Li Boguang, Ph.D. (Law), Champion of Peasants’ RightsChina Law Digest Li Boguang, 37, a Christian from Hunan Province, graduated in 1997 from the Beijing University Law School. He previously served as a lecturer at the Hainan University Law School and currently manages the Beijing Qimin Research Center. As a constitutional law scholar, Li Boguang is different from other university scholars in that he has chosen an arduous job: delivering constitutional law and civic education to local villagers. He is the first constitutional law scholar to propose and implement a program for educating peasants about constitutional legal rights. He has been called a “champion of peasants’ rights” for these efforts. In the past few years, he has traveled to Fuzhou and Fu’an in Fujian Province, Tangshan and Qinhuang Island in Hebei Province, Shenyang and Fushun in Liaoning Province, and various cities in Guizhou Province. The well-known Chinese Youth Daily published a lengthy article on October 3, 2004 entitled “Li Boguang: Reflections on Sending Law to the Villages.” The article profiled his civic education efforts on constitutional legal rights and his work on protecting the rights of peasants. In March 2004, Fu’an peasants demanded the resignation of the Ningde and Fu’an City Party Secretaries and others, and Li Boguang provided legal aid to 60,000 Fujian peasants. On December 14 of last year, Li Boguang was captured by local police in Fu’an, Fujian province, on suspicion of fraud. On January 21 of this year, the Fu’an City Police Department released him on bail awaiting trial. Li once composed the Reader for Chinese Citizens’ General Knowledge, which systematically and plainly introduces human rights, government, democracy, rule of law, constitutional government, and other such knowledge, but his many activities introducing constitutional law in the Chinese countryside have turned Li Boguang from a constitutional law scholar into a constitutional law practitioner. To this end, Chinese scholar Chen Yongmiao has placed Li Boguang fourth among the top ten rights advocacy figures, appraising Li Boguang as “a pioneering enlightenment intellectual, and a picture-perfect example of a legal scholar turning into a rights advocacy activist.” -------------------------- |