On the Uigur Rebellion in Western China
Posted by Mike E on July 8, 2009
Uigur men form a barricade to protect their community
If you run across informative or radical analysis of this rebellion post links below in this thread.
(There are already some posts made on our bulletin board, Kasama Threads.)
The New York Times wrote:
“As northwest China’s Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region settled into tense stillness on Wednesday after three days of deadly ethnic violence, a Communist Party leader from the region pledged to seek the death penalty for anyone behind the strife that state news reports say claimed at least 156 lives….A wide variety of government policies here in the western desert region of Xinjiang, a lightly populated area that covers about a sixth of China’s total landmass, has for years led many of the area’s 10 million Uighurs to believe their culture and livelihoods were under assault by the Han Chinese, the dominant ethnic group in China, according to local residents, foreign scholars and recent studies of the area.
“The policies include limits on religious practice, the phasing out of Uighur-language instruction in schools and the reinforcement of better economic opportunities for the Han, from businesspeople to migrant workers.”
For now, here is a brief quote from the August 28, 2008, the Financial Times: (thanks to Louis Proyect):
The increasing importance of the Muslim-dominated Xinjiang autonomous region as a source of the energy and minerals needed to fuel China’s booming eastern cities is raising the stakes for Beijing in its battle against separatists agitating for an independent state.
“The Chinese didn’t want to let Xinjiang be independent before, but after they built all the oilfields, it became absolutely impossible,” said one Muslim resident in Korla, who asked not to be named for fear of retribution by government security agents.
The desert around the city is punctuated every kilometre or two by oil and gas derricks, each of them topped with the red Chinese national flag, an assertion of sovereignty over every inch of the energy-rich ground.
In 2005, Xinjiang’s local government was allotted only Rmb240m ($35m, €24m, £19m) out of the Rmb14.8bn in tax revenue from the petrochemical industries that are based in the region.
In Korla, the oil industry is under the control of a subsidiary of PetroChina, the state-owned energy giant, which answers directly to its head office in Beijing.
“We don’t have the power to tell them to do anything – they only listen to their bosses in Beijing,” said one local government official who asked not to be named.
Many of Korla’s original Uighur residents feel they have missed out altogether on the few benefits that have trickled down to the region from the rapid extraction of its energy resources.
Terry Townsend said
A year old, but here’s Green Left Weekly’s article on this: http://www.greenleft.org.au/2008/746/38568
Miles Ahead said
From the comments on both this post and the one “Uigur Ballad”, plus the news coming out of China (and interpreted by the western press), I still don’t have a real sense of what the hell is going on, except this has pretty much been a slaughter; the Chinese government and military is trying to quell the violence (?—from reports I’ve heard, this has more to do with preserving some image of a united China to the rest of the world. Hu Jintao even left the G8 summit, to return to China.).
Some glib remarks about cowboy hats (in “Uigur Ballad”) just doesn’t cut it for me.
There was a report on CNN international last night about a prior “movement” to encourage many Han Chinese to “go West” to up production in the region and bring it up to national standards. However, given the fact that the Uigur people are mostly Muslim, yes, there is the question of the Han being given preferential treatment say economically, but politically what is really going on here? Was the Xinjiang province really semi-autonomous, and what does that autonomy really mean? And BTW, I’m really asking.
In a former post, “Nuclear Fallout in Maoist China then and now” (http://mikeely.wordpress.com/2009/06/18/speaking-out-about-nuclear-fallout-in-maoist-china-then-and-now/) something else was raised about the Uigur minority, and I am also wondering how much effect this had on the Uigur people politically, even though it was several years ago. Has there been underlying divisions and a festering hatred culturally and politically long before this violent outbreak?
From “Nuclear Fallout…”:
Mike E said
The question of autonomy in the Chinese post-revolutionary structures is covered in some length in my writings on Tibet.
http://mikeely.wordpress.com/2009/05/01/the-true-story-of-maoist-revolution-in-tibet-part-2/
The Chinese revolution developed as a great storm in the heart of the Han regions of China. In the national minority areas (which are half of China’s landmass, mainly in border areas, and often very sparcely populated) the revolution often had only tenuous roots, if any at all, when the initial 1949 victory happened.
In many ways, autonomy meant that the pace of revolutionary change and the policy of governance were localized in areas outside majority Han regions. In Tibet, for example, the Lamaist monks (and the Dalai Lama) remained in power for ten years — their positions were not initially touched, even while changes started to arise from Tibet’s growing connection to commodities, trade and the ideas of the revolution.
At its core, this was rooted in the idea that revolution has to be the act of the people themselves — and that if radical changes were simply imposed from without (by the revolutionary army or party), they would not be real or lasting. It is not simple or automatic, of course, that the people in any given area then decide (voluntarily) to discard their old society (and its traditions and religions) — and so contradictions arise as revolution advances in the society overall, and doesn’t in some particular areas (or institutions, or spheres of society).
All through the socialist period (under Mao) there were very sharp contestations and struggles over how to view the culture and religions of national minorities — and what precisely the policy of autonomy would mean.
This is covered (in connection with Tibet) in part 3 of “The Maoist Revolution in China”:
http://mikeely.wordpress.com/2009/05/01/the-true-story-of-maoist-revolution-in-tibet-part-3/
And clearly, those struggles were resolved (for the worse) in the decades after Mao’s death — and there clearly earlier approaches of autonomy have been replaced by some crude policy expressions of Han chauvinism wedded to resource exploitation.
And a sharply different set of contradictions posed themselves when Chinese society (as a whole) went through a restoration of capitalism — and the central state’s approach to the border areas had nothing to do with a “mass line” or advancing the revolution — but focused (increasingly and ruthlessly) on the extraction of raw materials for the larger economy, and on the “development” of western areas through Han migration.
There remain still some examples of different policies in the border regions — for example, Han people are limited to one child, but non-Han nationalities are encouraged to grow and don’t face such population limits. But overall, there has clearly been a reversal — giving rise to sharp contradictions: both contradictions between oppressed minorities and the central state, and acute antagonism between the Han immigrants and the minority peoples.
* * * * * *
While we are talking…. I’d like to note that Louis Proyect (whose writings on many topics I find valuable) wrote a rather disappointingly dogmatic and uniformed commentary on the question of nationalities in China.
