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燕山剑
05-29-2007, 03:39 AM
Moderator's Note. In February 2013 three older, smaller threads on internal disorder were merged into this thread. A year later the Tienanmen Square attack and the Kunming train station attack thread were merged in.

There is a separate thread in the Central Asia theme, for China's Far West provinces (inc. Tibet), with 131 posts and 79k views. It mainly covers the Uighur / ETIM violence and China's response:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=246


"Many women have been forced to have abortions. Authorities are going into their homes and destroying their homes to implement the policy," said a woman in Bobai county.

People here said, birth control bureaucrats showed up in a half-dozen towns with sledgehammers and threatened to knock holes in the homes of people who had failed to pay fines imposed for having more than one child. Other family planning officials, backed by hired toughs, pushed their way into businesses owned by parents of more than one child and confiscated everything from sacks of rice to color televisions, they said.

Bobai was at the heart of riots that erupted late last week across Guangxi region and saw thousands of people take to the streets in anger against local authorities' efforts to enforce China's so-called "one-child policy".

The CCP has devoted the nation’s resources to destroying China’s independant thinking,uproot all independent organisations. With better social security and pay ,who will have so many children?

SWCAdmin
05-29-2007, 11:30 AM
Chinese Patriot League,

At first I thought you were a spammer. Almost banned you.

On second look, I see you have a cause. And it looks like you took the time to post in an appropriate forum. Thanks.

You are welcome to continue to post objective observations of significant developments on the ground, and to engage as a member in rational discussion with others. I'm leaving these posts up only because I have a glimmer of hope that you have something more to say, and will say it without cut & paste sloganism.

Don't make this a rant, and don't make random calls for activism a habit. We don't go for that here.

How would boycotting the Olympics help? What are the other options? How does it connect to the one child policy?

SWCAdmin
05-29-2007, 11:33 AM
P.S. For our non-Chinese readers, here's the Google translation of the Chinese portion of the post above.


According to the report in the Apple Daily, violence by local officials to implement "family planning" (one-child) policy triggered by the Guangxi Bobai County townships of mass anti-tyranny incident. On the 17th of this month from the beginning of the incident spread Bobai County townships, The angry villagers caught fire up the township government program of the Office of the Health Station, smashing burning cars, motorcycles and other objects. On the 20th Bobai emergency authorities from neighboring Guigang, and the north, such as Rong, transferred a large number of police force to control the situation in the townships. According to local sources, the government has requested the villages were unemployed when the "Task Force" to see women can do Rafah sterilization surgery "but no one to see objects that were not on the demolition," Nabuzou it smashed, Sasha meters depth. TAN Lian town of a secondary school girls and a 50-year-old woman was picked up by recruiters surgery resulted in a number of ruined the incident. He refers to the residents, "Now the whole Bobai County streets, everywhere was covered with a 『beat SU (Mr. White County Chief), and shot Huang Shao-ming (Mr. White County)』 slogans farmer who was forced to the fire. "At present, Bobai all tense inside, outside, a police car along the street in possession of a large number of public security, County 200-meter passage on a large number of plainclothes police, more government officials on duty on the streets to prevent public access.

goesh
05-29-2007, 01:12 PM
-it's just hard to keep hormones suppressed, much like keeping safety standards in mines intact over there. It seems the booming economy in China is rippling in many ways and not all for the better.

goesh
05-29-2007, 05:04 PM
On the other hand, China appears to take corruption seriously. According to this FOX report, they are going to execute their former drug regulator. It appears he gave the nod of approval for some cash to some drugs that killed a few people.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,276035,00.html

Firestaller
05-29-2007, 11:16 PM
China's been a corporation for the past decade ... I guess they need to start running a government now.


With a booming economy, they have to deal with booming birthrates. I really don't have an good answer to their 1.3 billion people 'problem' though.

Firestaller
05-29-2007, 11:29 PM
On the other hand, China appears to take corruption seriously. According to this FOX report, they are going to execute their former drug regulator. It appears he gave the nod of approval for some cash to some drugs that killed a few people.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,276035,00.html



If I had to guess the future government of China, I think that they're going to go back to Confucianism (or Meritocracy ... as the ethnic Chinese setup in Singapore (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meritocracy) ... how is the Communist government to stop the Han Chinese from being Chinese.)


With that, you'll probably see the same laws as the Signaporeans.

FascistLibertarian
05-30-2007, 12:00 AM
aawww but Confucianism hates merchants because they dont produce anything, and I really doubt the leaders of China will turn their back on merchants in favour of some perfect past society which never in fact existed!
:)
I dont see the Communists giving up power any time soon

WVO
05-30-2007, 12:30 AM
I agree that one-party rule in China isn't going away any time soon. Singapore is a likely model, but probably what we'll see is a mix of Singapore, Malaysia, S. Korea, Japan and, ironically, Taiwan.

China is less opaque than we think. It's driven by a desire to increase national wealth (including standard of living) and prestige while maintaining stability. It's doesn't take years of study to figure this out, they've been saying it since Deng Xiaoping took power and still. say it all the time

If you're interested in a theory about political change in China that isn't the "China Will be a World-Dominating Superpower," or "China is our Friend and Just Wants to be Like the United States," check out Suisheng Zhao's, "A Nation-State by Construction: Dynamics of Modern Chinese Nationalism," or any of his stuff on Chinese nationalism. He takes the view that China is, and has been since the late 19th c., driven more by nationalism than any other ideology.

燕山剑
05-30-2007, 02:45 AM
With a booming economy...

But many feel the GDP comes from inflation.
house,food,and all are more expensive.China is falling into capitalism of 1800s,before
the October Revolution . Many here are envying the captalism in Taiwan,no
mentioning Sweden,expecting Ma Yingjiu.

Firestaller
05-30-2007, 03:49 AM
I agree that one-party rule in China isn't going away any time soon. Singapore is a likely model, but probably what we'll see is a mix of Singapore, Malaysia, S. Korea, Japan and, ironically, Taiwan.

China is less opaque than we think. It's driven by a desire to increase national wealth (including standard of living) and prestige while maintaining stability.


Yeah, Singapore ... heck, even Japan has been ruled by 1 party since they installed a parliamentary system.

Though, it will take China a while to have that. The Chinese are afraid of foreign meddling/influence in their political affairs if they were to be more politically open ... especially since they have a long road ahead of them.


China is like watching the Industrial Revolution, the Great Deppression and the 1950's (and all the problems that came during those periods) going on at once.

燕山剑
05-30-2007, 08:39 AM
Zheng Xiaoyu, former director of China's State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA), was sentenced to death by a Beijing court Tuesday morning.

The bribes taken by Zheng, including cash and gifts, were worth more than 6.49 million yuan (about 850,000 U.S. dollars), according to the court. The bribes were given either directly or through his wife and son.

The consequences of Zheng's dereliction of duty have proved extremely serious. Six types of medicine approved by the administration during that period were fake medicines. Some pharmaceutical companies used false documents to apply for approvals, the court said.

How hapless! If he had flattered Jiang or Hu more,he would die?

sullygoarmy
05-30-2007, 01:45 PM
If only we could get our politicians to worry about being executed for corruption. Hell, I'd be happy with just some jail time!

goesh
05-31-2007, 02:07 PM
Amen to that - I'd like to see the convicted crooks at least do some hard time instead of resting at some cushy, countryclub joint

燕山剑
06-07-2007, 01:55 AM
The headmasters are keen on cost. Elementary school teachers are paid as badly as unskilled workers! For example,one in Beijing gets a little more than 1000 yuan a month.They have to pluralize and can not concentrate on their pupils.

The commie regime of China says that teachers are in the civil servant system.But it is not serious about this.In fact ,the bureaucrats only care about themselves and bribers.

All professionals ,including teachers,engineers,accountants etc are all regarded as rebellious.Of course! Thinking people see right through the propaganda and know there is a better way.While GDP inflates and inflates,the Chinese Communist Party monopolize moer and more money, the professionals are falling into relative poverty.

I thought pretty much everyone in China is paid badly.Whitout indepent trade uions,they can not earn better.

goesh
06-15-2007, 12:23 PM
The newspaper I picked up this morning had a small post about this. In central China, police rescued 217 people, including 29 children, who had been forced to work in brick kilns as slaves. The brief article said the internet sparked a national furor when a bunch of fathers started trying to track down their sons who they believed had been sold as slaves. Of all things, the internet..........Here's the MSNBC article on it:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19224794/

"Last week, state media reported the rescue of 31 people, forced to work for a year as slaves at a brickworks run by the son of a local Communist Party official in Shanxi."

