Tang Prize | Week

Date:

2014/9/18 (Thurs) 2:30 PM – 4:00 PM

Venue:

Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall

Description:

The Tang Prize will be an influential guide to the fields important to the 21st Century—Sustainable Development, Biopharmaceutical Science, Sinology, and Rule of Law. Through the contributions and vision of the prize winners, the Foundation hopes to support and guide research and the education of our youth. Qualities specific to Eastern culture—oneness, integration, and broad vision—and those cherished by the West—analysis and classification—come together to contribute to the sustainable development of the human race. Prize recipients will also contribute to bringing Taiwan into the international spotlight through media coverage and academic exchange and discussion. With its influence in technology, education, and culture, the Tang Prize is set to become a most significant event in the Asian world.

Time	Item	Details
1340~1430	Entrance/Seating
1429	Announcement
1430~1440	Guest Seating
1440~1443	Opening of Ceremony	Overture of the Tang Prize (played by the Evergreen Symphony Orchestra)
1443~1445	Address from Host
1445~1451	Address from Foundation	Tang Prize Foundation CEO Dr. Jenn-Chuan Chern
1451~1456	Address from Academia Sinica	Academia Sinica President Dr. Wong Chi-Huey
1456~1509	Awarding of Prize in Sustainable Development
1509~1522	Awarding of Prize in Biopharmaceutical Science
1522~1527	Brief Musical Interlude	Beethoven: Symphony No. 6 Mov. 5 (Pastoral) (played by the Evergreen Symphony Orchestra)
1527~1540	Awarding of Prize in Sinology
1540~1553	Awarding of Prize in Rule of Law
1553~1603	Ending Musical Performance	Bach: “Little” Fugue in G minor BWV 578 (arr. for strings) Mahler: Das Lied von der Erde (The Song of the Earth) Mov. 3 von der jugend (of youth) (played by the Evergreen Symphony Orchestra)
1603~1605	End of Award Ceremony
1605~1620	Photos

Gro Harlem Brundtland in Sustainable Development

I am deeply honored by having been selected for the first prize given in Sustainable Development through this impressive and innovative initiative. I certainly share the views expressed by the honorable Dr Samuel Yin, when he announced these new, prestigious Tang Prizes, that the world is a very different place today, than more than a hundred years ago, when Alfred Nobel established his foundation and Prizes. It is indeed true that we now need to reflect the new challenges faced by humanity- climate change, energy shortages, emerging diseases, clashes of cultures and ideas, and shifting world orders. I am very happy to be here with my fellow awardees at this great Ceremony this evening.
As I notice I am the only one in a dress, not a tuxedo, I appreciate the fact that there is one woman here on this occasion. I hope it is a sign that there will be more to come in the future, so that this new Century can fully realize that we all have the same potential, women as well as men.
This new prestigious Prize has started its legacy by marking this trend, as compared with more than a hundred years ago, in Stockholm and Oslo, when only men were seen as potential candidates for this kind of recognition.
I am humble and grateful to have had the opportunity to serve in different capacities and positions during my 75 year long life, and to have been part of the process of innovation, leadership and implementation of Sustainable development that the Jury refers to.
Yes, I believe we were able to lay out “the scientific and technical challenges for the global community to achieve a better balance of economic development, environmental integrity and social equality for the benefit of all humanity.”
I have always been convinced, as a doctor and a scientist, that we need to base our decisions upon facts and evidence.
There is indeed no alternative, common language to build on, across a multicultural and multifaceted world.
However, even such essential and shared knowledge, although so critical, is not in itself sufficient to secure essential and effective action.
This we have been able to observe over the last more than a quarter Century, since the realities of dangerous climate change became obvious. Our ability to chart urgent and necessary change has been desperately lacking.
As nation states, we are not able, so far, to be wise enough and farsighted enough to do what is needed.
The complexity of the issues, as illustrated by the challenge of climate change, has limited the ability and effectiveness of humanity to act in its own self-interest.
The very idea that we who inhabit this Planet today, must be responsible, not only for present, but also for all future generations, was a new one facing the generation I belong to.
My grandchildren have now had this knowledge since their early school years.
It gives some hope that the younger generations will be able to take more effective action, as the footprints of our time are no longer deleted as we move on, but are adding up and continuously pushing and even overstepping the limits of nature.
As scientists, across the world, as citizens of a global community, as decision makers, politicians and entrepreneurs, we must now rise to the challenge, seek the common good, irrespective of where we happen to live on our one Planet.
As I have looked at the lives and backgrounds of my fellow awardees tonight, they all illustrate how we must work together to move towards a better, more just and more secure future.
Overcoming Apartheid, promoting human rights and justice in South Africa and globally, preventing and curing emerging diseases,

