[author]Li Na

[content]

Construction of A Society of Compliance: Meaning, Rationale and Approach

Author Li Na

Associate Professor, Yunnan University Law School

Abstract: “Full compliance” is an important goal as well as content in the construction of rule of law in China. Compliance however is not a sole outcome of application of legal norms, but a sort of logic of social actions. Construction of a society of compliance requires three major subjects: the individual, group and organization. And it refers to three principal levels: the society, government and the country. Construction of a society of compliance indicates a high level of rule of law construction as it contributes to national governance. With an comprehensive and processual perspective, compliance construction requires useful interrelation between law, society and the individual, interrelation between the rule, action and ideas, and interrelation between subjective and objective factors. In this sense, the core of a society of compliance includes three critical aspects: compliance awareness, compliance capacity, and compliance conditions. Such three aspects further develop seven basic elements: acceptance of legitimacy, ethical morality, knowledge, resource, legal system, legal deterrence, and social-cultural psychology. In general, the rule of law construction in China calls for new development in both compliance theory and compliance practice.

The report to the 19th National Congress of CPC clearly states that "the overall goal of comprehensively promoting the rule of law is to build a socialist rule of law system with Chinese characteristics and a socialist country under the rule of law", among which "law-abiding by all people" is an important goal and construction content of comprehensively law-based governance. However, there are various difficulties in building a social foundation for universal respect for the law, belief in the law, compliance with the law and the use of the law. A law-abiding society for all cannot be fully realized simply by increasingly sophisticated legislative techniques, intensified law-enforcement activities, or by relying solely on legal literacy and moral education. "Law-abiding" itself depends on effective construction. Compared with research on legislation, the judiciary and law enforcement, academic research on law-abiding behaviour is relatively weak.

The purpose of this paper is to establish a connection between law, society and individuals, rules, actions and ideas, actors' subjective consciousness, objective ability and objective environment with a holistic and process perspective, in order to explore the basic connotations, core mechanisms and path possibility of law-abiding society construction by answering the question of what law-abidingness is, what is the core composition of a law-abiding society, and what are the systematic elements of the construction of a law-abiding society.

1.Building a law-abiding society as a "high-level goal" in building the rule of law

1.1 Connotation of law-abidingness

Figuring out from what position, at what level and under what logic to talk about law-abidingness determines how research is done, what research is done, and how a law-abiding society is built. For example, if law-abidingness is considered to be the result of law enforcement, the focus of research and construction becomes how to improve law enforcement. To clarify the connotation of law-abiding, there are many questions worth clarifying: Is it true that legislation, law enforcement and justice are good enough to realize universal respect for the law and law-abiding in the whole society? Is it true that increased legal knowledge and high moral standards inevitably produce law-abiding behaviour? Is law-abiding merely the result of the application of rules, or is it merely a behavioral response of people to the external environment? What is the core of a law-abiding society?

Knowledge of law-abidingness should not, first of all, be confined to moral and ethical contingency arguments. A large number of real-life phenomena show that the perception of the contingency of law-abiding behaviour does not explain many phenomena in practice very well. For example, in many fields, the proportion of minor violations of the law remains high, even if the moral condemnation of such behaviour, even if the law enforcement agencies from time to time to take special action, once the law enforcement efforts to weaken, the momentum of violation of the law will rise again, and law enforcement is often caught in a dead cycle. In the face of such a situation, it is no longer possible to find a way out of the dilemma solely from the perspective of law enforcement. Another example is that a team of social psychologists in the United States conducted a set of behavioral experiments, which initially arose from the following dilemma faced by a national park: visitors to the park were often tempted to pick their favorite flowers and branches, and park managers repeatedly posted signs to warn them, but with little effect. At the suggestion of the team, the park replaced the sign with another that read "95 percent of visitors to the park consider picking to be shameful". It was found that many visitors gave up picking when they saw the new sign. The team then extended the experiment to a hotel, where the following message was posted in the bathrooms of all the rooms on a particular floor: "90% of guests who stayed in this room chose to reuse their towels." In the end, it was found that a large percentage of guests who stayed on that floor reused their towels compared to other floors that did not have the above prompt posted. The above study proves the theory that people are more likely to choose to do actions that others think are right or that others are doing the same, which is an influence from social norms. There are also areas where it may be found that people consciously and voluntarily engage in behaviors that are in line with legal expectations and are not motivated by legal or moral pressures. For example, the author's empirical study of safety compliance by construction workers showed that workers, who had very limited knowledge of the law and little contact with regulators, acted more on the basis of individualized perceptions, experiences and judgments that coincided with the way the law expected them to act. There are also cases of hyper-compliance. For example, a study in Europe found that environmental regulators would require restaurants to install kitchen equipment that has the ability to monitor smoke emissions, and as a result, some businesses installed costly, more demanding equipment on their own that far exceeded the minimum requirements of the law. For such businesses, the incentive to comply with the law comes from the need to create a better social reputation, and they are therefore willing to bear the higher costs of compliance.

Numerous observations and empirical studies remind us that law-abiding is not just a legal fact, a result, but also a logic of social action, with conceptual and conscious dimensions, and including dimensions of behavioral choices and daily practices. From the perspective of social science, from static legal rules to dynamic behavior (rules → law-abiding), is not an automatic result, which may experience the process of legal rules being disseminated, selected, acquired, recognized, internalized, and acted upon. In this respect, it has many similarities with the process of law enforcement and justice.

If we accept that law-abiding is a logic of social action, then its content is "much broader, deeper and richer than many people understand". First, compliance as a logic of action means that the "subjectivity" of the actor should not be avoided or ignored. Recognizing the subjectivity of the subject is not a diminution of the authority of the law (i.e., that social subjects should respect and obey the law). On the contrary, it helps to find out in the real world in what situation and in what way human cognition and action are specifically linked or collided with the law. And if this subjectivity is denied and the implementation of the law is viewed only from a top-down perspective, the vision of law and public policy tends to become unresponsive to social reality. Second, as a kind of social action, law-abiding has a process nature, and there are many elements affecting different parts of the law-abiding process. The understanding and study of law-abiding behavioral patterns and their consequences should be multidimensional and not only focus on punishment, control and discipline. At the same time, the different elements of the process often form a mutually constructive relationship with each other. In other words, compliance can become a constructive force. In addition, as a logic of action, law-abiding should not be understood simply as a form of external shaping, of responding to the external environment; it is also something endogenous, with the ability and mechanism of self-generation and self-evolution. For example, when the value of respect for the law is recognized by the actors, or when the actors of a certain behavioral motivation in line with the expectations of the law, we will see a "law-abiding practice without the implementation of the law". In this regard, the endogenous force of compliance is precisely one of the growth mechanisms of the rule of law.