AdamG
07-31-2010, 09:07 PM
Bear with me : this article touched on the fairly large population of disgruntled Chinese veterans (core being the Sino-Viet '79 vets), their efforts at organizing public disobedience and the potentials of them becoming a political force (or loose-cannon, depending on your perspective).

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128852968


A consequence of China's military modernization program is that some veterans have been left behind, which has led them to protest their condition. Once the backbone of the communist revolution, soldiers are now considered among the groups that should be suppressed.

China has embarked on an ambitious program to streamline its military, cutting manpower and improving technology. But some demobilized soldiers have fallen through the cracks and have taken to the streets to protest lack of jobs, health care and other benefits. It is a seldom-seen aspect of China's military modernization that has the Chinese government worried.

Internal Courier
07-31-2010, 11:33 PM
I remember I was once on a train in China when a fellow came down the aisle on his knuckle calling out stuff. My translator told me he was a soldier who lost his legs somehow in service and he was asking for money to support him and his family. I got a brief chance to talk to the guy and it turns out they didn't even pay the guy out a pension, just turfed him out of the army.

So really, no wonder old soldiers there are pissed off.

AdamG
12-14-2011, 10:21 PM
Not just the Western reaches....


BEIJING– For years, in the name of social harmony, China’s ruling Communist Party has been highly successful in masking, placating or simply distorting the tens of thousands of protests – dubbed “mass demonstrations” – that occur here ever year.
The Wukan rebellion will prove a tougher dilemma for Beijing to solve.
From The Telegraph newspaper’s Malcolm Moore comes details of the stunning story of Wukan, a fishing village of 20,000 in China’s southern Guangdong Province. Earlier this week, the entire town rose up and threw out local party officials and police forces following years of having the people’s land sold out from underneath them.
http://behindthewall.msnbc.msn.com/


For the first time on record, the Chinese Communist party has lost all control, with the population of 20,000 in this southern fishing village now in open revolt.
The last of Wukan’s dozen party officials fled on Monday after thousands of people blocked armed police from retaking the village, standing firm against tear gas and water cannons.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/8954315/Inside-Wukan-the-Chinese-village-that-fought-back.html

davidbfpo
12-14-2011, 10:57 PM
There is another separate thread on the domestic security situation in China's far west provinces, called 'China's Far West provinces: a Small War', which is in the Central Asia arena and on:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=246

China's internal security has popped up once before in a thread, in 2007:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=3019

So I have created this new thread.

davidbfpo
12-14-2011, 11:15 PM
The BBC report, with links to three related reports, is from a Beijing-based correspondent:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-16173768

It is noteworthy that this incident is in Guangdong Province, the richest, most populous province and a quarter of it's exports. For a glimpse check:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guangdong

Nearby are Hong Kong and Macau, which remain significant entry points and places to watch events from.

With the exception of say a city like Shanghai and the national capital Beijing, this incident couldn't happen in a worse place IMHO.

davidbfpo
12-15-2011, 10:25 PM
A BBC reporter has gained access to the town, his short report:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-16195113

bourbon
12-16-2011, 03:35 AM
Villagers say five people have been snatched from Wukan by police in recent days, prompting local people to mount nightly patrols to defend the village, he adds.
The villagers should grab some cops or government officials as counterhostages.

davidbfpo
12-27-2011, 06:11 PM
FP Blog has a good update on the situation in Wukan; it opens with:
Peasants do not have a good record facing off with the Communist Party. Rural standoffs usually end with the arrest of the ringleaders and an increased security presence for the remaining residents. Yet on Thursday afternoon, Dec. 22, residents of the embattled village of Wukan scored a major achievement in their 11-day stand-off with local government, securing the release of one of the village's three detained leaders; the other two were released today.

Then asks is Wukan a crisis barometer:
The small farming village of 13,000 thousand embodies social changes brought about by more than 30 years of economic reforms in China.

I would suggest not:
...most Wukanese stressed that they only wanted resolution of their local issues, and that they maintained trust in the Communist Party.

Link:http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/12/23/wukan_protest_china_corruption?page=0,0

davidbfpo
01-13-2012, 12:11 PM
Hat tip to Open Democracy:
The western media are too easily tying each and every mass incident to the question of the country’s democratic reform. Instead we should have a new discourse that captures how ordinary resistance has become in modern-day China. The interesting question is not whether such protests can lead to reform, but rather: How it is that so many can occur without undermining the Party’s rule?

Link:http://www.opendemocracy.net/evelyn-chan/no-news-from-wukan-protests-are-far-from-isolated-anomaly

Despite the lack of coverage, the protest continues and a Google news search confirmed an absence of Western reporting since Xmas 2011, but found this commentary, which appears to be by Communist party cadres. Introduction states:
Wang Zhanyang, Director of the Political Science Department at the Central Institute of Socialism, contributed this essay to a forum on the implications of Wukan for the country as a whole. The forum responds to the December 22 People’s Daily editorial, “What Does ‘Wukan‘s Turn’ Mean for Us?”

Link:http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2012/01/wang-zhanyang-on-wukan-and-village-autonomy/

TheCurmudgeon
01-13-2012, 06:24 PM
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fiw-apple-china-20120114,0,7243366.story

The Chinese have a burgeoning middle class and some commentators expect it to transition to to a democracy in the next twenty years.

http://books.google.com/books/about/China_s_democratic_future.html?id=T0Yvwq2eYTAC

Is this really the country we want to hang our hats on as the new threat to the United States?

Ray
01-15-2012, 09:32 AM
Consumerism causes discontent amongst the haves and havenots.

A great tool to disintegrate society?

Who is doing it?

Is it a part of a plan that is succeeding?

MikeF
01-15-2012, 10:24 AM
Consumerism causes discontent amongst the haves and havenots.

A great tool to disintegrate society?

Who is doing it?

Is it a part of a plan that is succeeding?

Westernization and Modernization- part of the continued process of adding a Walmart and McDonalds in every city. This issue is better articulated by Samuel Huntington and Fareed Zakaria.

Firn
01-15-2012, 10:48 AM
Consumerism causes discontent amongst the haves and havenots.

A great tool to disintegrate society?

Who is doing it?

Is it a part of a plan that is succeeding?

Sounds almost like the great Satan is succeding in sapping the Dragons strenght before it is able to rise. Sometimes I think the cui bono gets streched a bit too far.

In general the Western Way after WWII has led to far more equal societies then in pretty much ages before. This trend has been reversed to a different degree in Western countries, due to a couple of economic and political trends, but in general it is hard to find a period in which societies have been more equal and stable for such a long time. And that even at times such as this ones, with irregular mass protests in some countries and one of the European countries, Greece at the verge of bankruptcy.

TheCurmudgeon
01-15-2012, 02:11 PM
Westernization and Modernization- part of the continued process of adding a Walmart and McDonalds in every city. This issue is better articulated by Samuel Huntington and Fareed Zakaria.

With a middle class comes social and political change ala Huntington. The Western power are doing this but not through any coherent plan. As the middle class spreads there are two possible outcomes. First, slow transition to a more liberal form of "democracy" then is currently practiced in China or the "J-Curve" where there is a tightening of authority that goes too far and there is social upheaval (if they will riot over not getting the latest I-Phone just wait to see what they will do if you try to take them away).

The question for the Western Liberal Democracies is how do you foster this change and where do our military fit into that transition.

If China were to become a more democratic state but still very nationalist and very much wanting to demonstrate its renewed place as a major power in Asia what likelihood is there that it will use its military to demonstrate its power (versus using its economic influence as in the case of Africa)?

What is China's military likely to do? Will it feel the need to continue the Maoist revolution and crack down independent of the Party or will it quietly accept the changes?

What will happen in large part will be based on the value system of the middle class. If they remain Confucianist then change will probably come slowly if at all. If they embrace individualism then change may come sooner. I am assuming that if they are rioting for cell phones they are leaning towards individualism. In any case the rural poor will probably remain Confucionist and simply accept whatever the middle class dictate.

Dayuhan
01-15-2012, 11:15 PM
With a middle class comes social and political change ala Huntington. The Western power are doing this but not through any coherent plan.

I don't see how you can say that "the Western powers are doing this". They aren't, by plan or otherwise. he Chinese are doing it themselves.

It's interesting too see people saying that "consumerism" spas strength and disintegrates society, when the strongest and most integrated societies on the planet are unabashedly consumerist.


As the middle class spreads there are two possible outcomes. First, slow transition to a more liberal form of "democracy" then is currently practiced in China or the "J-Curve" where there is a tightening of authority that goes too far and there is social upheaval (if they will riot over not getting the latest I-Phone just wait to see what they will do if you try to take them away).