The heart of his analysis is this:
There are some things that stand out:
1) the opening sentence refers to the period “between 1949 and the mid-80s” — as if they are one thing. It may be true that 5 million Han people entered Xinjiang from eastern China aover that period…. But in fact, the policies were radically different in the Mao period (1949-76) and then in the Deng period (1976 forward). And the most aggressive policies of Han migration took place after the restoration of capitalism in the mid-70s. In other words, the rather sloppy combining of the periods can be used to imply that Mao was the father of a policy of chauvinist assimilation, when the opposite was the case.
2) This analysis rather crudely relies on a quick, passing summation in the NYTimes for analysis of the nationalities policies during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution — which (does it need to be said) is a rather sloppy policy. (I.e. the New York Times makes a tidy anti-Mao anti-GPCR statement, and cuz that fits someone’s preconceived notions, the NYT paragraph gets adopted to reinforce the preconceived notions.) I have to confess that I have not done the serious research needed to know what the experience in Xinjiang was, during the GPCR — my point here is that neither has Louis.
3) There is a similar apriori notion here in regard to Mao’s policy and Stalin. The assumption here is a sequence of assumptions: (1) Lenin had the correct universal policies for natonalities under socialism, (2) (Stalin departed from Lenin’s policy on nationalities, a(3) Maoism is just an application of general Stalinism to China, and finally, therefore (4) Mao’s policies in Xinjiang are an extension of Stalin’s approach (to the Baltic states, or the Caucasus) etc.
This approach is wrong as a method, and factually absurd once you actually investigate.
First, I think it was a mistake (of the comintern) to assume that the communist nationality problems in Eastern Europe applied universally (all countries, all national minorities, all time). Certainly the thinking concentrated in Stalin’s 1912 writings on “the national question” were an improvement over the often chauvinist and colonialist approaches of various socialists around the world (including notoriously the U.S. Socialist movement which included openly racist elements and at best indifference to the oppression of Black and Native peoples.)
And it has to be noted that, within the Russian Bolshevik movement, Stalin was the articulator of Lenin’s theoretical approach to nationalities in the period before the revolution — any “air” between them came later and on a largely non-theoretical plane of difficult choices in the heat of battle.
China did not apply either Lenin’s approach or Stalin’s. they did their own independent analysis — which was important because China was (in fact) quite different from the Tsarist empire. And the difference started with the fact that all of China (including the Han regions) suffered sharply from national oppression at the hands of foreign imperialists (who were carving up the country, and flooding it with cheap commodities and opium that shattered the old social order).
Also many of the border nationalities (in a way similar to indigenous peoples in many parts of the world) did not have in any practical sense the possiblity of considering national independence — i.e. Tibet (scattered, weak, without a national market or economy) was not going to emerge (in 1949) as an independent country — it was either going to be part of the British sphere of south asia, or part of China. And so, the Maoist approach was to develop autonomous regions within the context of a newly liberated China.
Summing this up is not easy, and in some ways the writings I did a decade ago are not as subtle and nuanced as i would like — however the answer is not (as Louis implies) to apply Lenin’s principles to china, while dropping Stalin’s. That approach will not solve political problems generally, and suggesting it for china really misses the whole history of the Chinese revolution, its particularities, and its rather significant and necessary rupture with the policies of both Lenin and Stalin.
louisproyect said
Mike, you seem to skirt the whole question of Lenin’s Testament. Have you read it? What do you make of it?
Mike E said
Thanks for writing Louis.
Sometimes a world of method and assumptions lie coiled up in a quick comment.
We are discussing the history of nationalities in China, and Louis’ comment is that we are skirting “the whole question of Lenin’s testament.”
hmmmm.
Well, if lenin’s last letter doesn’t come up, it may be because it is not particularly relevant.
yes I have studied what is sometimes called Lenin’s “last testament”, and the whole history around it. (Among other things starting with Moshe Lewin’s “Lenin’s Last Struggle” when it came out in 1969). For those unaware of this: The communist leader V.I. Lenin, as he was dying, wrote a letter to the congress of his party, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, discussing each of the party’s second tier leaders — with some very sharp critiques and suggestions. And, among them, is a criticism of Joseph Stalin for rudeness and a suggestion (in an addendum) that Stalin be removed as general secretary (a very powerful post).
While we are talking, part of the “rudeness” criticized was personal (Stalin’s rudeness to Krupskaya in particular precipitated a break) — but part of it involved his heavy-handed approach to the nation of Georgia (in the Caucasus). Stalin was himself a Georgian, and one of the minority nationality communists in the top leadership of the Communist party — but he was criticized for a high-handed disregard for the particularities of such nationalities, and lacking sufficient regard for the difficulties of winning them over to the socialist road.
What do I make of the letter? Lenin’s perceptions were (as you might imagine) very sharp and insightful. Not just in regard to stalin but also to the others (trotsky, zinoviev, bukharin and so on)
I don’t really think you can understand the subsequent line struggles of the Soviet party by starting with that letter. Lenin’s own party (i.e. its new collective post-Lenin leadership) chose not to disclose this letter to the impending congress, and chose not to remove Stalin from his post — because of very real considerations at that time. And once again, it is a bit mechanical and dogmatic to assume that Lenin was simply correct, and that everything would work out better if he was just followed more totally and precisely.
And while this letter (which some people inflate to the level of a “testament”) has some relevance to Soviet history — and the line struggles that erupted before, and then after, Lenin’s death — I fail to understand why it is so central to all subsequent revolutionary history in the whole world that we are accused of “skirting” that letter when discussing thirty years of revolution and counterrevolution in China.
Really, is every question of revolutionary advance a subset of the “Stalin Question”? Can we solve problems, establish verdicts, evaluate events, identify correct policies simply by repeatedly returning to those moments where a dying Lenin chastized a rising Stalin?
I suspect not.
And, in particular, this rather backward-looking approach (which emerges from a number of political corners, often associated with Trotskyism) has the larger ideological problem of assuming that all politics is merely an application of known principles (seemingly eternal principles that are known by identifying them in the writings of some early marxists), and second by assuming that therefore the whole of a complex revolution (like the Chinese revolution) can be evaluated by comparing ITS principles with those earlier verdicts.
It is a dogmatic method — as if the universe (and our own creative abilities) stood still after 1924 when Stalin rose to power. As if every question we face is merely a reflection of questions already confronted and settled in the Soviet line struggles from 1917-1924.
* * * * * * *
In fact, Mao’s policies were a major rupture with the Soviet experience on many levels — and this is certainly true on the question of nationalities. And (dare I say) I don’t think the communists could have developed correct approaches to extending and then deepening the Chinese revolution — by mechanically treating the peoples of China (like the Tibetans, or Uigurs, or Han people) as if they were equivalent of Poles, Jews or Russians. The world just doesn’t work like that.
