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Penn State Law graduate has dissertation published as book

Chenyang Xie is the first graduate of Penn State Law’s doctor of juridical science program. Credit: Penn StateCreative Commons

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – The doctoral dissertation of Chenyang Xie, the first graduate of Penn State Law’s doctor of juridical science (S.J.D.) program, has been published, with revisions, as a book by Wildy, Simmonds & Hill Publishing in the United Kingdom.

"The Legal Regime of Chinese Overseas Investment" examines how the Chinese legal system regulates Chinese investor behavior relating to outward investment opportunities and/or priorities. Xie presents critiques of the legal rules, institutions, systems and administrative practices at play, and suggests reforms and adjustments for the current regime.

The book includes a draft Code of Overseas Investment Law, the first of its kind for any legal system, and an accompanying commentary that explains the role of, and need for, each formulation. It also covers the Chinese macro policies and concepts of overseas investment, information services, investment promotion, approvals, authorizations, and filings, financial support, foreign exchange regulation, insurance, taxation, and supervision of state-owned assets abroad.

“As an experienced senior legal practitioner, Xie has a sophisticated understanding of the problems that the rudimentary legal regulation in existence poses for China, the extent to which that regulation operates as a barrier or obstruction or disincentive to outward investment and the extent to which the absence of any regulation serves to interfere with Chinese objectives in outward foreign investment,” wrote Xie’s doctoral adviser William E. Butler, the John Edward Fowler Distinguished Professor of Law at Penn State, in the book’s introduction.

Butler said that Xie has produced “an original and substantial contribution to legal scholarship that advances our understanding of comparative socialist legal systems, Chinese foreign relations law with respect to outward investment and the national regulation of outward investment relations generally.”

Xie, who practices investment law as senior legal adviser at The Tiens Group in Beijing, holds masters of law and S.J.D. degrees from Penn State Law. He became Penn State Law’s first S.J.D. graduate in December, after successfully defending his dissertation in September.

The Penn State Law S.J.D. Program is intended for individuals who wish to make an original and substantial contribution to legal scholarship, particularly those who are able to draw on a wealth of legal experience. It is also recommended for those who seek an academic career in law or in other scholarly, research, policy or professional enterprises, or career advancement through the acquisition of a doctorate in law.

Last Updated July 22, 2015

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