A third alternative, and IMO most likely, is a serious economic crash followed by serious disorder. That could lead to a conservative backlash and an effort to return to the pure way of communism under military leadership, it could lead to the emergence of a more democratic order, or a whole buch of other things.


The question for the Western Liberal Democracies is how do you foster this change and where do our military fit into that transition.

A simple answer is that we don't do anything. We accept that it's not about us, and we watch.

TheCurmudgeon
01-16-2012, 12:25 AM
Us Westrners are doing it by buying Chinese. We effectively shift our production of a number of products to China over the last twenty years or longer. Textiles, plastics, electronics, steel (although some of these are now moving to other countries). As a result, they have had increased economic success. Had we chosen not to engage the Chinese and left them in isolation I dare say that this level of economic expansion would not be possible.

Of course a large part of the credit goes to the Chinese, including their socialist policy of government ownership of businesses that effectively makes the government a partner in every business enterprise, slowly drawing them into the capitalist web.

The change will come. As other threads have noted even the military is expecting to transition to democracy. Historically these transitions can be messy. Theoretically, a poorly executed transition can lead to regional instability.

Dayuhan
01-16-2012, 12:52 AM
The Chinese made the decision to mass produce consumer goods for export. A decision not to buy those goods would have been perverse and largely unenforceable. This is not something "we" are doing to "them", it's a natural part of their evolution. It's not as if entrepreneurship is in any way alien to Chinese culture, far from it...

MikeF
01-16-2012, 09:27 AM
The change will come. As other threads have noted even the military is expecting to transition to democracy. Historically these transitions can be messy. Theoretically, a poorly executed transition can lead to regional instability.

The Chinese will change or not change in their own way. Ultimately, they want to be like the West in that they way to pursue their own version of the American Dream (Chinese Dream?).

Another way to look at the issue is to recognize that we have two major problems in understanding China.

1. Sourcing. A lot of U.S. and western understanding about China is viewed from a Taiwanese lens. This lens is skewed toward a particular ideology.

2. Mass. China is huge. What looks like a riot at an Apple store may actually be normal for the way things work in an urban environment.

Fuchs
01-16-2012, 02:18 PM
China has a history of regional revolts and warlords.

The Chinese know and understand that the pseudo-communist regime is their best hope for unity in peace, for a powerful China which can resist even foreign great powers.

A move towards nation-wide democracy risks a Soviet Union-like collapse (losing especially Western parts), fractioning and even civil war.
Only the one-party dictatorship with its domestic intelligence service and toughness can claim to have ever kept China at de facto unity and peace for decades.




Different background lead to different behaviour. The expectations about other's behaviours and standards applied can lead to conflicts and misunderstandings. Such conflicts (and foreign policy mistakes) may be avoidable with a sufficient understanding of the other's background.

That's why I'd like to mention three important parts of Chinese history.
I'm no China expert, but I know a lot about history, and some events in Chinese history were just too large - they had a lasting influence on the Chinese culture.

- - - - -

Historical Fact #1 is their never-ending quest for unified central governance.

China had been unified in 221 BC (after the period of the warring states that gave us the teachings of Sun Tzu).
Since then it was in an seemingly endless struggle against decentralization. Many powerful governors of provinces attempted to rule independently, many uprisings led to preliminary independent states and the 20th century civil war of communists vs. nationalists was the last great division of the country.
China isn't really one nation, but it's a group of nations that know prosperity only from times of unity.
The Communist's party reputation rests in great part on its ability to keep the country united (except Taiwan, of course) and to prevent civil war. (Another reason for its power is its ability to prevent famines.)

This historical fact leads to two important insights:
(1) It's near-insane to expect mainland China to accept a secession of Uighurs, Tibetans or other regions, or to give up its claim on Taiwan.
(2) The PR China can be expected to crack down reliably on too independent (corrupt) governors and bureaucracies in order to retain as much central control as the central government wants to have.

- - - - -

Historical fact #2 is the Chinese experience religious fanatics/sects.

The best and most influential example is the Taiping Rebellion. It raged in 1850-1864 and killed much more people than the First World War. The reason was a pseudo-Christian sect.
This war is almost entirely unknown in the Western World - that's not surprising, for Western knowledge of history in 'exotic' places is pretty much limited to universities with historical seminars.

This historical fact should help to explain why it's pointless and very irritating to call for a more moderate treatment of sects like Falun Gong by the Chinese authorities.

- - - - -

Historical fact #3 is the Opium wars and the effect of Western imperialism on China in the 19th century.

The short story is that China was humiliated, partially colonized, pumped full with drugs, subjected to dictates about domestic legislation, exploited and disrespected by foreigners - especially Europeans.

The foreign control of Hong Kong (by the UK) and Macau (by Portuguese) was a well-known reminder of this history till a few years ago.

This historical fact explains why Chinese have a good reason to reject even the slightest attempt of outside interference in domestic affairs. We can attempt it, but it's most likely a stupid idea.

- - - - -

On top of that there's of course a rich culture and history as an ancient civilization.

There was also a bloody war with Japan in 1937-1945 (with several previous clashes) that deserves to be called the beginning of WW2 because it was really a huge war with many victims and only ended with the Japanese surrender.
The Japanese did never really apologise for the war and what Japanese forces did in that war. That and a lingering racism in the triangle of China-Korea-Japan is a serious burden on foreign policy relations in the region.

- - - - -

We should look at China's history and its lasting impact in order to avoid unnecessary conflicts and irritations. The knowledge of history also helps to avoid illusions about China and our influence on it.
Other historical facts than the ones I mentioned lead to additional insights, for example its own (limited) imperial history and its history with Korea and other continental neighbours.

MikeF
01-17-2012, 12:07 PM
China city dwellers exceed villagers for first time (http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/01/17/us-china-population-idUSTRE80G0DB20120117)
Reuters

Chinese Exceptionalism? (http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/talktojazeera/2012/01/2012114143938654345.html)
Al Jazeera

Dayuhan
01-17-2012, 10:42 PM
The Chinese know and understand that the pseudo-communist regime is their best hope for unity in peace, for a powerful China which can resist even foreign great powers.

The Chinese know? What, all 1.3 billion of them?

I suspect you'd find that there's as little consensus in China as anywhere else, and a very considerable degree of discontent with the established order. Paradoxically, this discontent is often most prominent among those who might be called the winners under the established order... though a serious economic disruption and consequent unemployment is likely to get the commoners pretty fired up as well.

Fuchs
01-17-2012, 11:46 PM
I am under the impression that my choice of words meant "a strong enough majority of those who care about politics at all".

Accurate choice of words is nice and all, but sometimes there's a superior trade-off to be had if you risk being misunderstood once in a while and in exchange can skip entire book volumes of writing over the course of a few years.
People tend to be annoyed or bored by super-accurate writing styles anyway.

Ray
01-18-2012, 06:23 AM
"Consumerism" certainly disintegrates society. The strongest and most integrated societies on the planet are unabashedly consumerist, but they were not subjected to a socialist or a communist system and then introduced to globalisation! They evolved differently.

Unbridled consumerism unleashed by globalisation does affect nations that till now have been subjected to socialist or communist governance where life is dictated and decided from the womb to the tomb. And where daily necessities were shoddy and substandard as per western standards.

Globalisation and consumerism gives the citizenry a ‘freedom’ that they cannot fathom or handle. As it grows on the citizenry, the individual aspirations and desires soar. However, the State is in no position to address the same.

In such a scenario, a section of society by various means, fair or foul, enjoy the new found societal structure acquiring immense wealth, while the majority continues to wallow, and what is worse, is that they do not have the ‘safety’ of the socialist or communist system based on the womb to the tomb policy.

The gap between the haves and have nots increases, the gap between the rural and the urban, the gap between the industrialist and the worker, the gap between the farmer and the owner of the food mart increases and all this causes disharmony.

The real poor, who have no hope in hell to compete, take to arms and there is insurrection, the rationale given for such insurrection can be many, but is basically social injustice, inequality and poverty.

Therefore, the environment is ideal for exploitation, be it by forces within or by any external power that wishes to do so!

Just look around!

Don't confine to China alone!

Dayuhan
01-18-2012, 11:56 AM
I am under the impression that my choice of words meant "a strong enough majority of those who care about politics at all".


Ok, correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like you mean to say something like...

a strong enough majority of those who care about politics at all... know and understand that the pseudo-communist regime is their best hope for unity in peace, for a powerful China which can resist even foreign great powers.

Upon what evidence is that conclusion based?


"Consumerism" certainly disintegrates society. The strongest and most integrated societies on the planet are unabashedly consumerist, but they were not subjected to a socialist or a communist system and then introduced to globalisation! They evolved differently.