1.2 The construction of a law-abiding society should become a "high-level goal" in the construction of the rule of law.

Law-abidance involves three types of subjects, namely, individuals, groups and organizations, and three levels, namely, society, the Government and the State. The ideal state of a law-abiding society is that: in terms of subjects, different individuals, various social groups and organizations of different natures are generally law-abiding; in terms of the constitutive level of life, the unfolding of social relations is orderly because of law-abidance; governments at all levels can operate in accordance with the law; and the existence and functioning of the Party and the structure of the State power is a kind of law-abiding practice. Therefore, the construction of a law-abiding society is related to the construction of the trinity of the rule of law, the rule of law government and the rule of law society. From a broader perspective, it will be realized that the construction of a law-abiding society should become, and will become, an advanced stage in the construction of the rule of law in a country.

Firstly, compliance is not the end of the road in the construction of a rule of law State; on the contrary, it may affect other parts of the rule of law governance system, creating positive beneficial or destructive effects. For example, there have been a number of studies that have explored the social bonding function of positive law-abidingness, but we have also seen the generalization of routine violations in many areas, thus dragging the implementation of the law into a quagmire. Thus, compliance should not be used merely as a "mirror" to project the consequences of legislation, law enforcement or justice. Rather, it is dynamic and constructive. In a sense, "what is law-abiding" should become an important topic of legal research and legal practice, because it can produce a series of related and critical issues such as what kind of law to make, how to enforce the law, and how to adjudicate.

Secondly, the construction of a law-abiding society can change a country's governance from a "command-and-control" model to a lower-cost, stronger-growth governance model, which can more effectively solve the problems of China's national governance scale and governance load. It is clear from the practice of countries around the world that the "command-and-control" mode of governance consumes a great deal of social resources, but may not be able to achieve the desired results. At present, the Party and the state have put forward the specific goal of "enhancing the enthusiasm and initiative of the whole society in practicing the rule of law", but where is the way forward? The construction of law-abiding may give some possibilities: When we expand from treating law-abiding as an obligation to studying the internal logic of the generation of law-abiding behavior, and from studying the passive state of law-abiding(i.e., to answer the question of "why does it appear to be in conformity or in departure with the law") to studying the positive state of law-abiding(i.e., answer to the question "How is it possible to promote pisitive compliance with the law?"), it will be possible to grasp some of the key mechanisms and links that only need to be generated, so that the desired goals of the law can be achieved at a lesser cost by stimulating the autonomy and self-consciousness of action.

Thirdly, the building of a law-abiding society should be a "high-level goal" in the construction of a State based on the rule of law. Because it explores the combination of external and endogenous forces, the question of society as an operating system, and the question of how all the players and forces in a society fit into the process, it is an "incremental" element in the construction of a State governed by the rule of law, and it is a possible path to stimulate social vitality. In this sense, the importance of law-abiding construction, it is possible to truly realize "society in the profound changes in both vibrant and orderly. In terms of the overall strategy of national governance, the construction of a law-abiding society will also help to identify the practical challenges that China is currently facing in the process of comprehensively promoting the rule of law, and provide useful references for the construction of a rule-of-law state in terms of the institutional environment of society, its operation mechanism and mobilization mechanism.

In sum, as far as the current practice of the rule of law in China is concerned, legislative techniques are becoming more and more sophisticated, and law enforcement and judicial activities are being strengthened and standardized, but there is still a lack of accumulated knowledge and concrete countermeasures as to what constitutes the inherent power and mobilizing mechanism that enables society at large (citizens, organizations and institutions) to voluntarily put the law into practice. In view of this, there is a need to further explore the mechanisms that generate a law-abiding society.

2.Core constituent dimensions and elements of a law-abiding society

There are many factors that shape or contribute to the choice of law-abiding action. For example, instrumentalist analyses are based on the basic assumption of rational human beings and emphasize the shaping of behavior by deterrence theory: people choose their action strategies based on cost-benefit calculations of whether to violate the law or not. Therefore, good institutional design or legal enforcement should make the benefits or incentives that people derive from violating the law smaller than the costs they have to pay. In other words, the fear of being punished becomes a source of motivation for compliance. The prevalence of "strong law enforcement" in various countries can be seen as a realization of this theory. Instrumental motivation, of course, also includes the motivation to comply with the law when people perceive greater benefits or incentives for doing so. In contrast, normative analyses emphasize that people's conceptions of justice and moral values, as well as the degree to which they identify with the legitimacy of the law, greatly influence their choices of action. Tom Tyler (Tom Tyler) pointed out that: "people have their own ideas about how they should behave. If they are based on their own conception of behavior and believe that compliance with the law is justified, they will consciously undertake the obligation to comply with the law. This normative loyalty to the law is based on people's sense of personal moral obligation, or on their identification with the legitimacy of legal authorities." The normative analysis was later expanded by sociologists and social psychologists, who discovered the importance of social norms in shaping behavior-people consciously or unconsciously prefer to do "what everyone else is doing" or "what everyone else thinks is right. "what everyone else is doing" or "what everyone else thinks is right". For example, a taxpayer's motivation to comply with the law is significantly higher when he believes that the vast majority of other people pay their taxes according to the law. People are significantly more motivated to act when they believe that they will gain better external recognition or respect for doing something. Conversely, people's motivation to act outside the law is strengthened when they believe that "the law is not for everyone". Other studies focusing on business organizations have found that compliance is not only a choice, but also a matter of the ability to act, such as the knowledge, information, and resources that the actor possesses and can mobilize.  Further studies have found that there are many factors within an organization that influence the state of compliance it exhibits as a whole, including the leader's motivation to be compliant, the internal structure, the hierarchy of power, the operation of personnel and management systems, and the cultural characteristics of the organization, among others.