And the problem with this method is reflecting in the real superficiality of analysis: Look at how you handle the question of the Cultural Revolution in the border regions. I spent quite a bit of time studying the Cultural revolution in Tibet — It was a difficult area, with scant information — and the different lines and forces that had RADICALLY different approaches to the Tibetan nationality, the very real problems of drawing Tibetans into the revolutionary process, first against serfdom, and then against state capitalist forces within the Chinese party.
By contrast, you imply rather flippantly that it is simply wrong to connect Islam with the class struggle against “the old rule by capitalists, feudal lords, slave-owners.”
But is that so wrong? Is it really obviously impossible that Islam, the influence of Islam, and the defense of Islam in revolutionary China were linked to the defense of outmoded classes? How do you know? Isn’t that something that requires specific analysis and facts? Can you dismiss it without investigation?
You assume that the policies of the whole revolutionary period was motivated by a desire to “assimilate” the minority peoples (into china? into the Han people? or into the revolutionary process?) Well that is an interesting thesis…. and if we wanted to investigate that thesis, wouldn’t we need to actually excavate the sharp struggle over approach and policy that went on within the Chinese revolution?
louisproyect said
I was not getting into the whole question of Soviet history from the early 1920s until now. I was simply pointing out that Stalin might have written an unexceptional article but his *activity* was anti-Leninist in the sense of it reflecting Great Russian chauvinism. This behavior did not end in the early 1920s. It went on until his death. His treatment of Jews and Crimean Tatars was dastardly to say the least. I am not one to give you advice on party-building but this “Stalin wasn’t all bad” nonsense should be buried once and for all, even if Mao said it. Frankly, I think all this Mao-quoting you are doing here leaves me a bit cold. I don’t know how old you are but I got my fill of it in the 1960s and 70s. You should read Max Elbaum’s book on the Maoist (or New Communist movement, if you prefer) movement to see how fucked up it was. To try to reinvigorate a movement that shot itself in the foot with dogmatism and sectarianism is a bad idea in my opinion, just as it is a bad idea to “build the Fourth International”. Marxism has to be built on a new basis, one that leaves this search for revolutionary pedigrees behind once and for all.
Mike E said
Louis:
Lets start with where we agree:
Now we are discussing the situation of the Uigur people, and their revolt against their conditions. And you implied (in your article) that this is the result of mistreatment that is rooted in the Mao era (and even, in the methods of the Stalin era in Russia). So you are the one who raised (a) Soviet history in the 1920s, and (b) the experience of the cultural revolution in western china.
To sort things out, i.e. to respond to your analysis, required raising some facts about the policies and events of those days. Right? If i’m quoting Mao in this regard, it is precisely to raise evidence and facts in contrast to “dogmatism and sectarianism” (if you get my drift).
I don’t think you should misunderstand this as a search for “revolutionary continuity” or an eagerness to define the present by the ideological “demarcations” of the past.
You misread some things: If anything Kasama is organized around a conviction that we should not repeat the pattern of the new communist movement (in the 1970s) to create a constellation of small ideological capsules. I don’t agree with Elbaum’s analysis (which you cite, and which contains an argument for non-revolutionary electoralism) but certainly that strategy of forming min-parties (with a self-conception of vanguard) hasn’t worked out well, and is not how we are proceeding.
David_D said
louisproyect said: “I think all this Mao-quoting you are doing here leaves me a bit cold. I don’t know how old you are but I got my fill of it in the 1960s and 70s. You should read Max Elbaum’s book on the Maoist (or New Communist movement, if you prefer) movement to see how fucked up it was. To try to reinvigorate a movement that shot itself in the foot with dogmatism and sectarianism is a bad idea in my opinion…”
The abandonment of the study of Marxist theory means the abandonment of the fight for socialism. I don’t think the problem was ever with quoting Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin (though Trotskyists obviously disagree here), or Mao, but rather with a mechanical application of these citations. Marxism must be understood as a systemic whole.
I disagree with this whole “anti-dogmatism” emphasis. The main danger among communists is not dogmatism, but rather the abandonment of Marxism – right revisionism and capitulation to bourgeois ideology.
Communists and Trotskyists obviously do not agree on the question of the meaning of Lenin’s “testament.” He dished out a lot of criticism in different directions.
I think the appraisal of Stalin as “70% good” is a correct one, and he should be upheld alongside Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Mao. They all made mistakes – all of them. Engels was apparently anti-homosexual. Marx made errors too. But their errors pale in significance as compared with their contributions to the development of the movement for, and ideology of, human liberation.
Mike E said
David writes:
I’m not a fan of the logic of “main danger” — where you list several problems, pinpoint one as “main,” and so ignore the others.
I think there are acute dangers from both dogmatic thinking and the abandonment of revolution.
Which is principal? I think it depends on where you look. They even tend to be entwined at times.
Shouldn’t we have an “anti-dogmatism” emphasis? I think the history of the communist movement demands it. And we don’t just need “the study of marxism” — we also need the critical approach to previously inherited marxism (a problematizing of previous assumptions).
Shouldn’t we guard against the abandonment of revolution? Of course, the whole weight of current society (and the current “death of communism” climate) gives that task urgency.
I think we need a movement that is starkly non-dogmatic and fiercely revolutionary — and I expect that both aspects will be highly controversial (including among revolutionaries and communists).
I’m not a fan of the “five heads” (history of shaving) form of “upholding.”
In specific, I don’t think Stalin should be upheld alongside those others. Neither did the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement (which had a “three heads” approach). I don’t think stalin’s contributions and approach is in their company.
And it is not a matter of “they all made mistakes” (though that is literally true of course).
As for the “70% good” — i’d like to see where that appraisal is argued. I have many thoughts on this, from long investigations — but I have never seen any significant argumentation for this specific appraisal. Have you? And if it is a very specific verdict offered without argumentation, how can you embrace it? On what basis?
I tend to agree with Mao’s distinction between the early Stalin and the late Stalin — and I think that the problems of the 1930s were more serious than many have been willing to acknowledge. (this is one of several cases where many communists choose to look away, rather than dig into the difficult truths of the last century.)
David_D said
Mao said:
“I think there are two `swords’: one is Lenin and the other Stalin. The sword of Stalin has now been discarded by the Russians. Gomulka and some people in Hungary have picked it up to stab at the Soviet Union and oppose so-called Stalinism.
