Mimi Zou

Fangda Career Development Fellow in Chinese Commercial Law

Profile menu
Contact

Address

St Hugh's College

Oxford, OX2 6LE

Other affiliations

  • Oxford Law Faculty
Email

Biography

Dr Mimi Zou is the inaugural Fangda Career Development Fellow in Chinese Commercial Law at St Hugh's College, in association with the Oxford Law Faculty and the Oxford China Centre. It is the first post in Chinese law at the University of Oxford. Dr Zou has the role of developing the subject as a new field of study and research at Oxford, exploring how best to understand Chinese law and the links between law, economy, politics, and society, both within China and as it affects transnational relations. 

Dr Zou obtained her Doctor of Philosophy in Law and Bachelor of Civil Law (Distinction) degrees from St John's College and Christ Church, University of Oxford on a Commonwealth Scholarship and a James Fairfax Oxford Australia Scholarship. She also graduated with first class honours degrees in Law, Economics, and Social Sciences (University Medal) from the University of Sydney. She is currently completing an Executive MBA programme.

Prior to her appointment at Oxford, Dr Zou was Edwards Fellow at Columbia Law School, Assistant Professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and Senior Researcher at Utrecht University. Dr Zou has also taught and researched at leading Chinese universities and think tanks, including the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Tsinghua University, China University of Political Science and Law, Zhejiang University, and Southwest University of Political Science and Law. She has collaborated with senior researchers, policy makers, practitioners in China on various law reform projects.

Dr Zou won the 2016 International Association of Labour Law Journals Marco Biagi Prize for Best Paper and was a finalist in the 2016 Taylor & Francis Commonwealth Scholar Best Journal Article Prize. She received the first Innovation in Teaching Award from the Faculty of Law at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2015 for blended learning initiatives (such as a 'flipped classroom' project on Elder Law). Her research has been cited in an Australian appellate court and several parliamentary inquiries and covered by international media outlets such as The New York Times, BBC, The Guardian, Reuters, China Daily, and South China Morning Post.

Dr Zou is a qualified solicitor in England and Wales and lawyer in New South Wales (Australia). Alongside academia, she has served as an independent adviser and consultant for international organisations and firms in tech and professional services sectors in China, USA, and Australasia. For over 15 years, she has worked in law firms, international organisations, government departments, and financial institutions in Asia-Pacific and Europe. In 2016, the Asia Society named her an ‘Asia 21 Young Leader’. She was a finalist in the British Council's Education UK Alumni Awards and Young Australian of the Year Awards.

Languages: English, Mandarin, and Cantonese

邹密密博士是牛津大学开展中国法律研究此一新领域的课题负责人。该课题由方达律师事务所慷慨资助。邹博士曾任香港中文大学助理教授，哥大法学院爱德华基金项目访问学者，同时担任联合国咨询顾问11年。邹博士曾以一等荣誉经济学与法学学士学位毕业于悉尼大学，随后于牛津大学获得硕士和博士学位，并获得全额奖学金。邹博士同时拥有英国和澳大利亚新南威尔士州执业律师资格, 曾经在澳大利亚律所Mallesons Stephen Jaques（已与金杜律师事务所合并）及Linklaters伦敦办公室工作。她被亚洲协会评为2016亚洲杰出青年领袖，获得英国文化协会的英国校友奖，并被澳大利亚驻华使领馆评为澳大利亚全球校友会之杰出领导能力女性校友。

邹博士正在进行中的研究项目是关于中国互联网经济和中国外商投资环境下的商业法律问题。

 

