| China has developed a set of objective formal systems consisting of evidence, proof concepts and methods in criminal procedure, which can be called the “objectivist” approach, based on objective evidence, objective facts, objectified methods and objectified standards. This approach presents such typical patterns in criminal justice practice as relying on objective evidence to decide cases, making decisions only with verification, deciding cases by legally prescribed evidence, and pursuing judgments that are based on irrefutable evidence. The “objectivist” approach confuses evidence, facts and objective existence, deviates from the law of litigation cognition, ignores the process of fact inference and departs the substantive trail, thus is unable to realize the progress and innovation of the theories and methods of proof in China’s criminal justice. Judicial proof, which is based on epistemology rather than ontology, should have such contents as proof structure, evidence interpretation, contrast judgment and belief requirements, and the conclusions drawn from it are characterized by probability and fallibility. According to the method by which human beings make decisions and judge things through experience, reasoning, observation, intuition and other informal knowledge under the condition of incomplete information, the methodological system that can reveal and reflect the required characteristics of judicial proof can be called the “heuristic” approach. With this approach, China should create a new pattern of criminal judicial proof in which multiple proof methods are developed in parallel, the probability and fallibility are recognized, and the substantive trial and rigorous inference process are emphasized. |
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