“The imperialists also use this sword to slay people with. Dulles, for instance, has brandished it for some time. This sword has not been lent out, it has been thrown out. We Chinese have not thrown it out.
“As for the sword of Lenin, hasn’t it too been discarded to a certain extent by some Soviet leaders? In my view, it has been discarded to a considerable extent. Is the October Revolution still valid? Can it still serve as the example for all countries? Khrushchov’s report at the Twentieth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union says it is possible to seize power by the parliamentary road, that is to say, it is no longer necessary for all countries to learn from the October Revolution. Once this gate is opened, by and large Leninism is thrown away.” – November 15, 1956
The question of Stalin is the question of the experience of socialist state construction from, really, 1922 onward to 1953. Decades of experience during which Stalin was the main force, main leader of the CPSU, and during which the international communist movement crystallized. There were very serious errors, and indeed crimes were committed under socialism! Nonetheless, this experience must be learned from, upheld, and defended, while also being criticized
What is the content of “non-dogmatic and fiercely revolutionary?” How does this inform practical work?
passerby said
1) To those who support the terrorist gangs inside the Uigur nation and sincerely think the Uigur nation is the oppressed minority:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/09/world/asia/09han.html?_r=3&ref=world
and here are some horrible pictures depicting the Han chinese who were hurt or killed during this riot.(transfered from a chinese leftist website)
http://washeng.net/HuaShan/BBS/shishi/gbcurrent/166361.shtml
http://washeng.net/HuaShan/BBS/shishi/gbcurrent/166368.shtml
2) In an official document released in 1984 by CPC, it is provided that when minorities violate the law, arrest them or sentence them to death only for extreme cases, and if some are detained less serious judgement should be given to those criminals. This item is quite famous in china because it stands for the tolerant and sometimes excessive indulge nationality policies in post-Mao era.
In Mao’s era, the nationalities are equal, special assistance are given to support the development of minorities from economy to culture. Different nations live together without much contradtions. Under the leadership of the then communist party of China, the influence of religion especially the fundamentalism is weakened to such a low level that during GPCR, only one thousand temples are active to public, less than ten percent before liberation. But nowadays, there are about twenty thousand mosques in Xinjiang now. The party stuctures in Uigur is weakened and some party members in Uigur believe in Islam again. The Pan-Turkism and Pan-Islamism are more and more popular, publicly or underground. Most of the young man, students or hobos, are stimulated by religion fundamentlism.
The party’s revisionism is developed to such a state that many policies are changed just opposite to what Mao had done. Due to these policies, the Han Chinese falls to the second class citizen especially in the place where minorities gather. In Urumqi, the gap between the Han chinese and Uigur is more and more clearer, gradually they live separately. This time the riot erupted just inside where the Uigur assembles.
The direct reason of the riot lies in the fact that 1) the Uigur communities rely on the government assistance so some of them becomes lazy and then 2) many Uigur become jobless(just like some Han chinese in other provinces) due to low level skills or severe competitions in the so-called “socialist market economy”, so some of them get used to steal and grab and even kill without panelty; 3) they are told and then believe the Han Chinese (including the Hui chinese) took their homeland and resources and they are discriminated by all kinds of sources so there is more hate now. For these reasons the Han chinese gradually moved out where Uigur lives.
3) and why all of these happened, is there any deeper reason?
China is a third world country although it has the third largest GDP in the world. It is just some kind of workplace where all sorts of merchandizes are fabricated in China and then export to the worldwide. And in China there are many compradors, in the upper layer of the so-called communist party, there alot of compradors too (I even think they may take advantage of the nationalist part, that’s why they buy so many US debts). They serve for the interest of foreign capital, they hate the chinese revolution and GPCR. They take the imperalist countries as their friends abroad and take the capitalists and new landlords and also upper class of all nationalities as their friends at home. They take the majority oppressed people as the main enemy, especially their representatives–Mao and his followers. So they completely overthrow Mao’s right policies as much as possible.
However, they are weak because they are afraid of touching the interests of their friends(although these so-called friends sometimes even hurt them), but they are strong because they control the army so they can oppress the people.
Here please don’t think that the Han Chinese is oppressing the minorities, it will be a joke in China if you say so. Because even sometimes some Han Chinese want to change their nationalities to minorities to get more profit the law has given(such as less scores for high school students to enroll into universities, more children allowed to be given birth to, and more opportunities to be promoted and so on). Almost all of the strange and absurd policies are invented by Hu YaoBang(1980s) and continued by Deng’s followers just to blandish the minorities.
Maybe you can see that Han Chinese are killed this time, but maybe you never know they are threatened to be killed or really be killed all the time from long time ago. But whatever killings, stealings or robbing happens, the police will disregard except for too shocking cases. That’s why after the most severe riot(up to now) took place, the Han Chinese went to street to protest. On one hand, they should protect themselves because nobody guard them, bringing sticks or knives(even including old ladies and young girls); on the other hand they want to protest the discrimination policies.
4) In all, here comrades, I mainly want to show you that the most oppressed group is not the Uigur(additionally, the Uigur is not welcomed too by other minorities because they are the largest group in Xinjiang and discriminate and insult the smaller nations) but the Han Chinese. It’s a quite strange reality(at least I think so).
And the reason lies in the fact that nationality contraditions are rooted in class contradition, which takes a different logic in China. The governor want to keep their position, keeping less and less governing basis. However, they resort to the foreign power centers’ pity and they pursue the skin-deep harmony with minorities rather serve for the people’s interest. So that they fell into a silly trap they had set up, hurting themselves. In fact, the struggle is unfolded between the these governing classes( including US, Germany, maybe Turkish, and Uigur upper class), but the blood is both Han Chinese and Uigur. This time the blood mainly comes from the Han Chinese, but next time, I don’t know, just take Yugoslavia as a former example.
However, one thing is clear that the biggest winner in this fight is the western power center especially US, which are struggling from sinking during this global capitalist economy crisis.
Sorry, maybe I don’t have time to reply. Just for reference if it was worthy. Maybe next time I could find some systematic articles to compare the difference between Mao’s and Deng’s nationalities, if anyone is interested.
entdinglichung said
* a text by a comrade of the CWI: Xinjiang: Brutal policing triggers deadly riot
* a few texts on ESSF: http://www.europe-solidaire.org/spip.php?rubrique786
Mike E said
That first article from the CWI says:
Is that true?
