经济学人:遗嘱有争议,继承法修法不积极

In recent weeks China's leaders have been talking up the need to enhance the rule of r aim is to strengthen the Communist Party's grip on power while at the same time ensuring that justice is served more fairly. This may improve thelives of some. Many people complain bitterly that courts often pay more heed tothe whims of officials than to the law. But in the realm of death, it is the law itself that is the problem. The country's statutes on inheritance remain littlechanged from the days when few had any property to bequeath. The rapid emergence in recent years of a large middle-class with complex property claims has been fuelling inheritance disputes. The crudity of the law is making matters worse.

最近几周，中国各领导人已开始讨论加强法治的必要性。他们旨在强化中共的掌权能力，与此同时确保司法更加公正，这可能会使一些人的生活获得改善。很多人强烈抱怨法院常常关注官员的突发奇想胜于法律本身。但当涉及死亡问题时，法律本身就存在问题。中国的继承法从少有人有遗产遗赠订立以来就没有作过什么修正。而近年来大批中产阶级迅速崛起，其复杂的财产构成加剧了遗产继承纠纷，而继承法的不成熟则让情况变得更糟。

Today's inheritance law was adopted in 1985 when divorce and remarriage were rare and international marriage nearly unknown. Fewowned homes, cars or other valuable property. The law does at least grant menand women equal rights to their kin's estates, but otherwise it is based largely on tradition. It is specific when it comes to handing down "foresttrees, livestock and poultry" but runs out of steam when it comes to new fangled notions such as intellectual property; never mind domain names and digital photographs. A sweeping reference to "other lawful property" is its unhelpful attempt to cover all eventualities. What counts as property? By whose laws? The statute has no answers.

现用的继承法是1985年通过的，那是个离婚和重婚罕见的年代，而跨国婚姻也近乎是陌生的事物，很少人有房、车或其他有价值的财产。但继承法至少确保了男女平等的继承权，否则在很大程度上则是依照传统进行。继承法详述了“林木、牲畜和家禽”此类遗产的继承细则，但在如知识产权、域名和数码照片这些新概念方面却是一片空白。而包罗一切的“其他合法财产”则无法涵盖所有可能发生的情况。什么算得上是财产？根据那些法规？继承法则给不出答案。

Modest changes were approved in 2003, but woollyareas remain such as in procedures for registering wills. This has led to rancorous court cases like one that last month attracted much public involved a disputed will and the embattled surviving family members of a famous calligrapher and his estate worth about 2 billion yuan ($326m).

继承法于2003年获得小幅调整，但如立遗嘱的程序这些模糊的领域依然存在。这导致了数起如上个月那样吸引众人关注的满怀愤懑的诉讼案件，卷入上月那起诉讼案件的包括遗嘱争议以及遗嘱订立者名书法家的问题缠身的家属及书法家价值达20亿元的财产。

Since the last revisions to the law, society has kept up its blistering pace of change. The divorce rate has risen in each ofthe past ten years. In 2009 divorces outnumbered marriages. Thus there are nowex-spouses and step children among those squabbling over estates. China'sembrace of globalisation means that some assets (and indeed, clamouring relatives) are located in other countries.

自从上次修订继承法以来，社会变化的步伐极快。在过去的每个十年中，离婚率均呈上升趋势，2009年离婚的人次甚至超过了结婚的，这样前任配偶和继子女也成了财产纠纷的一份子。中国迎接全球化意味着有些财产（甚至是有异议的亲属）还可能安置在其他的国家。

China's one-child policy has sometimes complicated matters. State media reported on a car crash in 2012 in which both parents died several hours before their sole child, a six-year-old girl. She automatically inherited their assetsin that short interval but had no legal heir herself, meaning the assets wentto the state instead of other kin.

中国的独生子女政策有时还将问题复杂化了。据国家媒体报道，2012年的一起车祸夺去了一对父母的生命，而他们唯一的年仅6岁的女儿也在数小时后死去。他们的女儿在那短暂的时间里拥有了继承权，但由于她没有合法继承人，也就意味着她父母的遗产就为国家所有而不归其他亲属所有。

At a meeting in October Chinese leaders expressed support for amending the inheritance law (though a long-mooted plan to introduce an inheritance tax still looks far from being put into force: the middle class does not want that). Yang Lixin of Renmin University in Beijing says that despitethis resolve it could still be several years before the law catches up with reality.

在10月份举办的一个会议上，中国领导人们表示支持修订继承法（虽然长期未决议的遗产税看起来仍遥不可及：中产阶级不愿接受）。中国人大的杨立新表示，尽管作出了这个决定，继承法与实际相符仍需要数年时间才能实现。