Olympic ideal demolished: how forced evictions in China related to the 2008 Olympic Games are violating international law.

The ability to effectively contest the validity of a taking requires consultation, information, and notice. No national Chinese law requires developers to consult or notify the actual evictees about impending demolition of their residences. (209) Requiring consultation offers an initial informal notice about the possibility a person's property may be used in a future government approved development. Consultation prior to eviction or demolition may also aide in decreasing the negative impact an affected community experiences. (210) Developers would also gain an appreciation for a community's makeup and thus have the ability to plan construction so as to minimize the number of evictees.

In addition to consultation, requiring the exchange of adequate and accurate information between the government, developers, and affected residents is imperative. Developers should be required to inform all potential evictees of their proposed plans, so, if approved, citizens have the necessary information to contest the decision in court. Developers should also be required to include in their request for permission to evict people a detailed description of why particular evictions are necessary, (211) details of the company's planned project, and information gained during the mandatory consultation about how many people will be affected and any other possibly negative consequences. With this information, government officials will be able to make appropriate decisions based on reason and fact.

Requiring developers to give residents reasonable notice of the actual date approved evictions will begin is also necessary to ensure a legitimate taking. One of the main sources of conflict arising out of forced evictions is that residents often have insufficient notice. In many instances they find out their homes are being "taken" for demolition only a few days before the government expects them to move. (212) Although this Comment does not suggest a minimum amount of days, enough time should be given to allow a person to file a lawsuit if she decides to contest the taking. Finally, a law requiring the immediate cessation of planned construction until the outcome of any arbitration or litigation would complete a resident's opportunity to effectively contest a government taking. Advance notice would also allow more time for residents not interested in contesting the government's actions to locate alternative housing.

2. Fair Compensation and the Ability to Effectively Contest the Amount

If a legitimate governmental taking has occurred, (213) Chinese citizens should receive fair compensation and have the ability to effectively contest the compensation amount. Paying evictees just compensation is essential when the government determines a private citizen's land would best be used for a public purpose. (214) Chinese law requires individuals be paid full market value for their property. However, the government price lists upon which the appraisers base their determinations are outdated and skewed. The marketplace should be the sole source of appraisal information. (215) Compensation should also include any lost earnings if the property is used for business purposes.

With fair compensation, citizens will be able to find comparable new housing and continue with their lives relatively uninterrupted. Adequate money not only compensates the individual for his financial loss but also builds confidence in the legal system. When people can rest assured they will receive monetary compensation from the government even though they oppose the appropriation of their land or home, confidence vests in the fairness of the process.

If a citizen does not receive compensation or believes the amount given is inadequate, he or she should have legal recourse. The information requirements mentioned above would apply in this situation, too. Residents should know who calculated their compensation sum and how it was calculated. These requirements would provide citizens the knowledge needed to dispute the accuracy of the amount.

3. Enforcement

Simply proclaiming these rights will not satisfy international requirements alone. In order to be effective, China must also guarantee the enforcement of these rights. To be enforced nonarbitrarily, China should rethink the current arbitration structure. The very officials who grant developers licenses should not sit as the neutral decision makers in compensation disputes. Arbitrators and judges should feel free to rule in favor of the individual citizens in appropriate circumstances, and bribes should be ardently opposed. Lawyers should also be free from fear of retaliation when representing evicted residents in suit over validity or compensation. Finally, citizens should have easy access to these systems, possibly making legal aid available to those who cannot afford court and attorney fees.

Top officials in China have taken a step in the right direction by leading a campaign against illegal land seizures and evictions. (216) Liu Zhihua, a Beijing vice mayor with final authority for citywide demolitions regarding Olympic venue construction, was accused of corruption and removed from office on June 11, 2006. (217) This campaign is a positive first move, but China must commit to eradicating corruption at all levels of the property dispute system to ensure their citizens' property rights are not violated.

V. CONCLUSION

Major government-sanctioned construction projects approved in the run up to the 2008 Games have forced countless Chinese citizens onto the streets. Protests regarding forced eviction and demolition have been reported through a host of media, from sophisticated international news conglomerates to informal internet blogs. With the Games approaching swiftly, evictions and protests are certain to continue, and will likely increase. The Olympic ideal has been eroded through the hundreds of thousands of illegal forced evictions occurring to make way for the Games.

Although major advances in property rights have emerged even since Beijing won the Olympic bid, showing at least an effort on the part of the P.R.C. to conform to international law, current practices are not sufficient. First, the Chinese people must be given the ability to effectively contest the validity of governmental takings, which should include adequate consultation, information, and notice. Second, in the event a legitimate taking occurs, residents should receive just compensation and have the ability to effectively contest that amount. The Olympic Committee should take immediate measures to ensure a historically peace-promoting competition is not overshadowed by egregious human rights and international law violations.

(1.) See Pico Iyer, The Unknown Rebel, TIME, Apr. 13, 1998, at 192 (describing the image of the single protester whose actions halted an advancing column of tanks for over half an hour). TIME magazine dubbed the anonymous student the "Unknown Rebel," and to this day he symbolizes Chinese freedom. See id.

(2.) See id. (proposing the man "may have impressed his image on the global memory more vividly, more intimately than even Sun Yat-sen did" and was seen "by more people than ever laid eyes on Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein and James Joyce combined").

(3.) The Author uses the terms China and P.R.C. interchangeably to refer to the People's Republic of China throughout the remainder of this Comment.

(4.) See, e.g., Zhu Zhongshun, Suzhou yili chaiqian 'dingfeng zuoan' shimin shenye zao yeman bangjia [Suzhou forced evictee brutally kidnapped in middle of night], JIANGNAN SHIBAO [JIANGNAN TIMES], Dec. 12, 2003, http://news.sina.com.cn/c/2003-1212/06531321126s.shtml (reporting developers sent bulldozers in the middle of night to destroy residences).

(5.) See Teresa Martin, Note, Hong Kong Right of Abode: Ng Siu Tung & Others v. Director of Immigration--Constitutional and Human Rights at the Mercy of China, 5 SAN DIEGO INT'L L.J. 465, 474 n.49 (2004) (briefly surveying the reasons behind the 1989 protests and the government's reaction to the protests).

(6.) See, e.g., Daniel Griffiths, China Faces Growing Land Disputes, BBC NEWS, Aug. 2, 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4728025.stm (observing on July 20, 2005, hundreds of people blocked the entrance to land assigned for use in the 2008 Olympics).

(7.) Cf. Jiangyu Wang, China and the Universal Human Rights Standards, 29 SYRACUSE J. INT'L L. & COM. 135, 141-42 (2001) (suggesting negative international public opinion of China's human rights record was at least partly responsible for its defeat in the 1993 bid for the 2000 Olympic Games).

(8.) See Sara Meg Davis, Demolished: Forced Evictions and the Tenants" Rights Movement in China, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH VOL. 16, NO. 4(C), Mar. 2004, at 6, available at http://199.173.149.140/reports/2004/china0304/china0304.pdf (detailing reported incidents of forced evictions and demolition); infra Part III.

(9.) See Davis, supra note 8, at 1-2, 22.

(10.) See id. at 13-15.

(11.) "The Olympic Movement includes the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Organising Committees of the Olympic Games (OCOGs), the National Olympic Committees (NOCs), the International Federations (IFs), the national associations, clubs and, of course, the athletes." Official Website of the Olympic Movement, http://www.olympic.org/uk/organisation/index_uk.asp (last visited Oct. 14, 2006).