Reflective Learning Journal

Reflection learning journal

Based on numerous historical researches on Chinese civil society and politic system, the common statement tends to deny the existence of democracy in Chinese society (Brown, 2011). However, with more and more researches studying on Chinese village election mechanism, the consideration of rethinking civil society or democracy in Chinese context is brought up again. Influenced by “no democracy in china” statement, I always keep a suspicious attitude when discussing Chinese civil society or democracy issues. Besides, 1989 Tiananmen square event has left me a deep impression on China’s dark politics especially the arbitrary crackdown on protests by central government. On the contrary, responding measures adopted to deal with protests by local government rekindle my confidence to embrace some slimsy democracy in grassroots. For instance, several anti-PX (anti-pparaxylene) protests such as Xiamen protest is generally regarded as one important step heading in civil participation for Chinese local government (Cody, 2007; Tang, 2008). These information has built up my cognition on Chinese democracy: central government suppress civil liberty while local government does better on this issue because of their direct contact with grassroots. However, a dramatic reversal happens after I attend this module and read some relevant readings. According to Zhong (2003), central government always delegates local government to maintain stability and defuse popular discontent in appropriate way rather than sharpening contradiction. While local government often choose to strengthen their discretion to make profits for themselves. But why does this kind of possibility exist? Central-local relations may provide the answer. When Dr David O’Brien firstly mentioned about the disparity between the party and the regions, I feel confused because I never before linked the Chinese unbalanced development between regions to top-down system. Zhou’s (2009) article then has solved my doubt in this part. He mentioned about the joint mechanism by lower authorities to poll together several local authorities in order to avoid inspection work from central government. That is to say, even if local officials corrupt or misconduct, central government can hardly decide to punish them since lower authorities will unite to deceive central investigators. Because of this, appeal system becomes the most important mechanism for Chinese citizens especially for grassroots to make their political participation (Cai, 2004). However, it is still hard for ordinary people to petition because of the drain on manpower and material resources. All these difficulties increase the probability of civil unrest such as protest, which surprises me because I thought local protests reflect increasing democratic factors rather than misconducts of local government.

Different from my impression on Tiananmen square event, central government restricted violent repression or suppression on smooth protest and non-anti-regime activities hold by citizens (Cai,2008). However, local government develops their right of discretion may be because of their absolute authority in local and the blocked top-down command system. As Dr Wang Zhengxu introduces, when citizens choose to revolt their unfair treatment beyond endurance, local government tends to ignore their valid request. It finally turns out as collective protests or unrest despite harmonious society advocated by central government. Some protests lead to an happy ending such as Xiamen anti-PX protests. Jointly signed boycott by more than 100 members of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) successfully exposed the potential harm of this chemical plant project in the public view, which led a large-scale protests by Xiamen citizens and finally forced local government to relocate the project (Cody, 2007). Direct intervention of CPPCC has broken the traditional obstacle hindered between central government and local citizens. But can this pattern be replicated as an official system? Compared to Xiamen peaceful protest, other protests may lead to bloody suppression, such as Maoming protest and Wukan protest. Without direct intervention by superior departments, local government seems to be able to suppress protests under the pressure of vox populi. As Dr David O’Brien mentioned, the disparity of different regions in China is not only the economic one. Some places such as Beijing, local government is more afraid of causing discontented for local citizens, since it is easy for central government to master the situation and manage the local government. While in other cases, central government may feel weak to control the local government because of the long distance and those countless barriers in-between. Connecting with class discussion, I found that Hu kou (registered permanent residence) reflects not only the inequality in education, income and social welfare, but also to some extent the the degree of democratic because when something bad happened to you, you can hardly fight against the local government if the “the emperor is too far to handle the situation”. It may also reflect a fact that this kind of local-central relations can hardly result in democratic development because central government is too authoritative to challenge while local government tends to exceed their authorities without central permission and the local-central relations remain problematic.

To conclude, ET 4013 CN module has provided me some new points of view rethinking Chinese politics systems, including central-local relations pattern such as potentially problematic tiao-kuai system. My previous cognition about central government and local government on suppressing civil participation such as protests has been subverted because I found that different from Tiananman square event, central government tend to appease complaints through complying with the aspirations of people while local government hehaves conversely. Additionally, based on the lecture content of Dr David O’Brien and Dr Wang Zhengxu, I found the current tiao-kuai system problematic when dealing with anti-graft issues because the investigator is to some extent subordinate to those who under inspection, which is ridiculous for this supervision mechanism to function well. One-party system is also criticized by some scholars because of its absolute power which usually serves as a hotbed of corruption. Government and politics in contemporary China seems to be an everlasting learning class for me because every time I can update my cognition on the same issues and that it is an exciting study for doing researches in.

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Reference:

Brown, K. (2011). Ballot Box China: grassroots democracy in the final major one-party state (p. 40). London and New York: Zed Books.

Cai, Y. (2004). Managed participation in China. Political Science Quarterly, 119(3), 425-451.

Cai, Y. (2008). Local governments and the suppression of popular resistance in China. The China Quarterly, 193, pp. 24-42.

Zhou, X. (2009). The institutional logic of collusion among local governments in China. Modern China.

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