Unbridled consumerism unleashed by globalisation does affect nations that till now have been subjected to socialist or communist governance where life is dictated and decided from the womb to the tomb. And where daily necessities were shoddy and substandard as per western standards.

Globalisation and consumerism gives the citizenry a ‘freedom’ that they cannot fathom or handle. As it grows on the citizenry, the individual aspirations and desires soar. However, the State is in no position to address the same.

In such a scenario, a section of society by various means, fair or foul, enjoy the new found societal structure acquiring immense wealth, while the majority continues to wallow, and what is worse, is that they do not have the ‘safety’ of the socialist or communist system based on the womb to the tomb policy.

The gap between the haves and have nots increases, the gap between the rural and the urban, the gap between the industrialist and the worker, the gap between the farmer and the owner of the food mart increases and all this causes disharmony.

The real poor, who have no hope in hell to compete, take to arms and there is insurrection, the rationale given for such insurrection can be many, but is basically social injustice, inequality and poverty.

Therefore, the environment is ideal for exploitation, be it by forces within or by any external power that wishes to do so!

Just look around!

Don't confine to China alone!

Where would you have us look? In which formerly communist states are the "real poor" taking to arms in insurrection?

Even if the transition out of communism and the rise of consumerism creates some degree of disruptive force, what can anyone do about it? Try to preserve a detested system that nobody wants to keep? Tell people they won't be allowed to acquire more goods because that would disintegrate society? I suspect that efforts to forcibly repress emergent consumerism in order to prevent these rather hypothetical disintegrating effects would disintegrate things a lot faster and cause a lot more rebellion than consumerism would.

Ray
01-18-2012, 02:29 PM
Selective reading will only confuse issues.

The key sentence is - Don't confine to China alone!

In a totalitarian regime, it is not that easy to organise an insurrection, but there are other countries too where the gap has widened a wee too large to close it and there is insurrection!


Crass Consumerism can be controlled and of that there is no doubt. One cannot replicate the West overnight. Anything done suddenly will have negative repercussions.

Fuchs
01-18-2012, 06:44 PM
Upon what evidence is that conclusion based?

It's an official line from China, component of their propaganda (thus widely known there), plausible, reinforced by history, I didn't find a single bit of evidence to the contrary for years since I learned about this aspect of Chinese political culture.

That may not be a positive proof, but I doubt there's a negative one either.

Dayuhan
01-18-2012, 10:41 PM
Selective reading will only confuse issues.

The key sentence is - Don't confine to China alone!

In a totalitarian regime, it is not that easy to organise an insurrection, but there are other countries too where the gap has widened a wee too large to close it and there is insurrection!

Crass Consumerism can be controlled and of that there is no doubt. One cannot replicate the West overnight. Anything done suddenly will have negative repercussions.

Are we talking about totalitarian regimes or about post-communist states turning to consumerism? Not a whole lot of overlap there.

In my experience "crass consumerism" usually refers to somebody else trying to get what he wants. What we want is never crass.

How would you propose to repress acquisitive impulses in post-communist environments? Restrict people's incomes? Control the goods available for purchase? Doesn't that suggest a return to communism, or something much like it?


It's an official line from China, component of their propaganda (thus widely known there), plausible, reinforced by history, I didn't find a single bit of evidence to the contrary for years since I learned about this aspect of Chinese political culture.

That may not be a positive proof, but I doubt there's a negative one either.

Obviously one can't prove such a contention either way, but I doubt that many who watch China on a day to day basis would agree that there's that level of consensus supporting the pseudo-communist regime. There's a great deal of discontent in China, and if they encounter serious economic problems - which is looking more likely by the day - it's hard to say what will happen.

Ray
01-19-2012, 01:21 PM
Are we talking about totalitarian regimes or about post-communist states turning to consumerism? Not a whole lot of overlap there.

In my experience "crass consumerism" usually refers to somebody else trying to get what he wants. What we want is never crass.

How would you propose to repress acquisitive impulses in post-communist environments? Restrict people's incomes? Control the goods available for purchase? Doesn't that suggest a return to communism, or something much like it?



I am talking about countries across the globe that did not follow western economic models.

It is obvious that What we want cannot be crass, but what one wants to satiate vanity or keeping up with the Joneses is what could be termed as ‘crass’ almost vulgar and nouveau riche.

Indeed, one can argue as to so what? True, but when such a Nation has people who can flaunt wealth which was not possible under a command economy, people do tend to believe that wealth is ill gotten and at the expense of the honest taxpayers. Result: Discontent!

As from Crass commercialism, the link below indicates that your interpretation - "crass consumerism" usually refers to somebody else trying to get what he wants. - is at variation to it.

The link indicates that it is a term referring to articles of culture which are based mostly on capitalist pursuits, while masquerading as being material of substance.

The 'crass' aspect of this is the thinness of the disguise, as many capitalist cultural ventures do not make attempts to hide their true purpose. In capitalist societies, such articles are very common, and so what is crass commercialism depends largely on perception.
(http://www.knowledgerush.com/kr/encyclopedia/Crass_commercialism/)

One does not restrict income to achieve limiting the symbols of vanity that creates a social discontent (and that is important for nations emerging with baby steps from the shadow of command economies i.e. State controlled economies). One merely increases the prices through taxation (which will go to the State coffers and help generate faster movement towards a market driven economy and narrowing the gap between social order). It would be something on the lines of heavy taxation on cigarettes in the UK to discourage smoking. Of course, there are possibly many other ways too!

It is obvious that such steps are hardly a return to communism.

In so far as China is concerned, there is discontent, as I discern, mainly because of the widening gap between the haves and have nots, the disparity between rural vs urban development and the disharmony in development between the interiors of China vs the coastal belt.

There must be many other reasons for the social unrest in China.

One could peruse “Social Instability in China: Causes, Consequences, and Implications”
http://csis.org/files/media/csis/events/061205_mizner_abstract.pdf

Ray
01-19-2012, 02:36 PM
In addition to the above, this is worth reading:


Over half of China's people now live in urban areas

Over the next ten years the government remained wary of free movement, even as it made its peace with free enterprise. Touting a policy of “leaving the land but not the villages, entering the factories but not cities”, it sought industrialisation without urbanisation, only to discover it could not have one without the other.

http://media.economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/original-size/20120121_WOC435.gif



http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2012/01/daily-chart-6

This influx will have to manage within the infrastructure available and that will not be adequate since the cities were not geared for such an influx.

The result is for everyone to see.

Ray
01-19-2012, 05:27 PM
Check this Youtube to see what are the conditions when the infrastructure cannot take the influx because the change to a market economy is done in a hurry. Applicable in all countries that are changing from command to market economies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2TLl6Nj6Oo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddU8rV7_Qis&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVuScVCF1Ws&feature=related

And see the misery of a migrant worker trying to return home for holidays all because the the railways are not geared inspite of modernisation.

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1120119/jsp/opinion/story_15021198.jsp

All this adds to woes. Woes lead to anger. And so on......;..

Dayuhan
01-19-2012, 11:11 PM
I have never yet clicked on a You Tube link purporting to provide economic or political analysis, and I'm not going to start now. The format doesn't suit the purpose.


The 'crass' aspect of this is the thinness of the disguise, as many capitalist cultural ventures do not make attempts to hide their true purpose. In capitalist societies, such articles are very common, and so what is crass commercialism depends largely on perception.

"Crassness" is entirely a matter of perception. As I said before, crass consumerism is what the other guy wants. Of course to the other guy, what you want is equally crass.


One does not restrict income to achieve limiting the symbols of vanity that creates a social discontent (and that is important for nations emerging with baby steps from the shadow of command economies i.e. State controlled economies). One merely increases the prices through taxation (which will go to the State coffers and help generate faster movement towards a market driven economy and narrowing the gap between social order). It would be something on the lines of heavy taxation on cigarettes in the UK to discourage smoking. Of course, there are possibly many other ways too!

The assumption that money going to the State will "help generate faster movement towards a market driven economy and narrowing the gap between social order" seems excessively optimistic to me.

Don't you think that State decisions on what should and should not be punitively taxed to discourage consumption has the potential to produce discontent as well... both among those who would like to consume those products and among those who earn their living producing them? Those who oppose crass consumerism often forget that without consumption there will be no production, and without production there will be no employment, and on down the line.


In so far as China is concerned, there is discontent, as I discern, mainly because of the widening gap between the haves and have nots, the disparity between rural vs urban development and the disharmony in development between the interiors of China vs the coastal belt.

There must be many other reasons for the social unrest in China.

There are many reasons for discontent in China, but they are as much connected to the Stete's efforts to maintain control as they are to excessively rapid decontrol.