It is somewhat hard to jibe with the experience of African American people in the U.S. — where socalled “riots” (we called them rebellions) were repeatedly a response to police murders and other intolerable conditions, and were widely perceived as connected to political demands (see LA Rebellion 1992).
Certainly it was a weakness that such demands were not, generally, articulated publicly and directly. But they were understood as such.
And certainly, in the history of the U.S., political support (if not tactical advocacy) for the rebellions of the 1960s (including the over 100 rebellions that happened in the wake of Rev. King’s assassination) was a dividing line — between those who supported black liberation and those who did not.
Key organizers of SNCC were accused of organizing “riots” — and the U.S. congress passed the “H Rap Brown Amendment” which made it a federal crime to cross state lines to instigate riots.
Interestingly, the only revolutionary formation I know of (in the US) who did not support the rebellions was the Black Panther Party.
entdinglichung said
this position by the CWI on rioting reflects that their leading section Militant/Socialist Party stayed for decades in the Labour Party (they called it “entrism sui generis”), one result of this was their denunciation of the london Poll Tax riots of 1990 … the opposite position gloryfying everything which smells or looks like a riot is advocated on the left in Britain by Class War
Gary said
Mike notes:
I think this is probably true of much of what became the Soviet Union after the Bolshevik Revolution as well. There were vast regions to which the revolution came “from without,” really from one nation to another.
But that raises the question, is there really that much difference, in terms of the authenticity of socialist experience, between (say) the Soviet revolution coming to Uzbekistan or Turkmenistan in 1918, or the Chinese revolution arriving in Tibet in 1950, and the establishment of socialism in a country as the happy result of military victory? (I won’t complicate this by drawing in the People’s Republic of Mongolia, established in 1921 with Soviet support.)
Stalin saw Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe, dictated by Soviet defense concerns, as securing the conditions for the construction of socialism—by forces that would be probably be directed by Moscow. I’m not sure this is so different from maintaining national borders out of national security concerns (Mike mentions the strategic position of Tibet), and trying to build socialism even though the revolution may have tenuous roots (and may not grow firm ones if certain questions are mishandled).
What I’m trying to say is that it looks to me as though there have been problems in Xinjiang, involving the relationship between Uighurs and other minorities to the state and party, since 1949. I’ve been looking into the history of the ICM’s relationship to Uighur nationalism and it looks to me as though communists have never quite handled the issue right.
From 1930 to 1942 Xinjiang was under the control of a Chinese warlord friendly to Moscow, Sheng Shicai, who signed many agreements with the USSR involving the exploitation of oil and gas. He split with Moscow and threw in his lot with the Guomindang in 1943, but was removed by the Guomindang in 1944 after which a Moscow-backed rebellion rooted among the Uighurs produced the East Turkestan Republic. Moscow recognized this an independent country until 1945.
As I understand it the ETR and the Guomindang (part of the united front government as of this time) were engaged in negotiations when the united front broke down after the war in 1946. The PLA entered Xinjiang in 1949 and the Chinese party sought talks with the ETR leaders. Five of them were scheduled to meet with CCP representatives in Jinin in September but they were killed in an air crash en route from Alma-ata, Kazakhstan. (One former KGB operative has stated was an incident staged to liquidate the nationalist leaders). Those appearing at the Jinin conference agreed to the CCP terms for incorporation into the People’s Republic.
But there were disturbances from early on, including a Uighur nationalist uprising in Hotan in 1954 led by people trying to revive the concept of a Republic of Eastern Turkistan. Maybe all such actions up to 1976 when Mao died can be described, by definition, as “counter-revolutionary” because Beijing was revolutionary. And the uprisings and incidents since can be assessed more positively or neutrally as rebellions against a regime that has restored capitalism.
But maybe there’s just been the problem of “greater Han chauvinism” here all along, the denial of the real autonomy local politically conscious forces seek, and big mistakes by the CCP in Xinjiang.
Mike E said
Interesting questions, Gary.
Gary writes:
It would take a lot to unravel these things — including more specific investigation.
Some initial thoughts:
One difference between the USSR and China is that the pre-revolutionary societies had been different — the USSR emerged from an expansionist empire (the Russian Tsarist empire) that has systematically conquered and annexed its border areas over centuries (earning the title, prison house of nations). China, by contrast, was itself an oppressed country by the twentieth century — and many of the regions we are talking about (like many parts of China itself) had not been dominated by some central power for a long time, but were under the rule of local feudal forces (including as you point out semi-autonomous warlords).
A central part of the Soviet revolution was an effort to end the central oppression of smaller nations. While (by contrast) a central thrust of the Chinese revolution was ending the escalating fragmentation of China, and the carving up of the country by external spheres of influence (Britain in the south around Hong kong, Russia in its border regions like Manchuria and Port Arthur, Purtugal at Macao and so on.)
This shaped the orientation of the revolutionary core (the CCP) toward the question of border regions (as opposed to the Bolshevik revolution which emerged out of an anti-Great-Russian-chauvinist patriotic struggle against “the prison house of nations”). The chinese revolution spoke of autonomy for the border nationalities — while the Soviet revolution spoke of a right of self-determination for annexed nations.
Despite Louis Proyect’s hit on this, Mao’s approach was actually quite similar to the advice from Lenin that Louis quotes — i.e. to be patient and seek to have serious internal support for the coming waves of revolutionary change. In Russia, any talk of patience coexisted with an attempt by the the red army to extend the soviet revolution by force of arms — defeating and overthrowing a Menshevik government in Georgia, and invading Poland in an attempt to take Warsaw and hook up with Germany beyond.
Gary writes:
I’m not sure it was so different either — in the sense that socialist countries do have strategic concerns, the need for defensible borders, and have historically acted on those concerns.
Tibet before 1949 was a highly scattered, sparsely populated high plateau with a common culture but no real government, no national market or no material basis for independence in the modern world (where previously untouched and even explored regions of the world had been systematically penetrated by imperialism from the late 1800s to the mid 1900s).
In 1950, it was not going to remain a remote theocratic mountain society untouched by the modern world. It was quite likely that Tibet was either going to be part of New China, or it was going to fall under the control of British influence extending from south Asia — and everyone knew it.
Given the immediate encirclement of revolutionary china, including the U.S. occupation and war preparations on the Korean peninsula, and given the infuriating history of China’s dismemberment at the hands of foreign powers — the decision by the new Chinese government to consolidate New China along traditional borders had a real logic to it.
