'As villagers get smarter, they become harder to manage.'
FP Blog has a good update on the situation in Wukan; it opens with:
Quote:
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:
Quote:
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:
Quote:
...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/article...ption?page=0,0
No news from Wukan: protests are far from an isolated anomaly
Hat tip to Open Democracy:
Quote:
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-...olated-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:
Quote:
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...lage-autonomy/
Chinese Riots over I-Phones - are they really the enemy of the future
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-f...,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/...d=T0Yvwq2eYTAC
Is this really the country we want to hang our hats on as the new threat to the United States?