Existing research and practice give many insightful elements. However, the law-abidingness of an individual, of a group, of an organization/institution is not exactly the same thing as the law-abidingness of a society. Building on the established results, it is necessary to continue to explore what is at the heart of a law-abiding society. There are many possible ways of thinking to answer this question, while the author believes that there are several key elements to distill the core elements of the generation and operation of a law-abiding society from the complex social phenomena, as follows: First, the construction of a law-abiding society is an integrated system, which closely links the law, the society and the individual. Therefore, it is necessary to study the law (how the law enters the society, and how it shapes the action and order in practice), the human being (how the human being encounters with the law, and how to make the choice of action), and the society (the principle and mechanism of the generation of the social order), and then to answer the question of what kind of method and mechanism can effectively make the majority of the society abide by the law. Secondly, we should see the composite and dynamic characteristics of law-abiding, and see that there is a close connection between rules, actions and concepts. Therefore, the core elements of the construction of a law-abiding society include both objective and subjective elements. Third, the generation and operation of a law-abiding society is a process and should have a process perspective. Therefore, law-abiding is not only the inculcation of ideas and concepts, but also includes the cultivation of abilities, the provision of conditions and the shaping of the environment. Fourth, the construction of a law-abiding society cannot lack the subjective perspective of the actors, so it is necessary to conduct a systematic examination around the subjective consciousness of the actors, the objective ability and the objective environment, to avoid the narrow judgment that may be brought about by the objectification of the object of law-abiding and the phenomenon of law-abiding. Fifth, existing research has touched upon issues related to law-abidingness for certain specific groups, specific behaviors, or in specific areas, but from the perspective of social construction, it is necessary to expand the exploration of law-abidingness from the localization of society to the study of general social patterns, and thus develop a general, holistic understanding of law-abiding societies.

Based on the above key points, this paper, based on theories, real-life observations and empirical research, and adhering to the "holistic" research approach, proposes that the basic core of a law-abiding society consists of three interconnected dimensions, and that these three core dimensions in turn consist of seven specific constituent elements (see Fig. 1):

The core of a law-abiding society:

law-abiding awareness

Recognition

moral obligation

law-abiding capacity

Knowledge

resources

law-abiding conditions and environment

Legal system

legal deterrence

socio-cultural psychology

First, law-abiding consciousness. Law-abiding consciousness is the subjective dimension of the construction of a law-abiding society, which is the psychological and cognitive generating mechanism for respecting and believing in the law, and the basic condition for the formation of law-abiding motives. Law-abiding consciousness contains two core elements: identity and moral obligation. Among them, the former points to the actor's internal recognition of "the law should be obeyed", and the latter points to the actor's sense of moral obligation, that is, "obey the law is the right thing to do".

Second, the ability to comply with the law. As mentioned earlier, the construction of a law-abiding society is a combination of subjective and objective systems. The subjective readiness to abide by the law does not necessarily lead to a state of law-abiding action, because the objective elements also shape and constrain the practice of law-abiding. The ability to comply with the law is one of the objective dimensions of the construction of a law-abiding society. Even after solving the problem of consciousness, the degree of law-abidingness is still limited by the degree of ability of the actors, and the element of ability is often not paid enough attention by the theoretical and practical circles. Whether as an individual or as an organization or institution, the key elements affecting the ability to comply with the law are reflected in two aspects: knowledge of the law, and the resources available to achieve compliance. It should be noted that some literature categorizes knowledge of the law as a subjective element, i.e., it falls under the category of legal awareness. However, this paper argues that although the two are closely related, from the perspective of functional mechanisms, legal awareness addresses the issue of psychological mechanisms, while the level of legal knowledge reflects the issue of ability mechanisms. Such a demarcation is more conducive to the exploration of operational and strategic ideas.

Third, the conditions and environment for compliance. If the law-abiding ability is an individual objective element, then the law-abiding conditions and environment emphasize the systematic objective element. In addition to social members [individuals, groups, organizations, institutions (including state organs)] with law-abiding awareness and certain law-abiding ability, the construction of law-abiding society can not be separated from the social system of the influence of many real conditions and elements. Such environmental factors include three core aspects: the legal system, legal deterrence, and social and cultural psychology.

As a whole, the combination of consciousness, ability and environmental conditions basically constructs a trinity of law-abiding social operation mechanism, and the correlation between the seven specific elements also constitutes a kind of composite interaction, for example, the sample of the legal system may affect the degree of identification with the law, and the ability of the actors to abide by the law also affects the actual effect of the legal deterrence. It is for this reason that the construction of a law-abiding society requires the holistic promotion of the trinity. Starting with certain elements first may have a pulling and driving effect. However, from the perspective of the long-term process of social construction, the three core dimensions cannot be separated or compromised.

3. The Path of Building a Law-abiding Society

3.1 Generation and maintenance of law-abiding consciousness

The relationship between duty, morality, faith and law-abiding consciousness is an ancient proposition. People read from Aristotle that "the universal observance of established laws" is an inherent meaning of the rule of law itself. Since then, the question of the "oughtness" of law-abiding has been developed in jurisprudence, philosophy of law and political philosophy. Of course, this theoretical inquiry itself has been subject to a variety of complex discussions, and no consensus has been reached. This paper argues that, in addition to recognizing its relevance to ethics, faith, and the spirit of the rule of law, it is also important to positively answer the question of how to make law-abidingness a moral foundation and an internal belief. In other words, it is important to discuss the concept, but the key is to be able to translate it into ideas for action. Instead of just arguing that "law-abiding should become ......", it is also necessary to address the reality of "how to become ......". The questions we need to explore are: How is law-abiding awareness generated in practice? What are the specific problems or obstacles faced? And how do they shape the way in which action is taken? As mentioned earlier, this paper argues that there are two key elements in the creation of a sense of lawfulness: identification with the law, and a sense of moral obligation to abide by it.