focusing on overcoming clashes of cultures and ideas, they are all ideas and examples of challenges that also I have spent parts of my life trying to deal with.
I feel humbled and grateful to be part of these wider efforts for the future of humanity on a fair, safe and secure Planet.
Thank You.

James P. Allison in Biopharmaceutical Science (joint recipient)

I am truly honored and humbled to be a laureate of the first Tang Prize, sharing in the Prize for Biopharmaceutical Science, and I thank the jury for considering me to be worthy of this honor. I am pleased to accept this prize on behalf of not only myself, but for those scientists who have labored for decades to achieve the goal of mobilizing the immune system to treat cancer.
In my view the chief among these was Lloyd Old, who provided the early demonstration in animal models that there were tumor specific transplantation antigen, and who along with others, showed that there were antigens on human tumors that could be recognized by the immune system. There were countless attempts to develop therapeutic vaccines to turn the immune system “on” to attack cancer, but these failed to provide reproducible clinical benefit. The solution to this hurdle came from basic science. Many scientists contributed to the realization that regulation of T cell activation was complex, and involved more signals than simply targeting the T cell antigen receptor to turn “on” an immune response. The first hint came from Marc Jenkins and Ron Schwartz that additional costimulatory signals were required. The second was the independent findings by Jeffrey Bluestone and myself that another molecule CTLA-4, opposed the costimulatory signals and could slow and even turn “off” T cell responses.
This led me to propose, and support with preclinical studies in mice, that blockade of the inhibitory signals of CTLA-4 could unleash the immune system to attack cancer, curing it in a variety tumor models. The idea that one can treat cancer not by targeting the cancer cells or by trying to turn the immune system “on”, but rather by blocking molecules that act to turn the immune system “off”, has now been confirmed in multiple human cancers, including melanoma as well as prostate, kidney, bladder, ovarian, lung, and other cancer types. A recent study of melanoma patients treated with anti-CTLA-4 showed that about 20% were alive for greater than10 years after treatment. Antibody blockade of CTLA-4 opened a new field of cancer treatment termed immune checkpoint therapy.
The work of Dr. Honjo, with whom I have the honor to share the Tang Prize, and other scientists, has shown that the molecule PD-1 defines another, distinct immune checkpoint that is functionally non-overlapping and can also be targeted to unleash the immune system to attack cancer. Recent clinical studies have shown that simultaneous targeting of both CTLA-4 and PD-1 immune checkpoints can be synergistic. Taken together, the success of targeting CTLA-4 and PD-1 has shown that immunotherapy of cancer can be effective, and makes it a real possibility that we are entering an age where we can think of actually curing many types of cancer.

Finally, I would like to thank the many students who have worked with me over the years, the patients who have participated in the clinical trials to evaluate anti-CTLA-4 and, my wonderful partner in life and science, Dr. Padmanee Sharma.