At the same time (like the earlier Soviet incorporation of the strategic and grain-rich western Ukraine) the revolutionary extension of the Peoples Liberation Army into Tibet added a territory to New China where revolutionary change proved extremely difficult to ignite.
* * * * * * *
Gary writes:
I have not studied Xinjiang, and will not speak to that history. But when I wrote “The Maoist Revolution in Tibet,” I shared the draft with a well-known, progressive scholar of Tibet. Part of his interesting response was his belief that i had underestimated the degree to which a general chauvinism influenced the policies of Chinese forces involved Tibet.
I suspect this may well be true — that sentiments and nationalisms arising from the great revolutionary storms in central china may have “played” differently in the border regions — that even among the better forces there was a much too simple equating of local culture and traditions with feudal backwardness, and a related overestimation of the speed with which the serfs and peasants of those regions could come to oppose deeply rooted theocratic systems.
Gary said
Thanks for those thoughts Mike. Your comparison of the early Soviet situation and that of revolutionary China sounds apt enough to me. The question I’m raising however is, what’s the difference between a nation (in Stalin’s definition) such as Tibet, (arguably) East Turkestan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, etc.—all of which were incorporated into revolutionary states, on the one hand, and a nation such Poland, Hungary or East Germany, which established what Stalin plainly considered socialism as (basically) a result of Soviet occupation. Occupation and control that produced resentment of a nationalist character.
To those replying, “But Poland, Hungary and East Germany were never socialist,” I’d point out that much of the argument for this contention is precisely that these countries never experienced a revolution but rather were forced to embrace a line set down by Moscow. Of course there are other issues as well, but this one seems key.
I’m just thinking that there may not be so great a difference between the kind of nationalistic resentment manifest in October 1956 in Hungary (when anger over the dismissal of premier Imre Nagy by Khrushchev helped produce an uprising demanding ”
A Socialist Hungary, truly independent; Imre Nagy reinstated in his former office; the State established on a new economic basis; new leaders for the Party and government; those responsible for mistakes held accountable at a public trial…” and the nationalist resentment apparently widespread in Xinjiang.
Mike I think speaks to my argument when he writes:
“I suspect this may well be true — that sentiments and nationalisms arising from the great revolutionary storms in central china may have “played” differently in the border regions — that even among the better forces there was a much too simple equating of local culture and traditions with feudal backwardness, and a related overestimation of the speed with which the serfs and peasants of those regions could come to oppose deeply rooted theocratic systems.”
I do think, though, that Xinjiang, Tibet, and Inner Mongolia are more than “border areas” since they make up a huge portion of the PRC. And Han chauvinism is someone separate from equating non-Han cultures with feudal backwardness. It derives more from the centuries-old equation of Chinese (Han) culture with civilization and non-Han cultures with barbarism. Mao understood the need to combat this and the party’s handling of the national question perhaps addressed the need to do so. But I wonder if even during the Mao period (1949-76)there weren’t major mistakes that alienated too many Turks (not only Uighurs by Kazakhs and Kirghiz etc.).
Mike E said
There is a lot involved in discussing the points you raise, Gary. So forgive me if this gets a bit long or sprawling.
* * * * * *
First, let me “come out of the bag” on this: I think that the success and development of a revolution rests heavily on the emergence of a “revolutinary people” and its development, renewal and maturation through different stages of a complex revolutionary process. (By revolutionary people, we have generally meant a section of the people that is, one way or another, to one degree or another, consciously for a revolutionary change — and increasingly willing to fight for that. In the great revolutions of the past, such forces have been “militant minorities” — when viewed against the whole of the population, but they have been real popular forces of many hundreds of thousands or millions, who are the core social basis for revolutionary parties, for new revolutionary ideas and for the revolution itself.
Part of the discussion of the soviet purges (in the 1930s) is the story of the dispersal, cooptation, bewilderment, demoralization, depoliticization and even suppression of what had constituted a “revolutionary people” within the Soviet revolution. And similarly there is a story to tell, within the Chinese Cultural Revolution, about how an enthusiastic new “revolutionary people” emerged (and was “unleashed) in the early stages of the Maoist cultural revolution (1966-68) — and how the complexities of that struggle left them dispersed, bewildered, and unable to act as the 70s progressed, and as the capitalist roaders tightened their garrot-hold on the revolution.
In the process of a revolution there is, inherently i believe, a center and periphery — a central area (geographically and democraphically) where a revolutionary people sets the tone, influences broadly beyond their numbers, and actually reaches for the seizure of power. In Russia that was the urban working class areas of Petrograd, Moscow, and a few other major centers of revolutoinary working class activity. In china, this revolution arose from the great peasant storms of central China where the red army and the recurring red zones sprang up and spread (and connected with a broader revolutionary mood among anti-feudal and anti-imperialist intellectuals, merchants, students and workers).
And then, there is inevitably a periphery to every such historic development — edges to the zones of revolution beyond which the masses have not been touched deeply, and where the revolution walks on wobbly legs. In some ways we can see this great storm arising in the core areas of China — and see as its epiphenomena the events of Tibet and Xinjiang (but also Korea and even the secondary revolutionary aftershock in Indochina that became the Vietnam War.)
One of the contradictions that arises from this, is the contradiction facing the revolution (the revolutionaryh peole and their party) when they feel compelled to extend revolutionary powers to, or beyond, their own periphery. Clearly it is difficult to have revolutionary popular power in areas where there are few revolutionary people — and so “the revolution” at times (and this is not just occassionally) takes the form of the entry of the revolutionary army into an area with a sharply divided, or indifferent, or hostile areas.
And you can’t have a revolution without that — new revolutionary societies require contiguous land, and a new state and defined borders. And there are inevitably whole areas within the revolutionary state where the people themselves are indifferent or hostile to the change that has happened. At best, this breaks out as a polarization (where the wealthy and most backward are hostile, but where there are even if only in weak or embryonic ways the beginnings of a mass revolutionary movement). But there have been times in history where key strategic areas of terrirtory were seized by revolutionary forces — where they felt they couldn’t just be “ceded” to the encircling reactionaries — but where the population as a whole had no real sparks of revolution or where the revolutionary movement had only the barest foothold.
