Foreign Law: Reform in Viet Nam

Reforming a country's entire legal system is a mammoth job in the best of times; doing it in the midst of a civil war seems virtually impossible. Yet last year South Viet Nam actually put a complete new constitution into effect. Now the country's legal experts are trying to align existing laws with the idealistic document. It is no easy task. The constitution strongly reflects contemporary Western notions of justice, but much of Viet Nam's legal structure is still based on the philosophical teachings of Confucius. To make matters worse, Vietnamese statutes include a bastardized version of the Napoleonic...