Tasuku Honjo in Biopharmaceutical Science (joint recipient)

Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, I am deeply grateful, honored and humbled to be a recipient of the first Tang Prize in Biopharmaceutical Science. I would like to thank the Tang Prize Foundation and the referees who have chosen me for such an extraordinary prize. It is to my great satisfaction that our discovery of PD-1 antibody cancer therapy has been proven to be effective for many cancer patients, and its recognition by the Tang Prize adds inexpressible value for me.
My path to a successful cancer immunotherapy with the PD-1 antibody has been guided by a series of fortunate incidents, and by a simple-minded idea. In 1992, we discovered PD-1 while searching for a protein related to programed cell death, which is the origin of the molecule’s name. It took 7 years for us to discover that PD-1 is the brake—or more technically, the negative regulatory receptor—of the immune reaction. We then identified two ligands of PD-1, PDL1 and PDL2, which are expressed on antigen-presenting cells and tumors. In 2001, the simple idea occurred to us that, by disabling the PD-1 brake function, we might be able to enhance immune activity and accelerate its reaction to cancer cells. And indeed, shortly afterward we demonstrated that the blockade of PD-1 signaling using antibodies or genetic deletion suppresses proliferation of tumors and protects mice from death.
This finding led us to propose that PD-1 antibody might be an effective medicine for the treatment of cancer. There were many reasons why we thought that PD-1 antibody treatment could be an ideal cancer therapy. First, mice without the PD-1 gene lived long lives and developed autoimmune diseases only later in life. This suggested that the side effects of PD-1 Ab treatment might not be particularly severe. Second, we thought that the treatment might be applicable to a large variety of tumors because lymphocytes are able to recognize the almost unlimited number of different antigens expressed on various types of tumors. Furthermore, although cancer cells often change their antigens, they cannot escape from the enormous diversity of antigen recognition mechanisms employed by lymphocytes.
When we suggested the possibility of PD-1 antibody treatment, cancer immunotherapy was not considered by doctors to be a serious choice for the treatment of cancer. We had to make a considerable effort to convince the pharmaceutical industry to invest in the development of humanized PD-1 Ab for cancer treatment. Fortunately, a recent series of clinical trial studies have indicated that PD-1 antibody treatment is very effective against a large number of tumors, even though the patients recruited for these studies were in the late stages of their diseases. On July 4th 2014, PD-1 antibody was approved for the treatment of melanoma by Japanese authorities.
There are still a number of problems related to the therapy that need to be solved, because not all patients with a particular kind of cancer respond to the PD-1 antibody treatment. We know that PD-1 deficient animals with different genetic backgrounds develop autoimmune diseases in different organs. It is therefore not surprising to find that patients with different genetic backgrounds respond to PD-1 antibody cancer immunotherapy with variable efficacy. Several approaches to overcoming this limitation have been developed, including combination therapy with CTLA4 antibody.
I would like to stress that approval for the PD-1 antibody drug came 22 years after the discovery of PD-1, and 12 years after successful trials in animal models. This clearly indicates that long-term investment in basic research is critical to the development of innovative drugs.
I am very proud of the fact that the basic principle of using the PD-1 antibody for cancer treatment was established entirely in academia. Fortunately, seeds from academic research have been successfully transplanted to the pharmaceutical industry in Japan. I believe that interaction between academia and industry should be mutually beneficial. Academia should expect a reasonable return from industry in order to allow the next generation scientists to nurse the seeds of their latest research.

Finally, I would like to thank all the members of my laboratory, Professor Minato , Professor Fujii, and Professor Konishi, all at Kyoto University, who contributed to the discovery of PD-1, to the elucidation of its physiological function, and finally to its clinical application.
Thank you very much.

