Constitution: history, function and significance of translation

Sun Qian Han Dayuan  Procuratorial daily2012Years10Month24Day

Editor's note　

To commemorate our current constitution30Anniversary of the world, the text of the constitution fully present, promote constitutional culture, organization of the Supreme People's Procuratorate to compile the "constitution" of all countries in the world, included193A member of the United Nations constitution text. This article is edited by Sun Qian,Professor Han Dayuan is the "preface" written constitution in the world, is hereby published, readers.

    In Chinese history, the constitution code translation together with the constitutional culture and constitutional development, and has a wide and profound influence on the development of constitutional culture and constitutional law.

Overview of the history, constitution code translation

    In more than one hundred years of China constitution(Science)In the course of development, the official or scholars have translated and published several foreign constitution. The constitution of the legal development, especially the Constitution(Science)Have an important effect on development. 

(A)The official translation of constitution

    Since the1901After years of Qing government announced the introduction of the new deal, the political reform especially follow constitutional government, has become the top priority of the late Qing dynasty.1905Years11Month25Day(Guangxu thirty-one years in October 29th)Promulgated the edict, set up"The political center",1906Years of political secretary after returning, the hundreds of foreign political books to study political Museum, the compiler finishing, official on the constitutional code translation thus began.1907Years8Month13Day(Guangxu thirty-three years in July 5th)The preparation for constitutionalism, in order to meet the needs of the decision, will"The political center"Instead of"The constitutional compilation Museum", specializing in constitutional study. The organization has been working to1911Years6Month23Day was abolished, incorporated into the cabinet.1913Years, the constitutional code translation and editing has become one of the most important characteristics of constitutionalism and constitutional research, provides the basis for the study of text. 

    After the founding of new Chinese, according to the need of constitutional development in different period, on the translation and research work of foreign constitution. In the1954Process of making new China first constitution, the constitution drafting committee secretary group not only translation of the constitution of the Soviet Union, but also collect translated many capitalist countries of the constitution. The constitution Drafting Committee editing "the constitution of the world data set," "democracy." the Constitution and other reference books to understand the representative national constitution, correctly grasp1954Historical position in constitution plays an important role in. Can say, the translation and publication of foreign constitutional law helps to compare different national constitutional system, provides a useful experience for the improvement of its constitution and constitutional system. 

(Two)The constitution of civil

    Folk translation constitution generally begins after the reform Wu Xu.1901Years, the modern Japanese translator Shen Hong translation of Itou Hirofumi's "the Japanese Constitution sense", opened the folk translation constitution wind. After the founding of new Chinese, civil constitution translation work to the meticulous, comprehensive development.1964Years, China Law Research Academy of science of Law Press edited and published the "constitution of the world assembly"(The first series).1981Years, with the1982Constitutional revision work, China Law Institute of the Academy of Social Sciences edited and published the "constitution" the decomposition data, the main constitution text translation, classified according to the subject type and, in order to facilitate the reader.1997Years, Jiang Shilin, editor of the "constitution" the World Encyclopedia published in Qingdao. Now, the publication of the "constitution" of all countries in the world, the United Nations193A member of the constitution text all translated into Chinese constitutional text, is so far the contents of a more comprehensive, integrated system.

The value and function of two, the constitution code translation

    The text of the constitution, the constitutional text translation research, is of special significance for the Chinese constitutionalism and constitutional jurisprudence. This year is the1982Years of constitution30Anniversary. In the history, review1982Years of the implementation of the Constitution30Contributions, achievements and experience of years, for our future, China constitution and building a socialist country of great significance. Review30The implementation of constitution, we should cherish the constitution implementation achievements, pay more attention to the text of the constitution, with the history and the position of the objective evaluation1982Years of constitution. In honor of1982Years of constitution30Anniversary, translation and publication of "constitution" of all countries in the world not only has the commemoration significance, on the development of constitution and constitutional research will also have a positive impact. 

(A)Mining culture and Value Constitution

    From the date of China constitutionalism in the late Qing Dynasty, the constitutional law has been more than a hundred years of development history. Meanwhile, in the different historical period, China historical arena, the monarchy and the Republic, the presidential system and the parliamentary system, centralization and decentralization. Different constitutional system on stage, promoting the constitutional text with different text, the country's constitution, reflect the culture and traditions of different countries under the historical condition at that time. Translation and finishing the text of the constitution, can provide the basis for the relevant research objective and solid, convenient for readers to understand the diversity of world culture constitution system and constitution, accurately grasp the historical background. 