3.1.1Recognition of the law

"The authority of the law stems from the people's inner support and sincere belief." Some scholars have pointed out that, at a time when the law has been demystified, it has become difficult to find the power of faith in the law simply in the slogan "supremacy of the law." Then, where is the basis and power to internalize the law as the authority in the heart? This paper argues that faith comes from identification, the core of which is the identification of the value of legal legitimacy (legitimacy). Theoretically speaking, identity means the active acceptance in thought and feeling, so as to be internalized into a way of life and survival style. So, how can people produce ideological and emotional conviction and active acceptance of a rule system? Research has shown that it is either based on an abstract recognition of the legitimacy of the ruling authority, or it is based on their personal experience of dealing with the legal authorities, forming opinions and evaluations of the good and bad of legal services (both substantive and procedural), and then deciding whether or not they identify themselves with the legitimacy of the law and the authorities and whether or not they want to abide by the law.

From this point of view, in order to convince the public of the law, the law should first of all have a "human heart" orientation, i.e., the law has to solve the problem of how to have legitimacy and credibility, and how to make the general public have trust and full confidence in the law. If the generation of legal authority relies solely on authority, how can it resonate with the hearts of the people? If only the authority of the law is emphasized, then law-abiding becomes "I want to abide by the law" rather than "I want to abide by the law", which is a passive view of law-abiding. There are many examples in practice as to whether the law (governance) has the orientation of the people's heart. For example, why does China emphasize law-abiding government, cadres and party members? It is because it is one of the direct sources for the public to perceive the legitimacy of the law, and it is one of the sources of information that can form an identity. And once the government does not abide by the law, cadres and party members do not comply with the rules, will easily destroy the generation of legal identity. Similarly, the question of judicial credibility is in essence a question of how trust is formed between the use of adjudicative power and the public. To borrow what Francis Bacon once said, the serious damage caused by unjust adjudication lies not in the specific injustice, but in the fact that it corrupts the water supply. More intuitively, in the everyday practice of street law enforcement, people's interaction with law enforcement officials generates concrete impressions of the government and leads to a holistic evaluation of trust/distrust in the government. These practices are all about how people evaluate the legitimacy of law (governance) and generate beliefs from it. In short, the generation of identity is accompanied by a continuous process of confirmation and conviction of legitimacy in the practice of law. Therefore, it is not possible to simply attribute non-compliance with the law by the general public of society to weak legal concepts and awareness, lack of legal beliefs, etc. Instead, we need to ask: what kind of law (and its governance) is likely to convince people? And what factors are likely to undermine legal identity?

3.1.2 Sense of moral obligation to obey the law

The second psychological mechanism for respecting and obeying the law is the coincidence of the law's view of obligation with the individual's moral values. That is, the requirements of the law conform to a judgment of moral justification, thus convincing the actor that obeying the law is the (morally) right thing to do. At this point, law-abiding is no longer a legal mechanism at work, but rather moral self-consciousness. How, then, do legal obligations intersect with moral obligations? There is a view that there is no moral mechanism for universal respect for and observance of the law in the Chinese tradition because the Chinese tradition does not have a modern concept of the state, but rather promotes the unity of the family, the state, and the heavens, so naturally there is no need for rules. This understanding is questionable. China has not lacked respect for rules since ancient times. For example, Fei Xiaotong points out that vernacular China is a set of ritualized order constructions, and the notion of abiding by "rituals" (as a system of rules) is a universal moral constraint. Therefore, the problem we need to face today is not that there was no rule system before, but that it has become a set of modern rule of law rule system how to form a universal moral psychological mechanism in the current practice. Of course, the formation of moral values is a process of indoctrination. This paper here only based on the practice has arisen in the problem, do a throwback type of discussion.

First of all, the indoctrination of law should have the dimension of life. Moral judgments about what is right and wrong and what should/shouldn't be done come from the interaction of interpersonal interactions in daily practice. As scholars have pointed out, obeying the law is a purposive need in people's lives. If it has nothing to do with one's life purpose and value significance, how can it resonate ethically and morally? Therefore, the life dimension of legal indoctrination is to resolve the possible conflict between the abstract and the concrete. For example, in a study on legal awareness, the author found that some people answered in the affirmative that "the law should be obeyed", but at the same time they were committing illegal acts; however, they did not think that there was a conflict between the two conceptually because they honestly believed that their behavior was a kind of daily practice, and was not related to the legal sense of right and wrong. correlation. In other words, the law as an abstract cognitive existence, people do not automatically connect it effectively with their life world.

Secondly, the indoctrination of law also needs a popularization dimension. Some scholars have systematically evaluated the thirty years (1986-2016) of popularization of the law in China, pointing out that popularization of the law has demonstrated a variety of dichotomies between knowledge and facts: those who represent the elite values of popularization of the law are often cognitively estranged from the audience who represents the values of the people, and there is a lack of communication between those who represent the popularization of the law and the audience; the officials are too preoccupied with the expectations of those who represent the popularization of the law while ignoring the expectations of the audience, and those who represent the popularization of the law are not only insufficiently caring for the audience's needs, but also inadequate in explaining the spirit of the rule of law. The official focuses too much on the expectations of the popularization of the law and ignores the expectations of the audience, the popularization of the law is not enough to take care of the needs of the audience, and the spirit of the rule of law is not enough to explain, which leads to the reduction of the popularization of the law. From this point of view, the indoctrination of the law needs to find an effective mechanism that can unite and form a general consensus among the general public.

Of course, cultivating a sense of moral obligation to respect and abide by the law is quite challenging nowadays. As scholars have pointed out, in today's society, the increase in personal selectivity and the decline in the binding rules of moral judgment co-exist, which is especially obvious in the field of private life and economic order. This puts higher demands on legal education: on the one hand, the legal authorities need to pay attention to people's specific views and reactions to justice, right and wrong, and rights and obligations, so as not to put forward unrealistic or unreasonable legal obligations; on the other hand, in the specific legal practice, we must continue to guide, adjust, and shape ethical and moral concepts in line with the requirements of the times. This is precisely where the dialectical principle of "embodying moral concepts with the rule of law, and nourishing the spirit of the rule of law with morality" lies.

In general, the generation and maintenance of law-abiding consciousness is a subjective cognitive and emotional construction, may be based on the recognition of the law itself, or the formation of moral consciousness. This is a complex process. This paper points out several important ideas that need to be paid attention to in this process, that is, the governance of the law should have the orientation of the human heart, while the indoctrination of the law should pay attention to the orientation of life and the orientation of the public. In addition, it is also important to note that what is important for the understanding and discussion of law-abiding consciousness is the development of a realistic correlation between theory and practice.