Yu Ying-Shih in Sinology

To be awarded the inaugural Tang Prize in Sinology is the greatest honor I have received in my life. Needless to say, I feel grateful and elated even though deep in my heart, I must confess, lurks an indelible sense of undeservedness.
Sinology, my own field of research, writing and teaching, calls for a comment. To begin with, I must pay my tribute to the Tang Prize Foundation for its far-sightedness in recognizing Sinology as one of its four prize categories. In my considered opinion, Sinology as a scholarly endeavor of ever-growing world importance is more in need of encouragement and support now than ever before. It is truly remarkable that the Tang Prize comes right in the nick of time.
In recent decades Sinology as a field of study has been undergoing a gradual but very significant transformation. China has come to be viewed more and more as a civilization of indigenous origin and independent growth very much comparable to other long-lasting ancient civilizations such as India, Persia, Israel and Greece. Unlike in the past, we begin to move away from the practice of reconstructing and interpreting the Chinese past according to the historical model of the West. Instead Sinologists, in ever-growing numbers, tend to be interested in understanding the growth of Chinese civilization on its own terms. It is generally assumed that only by focusing on the unique course and shape of Chinese historical changes can we hope to see more clearly how that great cultural tradition moved from stage to stage, driven primarily by its internal dynamics. However, this must not be mistaken as advocacy of isolationism. On the contrary, the importance of a comparative perspective in Sinological studies is more emphasized today than ever before. The reason is not far to seek. The uniqueness of Chinese civilization and its developmental pattern cannot be firmly and fully established without comparisons with other civilizations, especially the Western one. On the other hand, to study Chinese history in total isolation would inevitably fall into the age-old trap of Sinocentrism.
As a result, Sinology today has become thoroughly globalized. Unlike in the first half of the twentieth century, we rarely, if ever, speak of Sinology along national lines such as Chinese, Japanese, French or American. Sinology is one anywhere on the globe. At this very juncture, my memory naturally goes to my late mentor Yang Lien-sheng who introduced me to world of Sinology at Harvard in the late 1950s. In his 1967 “Introduction” to Yang’s pathbreaking Excursions in Sinology, Paul Demi’eville, the dean of Sinology in Europe, characterizes the latter’s scholarship as “inter-national, truly t’ien-hsia (天下).” This clearly suggests that globalization of Sinology was already well underway at the time and my mentor Yang was positively identified by Demi’eville as one of its earliest practitioners.

In this age of rapid globalization of ours, this new development in Sinology urgently needs to be carried further on an ever-growing scale. It is therefore my earnest hope that the Tang Prize may serve to attract more young talents with vibrant minds that will bring fresh perspectives to the Sinological world.

Albie Sachs in Rule Of Law

It is always exciting to be the first of anything. I didn’t even know the Tang Prize existed, and was sorely tempted to delete the congratulatory message from my inbox as a scam. I’m still a bit shell-shocked. I have been singled out as an individual for doing what we have always done as a team. Moreover, we desired no reward whatsoever, other, perhaps, than the knowledge that we werecontributing to human emancipation.
And yet it is quite, quite wonderful to be honoured in this way. I feel overwhelmingly proud. My role was to be in the wrong place at the right time. I feel proud of my generation, of my country.
We grew up under apartheid. Racial supremacy was guaranteed and enforced by law. We lived under rule by law, not rule of law.
Yet it was through developing a creative and people-centred view of the law that we were ultimately able to accomplish three great transformations. First, after centuries of racial oppression and conflict we managed to establish legal mechanisms that enabled us to look each other in the eye and negotiate a peaceful revolution. Second, we developed a home-grown constitutional order, deeply rooted in our own conditions, that avoided a hard choice between guaranteeing either civil and political rights or else social and economic rights. Our people didn’t want freedom without bread nor did they seek bread without freedom, they wanted both together. And since we are a country of great human diversity with a rich cultural heritage, they insisted on roses as well - Freedom, Bread and Roses.
The result is that the once-notorious land of apartheid today lives under the protective shelter of one of the most exemplary Constitutions in the world.
Many of our problems continue to be immense, others we unfortunately create anew for ourselves. But our Constitution and its Bill of Rights give us the space and the instruments to deal with them. In doing so we are guided by its foundational principles of upholding the rule of law and promoting non-racialism and non-sexism in an open and democratic society.
Pride of place is given to a comprehensive and forward-looking Bill of Rights. It ensures that the rule of law is not simply a mechanism to guarantee the wealth and power of the exalted in our society. It also affirms the right to human dignity of the landless, the homeless, the poor and the marginalised.
Certainly, the rule of law maintains its classical role of securing the independence of the judiciary, the vote and freedom of expression. It protects foreign and internal investment from arbitrary seizure. It denounces army coups. But it goes much further.
It protects people from being beaten in their homes or trafficked across frontiers, or ill-treated because they are refugees or migrants or belong to unpopular minorities or are abused by employers. It protects the rights of everyone to have reasonable access to education, housing, nutrition and health, including beneficial bio-pharmaceutical medication. It protects the Earth from voracious and damaging depletion. It protects and honours the diversity of cultures in the world. And it promotes the blossoming of many flowers of creativity and the free engagement of a multitude of ideas.
May this magnificent Prize encourage us, and all in the world, to keep our heads high as we journey arduously towards more complete justice for all.