    The text of the constitution is the product of the specific historical and cultural study, understand and constitutional law on the constitutional system should take the text as the basic starting point. Produce and implement the Constitution in a specific historical stage, is actually the product of the interaction of factors constitution system, ideology, theory and social awareness of the constitution of the different elements, mutual influence, and promote each other, forming a diversity of the constitution text. 

    In short, the constitutional culture is a complex phenomenon, reflected in the text of the historical, cultural, social and other factors is comprehensive, three-dimensional, diversified. Face193The text of the constitution state of diversification, we need to take a history, objective attitude, otherwise it will link between artificially separated constitutional system, ideology and culture. 

(Two)Understanding of foreign constitutional, promote constitutional development

    The constitution is the constitution, the basic consensus of the community to write in the text through the program, formed its own constitution. The text of the constitution is to use the text to write a constitution value system or the value of the expression. We see to read the constitution text is the text, but the text is the bearer of the national basic value view, display is the country's constitutional system. With the help of constitution, we can grasp the basic system and its changes, nation and citizen, power allocation, foreign policy, social basic consensus from the overall. 

    The constitution Chinese is the product of Western learning, introduction and transplantation is the most important academic work for China constitutional scholars, western constitutional knowledge is an important part of China constitutional theory. Today, the constitutionalism has become widely accepted modern civilized nation values. And the diversification, the constitutional guarantee of universal constitutional value, has become an important trend of the development of the national constitution. At the same time, it can not be denied, the basic goal of learning the foreign constitutional law knowledge is to explain the various phenomena China constitution in social development, and to provide theoretical guidance and specific countermeasures to solve practical problems, which must be related to the cultural tradition and reality of the system China. 

    Research on constitutional law should take the text as the center, both in practice and theory, we have the understanding of the text, explain the basic content of the. Familiar with the text of the constitution, seriously text, help to play the role of the Constitution in the development of the society, enrich constitutional operation mechanism, make the constitution to better adapt to the changes of social life. 

(Three)To promote the development of comparative constitutional law

    In China, comparative constitutional law at19End of the century20At the beginning of the century transplantation formed and developed in the process of Western constitutional theory, is one of the earliest established branches of constitutional law. In the20Century30In the 1980s and40Time, due to the relatively loose and Europe and the United States, Japan's constitution academic environment of Confucianism edification, comparative constitutional studies of be in fashion in one's time. After the theory preparation and constitutional practice a period of experience, some scholars began to publish the works of comparative constitution, among them, Wang Shijie, Qian Duansheng, "comparative constitution" the most representative, reflecting the Chinese comparative constitutional law at the time of the academic level. 

    The constitution system introduction and translation of western countries will inevitably start comparison, an application and the event itself is the comparative method, and constitutes a basis for comparative constitutional law. Can say, the early Chinese scholars through the comparison of the Constitution and the constitution of foreign constitutional theory, comparative constitutional law and foreign constitutional experience and understanding to become scholars think about knowledge base and method Chinese constitutional issues, Chinese constitutional law system based on the text of the constitution, and the translation of comparative constitutional research and teaching has produced important influence. At present, comparative constitutional law has become an important part of Chinese constitutional law, one of the sources of the idea is Chinese constitutional development in the future. 

(Four)To promote the development of constitutional theory

    Constitutional law including constitution text, translation, and provides an important platform for the exchange of academic research, promote academic exchange. From the20The beginning of 20th century, the translation of legal texts, academic circles also translated and published a large number of specially introduced the western constitutional system and theoretical writings. The first is the western constitutional system and the related theory knowledge background introduction, then gradually developed into a system of translation and refining the academic point of view and gradually formed the system. 

    At that time, in order to meet the needs of knowledge introduction and expansion of the academic community, the academic circles also set up some translation agencies, such as the translation of Book Compilation agency, Ancient Chinese Literature Search agency, Hunan compiled Association, Institute of fujian. The western modern constitution code translation and widely introduced a constitutional doctrine, the important enlightenment role of China ideological circles, academic analysis of social problems, promote the national construction provides a theoretical framework and tool design, become people who are actuated by high ideals that salvation plan reference system. 

(Five)Serve for the foreign policy of the country

    With the development of economic globalization, the constitution plays a more and more important role in the country's foreign policy. In the era of globalization, more and more communication between country and country, urgent need for timely and accurate information is obtained through the research on the constitution, as foreign policy formulation and adjustment services. From the development of the modern constitutional trend, foreign policy has become important content of constitutional jurisprudence, but also in the foreign policy of constitutional jurisprudence knowledge demand increases. The text of the constitution will undoubtedly become the understanding of foreign constitutional system, an important basis for the correct formulation and adjustment of foreign policy. With the strengthening of foreign policy function of constitution, the constitution will play an increasingly important role in safeguarding national interests, to promote world peace. 

