This collection assesses the legal developments which have taken place since the 1980s in China. It discusses China’s achievements in building a new legal system and identifies the theoretical and institutional limitations of China’s legal reform. Featuring an extensive case-study of foreign investment law, this book considers a wide-ranging set of interconnecting variables in China’s changing social context, in order to examine and illustrate the gap between the text and actual practice of the law, especially as it relates to foreign direct investment. It will be of great interest to students and scholars of Chinese Law, Business and Economics, as well as to business investors in China.