Yuan-Tseh Lee introducing Gro Harlem Brundtland

Sustainable Development is the defining challenge of our time. But 30 years ago, most people were not even aware of this defining challenge, and even fewer people had any notion of what to do about it.
Today, in contrast, Sustainable Development receives considerable attention. It’s on the agenda of global institutions, governments and businesses, and even common citizens on the street have at least heard of it. Solutions and strategies are growing like wildflowers.
Behind all this progress, one person stands above all others. Now, I have the pleasure to announce on behalf of the Tang Prize Foundation, Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland is awarded the first ever Tang Prize in Sustainable Development. Dr. Brundtland is from Bærum, Norway. She was the first female Prime Minister of Norway, and is known as the “Godmother of Sustainable Development”.
The Prize recognizes Dr. Brundtland “for her innovation, leadership and implementation of sustainable development that laid out the scientific and technical challenges for the global community to achieve a better balance of economic development, environmental integrity, and social equality for the benefit of all humanity.”
Ask anyone who knows anything about Sustainable Development, and they would know the name “Brundtland”. In 1987, Dr. Brundtland chaired the UN World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED), better known as the “Brundtland Commission”. It produced a landmark report entitled “Our Common Future”, better known as the “Brundtland Report”. The report set out a definition of sustainable development, also known as the “Brundtland Definition” that, 30 years later, is still the single most authoritative and cited definition. It reads:
“Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
To a generation that saw the looming threats but were at a loss for direction, Dr. Brundtland’s leadership shone the way forward. The Brundtland Commission not only defined the challenge of Sustainable Development, it identified strategic approaches, detailed necessary actions, and led directly to the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, and the creation of the most important global mechanisms on sustainable development we have today. One way or another, everything traces back to Dr. Brundtland.
But tonight is not just a celebration of what Dr. Brundtland has done. Dr. Brundtland showed us a vision and a way. But we still have much to do, so far to go, and not much time to get there. The climate is still changing. Species and habitats are still disappearing. And billions are still poor and hungry.
Dr. Brundtland is an inspiration to us all. The world is now for the younger generation to lead. They can either follow the failed ways of the past, or they can follow the example of Dr. Brundtland, who saw a better future for the world and did everything within her power to steer humanity towards it. Were our young people to do the same, and guide the world towards a sustainable future, it would be a better tribute to Dr. Brundtland than anything we could hope to give.