3.2 The shaping and development of law-abiding competence

In contrast to the awareness of compliance, the capacity for compliance is an objective limitation on the subject of action. Broadly speaking, this capacity consists of two aspects: knowledge as well as resources.

3.2.1 Knowledge

Knowledge in this context refers to the level of awareness and receptivity to legal rules (and their deterrents). This ability needs to be defined broadly to include: the ability to be aware of the existence of the rules, the ability to have an understanding of the requirements and implications of the rules, and the ability to cognitively relate the rules to one's actions. The availability of relevant legal knowledge does not actually determine people's choice of action entirely, but it influences the extent to which action conforms to or deviates from the expectations of the law. The ways and means of acquiring legal knowledge can be many, if not exhaustive, but we can notably see the key factors that contribute to uneven or inadequate access to knowledge:

One is the level of education. While it is not the case that higher levels of education increase legal knowledge, the level of education influences people's ability to learn. This influence includes the speed with which legal rules (as new knowledge) are recognized, the degree to which the connotations of the rules are understood and grasped, and so on. In particular, the ability to learn also includes the ability to think abstractly and logically, as well as the ability to translate abstract knowledge into concrete perceptions, which show significant differences among groups with different levels of education.

Second, the channel of information. Even among groups with comparable levels of education, there are differences in the channels through which they discover and acquire legal information. For example, in areas where information technology is highly developed, people are able to freely find legal information through the Internet and telephone consultation, and are able to gain anecdotal experience with the help of a large number of media, but in some areas or among certain groups of people, the digital lifestyle is still an unattained goal. Also, in areas with developed urban functions, people can conveniently access legal information with the help of services provided by various institutions and organizations, but in areas with less developed urban functions, such public services are very limited. In sum, differences in access to information have the potential to create a gap in the legal cognitive capacity of different groups.

Thirdly, the extent to which legal language and texts are translated and transformed. People's life-worlds are sustained by a great deal of oral expression (especially dialects) and direct interaction. This is at variance with the official language system itself. Therefore, the text of the law and its application (especially adjudication) requires a process of translation and transformation that enables a connection to the life-world. Accordingly, the extent of this translation and transformation directly affects the actors' perception of the law. Especially if translation and transformation also require a connection to a specific culture, the acceptance of legal knowledge becomes more challenging compared to the general population.

Finally, there is the challenge posed by the complexity of the law itself. For example, one study of polluting firms found that the requirements of environmental regulation are a complex system that creates difficulties for firms (as the regulated) in at least four ways: there are too many environmental regulations, the rules are difficult to understand, the rules change from time to time, and they are not easy to find. In modern state regulation, there are many other complex and specialised rule systems like this, such as securities, banking, insurance, patents, tax laws, etc. Even for those educated in law, it seems difficult to grasp such legal knowledge without knowledge of other related subjects or practical experience. Therefore, the complexity of the law itself often leads to the existence of a huge cost and gap in legal knowledge for actors.

It can be seen that "knowledge of the law" itself is a competence element, which has multiple requirements and is subject to the influence of various factors. Therefore, legal education that is merely satisfied with making the general public "aware of the existence of legal rules" is flawed and insufficient. The dissemination of legal knowledge needs to take into account the differences that may exist among the recipients (i.e. actors) in terms of education, access to information, cultural and intellectual backgrounds, etc., as well as whether the legal system itself creates unexpected barriers to the acquisition of legal knowledge. Similarly, when we want to make legal or social evaluations of specific behaviours of actors, we also need to be aware of the possibility that there may be a capacity gap in the acquisition of knowledge of the actors, which is not simply attributable to the shallowness of legal knowledge.

3.2.2. Resources

In addition to the level of cognition, the choice of action for compliance is also conditioned by the capacity of the actors to enforce the rules. This capacity is largely determined by the resources and opportunities available to the actors, and this is particularly true in the case of organisational compliance. The resources required for compliance include the necessary funds, personnel and even technology. For example, when restaurants are required by law to have fume detection equipment for pollution prevention purposes, the ability to invest in technical equipment is required. As another example, an increasing number of regulatory laws require organisations to have professional compliance managers or even dedicated compliance management departments. In addition, an organisation's compliance management also includes the necessary training of internal staff, as well as the ability to monitor and regulate their behaviour as necessary. All of this requires the ability to commit resources. It is for this reason that differences in compliance capabilities are revealed between firms of different organisational sizes. For example, studies of developing countries have shown that a large number of small or informal enterprises are of great significance to the local economy, but because of their small size, such enterprises are very weak in their ability to monitor their own pollution or to combat it, and strict enforcement of the law's standards implies a huge investment, which may even lead to the bankruptcy of these enterprises. Thus, resource-poor organisations are more likely to be in breach of the law. In other words, it is more difficult for resource-poor organisations to comply with the law, which is why they are more likely to develop the “what-the-hell” logic. Of course, criminological research has shown that capacity is a double-edged sword: high levels of competence and resources may also provide a countervailing incentive for speculative "non-compliance", as in the case of white-collar crime, and large organisations, particularly mega-organisations with dominant positions in industry, may be more likely to use their resources and power to conceal infractions or to avoid enforcement.

In short, capacity is a key dimension in building legal compliance. Taking for granted that "once a law is made, it should be obeyed" without regard to the obstacles that actors may have in recognising and implementing the rules of the law may end up being a cover-up. Accordingly, it is necessary to build capacity to comply with the law, or to provide an environment in which actors can be empowered to do so. For one thing, legislation or law enforcement should be wary of unrealistic or overly demanding requirements that create unnecessary capacity gaps, or even accidental "law-abiding incompetents"; for another, it is necessary to focus on the enhancement of compliance capacity - in addition to punishment, education, and differentiated support and empowerment strategies should be important dimensions of the building process. For example, since the "5th five-year plan on improving legal awareness" , the launching of the "Law into Organs, Villages, Communities, Schools, Enterprises, and Units" is to differentiate between different audiences, and different needs and abilities, and to provide different legal education accordingly. This is, of course, far from enough, and a more diversified, differentiated and targeted mechanism for enhancing law-abiding abilities needs to be further explored.