Publications

Displaying 1 - 47 of 47. Sorted by year, then title.
Filter by
  • Y. An and M. Zou, 'An Assessment of Advance Directives in China: The Coming of Age for Legal Regulation?' (2019) 20 Marquette Benefits and Social Welfare Law Review
  • M. Zou, An Introduction to Chinese Contract Law (Lexis Nexis 2018) (forthcoming)
  • M. Zou, 'Future trends in commercial dispute settlement' (2018) Cross-Border Commercial Dispute Resolution in the Belt and Road Initiative, Beijing, 20 March 2018
  • M. Zou, 'Pour une refonte des programmes pour les travailleurs migrants temporaires' (2018) Revue de Droit comparé du Travail et de la Sécurité sociale (forthcoming)
  • M. Zou, 'Rethinking Exit in Temporary Migrants' Work Relations' in Bernard Ryan (ed), Migrant Labour and the Reshaping of Employment Law (Hart 2018) (forthcoming)
  • M. Zou, 'Social Media and Privacy in the Chinese Workplace: Why One Should Not 'Friend' Their Employer on WeChat' (2018) 40 Comparative Labor Law and Policy Journal 101
    It is no understatement that social media has become a ubiquitous feature of our lives. In the People’s Republic of China, the popularity of social media usage continues to grow, particularly in the workplace setting. The vast quantity and range of data generated and shared on social networks, including personal information, have become a valuable resource for employers to screen job applicants, monitor work performance, and investigate employee wrongdoings. Developments in workplace surveillance technologies have also made it easier for employers to track, monitor, and access employees’ online activities. The legitimacy of employers’ inquiry into the online lives of job applicants and employees is often justified on the basis of business concerns about reputational risks, leakage of intellectual property and trade secrets, and other legal liabilities that could arise from employees’ social media activities. This article probes into a number of important regulatory challenges arising from employers’ access to and use of social media in China. It starts with an analysis of the extent to which privacy and data protection laws in China, including relatively recent developments in the Cyber Security Law and the General Rules of Civil Law, protect employees’ rights in this context. I then examine relevant cases brought before local courts that reveal how employers have accessed and made use of employees’ social media communications in a variety of common circumstances. From this analysis, three significant issues remain unresolved by lawmakers and the courts: unlawful discrimination arising from the use of social media in recruitment; employee speech that may harm an employer’s business and reputational interests; and off-duty social media communications of employees. I conclude that extant regulatory gaps provide much scope for employers in China to monitor and inquire into employees’ social media activities, especially in light of the power asymmetries in the employment relationship.
  • M. Zou, 'The Chinese Belt and Road Initiative in Russia: consequences for business?' (2018) Keynote address, Seminar for Dutch businesses, Residence of the Netherlands Ambassador to Moscow, April 2018
  • M. Zou, 'Chinese Multinationals and Corporate Social Responsibility' (2017) Asian Jurist 52
  • M. Zou, 'Regulating the Fissured Workplace: the Notion of the Employer in Chinese Employment Law' in Hiroya Nakakubo and Takashi Araki (eds), The Notion of Employer in the Era of the Fissured Workplace (Wolters Kluwer 2017)
    The term 'fissured workplace' has been coined by David Weil to describe fundamental changes in the organisation of work arising from firms' competitive strategies in the 21st century. As Weil put it, fissurisation refers to 'both a form of employment (for example, temporary agency employment; independent contracting) and a relationship between different business enterprises (subcontracting, franchising)'. In a fissured workplace that may have multiple legal entities intertwined in a range of complex contractual relationships, the notion of the 'employer' and thus the question of who should bear the legal responsibilities of an employer become extremely problematic. This paper examines the evolving phenonmenon of the fissured workplace in China and the regulatory dynamics of Chinese labour law in addressing the challenges of fissurisation over the past three decades. In the current phase of China's economic downturn, accelerating trends of fissurisation have brought to the forefront some major challenges for policymakers arising from the broader social consequences of fissured workplaces. The paper focuses on the notion of the 'employer' in Chinese labour law, particularly how policymakers in recent years have sought to regulate the use of labour dispatch as a prevalent manifestation of fissurisation in China.
  • M. Zou, 'The Regulatory Challenges of “Uberization” in China: How to Classify Ride-Hailing Drivers?' (2017) 33 International Journal of Comparative Labour Law and Industrial Relations 269