Two examples:
There were many stretches of the Soviet Union’s countryside (in the civil war and 1920s) where there were literally no communists. Often there had been sympathy among peasants for the radical land reform (land to the tiller) — but not always. But such unorganized and low-level support often didn’t transfer to supporting the needs of the new revolutionary state (including the supply of grain to urban areas, helping to finance industrialization, or supporting the collectivization process). So in quite a few areas (within the soviet union, the revolution appeared as something external (and even alien). And that wasn’t only in the Central Asian Muslim areas.
The most important example is western Ukraine (which was (a) very conservative, (b) rooted in agriculture that was small family farming, not big feudal estates, and (c) among the most crucial and productive breadbasket regions of the new USSR). On one level, the soviet revolution should perhaps have “let the western ukraine go” (i.e. let it merge with Poland) — on the simple basis that the revolution was not popular or supported there. But on a different level, it was very hard — because much of Russia is a very cold and very agriculturally unproductive, and the few “breadbaskets” of the southern areas are absolutely crucial for sustaining (and increasing) an urban working class population for socialist industrialization. Similarly, it did not matter all that much what how the complex national-grid of “Transcaucasia” felt about the Soviet revolution — for strategic reasons, the central Soviet government was not going to allow the British interventionists to control the Baku/Caspian oil fields.
In every revolution, the parties and armies built among the “revolutionary people” face the problem of emerging as (essentially) occupiers of some areas that are politically inhospitable — and where the basis for “popular agency” (and even collaboration) are weak.
If there is a powerful revolution on the western and eastern coasts of North America, and in the big industrial ‘heartland” around the Great Lakes…. it is possible to imagine that the great “empty” and mountainous areas of Nevada, Montana, Idaho etc. might well becompe part of a new socialist society — even if (by themselves) the small populations of those areas incline toward rightwing republicanism (especially the white people).
In such situations, the revolutionary forces have a few options:
* They can work as rapidly as possible to create and empower an “indigenous” revolutionary movement — using the many instruments available to a state and army. (Education, patronage, backing of struggle by previously oppressed groups, encouraging of class consciousness among the exploited, building new pro-revolutionary political networks around the structures of food distribution and production, and so on.)
* They can administer from without, in the mean while, bringing in cadre and resources to direct the affairs of non-supportative.
* They can slow the pace of revolutinoary change — so that the new society is not imposed on the people (in ways that produce backlash, longterm resentments, etc.) In other words, there will be one pace of revolutionary change in the storm centers of the revolution (changes in education, property, social relations, laws, prisons etc.), but quite possibly a much more relaxed pace in the more backward areas. (Or, in the case of Tibet from 1949-59, a virtual freeze on the transformation of some very basic things — like the political and social dominance of the parasitic lamaist monestaries).
And again: this is not just a matter of nationalities (whether “internal” or “external”). It will be a contradiction that emerges throughout a “checkerboard” of counties, suburbs, townships, key institutions, and whole regions in any large revolution.
And then the problem becomes particularly acute, when new revolutionary forces don’t arise (within these areas) to take up and lead the transformations there (and overthrow the hegemony of the backward).
At the time of the Chinese revolution, there were no communists in tibet. By the time of the disturbances of 1959, and the overthrow of the Dalai Lama, some communists had been trained (often from among serfs, sometimes from among former monks etc.) — but accounts question whether among them too there weren’t still a great deal of reverence for the lamaist customs and beliefs. And it proved very hard in many areas (western ukraine is a big example) to develop revolutionary movements in time to serve the needs of the revolution — in other words, there was a dilemma in Russia’s “breadbaskets” of how to build popular revolutionary movements, if at the same time the revolution had decided to undergo neckbreak industrialization (with all the demands that raised for grain surpluses moving to the cities and new workers). The communist structure (the state, the party, the army) all appeared to the farmers as taxmen seeking their grain — and seemed unrelated to view a great many of the farmers’ had of their personal interests or their view of what society should be.
In short, revolution requires “popular agency” — and when that has been extinguished, the hopes for revolutionary advancement (or survival) are very dim.
But that is extremely uneven: because the enthusiastic support for the revolution varies:
a) depending on social group
b) depending on the unevenness of geography (and historical areas, like the U.S. Deep South).
c) depending on nationality (in the USSR, there were even cases where some nationalities could be generally considered “progressive” and others were rather harshly counterrevolutionary).
d) depending on what stage the revolution was at (“land to the tiller”? Sure! End the veiling of women? Ah, that’s another question.)
e) depending on the needs and methods of the core revolutionary forces.
And there is often an ongoing need to GENERATE new “popular agency” (new “revolutionary people”) — first in those areas relatively untouched by the revolutionary storm, and then at each stage of the revolution, as new polarizations and new social opposition emerge.
Mike E said
Some scattered responses to Gary based on the preceding thinking:
First, i’m not at all sure that Tibet meets “Stalin’s Definition” of a nation. Surely they had a coherent culture — and a more or less common language. But i am not sure that Tibet had the cohesion needed for functional independence (i.e. this was a very very scattered and disconnected feudal society, with virtually no “national market.”) To grab (yet again) for a European analogy (despite the dangers of that): The empire of charlemagne was not a nation, and in fact France did not become a nation in this theoretical sense (in the sense communists generally use that term) until quite a bit after they had developed a central state (and a monarchy). In many ways, the later emergence of the absolute monarchy in France over the rights of feudal nobility, was a sign that the locus of social organization was rising above the regional and tribal, and objectively becoming national — and this rise of the absolute monarchy was a sign of the ripening of those conditions that gave rise to a modern capitalist nation-state. So, precisely in the communist theoretical sense of the term “nation” — I suspect that Tibet may well NOT have been a nation (in the way that Germany, or Poland, or Korea, or the Philippines had become by the twentieth century).
As i said above (in a post on the “periphery” of revolutionary people), i think there are often times in revolutions, where the revolution arrives on the shoulders of soldiers… where in a town, or commuinity, or region, or even a whole nation, the revolution would not have triumphed (or contended) without a forcible impulse from without. And that is, inherently, a difficult situation for the revolution to take root — the revolutionary forces start weak and with little initiative, their ability to develop networks and support often are tied to the new governments monopolies of food, power, force, jobs etc.(which attract support that may not be particularly, uh, revolutionary). And the reactionary forces have openings for marshaling the potent force of national resentments against the revolution (which now appears as outsiders and anti-democratic).
I don’t think failure is inherent. History is full of people discussing how their lives started the moment the red army marched in, and created all kinds of new possibilities. Revolution is a contagion, and it sometimes finds root.
