The Research Center for the State Rule of Law Index of the Institute of Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and the project team of the Innovation Project of the Rule of Law Index, in their enduring preoccupation with the rule of law development and the judicial system operation and reform, have successively launched Rule of Law Evaluation Reports series, including Report on the Transparency Index of China Government, Report on the Transparency Index of China Justice, Report on the Transparency Index of China Procuratorial Work, Report on the Index of Justice in Sunshine at Zhejiang Courts, Report on the Index of Justice in Sunshine at Beijing Courts, and Report on the Transparency Index of China Higher Education, together with Evaluation Report on Basic Settlement of Enforcement Difficulties – Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court as a Sample, International Comparison on Judicial Transparency, and People’s Forum – Special Issue of Zhejiang Courts etc.　　

　　A Third Party Evaluation Report on Informatization of Courts in China is the first of its kind in China to have conducted a third party evaluation on the development, effect and implementation of informatization of courts. It has been shown as in the result of investigation that Version 2.0 informatization of the people’s courts has been basically accomplished with interconnection and interoperability as its major characteristics; remarkable achievements have been made in such areas of endeavor as serving the people, improving trial quality and efficiency, reinforcing judicial enforcement, promoting judicial openness, boosting judicial reform, and implementing big data. Currently, as China courts are striving to construct court informatization Version 3.0, painstaking efforts ought to be devoted to renewal of mind, top-level design, business convergence, improvement of capability, and team construction for better service of the people, of trials and enforcement and of judicial management.

　　TIAN He, Dean of the Legal Situation Investigation & Research Office, the Institute of Law, CASS; director, research fellow of the Research Center for the State Rule of Law Index; Chief Editor of Rule of Law Blue Books; Chief Expert of the Innovation Project of the Rule of Law Index. Her research areas cover Empirical Science of Law and Judicial System.

　　Lü Yanbin, Research fellow of the Institute of Law, CASS; dean of the Research Office of Rule of Law Blue Books, assistant director of the Research Center for the State Rule of Law Index; Executive Editor of Rule of Law Blue Books; Executive Expert of the Innovation Project of the Rule of Law Index. His research areas cover Administrative Law and Information Law.

　　About the Translators

　　LI Wenzhong, professor from National Research Center for Foreign Language Education, Beijing Foreign Studies University

　　HU Haizhu, lecturer from Henan Normal University

　　LIU Bing, lecturer from Henan Polytechnic University

1.The theoretical foundation and practical significance of court informatization

1.1 The theoretical foundation

1.1.1 Need for facilities

1.1.2 Orientation of services

1.1.3 Construction costs

1.1.4 System risks

1.1.5 External circumstances

1.2 The practical significance

1.2.1 Serving the people and safeguarding judicial justice

1.2.2 Reinforcing judicial transparency and standardizing power enforcement

1.2.3 Optimizing judicial administration and enhancing trial quality and efficiency

1.2.4 Adapting to social changes and serving the state strategy

2.Achievements in the court informatization construction

2.1 A full coverage of courts in a rapid network constructiom

2.1.1 Information networks for trials and administrations at the Supreme People's Court

2.1.2 Information management platforms at the local courts

2.2 Judiciary Measure innovations to serve the people

2.2.1 People enjoy "less running about， less spending， and less trouble"

2.2.2 No more "hard to be served" and "hard to be interviewed"

2.2.3 Keeping clear the passage for the public interest demands and complaint articulation

2.2.4 "Legal services delivered to the door"

2.2.5 Keeping a "micro" distance in the aid of new media with the people

2.3 Informatization assisting in the modernization of trial capability

2.3.1 Constructing technological courtrooms

2.3.2 Implementing long—distance video system

2.3.3 Electronic courts online

2.3.4 The court e—stamp and e—signature

2.4 Significant enhancement ofthe court enforcement capability and effective credit corrections

2.4.1 Current construction and working of the information management system at the Supreme People's Court

2.4.2 Current construction and working of the information management system at the local courts of various levels

2.5 Precise management oftrials and dynamic monitoring oftheir working

2.5.1 Enhancing the trial and enforcement quality and efficiency

2.5.2 Providing smart services for the judges

2.5.3 Optimizing and reconstructing the procedure of trial and enforcement

2.5.4 Monitoring the situation and serving the trial and enforcement

2.6 Deepening judicial openness and contributing to the reinforcement of the court public credibility

2.6.1 Informatization promoting open trial process

2.6.2 Informatization facilitating open ruling documents

2.6.3 Informatization deepening open enforcement information

2.7 The judicial reform gaining its momentum by information technology

2.7.1 Informatization promoting the reform oftrial and enforcement

2.7.2 Informatization boosting reforming judicial management

2.8 Concentrating big data to enhance governance

2.8.1 Accomplishments in concentrated management ofjudicial information

2.8.2 Big data in service of socioeconomic construction

2.9 Boosting the construction of honest and clean courts and supervising judicial power exercising

2.9.1 An application system for discipline inspection and supervision

2.9.2 Easy access of complaints and reporting

2.9.3 Improving the internal supervision and monitoring system

2.10 Information construction in steady progress and the guarantee mechanism in constant improvement

2.10.1 Organization leadership and team construction

2.10.2 Maintenance guarantee and information safety

3.1 The direction of future work

3.1 Upgrading conception and revolutionizing the judicial system with informatization

3.2 Making top—level design for an overall coordinated advancement of the court information system

3.3 Mastering judicial regularities for an in depth coalescence of IT and court operations

3.4 Balancing supply and demand and assisting in trial enforcement in service of the people

3.5 Improving data analysis and serviceability for a better service to socioeconomic development

3.6 Strengthening team construction for training and exchange of excellent specialists in the court information

Concluding remarks

Appendixes 1： A list of the official documents for the informatization of the country—wide courts

Appendixes 2： A Five—Year Development Plan for the Construction of the Information System of the People's Courts （2016—2020）

　　《中国法院信息化第三方评估报告（英文版）》：

　　"Chinese Judgments Online" has been in operation and kept upgraded.The ruling document is the final product of a court trial； it is an important document of the court's determination of facts， application of law and judgment， being thus the important text medium bearing all the way through litigation activities， settling of disputes， and the quality ofjudgment.Releasing ruling documents online has been a significant undertaking to deepen judicial openness， to display judicial civilization， and to safeguardjudicial justice.Such documents are not only made accessible to the interested parties，but to the public at large， for social supervision and unification ofjustice standard， and for actual realization of fairness and justice in each case.These documents used to be extremely restricted in access， and one had to go to the hearing court to look up a specific document at the great expense of great time and energy.In November of 2013，the Supreme People's Court opened "Chinese Judgments Online"， having henceforth concentrated the publication of the ruling documents subject to enforcement at all of the country—wide courts.The database ofjudgments has become an important componentof Chinese Big Data of Justice.At the end of 2015， in an attempt to improve the user friendliness of the website， the Supreme People's Court upgraded the network by adding to its homepage one—click smart queries on related documents， individualized service and minority languages sections.The successful networking of ruling documents has made easy access to the public for query and research on one hand， and on the other it has produced a wash—back effect， prompting the judges to enhance their reasoning ability for betterment of document quality and judicial practices.

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