    There has been nascent litigation around the world on the employment classification of workers in the ‘sharing economy’, ‘gig economy’ or ‘on demand economy’. New business models and forms of work organization arising from rapid advancements in digital technologies (or ‘disruptive innovation’ as some have described the phenomenon) have sparked considerable debate on a wide array of regulatory issues, including the role of labour law protections for the emergent ‘digital workforce’. This debate is currently taking place in the People’s Republic of China. This article analyses how Chinese courts and lawmakers have addressed issues that are directly or indirectly relevant to determining the status of drivers in the ride-hailing sector. Despite the presence of criteria for identifying a ‘labour relationship’ under Chinese labour law, the courts have not adopted a uniform approach across different types of claims involving these drivers. A new government regulation on the ride-hailing sector, which took effect in November 2016, has not resolved this issue as it permits ride-hailing platform companies to enter into labour contracts and other forms of agreements with drivers based on the particularities of their work arrangements. In considering these recent cases and regulatory developments, the article concludes that a purposive approach to the existing criteria in Chinese labour law for ascertaining the status of workers in the sharing economy is useful for addressing the basic question of whether they should be protected, rather than creating ‘new’ categories of employment classification.
  • M. Zou, 'Employer Demand for “Skilled” Migrant Workers: Regulating Admission under the United Kingdom’s Tier 2 (General) Visa' in Joanne Howe and Rosemary Owens (eds), Temporary Labour Migration in the Global Era: The Regulatory Changes (Hart 2016)
    In our time of globalisation, the admission of migrant workers is one of the most debated public policy issues around the world. Over the past two decades, temporary migrant workers programmes (TMWPs) have expanded across all sectors and both ends of the skills spectrum in numerous advanced industrialised countries. These TMWPs are commonly based on a demand-driven model of employer sponsorship aimed at filling shortages in the local labour market on a short-term basis. Assessing employers’ claims in relation to ‘skills’ and ‘shortages’ is often a highly contested component of regulating admission under TMWPs. The admission criteria and processes of such schemes can have significant implications for the interests of and relations between different migrants, local workers, and employers in the host state. This chapter examines the regulatory challenges arising from the conditions of entry under the United Kingdom’s employer-sponsored Tier 2 (General) visa scheme, including the number of migrants admitted, the occupations, sectors, and geographical areas where they are recruited, as well as migrants’ skills and attributes. Employers may desire a laissez faire model of employer-led admission where they can freely decide who and how many migrant workers to admit. Yet, as reforms to the admission criteria under Tier 2 (General) visa scheme in recent years suggest, other competing policy considerations may prevail such as the interests of resident workers in having privileged access to the labour market and in ensuring these schemes are not used to undercut their wages and working conditions.
  • M. Zou, 'Labour standards on the One Belt One Road' in XI Chao and Lutz Christian Wolff (eds), Legal Dimensions of China’s One Belt One Road (Wolters Kluwer 2016)
    Chinese multinational enterprises (MNEs) are emerging as increasingly influential actors in the global political economy. Since the late 1990s, China has adopted a ‘Going Out’ industrialisation policy entailing the accelerated internationalisation of Chinese firms to acquire assets and expand business operations abroad. The centrepiece of the forthcoming phase of the ‘Going Out’ strategy is the ‘One Belt One Road’ (OBOR or ‘Belt and Road’) initiative, aimed at fostering closer economic connectivity between China and over 60 other countries with an emphasis on infrastructure and transportation projects. With the rapid expansion of Chinese outbound investments, there have been growing controversies over the social impacts on host countries. The conduct of Chinese state-owned enterprises and private firms investing along the ‘Belt and Road’ are likely to be subject to ever increasing scrutiny. OBOR has also been seen by some as a geo-political strategy that reflects China’s desire for a bigger role in global affairs. As such, there may be increasing expectations among the international community that China should ensure that its firms act as ‘good corporate citizens’ abroad. Indeed, unfavourable consequences for China’s image have already prompted the government to introduce regulations, guidelines, and policies in recent years that aim to govern the conduct of Chinese MNEs. There has also been an emerging set of corporate social responsibility schemes and codes of conduct adopted by Chinese MNEs and industry groups, often with the involvement of government authorities. This paper addresses a critical issue that arises as to the ways in which the world’s largest industrialising economy, in pursuing a new industrial development strategy that will broaden its role in global markets and production networks as well as its potential geo-political influence, may shape the governance of international labour standards. Could China (including its public and private actors) become a new standard-setter?