It was a particular problem in Eastern Europe, because the Russians could not decide if they were there to punish or liberate. And because the Soviet revolution had (by then) lost its own connection with any popular agency or a living revolutionary people — and was used to some highly cynical, alienating and threatening methods. there were huge problems of mass rape by the Soviet army in the course of the war and the occupations. There were policies of crating and hauling out everything of value from large parts of eastern europe (factories, machines, even pianos etc.) And that sometimes made difficult conditions for the homegrown communists to claim that this new situation was a revolution and a liberation.
These things could have been handled differently (and much better) in Eastern europe. I don’t think it was wrong to leave Soviet soil, crush the Nazis, replace Nazi-and-axis power wherever the Soviet army arrived, and try to create the conditions for new socialist states. But i think, in actual fact, socialism and revolution did not take root… and millions of pepole were simply “marking time” — waiting for the Soviet union to weaken enough so that they (and their imposed local agents) could be expelled. (Certainly my experience in Czechoslovakia convinced me of that, and not just there!)
And like gary, i don’t think that all “nationalistic resentments” were inherently reactionary — just that in the concrete conditions of the occupation they were entwined with many forms of reactionary politics. Certainly i think we should hold that before long, the uprisings against the Soviet Union (i.e. Czechoslovakia, waves in Poland ending with Solidarity) were very complex movements combining quite reactionary with quite justified currents. As Gary says: that is not that different from Tibet or Xinjiang today (and I think overall these explosions come from quite justified grievances against quite oppressive developments.)
Certainly there is a long history to Han chauvinism. But within the communist party, the distain for minority peoples often took a particular form (where objectively chauvinist views toward customs and cultures cam draped as a driving, even revolutionary desire for “modernization’ within a new china.)
When I wrote on Tibet, i found it very very hard to evaluate this from afar. It is just hard to know… how much of the discontent was raging during the Maoist period (1949-1976) — how much was ignited by the subsequent policies (1978-2009) of the capitalist-roaders-in-power. I do know that Mao’s policies were quite different from those capitalist roaders (though, to make the story more complicated, it was often their policies, and not Mao’s, in command of areas like Tibet, even in the pre-1976 period.) I do think it can be summed up that the oppression of poor and working people throughout china (including in the minority nationality areas) took a huge leap in the recent capitalist period — in new ways, that were hardly forshadowed or implemented in the socialist period. the policies of “han immigration” accelerated under the new capitalist forces, the raw and ruthless exploitation of resources, the vast pollution etc. all accelerated. (although here too it is not black-and-white, and we have written here about new revelations of the impact of Mao-era atmospheric nuclear testing among the Uigurs.)
Gary said
More very thought-provoking stuff, Mike. Just a couple quick comments.
“…backing of struggle by previously oppressed groups”
That almost sounds as though the coming of the revolution has spontaneously produced their non-oppression. But no, they are still oppressed and the revolution may or may not liberate them; that’s to be seen.
“By the time of the disturbances of 1959, and the overthrow of the Dalai Lama, some communists had been trained (often from among serfs, sometimes from among former monks etc.) — but accounts question whether among them too there weren’t still a great deal of reverence for the lamaist customs and beliefs.”
Personally I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a Tibetan communist respecting if not “revering” some “lamaist customs and beliefs.” In fact, I think it’d be not just natural but necessary to function in Tibet, which I’ve visited. There is a great deal in Buddhism including the rather distinctive Tibetan Vajrayana variety that ought to be respected, and the frontal assault on religion that has periodically occurred in Tibet does not seem to have produced good results.
I think the Nepali Maoists (perhaps in part from a nationalistic standpoint—the Buddha was born within what is now Nepal)have a different understanding of Buddhism. And of course a whole different relationship to institutional Buddhism since Nepal has not been under the rule of lamas but has rather until recently been a Hindu monarchy.
In any case it I wouldn’t attribute the problems in Tibet in 1959 (to the extent that communists’ errors helped produce them) to communists who hadn’t adequately broken with lamaism. The greater problem may have been communists who hadn’t broken with Greater Han chauvinism, couldn’t find ways to win over the Tibetan masses and wound up finding that Tibet’s type of Buddhism and its clerical stratum challenges rather than allies.
I don’t think that’s what Mao had hoped; he spent a lot of time with the young Dalai Lama. Mao knew a lot about Buddhism, in his meeting with Pol Pot in 1976, for example, adducing a classical philosopher of Theravada Buddhism among others in arguing against the Khmer Rouge’s policies. He at points sought to place China at the center of the Buddhist world through academic conferences etc.
Perhaps the ruling class in Tibet could have been dislodged, serfdom abolished, and various progressive measures implemented following the Liberation coming from the outside without so many people winding up feeling that their culture was being attacked (by new people speaking a foreign language), not providing an alternative to the past that could prevent people from rallying in opposition around religious, including really feudal and reactionary symbols.
Mike E said
just on some points of clarification:
Gary criticized the use of “previously oppressed” in a discussion of early socialism. Since he is right, I changed that to simply “oppressed” when I reposted this in the main Kasama channel.
gary writes:
I certainly agree. I think the problem was a mix of a tenacious-but-oppressive and hegemonic system in Tibet — and the difficulty of communists to get a mass foothold. (And as communists in North American who have failed to get a foothold, that is something we are familiar with). And certainly there were powerful strains of Han chauvinism among the communists (mascarading as progressive and anti-feudal ideas)… which added to the problem.
My remark about the Tibetan communist recruits was not to blame them at all — but to note that the dominant approach and assumptions of the Chinese Communist party had difficult taking root even among the Tibetans who chose to become communists.
Expatistani said
Han chauvinism is atrocious now. It is frankly bizarre just how unselfconscious the repeating of rank stereotypes is in China today. I once knew a college student who told me rather earnestly that I should stay away from the train station because “there are Xinjiang People (Uighurs) with AIDS who were infecting passersby with hypodermic needles full of infectious liquid.” This story became trajicomic a month later when the local paper ran a story of how the police had arrested a pair of Han guys for spreading this rumor. When I shared this with my college student friend, he replied,”Oh. You can’t believe what the newspapers say.”
I cannot count how many times people have just said without the slightest hint of shame that Uighurs are all the thieves in town, or that they are just bad. I should add that this has been the case in more than one city. While I realize this is anecdotal, I have seen no indication that there is anything beyond lip service and the words in the constitution against Han chauvinism in China.
entdinglichung said
another interesting article on the topic: Uyghur Commoners against the New Enclosures in Xinjiang, China