(Six)To promote the development of law and legal education

    The constitution is the fundamental law of the state, the constitution value directly influence the planning and development division method. No matter in the field of public law or in the field of private law, provide the basis for the unity of value, rules and principles of the constitution provided was system for branches of law, and form the basis for the national legal system and legal system. The development of the law department needs to take the constitution as the link, the legal principles and specific department law principle combined, priority to establish constitutional principle. 

    The basic goal of legal education is the cultivation of legal talents, and legal personnel should first establish the concept of fairness and justice, to the constitutional justice view as the foundation, analysis of various legal phenomena. Visible, the constitution study occupies an important position in the entire legal education, and grasp the constitution is the basis of learning the constitution, not only helps to train specialized constitutional thinking, but also lay the foundation for learning other department law. The constitution is a professional basic course. The Constitution and law department consists of the whole legal system of the state, this decision as an important legal and Social Sciences, need to set the number of courses, respectively study and Research on the Constitution and various departments of the law. Because the constitution at the core and leading position in the socialist legal system, many problems of other departments of law in the Constitution for the theoretical basis and standard according to the practice, many departments of law disputes will ultimately be resolved in the constitutional supervision level, and explain the basis of this problem is to return to the text of the constitution, to lay a good foundation for learning other department law from the comparative analysis, the text of the constitution. 

Three, the constitution code translation and constitutional development

(A)Pay attention to the text of the constitution value

    The development of a national constitution firstly based on the text, the basis for its adjustment of national and social life is the text of the constitution. For the text of the constitution to understand and implement, can not be separated from the text behind the constitutional culture. The construction of constitutionalism is the localization business, to Chinese constitutional text understanding and interpretation must be converted to China constitutional discourse system, embodies the constitutional system of knowledge Chinese oriented, but also need to establish the historical position of Chinese constitutional system in the world in the constitution, otherwise we can not understand the history and the era of the mission of the constitution. 

(Two)To establish the concept of rule of constitution

    The rule of law must first according to the constitution, according to the basic requirements of the constitution is the constitutional government, establish, improve the national system and the law. After the formation of the socialist legal system Chinese characteristics, this task has underscored the urgency. The formation, development and perfection of the legal system, we should take the constitution as the value guidance and evaluation standard, embody"Based on the Constitution"The function and mode of action in the legal system. It should be pointed out that, the system construction needs a large number of constitutional law and the constitutional spirit has knowledge of professional talents. In the early Xin Hai before the revolution, some call for a person with breadth of vision to open constitutional law knowledge education to enlighten the people, and to improve the official constitution literacy. We currently face different tasks at the time, but to improve the legal system, law enforcement, judicial justice also needs a large number of professional talents. Strengthen the education of constitution, set up the constitution supreme consciousness, is also very necessary. 

(Three)Cultivate respect the constitution text culture

    Through the translation and research of the text of the constitution, we should form a respect for the constitution text concept, universal constitutional value, realize the transformation will respect the constitution as a kind of political legitimacy of the form and will respect the constitution as a whole community of practice value form. At present, the social life presents the state of complexity, uncertainty and various accidental factors concurrent, tense relationship between faces constitutionality, legitimacy and social legitimacy. The constitution value should be the evaluation and inspection requirements from society is the basic standard of rationality. Economic development should be continued to achieve happiness and dignity of man, political construction should constantly improve the degree of freedom of human, social and cultural construction shall satisfy the human civilization needs, these should be to maintain the authority of constitution and law, the supreme law is the premise of. 

    Evaluation of a national development level comprehensive standard, which is one of the core elements of the rule of law. How to position the Constitution in social life, how the level of consciousness of the people, is one of the important indices for evaluating the degree of development of rule by law of a country, is also a substantial index. To achieve the establishment of the socialist rule of law state, the supremacy of constitution to establish the socialist constitutionalism idea, today's Chinese and on a new historical starting point. 

Four, the constitution code translation and cultural diversity

    The world constitution is not only an important academic works, but also marks the level of academic development, it is natural to face many problems, especially to ensure the accuracy of the translation, authoritative and readability, is not so easy. 