3.3 Generation and reinforcement of compliance conditions and environment

If the two dimensions of law-abiding awareness and law-abiding ability address the actors themselves, the third dimension of law-abiding construction focuses on the external shaping mechanisms. In the author's view, there are three key functional mechanisms in the social system that constitute the macro environment and conditions for law-abiding. They are: the guiding mechanism of the legal system, the deterrent mechanism through law enforcement (law enforcement, judicature), and the shaping mechanism of the social environment. The first two mechanisms can be seen as national influence, while the third exerts social influence.

3.3.1 Guiding mechanism of the legal rule system

As some scholars have pointed out, the institutional prerequisite for universal compliance is good law. There is no shortage of discussion about good law, but this paper focuses on what kind of rule system is more likely to influence compliance. Robert B. Seidman &Ann Seidman have argued that if legislators want the rules they make to be successful in influencing the behaviour of the regulated, then good legislation should have some understanding of their behaviour; similarly, Robert A. Kagan and John T. Scholz also pointed out that successful enforcement should consider the reasons why the relevant statute would lead to compliance or violation. From the present point of view, China's legal structure has been in the process of improving day by day, but along with it, the strangeness of the law has become an essential feature. Some scholars have reviewed China's legislation over the past thirty years (1979-2009) and concluded that the over-reliance on specialisation in legislation has deprived the public of the basic right to speak in legislation, making them "legislated", and then faced with the monopoly of professionalism in the application of the law, which has made the public passively "legally blind" in an intangible way. If people cannot know the law, how can they abide by it? In view of this, the rule system of the law should be able to prompt the actors to know, accept and act in practice in order to comply with the expectations of the law. The fulfilment of this guiding function requires the law to have some basic characteristics:

First, the "visibility" of the system of rules. "Visibility" emphasizes, first of all, that legal provisions are clear, understandable and free from ambiguity or contradiction. At the same time, "visibility" also means that the connotation of the legal rules with a certain way to intersect with real life, the legal objectives behind it can also be perceived and understood, otherwise it becomes an abstract, controlling, condescending existence. Second, the "feasibility" of the law itself. The connotation of "feasibility" lies in the fact that the requirements of legal rules are acceptable, concretely enforceable, and concretely applicable to the objects of legal regulation and the institutions responsible for implementing the law. If the goals of the law are set too high or the requirements are unrealistic, it will first affect the degree of acceptance and recognition of the rules by the actors (including law enforcers). At the same time, the actors know that they can not meet the requirements or feel that there is no way to start, can only be used in the actual combat adaptive coping strategies, such as circumventing the law, law enforcement officers discount and other situations. What's more, the low feasibility of the rules themselves may create thoroughly incompetent law-abiding and incompetent law-enforcers. In short, feasibility determines the cost of law enforcement, acceptance and compliance. Third, the efficiency of the law itself. Some scholars have suggested from the perspective of economics that the legal product provided by the state should itself be economical, so that the public will perceive law-abiding as an economical and efficient choice, so that universal compliance can be realized. Putting aside the economic analysis, we also need to consider this: legal provisions must not create additional costs of living for no reason, such as inefficient legal procedures and cumbersome paperwork administration requirements. The general public, businesses and organizations that cannot afford the costs of time and effort risk losing their trust in and acceptance of the authority of the law in concrete legal practice.

It is true that we have developed a range of indicators to evaluate the scientific nature of legislation and have set up various procedures to ensure that it is democratic. But perhaps there is another important measure that has been overlooked, namely, whether the rules of law actually make their way into the world of life of the actors, and whether they actually play a role in shaping behaviors in line with expectations. Whether the legal system itself has such a function or quality determines whether society at large recognizes the legitimacy of such rules. The lack of legitimacy can lead to a weakening of the incentive to respect and abide by the law, and in serious cases, to various kinds of resistance from people in their lives. Legislation needs to face the complexity of social life, which makes it quite challenging. But even so, legislators should dare to face and respond to the challenge of this complexity, not based on an ideal legislative model, on a theoretical or academic legislative path. Avoiding this complexity may turn into legislating for the sake of legislating. And a failed legislation that still demands compliance from the public is in itself a paradox.

3.3.2 Legal deterrence mechanisms through law enforcement (law enforcement, justice)

Although it has been pointed out that the state cannot be relied on to lead the way in creating a sense of compliance, it still needs to play its specific role in creating an institutional environment conducive to compliance. If the law is implemented in a way that does not effectively release deterrence, the legal system may be rendered ineffective. Once deterrence is weak or ineffective, the generalized damage to the public psychology of the society at large may be irreparable in the short term. Legal deterrence through the implementation of the law (law enforcement, justice) has two dimensions.

The first level is the deterrent effect that should be directed at the violator and the violation. If the provisions of the law establish the cost of compliance, the actual effect of law enforcement or justice determines the cost of non-compliance. As far as law enforcement is concerned, poor, ineffective or flexible law enforcement often leads to the daily practice of non-compliance with the law. Correspondingly, reforming law enforcement and improving the quality of law enforcement have become key requirements of the Party and the State. The key to reforming law enforcement does not lie in simply increasing the number of law enforcement actions, or even in strengthening the strength of penalties or the formalized elements of strict enforcement. The core mechanism of law enforcement should be the deterrent power constructed and spread through law enforcement activities. Such deterrence has both objective and subjective dimensions: the objective deterrent is to make actors bear the cost of their violations and to make changes in their actions. This requires that law enforcement agencies have the capacity to monitor the existence of violations and that enforcement actions have a defined strike force and a reasonable degree of punishment.Weak monitoring capacity of law enforcement agencies, enforcement inspections with randomness, overly casual or elastic responses after detecting violations, and mismatch between the strength of the penalty and the extent of the violation are some of the reasons why law enforcement loses its objective deterrent effect. Subjective deterrence is another key. Subjective deterrence is another key. Under the premise of limited law enforcement resources, the sense of awe of legal deterrence formed and held by either the violator, the violator who has not yet been detected, or the people who have not violated the law, can really have a sustained impact. This requires that limited enforcement (as a demonstration case) can release enough deterrent signals to make the target cognitively sensitive enough to make reasonable choices of action. In addition, deterrence through judicial activity is also important. The function of the judiciary is not only to settle disputes in specific cases, but also to provide people with guidelines on the right actions to take through adjudication. In both private and public law, if the process of adjudication and the outcome of adjudication do not have a deterrent mechanism, it is difficult to have a real impact on the public. In this sense, there are many misinterpretations of the meaning of "justice for the people", such as the idea that judicial activity is to be guided by public opinion. This perception has led many people to subconsciously believe that the rules of adjudication can be negotiated, and as a result, there have been a lot of unexpected interferences in judicial trials, such as deliberate guidance of public opinion by the media, lawyers, and the clients, and so on. In terms of building a healthy and law-abiding society, judicial activities should guide the public's perception of right and wrong, justice, good and bad by utilizing its proper deterrent mechanism.

