consumer welfare. Competition is a necessary precondition for this to occur, and to this end, an environment that will allow competition to flourish is indispensable. Hence, telecommunications regulation must be infused with competition law principles to ensure a robust, competitive sector that improves consumer welfare.