Ray
01-20-2012, 06:18 PM
I have never yet clicked on a You Tube link purporting to provide economic or political analysis, and I'm not going to start now. The format doesn't suit the purpose.

Pictures tell a 1000 words!

If you have not started, then you have missed much.

As reliable as the media and think tank analysis! Since everything is but a Maya!

Better that others since one can see it with your one's own two eyes and accept or reject because one should have a mind of one's own!




"Crassness" is entirely a matter of perception. As I said before, crass consumerism is what the other guy wants. Of course to the other guy, what you want is equally crass.

True.

But then, one cannot be cleverer than those who are by profession wordsmiths unless one is self opinionated as say, Churchill who had such a command over the language and its nuances, but still self opinionated. I go by what experts say.

I gave you the interpretation what is believed by the world, but then ofcourse, one will always have one's own interpretation.

No contest!




The assumption that money going to the State will "help generate faster movement towards a market driven economy and narrowing the gap between social order" seems excessively optimistic to me.

Optimism helps one to hope.

However, I have an added advantage. I am living it and experience it, even though it is far from satisfactory.


Don't you think that State decisions on what should and should not be punitively taxed to discourage consumption has the potential to produce discontent as well... both among those who would like to consume those products and among those who earn their living producing them? Those who oppose crass consumerism often forget that without consumption there will be no production, and without production there will be no employment, and on down the line.


Discontent is to be measured pragmatically.

Everyone cannot be made happy. That is so obvious and it requires no explanation.

However, the aim is achieved if the majority is happy!

Production of the irrelevant to the nation growth can be forsaken for the overall social good. Production giving money and riches to the rich and leaving the poor poor, maybe good statistically on the GDP etc, but can lead to social discontent and chaos. And then there maybe no nation!

Nowhere has it been suggested that production should stop!

Ray
01-21-2012, 01:54 PM
This country's not for sale ... not for all the yuan in China

In fact, just this week, the President of China, Hu Jinato, said in a Chinese Communist Party magazine that “We must clearly see that international hostile forces are intensifying the strategic plot of westernizing and dividing China … We should deeply understand the seriousness and complexity of the ideological struggle, always sound the alarms and remain vigilant, and take forceful measures to be on guard and respond.”

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/this-countrys-not-for-sale-not-for-all-the-yuan-in-china/story-e6frezz0-1226238872468

Now, what exactly is this 'westernising' that he referring to?

What are the 'forces' that is causing it so?

Why is this 'ideological struggle' necessary when the Chinese people are getting all the want and having all the money in the world to buy such happiness?

Dayuhan
01-23-2012, 05:41 AM
Pictures tell a 1000 words!

If you have not started, then you have missed much.

As reliable as the media and think tank analysis! Since everything is but a Maya!

Better that others since one can see it with your one's own two eyes and accept or reject because one should have a mind of one's own!

Video is a medium remarkably well suited to illusion. I could take a camera into a Manila slum and cut together a piece showing that the people are happy and cheerful and loving life, or I could do the same and portray misery... depending on what pictures I use and how. The final product ends up telling the viewer less about the subject than about the prejudices of the person who made the video.

Media and think tank analyses are always suspect; they have to be approached with awareness of the implicit biases of the organization producing the report and countered with information from other sources.


But then, one cannot be cleverer than those who are by profession wordsmiths unless one is self opinionated as say, Churchill who had such a command over the language and its nuances, but still self opinionated. I go by what experts say.

"Experts" say all sorts of things, many of them incompatible with what other "experts" say.


I gave you the interpretation what is believed by the world, but then of course, one will always have one's own interpretation.

Is anything, anywhere ever "believed by the world"? Seems to me there's a fair variety of belief out there on almost every issue.


Production of the irrelevant to the nation growth can be forsaken for the overall social good. Production giving money and riches to the rich and leaving the poor poor, maybe good statistically on the GDP etc, but can lead to social discontent and chaos. And then there maybe no nation!

Nowhere has it been suggested that production should stop!

Who decides what the "overall social good" will be, if not the people themselves? Is not consumption and the personal decision to allocate resources the ultimate "vote"?

Suggesting that consumption be artificially constrained or externally directed implicitly suggests that production and employment must be similarly constrained and directed.

I dislike the whole "crass consumerism" construct because it's built on the idea that the elite have the right or obligation to decide what other people ought to want or have. That doesn't sound like a terribly good idea to me, and I see no reason to assume that it limits conflict. Where have we seen post-communist nations where security is threatened by "crass consumerism"? Certainly growth and the development of opportunities and options raises potential for conflict, but trying to artificially constrain growth and opportunity is going to create conflict too.

Who decides where the legitimate desire for a materially better life ends and "crass consumerism" begins? Would you want the State or some kind of elite telling you what you're supposed to want or how you ought to spend what you earn?


Now, what exactly is this 'westernising' that he referring to?

What are the 'forces' that is causing it so?

Sounds to me like somebody's seriously worried over economic developments and wants to trot out the boogeyman to get people rallied behind the flag.


Why is this 'ideological struggle' necessary when the Chinese people are getting all the want and having all the money in the world to buy such happiness?

The Chinese people aren't getting all they want, they don't have all the money in the world, and an awful lot of them want more than they can have. That's not a stable situation.

davidbfpo
04-24-2012, 05:12 PM
An update on the events in Wukan, with Communist Party officials being expelled from the party:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-17821844

There are two links to other reports. On a quick read it appears that a compromise was reached some months ago, unlike other villages involved in conflict with the state and party.

flagg
07-04-2012, 07:35 AM
Probably exaggerated, still of interest... the list could be a whole lot longer:

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/07/02/5_signs_of_the_chinese_economic_apocalypse

Keep an eye on iTulip.com forum for analysis of the China slowdown.

It's well worth putting on the reading list for analysis on China as well as the entire GFC.

davidbfpo
07-04-2012, 10:04 AM
Prompted by the wider context given in the link within the above post I have posted this BBC News report on recent public order incidents or rioting:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-18623085

davidbfpo
10-30-2013, 02:57 PM
Was the jeep fire a "violent terrorist attack" in Tiananmen Square on Monday October 28th China's 9/11? The square IMHO is a similar iconic target, even if the two dead and thirty-eight injured are not comparable to 9/11.

The initial reporting was minimal, partly as the Chinese authorities moved rapidly to control information, taking images off Weibo (China's main social media site) for example and declaring martial law in the vicinity for a time.

Today China has admitted, citing Xinhua news agency:
The police said that what happened at Tiananmen Square was a "violent terrorist attack" which was "carefully planned and organised".

Today five suspects have been detained who it is suspected come from the Muslim Uighur minority in the restive western region of Xinjiang.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-24742810 and http://news.yahoo.com/uighur-group-fears-crackdown-tiananmen-crash-031852215.html

There is a thread which includes Xinjiang, China's Far West provinces (inc. Tibet) at:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/forumdisplay.php?f=84

davidbfpo
11-01-2013, 11:13 PM
Meng Jianzhu, chief of the commission for political and legal affairs of the ruling Communist party:
The violent terrorist incident that happened in Beijing is an organised and plotted act. Behind the instigation is the terrorist group East Turkestan Islamic Movement entrenched in central and west Asian regions

According to the story:
Alleged terrorist group has not claimed responsibility and critics accuse China of using its name to excuse repression of Uighurs

Link:http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/01/china-blames-east-turkestan-islamic-movement-beijing-attack

davidbfpo
11-02-2013, 08:05 PM
A CSM article title and sub-title:
What the Tiananmen Square attack reveals about China's security state; China blames a Uighur separatist group for the Tiananmen car attack this week. But that's highly unlikely, analysts say.

The key point:
On the contrary, say a number of Chinese and foreign experts on security in Xinjiang. In the restive far western province where most Uighurs live, they say, it may have been the attackers’ very lack of ties to any organization that helped them evade the Chinese police.

Link:http://m.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2013/1101/What-the-Tiananmen-Square-attack-reveals-about-China-s-security-state

Ray
11-07-2013, 05:16 PM
Icon indeed.

But it has only caused China to 'lose face'.

And for China, one could assume it was as big an attack as 9/11.

'Losing Face' is a very big issue.

The terrorists seem to be slowly taking grip over and cocking the snook at the the Chinese 'harmony & stability' mantra.

Another iconic building, one of the State Communist HQ at Tiayuan, in the Shanxi Province was subjected to a terrorist attack, causing one death and several injured!

davidbfpo
11-09-2013, 02:26 PM
An explanation for the Tiananmen Square attack, via a link in The Guardian to Radio Free Asia:
....recollected Hesen (the jeep driver) making an emotional speech soon after some 100 police officers surrounded the mosque as workers demolished the courtyard.