There is a second mechanism of deterrence resulting from the enforcement of the law, namely, the creation or adjustment of trust in compliance through deterrence. Imagine a person who has no incentive to break the law, but who feels that compliance becomes a loss (in terms of potential benefits) if he sees that others benefit greatly from breaking the law, or who feels that compliance is a high-cost activity if he sees that the costs of breaking the law are low. In other words, people may be passively involved in a cost-benefit calculation because of the effect of legal deterrence on others. Thus, legal deterrence should not only be directed at the violators themselves, but should also be able to help people develop the certainty that violating the law will inevitably be costly and expensive, and that being law-abiding is worthwhile. Even putting aside the rational economic man idea, in a general sense, the use of legal deterrence in practice affects the generation of public trust in the law. As some scholars have pointed out, if what should be protected according to the law is not protected and what should be punished is not punished, then people will think that the law is not trustworthy, and naturally they will not trust it and abide by it. As some scholars have emphasized, law-abiding is the unfolding of a cooperative social relationship, and law-abiding comes from the expectation of one subject of the legal relationship that the other will obey the law, and if this expectation is undermined, then the foundation of law-abiding will be undermined, and a crisis of trust in law-abiding may occur. Therefore, there is a dialectical relationship between law-abiding construction and legal coercion: on the one hand, the construction of a law-abiding society cannot be dominated by top-down coercion and deterrence, so that the audience becomes a passive party that complies with and obeys; but on the other hand, if the implementation of the law itself loses its due deterrent effect, the construction of a law-abiding society loses its key institutional foundation.

3.3.3 Mechanisms for shaping the social environment

The social environment is an overarching concept, and the environmental factors that play a significant role in compliance are two: social structure and ecology, and socio-cultural psychology.

The influence of social structure and ecology on compliance centers on three forces: the economic, political, and social environments. The influence of the economic environment is particularly significant. In practice, we see that it is very difficult to regulate dominant firms and that powerful firms can easily "capture" the government. Economic power can also intrude into social life, for example, in pollution control, where the livelihoods of local people are closely linked to polluting firms, and a high degree of social responsiveness can lead to increased lawlessness. Of course, the political environment can also significantly influence compliance. For example, in the areas of environmental and resource protection, food safety, and production safety, the fact that law enforcement has been significantly strengthened and has created a significant deterrent effect in society is closely related to the central government's firm determination and strong policy incentives. The social environment is also a productive shaping mechanism. For example, well-organized groups (trade unions, industry organizations, public interest organizations, organizations defending rights, etc.) are often able to exert pressure on violators directly, or indirectly through enforcement agencies. Stakeholder groups (victims, communities, etc.) can also be powerful monitors of violations and of enforcement. Of course, if the social environment holds a high level of tolerance for certain types of violations, then this can pose a challenge to governing violations. Overall, the coexistence of economic, political, and social forces shapes the social ecology of law-abiding practices. A social ecology conducive to law-abiding practices should maintain a reasonable dynamic balance and comprehensive effect among economic, political and social forces. The significant expansion and excessive influence of any one of these forces may lead to an imbalance in the social ecology, thus affecting the ecology of law-abiding practices.

In addition to social structure and ecology, sociocultural psychology is another key mechanism. It can be both a support system for action and a pressure mechanism for behavior. For example, one study analyzed the traditional Chinese view of law-abiding and concluded that "face" based on relationships and favors, and "retribution" based on practical rationality in life constitute the cultural-psychological mechanism for law-abiding members of society. Another example is that in many regulatory fields, a large number of minor violations are constantly ignored, accepted and repeated in daily practice, and eventually become normalized. In the process, the violation has developed and evolved from an isolated, external, objective action to a systematic, internalized socio-cultural psychology, and thus becomes hard to break and hard to change. This is an example of the opposite - the socio-cultural psychology becomes a support system for the normalization of violation. It is for this reason that it is important to construct a social and cultural psychology of positive law-abiding behavior. This is also the rationale behind the State's proposal to "form a social atmosphere in which law-abiding is honorable and law-breaking is shameful."

Of course, the formation of a particular social and cultural psychology requires a corresponding cultural soil and production environment, a time-consuming process, as well as a process of constant change and innovation. At present, it is necessary for us to explore what is the social and cultural psychological mechanism conducive to the generation of law-abiding, and how to develop the appropriate cultural psychological mechanism. For example, some studies claim that the realization of positive law-abiding is linked to the awakening and deepening of citizens' sense of public responsibility. Specifically, the topic of law-abiding or law-breaking should be placed in the context of publicity, so that people realize that law-breaking is not only an individualized choice, but also an act that has a public impact on society. And law-abiding should also be recognized by the public. For example, the State is promoting the "strengthening of social integrity, improving the credit records of citizens and organizations that abide by the law, and perfecting the mechanism for praising and rewarding law-abiding and honesty and the mechanism for punishing illegal and dishonest behavior", which is both an institutional and a socio-cultural psychological mechanism. In short, the construction of a law-abiding society cannot ignore the co-construction dimension of law and society and culture. We need to form a positive affirmation and incentive for law-abiding and a negative evaluation and moral pressure mechanism for law-breaking at the group cultural psychological level.

4.Direction of future endeavor

The report of the 19th CPC National Congress points out the need to "deepen the practice of ruling the country in accordance with the law" and to promote the realization of "universal compliance with the law", and also reaffirms the need to "build a State governed by the rule of law, a government governed by the rule of law and a society governed by the rule of law as a whole". In this regard, we should note that there is an intrinsic relationship between "universal law-abidingness" and the construction of the "trinity". The construction of a law-abiding society is directed towards three subjects: individuals, groups and organizations, as well as the three levels of society, the government and the state; therefore, the research in this paper is, to a large extent, a response to this intrinsic relationship, and a preliminary attempt to systematically develop the theory and practice of the construction of a law-abiding society.