  • M. Zou and J Goudkamp, 'Hounga v Allen [2014] UKSC 47' (2015) 21 Journal of Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Law 56 [Case Note]
    The claimant, Ms Hounga, travelled to the United Kingdom from Nigeria in 2007. She was then aged around 14. Upon her arrival, the claimant was granted a visitor visa on the ground that her purpose for being in the United Kingdom was to see relatives. In fact, the claimant had intended to study and work illegally for the respondents, Mr and Mrs Allen. The claimant worked as an au pair for the respondents, who were complicit in the claimant's immigration offences, although they neither paid her nor, as promised, provided her with education. The respondents' treatment of the claimant was, on any measure, highly exploitative. It included physical abuse. Eventually, the claimant was dismissed from her employment, whereupon she brought several claims against the respondents, including a claim in the statutory tort of race discrimination with respect to her dismissal (s 4(2)(c) of the Race Relations Act 1976 (now s 39(2)(c) of the Equality Act 2010)). The Employment Tribunal upheld that claim. The respondents relied on the illegality defence but the Tribunal found that it was inapplicable. The respondents' appeal to the Employment Appeal Tribunal was dismissed. The Court of Appeal ([2012] IRLR 685) reversed the findings below, holding that the illegality defence applied because the discrimination was inextricably linked with the claimant's illegal conduct. The claimant appealed to the Supreme Court.
  • J Woo, H Chan, A Chong and M. Zou, 'Medical Ethical Principles may Drive Improvement of Quality of Dying in Hong Kong' (2015) 14 Journal of Palliative Care and Medicine 580
    Population ageing raises concern regarding the quality of end of life care (EOLC), not only for people with cancer but for all dying of end stage chronic diseases, particularly for dementia. Medical ethical principles, legal and cultural factors affect the quality of end of life care. This article discusses how these three factors currently contribute to EOLC in Hong Kong, in the context of differing trajectories of development in China, other Asian countries, and the USA. EOLC for non cancer patients has only recently been highlighted, where ethical, legal, and cultural issues are being debated. Although there is no statute or case law that directly govern the legal status of advance directives in Hong Kong, a validly made advance directive is generally recognized at common law. However, there is a range of other legal barriers to providing EOLC according to medical ethical principles. There is little discussion among health care providers or the public regarding advance directives, euthanasia, physician assisted suicide, or withdrawal of life support, particularly for those with dementia. It is hoped that a continuing medical ethics discourse regarding EOLC issues may provide momentum to overcome current inertia or avoidance of EOLC issues, such that population aging may not be accompanied by increasingly poor quality of care in the dying process.
  • M. Zou and J Goudkamp, 'The Defence of Illegality in Tort Law: Beyond Judicial Redemption?' (2015) 74 Cambridge Law Journal 13 [Case Note]
    IN Hounga v Allen [2014] UKSC 47; [2014] 1 W.L.R. 2889, the Supreme Court unanimously upheld a claim in the statutory tort of discrimination by a woman who had been dismissed from her employment. The fact that the woman had been working in breach of immigration laws did not enliven the illegality defence. Hounga is one of several recent cases in which the illegality defence has been examined at the ultimate appellate level, the other decisions being Gray v Thames Trains Ltd [2009] UKHL 33; [2009] 1 A.C. 1339, Stone & Rolls Ltd v Moore Stephens [2009] UKHL 39; [2009] A.C. 1391, and Les Laboratoires Servier v Apotex Inc [2014] UKSC 55; [2014] 3 W.L.R. 1257. The fact that the defence has been considered so frequently as of late at the apex level seems to confirm that the Law Commission was wrong in its prediction, made shortly after Gray and Moore Stephens were decided, that the defence would be brought into a satisfactory state if responsibility for reforming it was left to the courts (The Illegality Defence (Law Com 320, 2010), at [3.37]–[3.41]). We are not alone in holding this view. Writing extra-judicially, Lord Mance and Lord Sumption have called for the Law Commission to re-examine the defence (J. Mance, “Ex Turpi Causa – When Latin Avoids Liability” (2014) 18 Edinburgh Law Review 175, 192; J. Sumption, “Reflections on the Law of Illegality” (2012) 20 Restitution Law Review 1, 8–12). We argue here that Hounga perpetuates (and possibly aggravates) the difficulties from which this area of law suffers.
  • M. Zou, 'The Legal Construction of Hyper-dependence and Hyper-Precarity in Migrant Work Relations' (2015) 31 International Journal of Comparative Labour Law and Industrial Relations 141