Hsing-Jien Kung introducing James P. Allison and Tasuku Honjo

One of the joys living in Taipei is riding a bike through the parks along the riverside. I enjoy the scenery and the fresh air. I often see young bicyclists, fast and furious, racing past me. Being young at heart, sometimes I get carried away and try to catch up with them … until all of a sudden I realize I’m going too fast and am at risk of losing control of the bike and crashing. This is when I truly appreciate having a bike with good, solid brakes. I often wonder if someone could invent a bike that has an auto-brake system, something that would prevent foolish old men like me from taking things too far. Our immune system is smarter and does have an auto-brake system. The fact we are all sitting here comfortably enjoying this awards ceremony is because our immune cells are working very hard every single second to fend off bacteria and virus infections. When there is infection, the immune cells are immediately stimulated and expand in number. At the same time, the brake system kicks in to prevent the immune cells from going overboard and attacking our own cells. The consequence of going overboard like that is not pretty: it is autoimmune disease, which may be even more devastating than the infections the immune system intends to fend off. This brake system, vital to our livelihood, is called the “immune checkpoint” and is one of the great mysteries in immunology. The joint recipients of the first Tang Prize in Biopharmaceutical Sciences have unlocked this mystery and discovered a centerpiece of this brake.
Why is this important? Well, extraordinary circumstances require extraordinary measures. Taking my bike analogy again, if I happened to be crossing some railway tracks and noticed that a train is coming, to survive I would need to completely release the brake system and use all my might to get out of the way as fast as I could. Likewise, when cancer strikes, cancer cells are extremely cunning: they outgrow normal cells, they spread, and they suppress immune cells. Thus, our ordinary immune response often fails to eliminate cancer cells. But what Dr. Allison and Dr. Honjo found is that by releasing the brake system or removing the immune checkpoint we can unleash suppressed immune responses and effectively kill cancer cells.
In the past, cancer therapy commonly involved either “poisoning” cells to death with toxic chemicals or “burning” the cells to death with radiation; both generally have side effects. More recently, targeted therapy which specifically targets oncogenes and tumor cells — has greatly improved the prospects of cancer therapy. But drug resistance sometimes follows. The ingenious concept of Dr. Allison and Dr. Honjo is that the best defense is self-defense, with there being no better means of achieving this than waking up our own suppressed immune system and letting nature run its course. Initial clinical trials seem to validate this approach. This indeed is welcome news and gives new hope for cancer patients.
Professor James Allison has long been interested in T-cell biology. While still a graduate student, he identified the T-cell receptor complex and later made the seminal discovery that T cells require a second signal from a co-stimulatory receptor to launch a response after they’ve bound to an antigen. He then identified the inhibitory receptor that shuts off the signals, the so-called immune checkpoint. This receptor is CTLA4 (cytotoxic T-lymphocytes antigen 4), which suppresses immune responses against tumor cells. The CTLA-4 antibody (ipilimumab) he developed has shown a remarkable survival benefit for metastatic melanoma, a deadly cancer. Four years after receiving this treatment, some patients are still alive — an amazing achievement.
Meanwhile, in Japan, Professor Tasuku Honjo has been studying another inhibitory receptor, PD-1, which, like CTLA-4, attenuates immune responses. His lab elucidated the mechanisms of its action and went on to develop blockade antibody. Clinical trials have demonstrated highly positive responses in a number of cancers, including renal carcinoma, melanoma, and non-small cell lung carcinoma. Dr. Honjo has distinguished himself in areas even beyond this great discovery; for example, he is a world-renowned leader in the study of immunoglobulin class switching, a critical step in B-cell development, and recently discovered that an RNA editing enzyme is involved in the process.
Today, we are honoring two giants in the field of immunology. They have not only contributed greatly to our understanding of fundamental immunology but also pioneered the revolutionary immune-checkpoint therapy, which will surely change the outlook of cancer therapy. Their work epitomizes what translational research is about and what the Tang Prize in Biopharmaceutical Science is aimed at rewarding.
Professors Allison and Honjo,
Through your groundbreaking experiments, you have uncovered the mystery of immune checkpoints and immune-tolerance. Because of your efforts, this paradigm-shifting research has been successfully translated into clinical trials, offering new hope for mankind in the fight against cancer.
On behalf of the Tang Prize Executive Committee, I wish to convey to you our warmest congratulations.

Pang-Hsin Ting introducing Yu Ying-Shih

Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen:
Today marks a historic moment. The Tang Prize in Sinology is being awarded for the very first time. It is my honor and privilege to introduce its first-ever recipient: Yu Ying-shih.
Renowned across both hemispheres, Professor Yu has had the rare distinction of teaching at the most prestigious universities in the world. He is probably the only professor of Chinese descent who has been tenured at three Ivy League universities.
Professor Yu’s scholarship has redefined the study of Chinese history. Over the past six decades, he has written on almost every single period of Chinese history. His books and papers have reassessed previously-held beliefs and brought new ideas and methods into the field of Sinology. His most well-known work, History and Thought, is esteemed by both Chinese and Western readers.
Despite these achievements, he has not rested on his laurels since his retirement in 2003. His groundbreaking masterpiece on Zhu Xi went where no scholarship has gone before, putting into words what others found no words to express. Reinterpreting the political and intellectual history of the Song period, this two-volume work is certainly one of the most influential writings on Chinese history of the early modern period.
Even though the majority of Professor Yu’s works is written in Chinese, he is equally respected both in the East and West. This speaks volumes about the quality of his scholarship. To gain such recognition, he has indeed discovered and conveyed the modern significance of Chinese history, philosophy, politics, and culture through his scholarship.
Beyond his research, Professor Yu is also a modern public intellectual himself, seeking to change the world through his research. Professor Yu perfectly embodies the spirit of the Tang Prize in Sinology. His research has transformed the study of Chinese history. His impact transcends disciplines, time periods, and borders. It is without a doubt that Yu Ying-shih is most deserving of this rare honor.
Thank you.