(A)Cultural background and overcome difficulties

    The constitution as a cultural product, reflects a country, a nation and a feature of the times, is a concentrated expression of the will of the state, the national spirit and the characteristics of the times. A mature constitutional text, reflects the nation's historical tradition, reflects the country's political, economic, cultural and other comprehensive factors, is systematic, system of the traditional culture and system summary, also is the highly generalization of constitutional theory and constitutional practice. If there is no deep understanding of the country's cultural tradition, if not fully grasp the background of constitutionalism, the translation may be deviation. Because the constitution is a concentrated expression of national traditional culture, as a cultural form of the constitutional code translation is a difficult process, just like Yan Fu said"A vertical, 70 hesitated". To do the work of translation, it is necessary to accurately grasp of foreign constitutional development history, to understand the basic theory of foreign constitutional law, familiar with foreign constitutional practice, the differences between Chinese and Western culture understanding. Therefore, translators in addition to the language skills, but also familiar with the Constitution and constitutional system of the country, to understand and feel the specific national culture and customs. 

    Here, we would like to talk about how to deal with the problem that the text of the constitution, shall treat the text of the constitution of different countries in what attitude. In the history, traditions, cultural psychology, values, between different countries may have some similarities, but also reflect their own characteristics. When we deal with these differences, should adopt an open, inclusive stance, recognize the diversity of culture and institution is the objective existence, is also the cultural diversity in the text of the Constitution on the performance of. The text of the constitution embodies the different cultural differences, or conflicts, but also in some aspects in common, such as in the protection of human rights, to safeguard national independence and sovereignty, build national institutions suitable to their own national conditions and so on, all the countries in the world have certain features in common. At the same time, keep the particularity of their constitutional in the conflict and fusion of different cultures, is an important condition for a country to obtain the equal status in the international community. Therefore, when we read the text, should establish multiple constitutional culture equal exchange of ideas, the particularity of the constitutional value of universality and national conditions of combination, avoid using single standard for judging the constitution text, also should avoid worthless stance of realism. Reading, learning the constitution text, an important goal is to absorb the reasonable experience for the development of China constitution. We should make good use of foreign constitutional these comparative law materials, reasonable reference but not blind xenophobia or blindly, in order to promote the development of China constitution. 

(Two)Text selection and overcome difficulties

    The text of the constitution is the constitution of translation. Collect the constitutional text is we first difficulties. The United Nations193Member States, to all the text of the constitution or constitutional documents, the constitutional amendment to collect complete, and to ensure its effectiveness is not easy.21Since the 20th century, the constitutional changes very frequently, not only the number of amendments to the constitution are various, the re constitution or re enacted the constitution of the state is not in the minority. In this book, the text of the constitution are mostly from the official websites or through diplomatic channels to collect. But even so, also can appear the problem of old data. Because in many countries the government's official website, the original Constitution and the amendment is not the same file, many countries only loaded constitution at the beginning of the text, the amendment to the parliamentary legislation in search. This complex situation, the editorial board before embarking on the initial translation, will arrange for a thorough check of the constitutional text and its changes;Check again in the translation the translator;In the text of the constitution after initial translation, checked by the auditor;Finally the editorial staff with the government official and academic database data validation, updated some constitution text translation. After several rounds of work, and strive to be the new text of the constitution was presented to the readers. 

(Three)The translation of words and overcome difficulties

    Every language of the world extremely diverse. The constitution code translation often encountered some common but difficult to accurate translation of noun, has different meanings in different contexts, which should be appropriately reflected. 

    The constitution must strictly abide by the norms in the translation of terminology, must have the correct grasp. In the translation of the book, we advocate the literal translation is appropriate, is not unnecessary in Translation;Existing fixed translation, should be in compliance with the fixed translation;In the sentence should be consistent with the original text, but should use legal professional words;In legal terms, should the legal words and China as correspondence, for legal terms similar to distinguish in translation. We aim to double check the translation text withstand constitutional jurisprudence, linguistics. 

    At present, although China has the constitutional text translation publishing world, such as "constitutional law", which play an important role in education, research and development of constitutional jurisprudence of constitutional law. But the constitution included text translation is not comprehensive, for example, the text Africa countries included less;The text of the Constitution in some countries, obsolete, and does not reflect the21The new changes, changes in the development trend of the constitutional century. A lapse of several years to complete, many scholars to participate in the "constitution of the world" is expected to compensate for the shortcomings existing constitution compiled books in content, text etc., tries to demonstrate the integrity of the text of the constitution of all countries in the world, carrying forward the constitutional culture, to commemorate our1982Years of constitution30Anniversary, to provide reference for the development of the system of constitutional law, in order to achieve"The constitution of China"The academic mission.