Hesen made the speech as he told the mosque community to stand down after they argued with the armed police.

“At that time, Usmen Hesen jumped in and persuaded the community to disperse by saying, ‘Today they have won and we have lost because they are carrying guns and we have nothing—but don’t worry, one day we will do something ourselves’,” Turdi said.

“As Usmen Hesen finished his emotional speech, [his mother] Kuwanhan Reyim (also in the jeep) went to him crying, and hugged and kissed his forehead because of her pride in him. The crowd was also moved to tears and retreated.”

Link:http://www.rfa.org/english/news/uyghur/demolition-11062013163042.html

The Guardian article has other views and links:http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/08/china-tiananmen-explosion-increase-dissent-repression

Bill Moore
03-01-2014, 08:05 PM
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_CHINA_TRAIN_STATION_ATTACK?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-03-01-13-30-50

China: Train station attack an act of terrorism


BEIJING (AP) -- China's official Xinhua News Agency says authorities consider the attack by a group of knife-wielding assailants at a train station in southwestern China in which at least 27 people died to be an act of terrorism.

Xinhua did not identify who might have been responsible for the Saturday evening attack at the Kunming Railway Station in Yunnan province. But the news agency said authorities considered it to be "an organized, premeditated violent terrorist attack."

davidbfpo
03-01-2014, 08:46 PM
That is a shocker. I had to check Kunming's location, it is near the Vietnamese border and a very long way from the known, occasional flash point in Xinjiang Province - where knives have been the preferred weapon in attacks. This maybe a repeat of the jeep attack in Tienanmen Square last year.

http://www.chinatravelca.com/wp-content/uploads/Kunming-map.jpg

Bill Moore
03-01-2014, 11:47 PM
That is a shocker. I had to check Kunming's location, it is near the Vietnamese border and a very long way from the known, occasional flash point in Xinjiang Province - where knives have been the preferred weapon in attacks. This maybe a repeat of the jeep attack in Tienanmen Square last year.

I guess it could be tied to the Uighers, but I think there are quite a few other possibilities. Heck, it could be a Green Peace like movement on steroids. If you Google unrest in Kunming you'll find several articles going back a few years.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/12/chinese-villagers-factory-polluting-police-baha-attack

Chinese villagers attack factory after reports of polluting


Environmental protests are on the rise in China, with the public becoming increasingly critical of the fouling of the country's air, soil and waterways during decades of breakneck development. The unrest poses a serious political challenge to the Communist party – anger over the party's response, or lack thereof, to environmental crises has fuelled wider dissatisfaction with corruption and a lack of official accountability.

Most protests have taken place along China's developed coastal region, reflecting the area's heavy pollution from industry as well as the rising demands of the country's well-off. But the latest unrest was in rural Yunnan, indicating the protest has now spread further inland.

Yunnan's provincial capital, Kunming, was the site of large protests last year against a planned petroleum refinery that were largely peaceful despite minor scuffles between demonstrators and police.

Maybe more to the point, is the rail road itself?

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2014/02/08/travel/railroading-debt-into-laos/#.UxJds42Ybug


Railroading debt into Laos

The construction of an ambitious rail link between Kunming and Vientiane reflects China's growing economic clout in Southeast Asia

However, the plan sparked surprisingly vocal protests from Lao villagers whose rural communities would be at threat of being bulldozed away.

Now, both governments involved have become more determined in their bid to push ahead, and one-party states are not known for being listening for too long to the voices of those opposing bureaucratically ordained projects.

Then again terrorist attacks are not unheard of in Kunming, in the run up to the Olympics in 2008....

http://ww4report.com/node/5818


China: Kunming blasts signal growing unrest in countdown to Olympics

BEIJING — Two public buses exploded during the Monday morning rush hour in the city of Kunming, killing at least two people and injuring 14 others in what the authorities described as deliberate attacks as China is tightening security nationwide and warning of possible terrorist threats in advance of next month's Olympic Games.

While it is difficult to cease speculating, I don't claim to have a clue on what actually prompted this attack.

davidbfpo
03-02-2014, 01:14 PM
I don't dismiss the possibility that the Kunming attack originates locally, but from faraway I'd still go for a link to Xinjiang - which is of course what the (official) Chinese media are indicating.

There is a thread on the violence in China's Far West, which includes Xinjiang Province:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=246

Normally I'd post this report there, today it is here:
Police in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region on Friday shot dead six attackers, while another six died in an explosion, local authorities revealed Saturday.

Two explosions took place in a beauty salon and a grocery market in Xinhe county, Aksu prefecture at around 6:40 pm Friday. A group of terrorist suspects threw explosives at police, who were making arrests, and police opened fire and gunned down six, the Xinjiang government announced on its official website ts.cn.

Link:http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/839350.shtml#.UxMeDuN_vk9

It is noteworthy that I've yet to see any foreign reporting from Kunming, where I'd be surprised foreign reporters are based. In the past far better, non-orchestrated reporting has come from non-Chinese sources, e.g. a visiting BBC World Service reporter in Lhasa, Tibet a few years ago.

Bill Moore
03-02-2014, 07:02 PM
It is noteworthy that I've yet to see any foreign reporting from Kunming, where I'd be surprised foreign reporters are based. In the past far better, non-orchestrated reporting has come from non-Chinese sources, e.g. a visiting BBC World Service reporter in Lhasa, Tibet a few years ago.

Not surprisingly there is no additional news coming from China, what did sort of surprise me is the lack of social media reporting from Kunming. In an article I read yesterday it stated China's government effectively removed most SM comments related to the attack. That could have been done for good reasons, for example, to prevent social rage movement against the Uyghurs who may or may not have been the culprits. It may also have been blocked to cover something up.

As a tactic, the cat is out of the bag. I suspect there will be copy cat attacks in the future globally along these lines. Based on what little I could find on witness accounts it didn't seem the attackers were well versed in the best way to inflict lethal blows with a knife, since more than one witness said they were focused on the striking the head and shoulders. Probably would have been more fatalities if they chose other target areas.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/27-dead-train-station-knife-attack-china-article-1.1707232


Sean Roberts, a cultural anthropologist at George Washington University who has studied Uighurs and China for two decades, said the Kunming violence would be a new kind of attack for ethnic Uighurs — premeditated, well-organized and outside Xinjiang — but still rudimentary in weaponry.

“If it is true that it was carried out by Uighurs, it’s much different than anything we’ve seen to date,” Roberts said by phone.

If it was Uyghurs this particular group doesn't seem to be tied to Al-Qaeda (some are, and we captured and killed a few in Afghanistan over the years), because they probably would have access to explosives and other weapons. I wouldn't rule out a martial art cult either.

omarali50
03-03-2014, 06:44 AM
Kunming apparently has a Uighur slum that has even been the site of some Chinese "hearts and minds" efforts. http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1439152/uygur-community-kunming-under-heavy-police-watch-after-bloody-massacre
This level of dedication to hopeless causes takes Muslims, so i personally dont have any doubt that it was Uighurs.
The CCP will surely crack down hard, but they are also trying NOT to ignite a major domestic media storm. It doesnt look good for the state to have such problems in the first place. Raises doubts about the mandate of heaven. http://shanghaiist.com/2014/03/03/news-of-kunming-attack-absent-from-chinas-front-pages.php
btw, Pakistani conspiracy theorists are convinced its CIA trying to destabilize China.

AdamG
04-22-2014, 09:24 AM
Riots in southeastern China after brutal police-inspector killed a man with a hammer in broad daylight. People smashed several police cars and were attacked with tear gas.

At least 4 Chengguan, the most hated police-inspectors in China, were beaten to death by angry people in Cangnan County of Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province (located in the industrial southeast), after they killed a man with a hammer. The police-inspectors hit the man with a hammer until he started to vomit blood, because he was trying to take pictures of their violence towards a woman, a street vendor. The man was rushed to hospital, but died on the way.

Thousands of angry people took to the streets, surrounded the police-inspectors in their van, attacked them with stones, bats, and beat them to death. People were shouting that the police-inspectors be killed on the spot for what they did: “Kill them! Kill them!”