Lance Liebman introducing Albie Sachs

When I was asked to serve on the Tang Committee for Rule of Law, I was of course greatly honored, delighted to return after some years to Taiwan, and certain that I was not as qualified as the other committee members, who came from every continent. I appreciated immensely Mr. Samuel Yin's vision in thinking that Rule of Law fits with the other three wise choices for these important new prizes. Also, however, I thought--as I prepared to attend the April meeting and studied the individuals and institutions that had been nominated--that it would be impossible to single out one person or one institution--that the different ways in which Rule of Law is advanced are hard to rank.
But as the committee gradually focused its discussions toward a decision, my prediction of impossibility to choose and unlikelihood of consensus became totally wrong. Now, five months after we did our work, all of us are certain that looking back on the second half of the twentieth century, no person symbolizes the good and necessary role of the Rule of Law better than Justice Sachs. He is modest and sensible and I am sure doubts that it is a provable fact that he is the #1 person to be a symbol and an icon in this way; but a unanimous committee of distinguished legal intellectuals concluded that it is true:
South Africa was in some ways the worst country in the world. As a Harvard professor, I served as chair of a committee that had to address whether it was acceptable for the university to hold stock in any U.S. or foreign company that sold its products in South Africa. Given other experience around the world, it was unlikely bordering on inconceivable that the racist and tyrannical apartheid regime could be overturned without great violence and that it could possibly be replaced by a multiracial democracy with a constitution and a Supreme Court that could rank so high on the international standings for Rule of Law.
Albie Sachs stands out among the many courageous and committed people who brought this about. He had stood for racial equality since he was a teenager. As a young lawyer he fought vigorously for justice, even though doing so against the apartheid regime meant daily risk of violent punishment. Eventually he was forced to leave his country. He studied and lived in England but felt more at home in newly independent Mozambique. He had survived horrible treatment in prison and then somehow survived an assassination attack by the agents of the evil regime that cost him an arm and the sight of one eye. But wherever he was, he wrote books that were among the most significant and persuasive descriptions of and arguments for the rule of law. In part because of his real-world experience, his books were read around the world. Always, he was a lawyer of high skill. And when the regime change occurred in South Africa and Nelson Mandela became President and appointed Albie--who had been a brilliant and courageous lawyer for the African National Congress--to the new Supreme Court, the new Justice Sachs was totally prepared to be a leader in the best nonviolent national revolution of its era. Most important for us, it was a revolution implemented by law and by a Supreme Court that is a model for the world, never hesitating to declare principles of equality and dignity for all people in South Africa even when those principles are not fully shared by the elected political leaders of the country.
As well as his extraordinary and successful work to create the Rule of Law in his own country, Justice Sachs has traveled the world, arguing for law as a necessary path to justice. In addition, he opened the legal process in his own Supreme Court to ideas and decisions from other progressive judges in many countries. And his own decisions have been studied and used in dozens of countries. He is a world leader of the Rule of Law. In his own words, "while one should always be skeptical about law's pretensions, one should never be cynical about law's possibilities."
Finally, there are words about Justice Sachs that are spoken and written by people from many countries who know him well. Those words include: humility, generosity, justice, morality, and respect for human dignity. He is also called brave and heroic. This is why his jurisprudence and indeed his life command worldwide respect.
Justice Albie Sachs, on behalf of the Tang Prize Foundation, it is my privilege to offer you my thanks and appreciation for your extraordinary work. I now ask you to step forward to receive the first Tang Prize for the Rule of Law from a distinguished lawyer, President Ma Ying-Jeou.