This paper firstly clearly puts forward that the connotation of law-abiding is a logic of social action. Therefore, the construction of a law-abiding society needs to be promoted from the three dimensions of law-abiding awareness, law-abiding ability, and law-abiding conditions and environment, with the help of seven key elements. Of course, viewed separately, the three dimensions and seven elements are a static analytical framework, and for practice, it is necessary to see the correlation and systemic nature of these dimensions and elements. How to use this framework to organically integrate the detailed elements that may influence and shape the law-abiding society, and to discover and interpret the connections and interactions among the elements from the level of the operation of the social system, so as to obtain a holistic grasp of the operation mechanism of the law-abiding society, this is precisely the aspect that needs to be worked on in the future. It should also be noted that the proposal of the three dimensions and seven elements is a practice-oriented theoretical generalization and exploration, and the system itself is not exclusive. On the contrary, the understanding of a law-abiding society should always be open to cognition and exploration. Whether it is the ideas proposed in this paper or various possible future programs, overall, the construction of a law-abiding society requires continuous and in-depth exploration from both the theoretical and practical levels.

First, the development of a more effective law-abiding epistemology and law-abiding research. Research on compliance has become more urgent than ever before because contemporary national governance places higher demands on the construction of a law-abiding society. From the perspective of international research, multidisciplinary studies from jurisprudence to political science, sociology, management, psychology, and behavioral sciences have provided diversified perspectives and theories, especially the empirical analysis of evidence has given many valuable cases and inspirations. However, foreign studies, especially those on law-abiding in developed economies such as Europe and the United States, are based on Western rule of law traditions, governance models and specific social structures, so many of the assumptions and conclusions of these studies cannot be directly copied to explain the practical problems of building a law-abiding society in China. As far as the existing domestic research is concerned, many key elements or links that influence and shape law abiding have been involved, such as the ethics of law abiding, legal deterrence, social and individual differences in law abiding, motivation for law abiding and compliance management of business organizations, and the social and cultural soil of law abiding, and so on. However, in the field of legal studies, the research on law-abiding issues is still very limited compared to the large number of discussions on legislation, justice and law enforcement issues. To some extent, law compliance has not yet been treated as an issue area requiring specialized research (it is often regarded as a social phenomenon or legal consequence, leading to other discussions of legislation, law enforcement, regulation, etc.), and a relatively systematic theoretical system or line of research has yet to be developed.

This paper argues that there is a need to develop a new understanding of "law-abiding" and to systematically develop jurisprudential theories about law-abiding and law-abiding social construction. Such a theoretical exploration will help to advance a new understanding of the mechanisms of the rule of law state and rule of law society, and at the same time help to expand theories about law and social construction. Figuring out "how to realize law-abidingness" should become a core issue in legal and social science research. The key to the understanding and study of law-abiding is to combine and analyze consciousness-ability-environmental conditions, and to examine law-society-individual, rule-action-concept, legislation-legal implementation-legal consequences in connection with one another, integrating macro-middle-micro perspectives. At the same time, the study of law-abiding should be directed to practice, otherwise the theoretical discussion itself will not be able to form a consensus. The implementation of law is a vast scope, need to respect common sense and the logic of life, the study should go back to the social situation, in order to truly grasp the actual challenges facing the practice of the rule of law. If we uphold such a pattern, vision and ideas to explore, then law-abiding research may also be one of the innovative paths of legal research in the new era.

Second, the development of effective law-abiding practices. The three dimensions and seven elements of law-abiding construction proposed in this paper are both an analytical perspective and a practical idea. The seven elements are in fact seven key connecting points, and what extends from them are countless points and details (including traps and misunderstandings) in practice. In short, the core of law-abiding construction lies in shaping behavior and social order in line with legal expectations, and thus aims to maximize social vitality. The discussion in this paper is just the beginning; the practice of law-abiding includes, but is not limited to, the following aspects: first, the institutional environment of a law-abiding society. Some scholars have pointed out that "for the state to allow people to derive benefits from obeying the law, it is necessary for people as a whole to be satisfied with the state as it is." The construction of a law-abiding society is weak without the supply and effective operation of the state's formal institutions. The supply of such institutions involves legislation, efficient legal procedures, application of the law, the effectiveness ( benefits) of the rule of law, and the overall legitimacy of the law as constructed by the above factors. Second, social mobilization mechanisms for compliance. The building of compliance requires that maximum energy be drawn from society itself, and this requires extensive mobilization mechanisms for compliance. For example, innovative rule of law education mechanisms can take into account the perspective of subjectivity, examining how the dissemination of knowledge can be effective, and how to obtain the correct values behind the knowledge, and how to stimulate public acceptance. Another example is the combination of incentive and disciplinary mechanisms to enhance the general motivation for active compliance. The mobilization mechanism of law-abiding also includes how to expand and improve the participation of the main body of action, for example, how the pluralistic normative forces in the society may become the social force and pressure source of general law-abiding, and how the public participates in and voices out legislation and decision-making, and supervises and gives feedbacks to the law enforcement, and so on. Thirdly, the cultural soil for law-abiding is cultivated. The sense of moral obligation to be law-abiding and the universal psychological mechanism of respecting and abiding by the law require a process of indoctrination. The meaning behind actions is constructed and sustained by culture. Therefore, the construction of a law-abiding society also needs to cultivate the corresponding cultural soil. Fourth, the subjectivity, autonomy and mobility of actors in law-abiding practice. The establishment of subjectivity in law-abiding practice is in line with the socialist rule of law and the national nature of people's democracy, as well as with the norms of behavioral science. Whether it is the study of law-abiding or the practice of law-abiding, if the perspective of subjectivity is missing, there will inevitably be deviation or failure.

Thirdly, we need to recognize that the high degree of complexity of the social system itself, the diversity of interests pursued by social agents, and the processual nature of law-abiding awareness, capacity and environmental elements themselves determine that the construction of a law-abiding society is not an immediate achievement. It is a long-term undertaking that has already begun and is under way, and it requires a wise mind, long-term goals and down-to-earth actions.