Read more at http://libertycrier.com/china-violent-government-thugs-beaten-death-angry-crowds-killed-man-documenting-brutality/#t2pyCBoAjq41imth.99

davidbfpo
04-22-2014, 05:31 PM
There are more details on thsi French report, which explains that thsoe attacked were not the regular or state police, but auxiliaries tasked to regulate street trading:
he Chengguan are notorious in China. According to a report (http://www.hrw.org/news/2012/05/23/china-unaccountable-chengguan-forces-fuel-public-resentment) by Human Rights Watch, branches have been set up in more than 650 cities in China. Yet no overarching framework (http://www.hrw.org/news/2012/05/23/china-unaccountable-chengguan-forces-fuel-public-resentment) exists to regulate and supervise these parallel police units. As a result, Chengguan have earned a reputation for “brutality and impunity” [Editor's note: in 2009, a guide (http://observers.france24.com/content/20090423-handbook-beating-street-traders-chinese-policemen-china) appeared instructing Chengguan on the arts of ‘beating up’ illegal street traders]. Several victims allege to have bore the brunt of this abuse, including being “punched, kicked” and “thrown from their vehicle into the street”.

Link:http://observers.france24.com/content/20140421-residents-chinese-city-stage-brutal-backlash-against-%E2%80%98chengguan%E2%80%99-police-unit

davidbfpo
01-03-2016, 12:16 AM
A BBC commentary by Raffaello Pantucci, of RUSI and close observer of China's activity in the far west Xinjiang Province. He asks:
China's long-discussed counter-terrorism legislation, passed this week, frames the way the country will counter terrorist threats at home and abroad. But it is capable of getting to the root of the problem?

(He concludes) If China wants to be able to properly and effectively tackle its terrorism problems at home and abroad, it needs to start to think in this way too. It needs to find a way to not only disrupt terror networks but to understand why people are drawn to terror in the first place and how it can address the issue.
Link:http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-35199712

Bill Moore
07-04-2016, 12:40 AM
http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/18998/amid-crackdown-china-s-dissidents-fight-to-keep-the-spirit-of-tiananmen-alive

Amid Crackdown, China’s Dissidents Fight to Keep the Spirit of Tiananmen Alive

In
the years following the bloodshed in 1989, during which hundreds or even thousands died, a number of surviving political activists struggled to carry on the legacy of nonviolent resistance. Their endeavors were met with merciless government suppression, and a spate of arrests ensued.


In the spring of 2008, dissidents including the prominent writer Liu Xiaobo drafted Charter 08, a petition calling for human rights, democracy and the end of one-party rule in China, which was initially signed by a coalition of 303 Chinese citizens and posted online in December 2008. The idea of Charter 08, free for anyone to sign, was that its signatories would form a loose group with the common cause of promoting human rights and democracy in China.

The article describes how this movement was rapidly suppressed. It further illustrates that non-violent resistance has little chance of success when the state maintains control of its security forces and is willing to use oppressive measures against its own people. The West remains relatively silent because of their economic interests.


The collective suffering of China’s dissidents, known only to a tiny population of the country, is enormous, while the concrete results of their sacrifices are difficult to see.


All these recent developments bode ill for the future of political opposition in China. As prominent dissident Mo Zhixu wrote, “Grassroots resistance is entering the toughest period. How to cope with the increasingly frozen ‘ice age’ will be a test to all activists.”

One can continue to hope the Chinese people will rise up and compel change, but I tend to think that is a long shot, not one we should bet on.

AdamG
06-21-2018, 07:51 PM
If you're looking to post something about John Oliver on Chinese social media this week, chances are you can't. The British television host been censored on China's biggest social media site, just days after he criticised Chinese President Xi Jinping on his popular US show Last Week Tonight.

In the show's latest episode, Mr Oliver highlights the political, human rights and economic issues China is currently facing, and delivers some striking criticisms of the Chinese government.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-44557528

AdamG
06-27-2018, 07:15 PM
BEIJING – On Chinese state television broadcasts, President Xi Jinping is often shown clad in battle fatigues inspecting troops, praising their service, and hailing the People's Liberation Army as key to the country's rising global power.

But the nationalist drumbeat rings hollow for many retired soldiers who feel left behind, and they have taken to the streets in droves to complain about having to fend for themselves with meager pensions and little support. The unrest poses a delicate political challenge for Xi, who has made his affinity for the military one of the pillars of his folksy image.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2018/06/26/large-army-veteran-protests-in-china-pose-challenge-for-xi.html

AdamG
08-14-2018, 12:35 PM
The officers took Liu’s iPhone, hooked it up to a handheld device that looked like a laptop and told him they were “checking his phone for illegal information”.
Liu’s experience in Urumqi, the Xinjiang capital, is not uncommon in a region that has been wracked by separatist violence and a crackdown by security forces. But such surveillance technologies, tested out in the laboratory of Xinjiang, are now quietly spreading across China. Government procurement documents collected by Reuters and rare insights from officials show the technology Liu encountered in Xinjiang is encroaching into cities like Shanghai and Beijing.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-monitoring-insight/from-laboratory-in-far-west-chinas-surveillance-state-spreads-quietly-idUSKBN1KZ0R3

Bill Moore
08-26-2018, 07:18 PM
China's internal ideological warfare seeks to promote so-called correct thinking and love for the f'd up communist party.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/08/22...-end-in-sight/

China’s Mass Internment Camps Have No Clear End in Sight
Around 1 million Uighurs have disappeared without trial. Worse may come.


It is not surprising, then, that the most common officially cited purpose for the internment camps is to purify people’s thoughts, “eliminating extremism” and instilling a love for the party. A recorded announcement leaked this month from Xinjiang’s Communist Party Youth League, designed to calm rampant fears about the re-education camps, explained that camps “treat and cleanse the virus from their brains.” The names used for camps have varied widely, both for the same camp over time and from one camp to the next, but most have included the word “transformation”—for example, “concentrated education transformation center.”

This is the real Chinese Communist Party, as ugly as it have ever been throughout its long history of repressing its people. Once again we see mass internment, and the party leveraging a youth league to impose its will. It reminds me of Mao's atrocities when he used youth leagues to conduct mass murder of teachers and others who didn't have the correct political views. Today the world can see it happen, but much of the world turns a blind eye to it. Why? To pursue a superficial Chamberlain peace in our time? In hope of gaining economic benefit through trade with China that could be damaged if they demonstrated incorrect thinking? There is a point when the illusion of the communist party as modern political party that shares many common interests with the majority of the advanced countries must end.


The content of the indoctrination reflects a new emphasis on nationalism throughout the PRC. State media outlets tout the party as China’s savior as they always have, but “China” is now more tightly linked to the culture of the ethnic majority, the Han Chinese. In this view, religions deemed foreign, for example Islam and Christianity, are seen as threats, as is the purportedly Chinese religion of Buddhism when it is practiced by non-Han people such as Tibetans. More than any leader since Mao Zedong, Xi Jinping has promoted the idea that he himself is the embodiment and protector of the Chinese nation. In some camps, inmates are required to replace the common Islamic blessing before meals, bismillah, with thanks to Xi Jinping.

It isn't just Uighers, but CCP also suppresses other religions such as Tibetan Buddhists and Christians. The state has destroyed numerous churches, and put large pictures of Xi in the churches remaining. I guess he views himself as superior to Jesus Christ, or maybe it is Christianity with CCP socialist traits? Despite this the Pope recently reached out to China to reach some sort of accommodation, but now the Pope has recently awakened from the illusion that accommodations can be made with the CCP at an acceptable cost.

There is no limit to the CCP's brashness:
The strangest of these were the coerced line-dancing competitions that spread across the region in 2014. These were supposed to move people away from “extremist” forms of Islam that forbid dance. In other places they pushed children to sign promises not to believe in God and arranged public ceremonies for pledging loyalty to the CCP.


The following is not wild speculation, there is ample historical evidence that provides credibility for this assertion.


Local officials have already expressed dehumanizing outlooks on the role of the re-education camps as “eradicating tumors” and “spraying chemicals on the crops to kill the weeds.” Should authorities decide that forced indoctrination has widely failed, much of Xinjiang’s minority population will be framed as irredeemable. And with the state-controlled Global Times claiming, in response to the recent U.N. condemnation of China’s racial policies in Xinjiang, that “all measures can be tried” in the pursuit of China’s “stability,” mass murder and genocide do not look like impossible outcomes.

When viewed as a whole, hyper-nationalism promoted by the CCP; rapid expansion of its military which it uses to coerce other nations; illegal expansion of its territory; mass internment camps, and a return to youth leagues to enforce "correct thinking, " it is clear that dangerous storm clouds are forming in East Asia. Mao used the youth leagues to kill millions, and then the CCP promoted the same behavior in Cambodia when they supported the Khmer Rouge. The trade war should be the least of our concerns. Communism is a sick form of extremism that is at least as evil as the pseudo-religious ideology that ISIS claims to adhere to.