    he two key concepts developed in this article, ‘hyper-dependence’ and ‘hyper-precarity’, are aimed at drawing attention to the constitutive role of immigration law in shaping certain vulnerabilities in migrants’ work relations. Immigration law is not merely concerned with controlling the entry and exit of migrants, but also creates personal legal statuses – some highly precarious – that shape their employment and residence in the host state. The two ‘hyper’ concepts seek to elucidate the most problematic features of Temporary Migrant Worker Programmes (TMWPs) currently found in a number of advanced industrialized, liberal democratic countries. Hyper-dependence refers to a particular tie of migrant workers to their employers as a requirement of their legal status. Hyper-precarity refers to the tenuous nature, in law and practice, of these workers’ entitlements to employment protection, social rights, and transition to more secure residence status. In some circumstances both hyper-dependence and hyper-precarity can combine to give rise to extremely exploitative situations for migrants at work. This article explores possible normative constraints on states’ design and implementation of TMWPs. It identifies two genres of normative interventions that may respond to the legal construction of hyper-precarity and hyper-dependence: first, the international human rights framework, and second, the discourse against forms of exploitation that could be regarded as ‘unfree labour’. However, it is argued that neither of the discourses poses a fundamental challenge to host states’ powers to create the precarious statuses of non-citizens admitted into their territory, nor do they tackle the complex realities of migrants’ work relations on a continuum of exploitation.
  • M. Zou, 'The Evolution of Collective Labour Law with “Chinese Characteristics”: Crossing the river by feeling the stones?' in Roger Blanpain, Ulla Liukkunen and Yifeng Chen (eds), China and ILO Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work (Bulletin of Comparative Labour Relations 2014)
    The expression of ‘crossing a river by feeling the stones’ (mozhe shitou guo he), popularised by Deng Xiaoping, is commonly evoked by Chinese policy-makers to promote a cautious, gradual, and selective approach to reform that takes into account ‘Chinese characteristics’ (zhongguo teshe). Over the past three decades, the framework for regulating collective labour relations in China appears to have evolved in this manner. However this approach may not be able to respond to the rapidly changing currents of China’s new market economy that have generated conflicting interests between labour and capital. The continued absence of genuine collective labour representation mechanisms at the workplace/enterprise level has seen the escalation of labour disputes in various forms and on different scales. The implementation of the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) fundamental principles and rights at work concerning freedom of association and collective bargaining would constitute an important step towards addressing the structural deficiencies in China’s collective labour relations framework by providing a vehicle for worker voice and for a fairer distribution of economic gains. This would strengthen the foundation for sound labour market governance based on a new approach of ‘crossing the river by building a bridge’ (dajian qiaoliang guo he).
  • M. Zou, V. Korff, T. Zwart and R. Wittek, 'Rational Choice Theory and Human Rights' in David Brunsma, Kerri Smith, and Brian Gran (eds), The Handbook of Sociology and Human Rights (Paradigm Publishers 2012)
  • M. Zou, 'Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace: Beyond the Business Case to Effective Reflexive Regulation' (2009) 1 Australian Law Students’ Association Academic Journal 17
  • M. Zou and R Lansbury, 'Multinational Corporations and Employment Relations in China: the case of Beijing Hyundai Motor Company' (2009) 20 Journal of International Human Resource Management 2349
    This contribution examines the transfer of employment relations policies and practices from the domestic operations of the Hyundai Motor Company (HMC) in Ulsan, Korea to its joint venture in China, the Beijing Hyundai Motors Company (BHMC). An integrated ‘political economy’ theoretical framework is used to analyse the complex interaction of institutional, strategic and micro-political forces that have shaped the hybrid model of employment relations at BHMC. The study shows that the transfer of policies and practices from Ulsan to Beijing has been influenced not only by institutional differences between the home and host countries and the strategies pursued by HMC management, but also by the political contests between various actors within and outside BHMC. Our research findings show that HMC headquarters has sought to maintain control over employment relations at BHMC through the transfer of its core policies and practices from its Korean operations to BHMC. However, a hybrid model has emerged at BHMC with some notable differences to HMC's Ulsan plant. Utilising an integrated political economy perspective, this contribution has shown that BHMC's employment relations policies and practices have been shaped and conditioned by a complex interplay of institutional and market forces, strategic choices and ongoing political contests between various actors within and beyond BHMC.

News

Research Interests

My current research programmes focus on commercial law issues in the contexts of China’s digital economy and Chinese outbound foreign investments.

Options taught

Contract

Research projects