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AbstractThis article examines how smart courts enhance the reform of judicial responsibility and the "trial supervision and management" mechanism. It holds that smart courts, while meant to provide better judicial services and improve access to justice, have the additional goal of enhancing the restructuring of accountability and power structures. It argues that automation and digitization help institutionalize and codify political supervision. Smart courts help resolve tension between the two opposing requirements of Chinese courts to maintain legal rationality and independent adjudication on the one hand, and the need for flexibility to allow intervention on the other. This article provides an account of the automation of "trial supervision and management" and explores the role of technology in enhancing political intervention in China's legal system. This investigation draws on internal court reports and central and local judicial documents, supplemented with a review of Chinese empirical scholarship.

Abstract
The belief in quantitative indicators based on standardized data as an effective tool has become more entrenched than ever before, in both public and corporate governance, because of a drive to achieve more efficiency and accountability. The power of automated computation systems and the ubiquitous availability of big data have magnified the potential and capacities for quantification. The People's Republic of China (prc) has enthusiastically embraced these advanced technologies. The rapid digitization and automation of social governance in China, called "smart governance," entail new approaches to social and political control, driven by innovations in algorithmic systems, big data analytics, and artificial intelligence. This article seeks to reveal the ideological foundations of the prc's push for the digitization and automation of social governance. Drawing on international scholarship on Chinese Marxism and Leninism, it argues that the positivist organizational and ideological principles of Marxism-Leninism help explain why technology and automation are embraced so enthusiastically by the Chinese party-state: they provide a way to achieve the dream of rational Marxist governance. Through an empirical analysis of 120 articles from 2014 to 2021, this article illustrates that these ideas are, or may be, a vital part of shaping academic discourse around smart governance in China today. An analysis of Chinese academic discourse is an essential part of understanding the ideological foundations of Chinese Communist Party (ccp) governance and statecraft and how these commitments shape the embrace and deployment of smart technologies. The way in which scholars discuss the transformative power of smart technologies demonstrates a similar ideological understanding of social governance.

This article reviews how Chinese scholars debate the policy of building smart courts in the context of judicial reform. This policy entails the automation and digitisation of judicial processes. It is part of broader judicial reforms that aim to create a more accurate and consistent judiciary. The article identifies four reform concepts that guide the debate: efficiency, consistency, transparency and supervision, and judicial fairness. This review is a meta-synthesis, using practices of narrative and systematic literature reviews, focusing on evaluating and interpreting the Chinese scholarship and reform concepts. It reviews how Chinese scholars discuss the implications of judicial automation and digitisation. Additionally, it analyses the normative concepts behind the reform goals within China's political-legal context. The analysis finds that the generally positive evaluation in the debate can be explained by an instrumentalist understanding of the reform concepts and the political purpose of courts in the Chinese political-legal context. (JCCA/GIGA)

This article reviews how Chinese scholars debate the policy of building smart courts in the context of judicial reform. This policy entails the automation and digitisation of judicial processes. It is part of broader judicial reforms that aim to create a more accurate and consistent judiciary. The article identifies four reform concepts that guide the debate: efficiency, consistency, transparency and supervision, and judicial fairness. This review is a meta-synthesis, using practices of narrative and systematic literature reviews, focusing on evaluating and interpreting the Chinese scholarship and reform concepts. It reviews how Chinese scholars discuss the implications of judicial automation and digitisation. Additionally, it analyses the normative concepts behind the reform goals within China's political-legal context. The analysis finds that the generally positive evaluation in the debate can be explained by an instrumentalist understanding of the reform concepts and the political purpose of courts in the Chinese political-legal context.