Bill Moore
08-30-2018, 07:59 AM
https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2018/08/china-pathologizing-uighur-muslims-mental-illness/568525/

China Is Treating Islam Like a Mental Illness


Here’s an excerpt from an official Communist Party audio recording, which was transmitted last year to Uighurs via WeChat, a social-media platform, and which was transcribed and translated by Radio Free Asia:

Members of the public who have been chosen for reeducation have been infected by an ideological illness. They have been infected with religious extremism and violent terrorist ideology, and therefore they must seek treatment from a hospital as an inpatient. … The religious extremist ideology is a type of poisonous medicine, which confuses the mind of the people. … If we do not eradicate religious extremism at its roots, the violent terrorist incidents will grow and spread all over like an incurable malignant tumor.

Bill Moore
08-30-2018, 08:17 AM
https://www.ibtimes.co.in/after-islam-china-cracks-down-christianity-razes-churches-confiscates-bibles-777252

After Islam, China cracks down on Christianity; razes churches and confiscates Bibles

Police officers are known to have visited hundreds of churches in Henan, ordering that they be shut down. Officials also showed up at a church and ordered the removal of paintings of the Last Supper and wall calligraphy of Bible verses


While China is known to crack down on ethnic minority Muslims, especially in the north-western region of Xinjiang, its latest focus seems to be on the Christians residing in the country. The ruling communist party has raised serious concerns after it recently raided and demolished hundreds of churches in China and also confiscated Bibles and other holy books in the province of Henan.

Bill Moore
09-01-2018, 06:02 PM
https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2018/country-chapters/china-and-tibet

Human Rights Watch Report on China

When a state becomes a police state it becomes a non-state. It is a political entity that is only sustained by force. A fragile mass that China risks setting ablaze with its abusive policies. Just as concerning is watching the world turn a blind eye to increasingly abusive police state.


China’s growing global influence means many of its rights violations now have international implications. In April, security officials at the United Nations headquarters in New York City ejected from the premises Dolkun Isa, an ethnic Uyghur rights activist, who was accredited as a nongovernmental organization (NGO) participant to a forum there; no explanation was provided.

In June, the European Union failed for the first time ever to deliver a statement under a standing agenda item at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) regarding country situations requiring the council’s attention. This stemmed from Greece blocking the necessary EU consensus for such an intervention due to its unwillingness to criticize human rights violations in China, with which it has substantial trade ties. Chinese officials continued throughout the year to pressure governments around the world to forcibly return allegedly corrupt mainland officials despite a lack of legal protections in China or refugee status determination procedures outside China.


At the UN Security Council, China joined Russia in February in a double veto of a resolution that would have imposed sanctions related to use of chemical weapons in Syria. In September, the council held closed-door discussions on Burmese military atrocities against Burma’s Rohingya Muslim minority; diplomats said China opposed language recognizing the right of return of the more than 630,000 Rohingya refugees who fled to Bangladesh. While senior UN officials described the military campaign as “ethnic cleansing,” Chinese state media endorsed it as a firm response to “Islamic terrorists.”

Bill Moore
09-01-2018, 06:08 PM
https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/02/02/deafening-silence-chinas-human-rights-abuses

The Deafening Silence on China's Human Rights Abuses
Published in Al Jazeera

It is amazing that cowardly European countries feel obligated to criticize President Trump, and admittedly there is much to criticize, BUT they remain dead silent on much more important issues. At least President Trump has the courage to hold China accountable for unfair trade practices, while the EU seeks to use this opportunity for personal gain.


The question for democracies or businesses isn't whether to engage: it is how to engage in a principled manner. This means treating China like many governments treat US President Donald Trump when he makes outrageous statements or adopts retrograde policies. Democratic leaders condemn Trump's remarks about "fake news" - but don't condemn China for its censorship or propaganda. They criticise Trump for his hostility towards the UN, but have nothing to say on China's efforts to weaken the institution.

It is time for new standards to reverse these highly abnormal relationships with China. Forty years into China's "reform era", Beijing has made clear it's not moving on democracy, a free press, or an independent legal system, though courageous people continue to push for these at considerable personal risk. If powerful outside voices mindlessly engage, they not only stab these brave people in the back - they may also find themselves obliged to dance to the tune of a highly repressive government.

Bill Moore
09-22-2018, 06:22 PM
https://www.rferl.org/a/china-muslim-uyghur-christians-pompeo-assails-treatment/29503526.html

Pompeo Denounces China’s Treatment Of Uyghur, Christian Minorities


U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo denounced the "awful abuses" of Muslim Uyghurs detained in Chinese reeducation camps and criticized what he said was a government crackdown on Christians in the country.

The comments on September 21 come after a recent UN report assailed China’s mass internment of Uyghurs under the pretext of preventing extremism in the western Xinjiang region.

Bill Moore
09-22-2018, 06:27 PM
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/22/world/asia/china-vatican-bishops.html?action=click&contentCollection=world&contentPlacement=1&module=stream_unit&pgtype=sectionfront&region=stream&rref=collection/sectioncollection/world&version=latest

China and Vatican Reach Breakthrough on Appointment of Bishops



Under the breakthrough, Pope Francis recognized the legitimacy of seven bishops appointed by the Chinese government. Because they had not been selected by the Vatican, they had previously been excommunicated.


But for critics loath to share any of the church’s authority with an authoritarian government, the deal marked a shameful retreat and the setting of a dangerous precedent for future relations with other countries.



Critics of the deal, including a prominent cardinal in Hong Kong, have argued that it would send a signal that the Vatican did not stand up for those who stood up for it.

The Pope made a deal with the devil in hopes of expanding the Churches' influence by compromising with the Communist Party of China, even when his own experts in China recommended against it. I suspect the Pope will be greatly disappointed when he finds this deal does more harm than good for the Church.

Bill Moore
09-23-2018, 08:42 AM
http://www.atimes.com/article/why-china-fears-myanmars-christians/

Why China fears Myanmar’s Christians
China-backed United Wa State Party is clamping down on Christian churches, priests and missionaries in a move likely aimed to ferret out suspected US CIA-backed plots and operatives


The Chinese language statement, obtained and reviewed by Asia Times, pledges to punish any local administration cadres who support missionary activities, bans the construction of new Christian churches, and requires that priests and workers in existing churches must be local not foreign.


Hardly coincidentally, the announcement comes after John Cao, an ethnic Chinese pastor and permanent US resident of the state of North Carolina, was arrested in China in March for illegally crossing the Sino-Myanmar border. In June, he was sentenced to seven years in prison on immigration-related charges.


It is clear that China does not want a similar situation with US missionaries emerging in the neighboring Wa Hills. With Myanmar’s broad relations with the West deteriorating over the flight of some 800,000 Muslim Rohingyas into Bangladesh amid reports of abuse, China has turned the crisis into a diplomatic opportunity to regain earlier lost influence.

From that position of strength, Beijing seems keen to export its model of Christian repression into areas of Myanmar where it has sway and historical reasons to fear Western infiltration.

China also supports Burma in the UN when it veto's resolutions concerning the mistreatment of the Rohingya by Burmese security forces.

AdamG
11-15-2018, 03:12 AM
Hong Kong (CNN)Fear is sweeping through the campuses of China's elite universities following a nationwide government crackdown aimed at silencing left-wing student activists, who had been campaigning for greater rights and protections for ordinary workers.

Since August at least nine young Chinese labor advocates have been forcibly detained in major cities across the country, a sharp escalation in Beijing's campaign against student activism on university campuses.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/13/asia/china-student-marxist-missing-intl/index.html

AdamG
12-28-2018, 11:44 AM
ULAANBAATAR (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Mongolians took to the streets on Thursday to protest against corruption in the top echelons of politics, braving temperatures that dropped below minus 20 degrees Celsius in the capital, Ulaanbaatar.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mongolia-politics-idUSKCN1OQ0RG

davidbfpo
06-28-2019, 04:23 PM
An IISS Military Balance blog article that opens with:
Now with a more centralised command structure and enhanced use of new technology like uninhabited air vehicles, China’s People’s Armed Police is being transformed into a more reliable and effective force focused on three core missions – internal security, maritime security and supporting the People’s Liberation Army in times of war....(soon after)...Thirty years after the events of Tiananmen, the internal security mission remains of central importance to the Chinese government. However, it is the People’s Armed Police (PAP) and not the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) that now has primary responsibility for this task, and it is a force – like the PLA – undergoing significant change.
Link:https://www.iiss.org/blogs/military-balance/2019/06/china-pap?

Bill Moore
07-05-2019, 12:10 AM
In China's never ending crusade to control the narrative, they are portraying the protests in Hong Kong against the communist party and a perceived violation of the one-country, two-system agreement, as protests against America, or demonstrations in support of China. Amazing that this type of propaganda survives in the 21st Century, but it does due to China's Orwellian social controls.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlV_NzITCoM&feature=youtu.be