Core-Periphery Tensions in Greater China, Essay Example

The ability to govern a defined territory is extremely important for a country to have if it is to be secure. This is important for the government to be able to maintain order and authority in an area recognized by the country’s own people and by other countries as well. Countries that cannot do this as well are often poorer, weaker countries. These countries cannot govern all of their territory capably; they may face international disputes and/or internal problems of different kinds, challenges that Nathan and Scobell call “problems of stateness.”[1]

But despite being a very powerful country, China has many of these problems. Specifically, China faces much opposition to its rule over Tibet and Xinjiang, while Taiwan, traditionally Chinese, operates under a politically separate Chinese government although it has not declared independence. These problems are in many ways surprising for a country as large and powerful as China is, but they are rooted in the history of China overall, and in each of the areas in question. Tibet was unified under the Dalai Lama in the seventeenth century, although it was a Chinese vassal for hundreds of years after this. As a member of China’s tributary state system Tibet was subordinate to China although it had its own government under the Dalai Lama. Then in 1904, the British intervened. From 1913 to 1951 Tibet functioned as an independent state, although it was not recognized as such in the international community. China was very weak and divided for most of this time, first under the Kuomintang and then with the war between the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party, and then the Japanese invasion. Because of this Tibet was able to become essentially an independent state.[2]

But in 1950 the People’s Liberation Army entered Tibet, and in 1951 Tibet and China agreed that Tibet would be a part of China though largely self-governing under the Dalai Lama. After uprisings in 1959, however, the Dalai Lama fled to Dharamsala in northern India. Since then China has tried to consolidate its power in Tibet by a number of means. For one thing, China has suppressed uprisings with a great deal of military force, especially in 1959, 1989, and 2008.[3]During Mao’s Cultural Revolution in the 1960’s and 1970’s, Buddhist monasteries were destroyed, and China has done a great deal to suppress the practices of Tibetan Buddhism. In addition, China has divided Tibet into a number of different ‘autonomous’ districts, and has flooded the whole Tibetan region with great numbers of Han Chinese. This has led many to think that China is trying to undermine Tibetan culture and even destroy it.[4]

For China, the problem of Tibet centers on both the continued activities of the Dalai Lama, who has become very popular internationally as a symbol for his land and people, and the fact that the Tibetan people continue to resist. Besides protests and disturbances, Tibetans resist simply by continuing to be loyal to the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama has abandoned his earlier position that China should give Tibet its full independence, arguing instead that Tibet should be very autonomous within China. The Dalai Lama has argued that the whole of the Tibetan region should be able to govern itself democratically, and manage many of its affairs, while maintaining a nominal position as a dependency of the People’s Republic of China.[5]

However, there is a possible solution to the issues raised by Tibet, a solution that could conceivably serve China’s interests as well. Article 31 of the PRC’s 1982 Constitution says that China may create regions with special administration, and it allows for a very broad range of possibilities. So far other articles of the Constitution have been used to block the passage of a ‘basic law’ for the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) that would allow it to create its own government. This would be an adaptation of China’s policies towards Hong Kong, although those policies still leave much to be desired as well. Although China has been occupying Tibet for five decades, the international awareness of the Tibetan people’s plight may in time succeed in pressuring China into living up to the guarantees of Tibetan autonomy that it made in 1951, when Tibet was effectively forced to join the People’s Republic of China.[6]

The Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) presents some similar problems to those of Tibet. Somewhat like Tibet, Xinjiang was overrun by China’s Qing Dynasty in the 18^th century, though it did not become fully incorporated into the empire until the late 19^th. The main local group are the Uyghurs, who along with other smaller groups are majority Muslim and have strong ties to the culture of Central Asia. This has made for a lot of tension between the local peoples and the Chinese government, especially because like in Tibet, China has been pouring in large numbers of Han Chinese settlers. Although Xinjiang is restive, with many people wanting more autonomy if not full independence, as with Tibet China cannot simply let Xinjiang go, since like Tibet Xinjiang has important natural resources and is extremely strategic for China to possess. Also as in Tibet, China has used a combination of military force, repression of culture and religion, and economic development to try to assimilate the peoples of Xinjiang into the fabric of Chinese society. Although separatists in Xinjiang have been much less active since the 1990s, the region remains unsettled, with many local peoples desiring more actual autonomy within the People’s Republic of China.[7]

Although Xinjiang is supposedly autonomous as the XUAR, in fact it is thoroughly controlled by China: the ruling clique of administrators are Han Chinese, not Uyghurs or other local peoples. As such, ‘autonomy’ amounts to relatively little, which fuels the perceptions of Uyghurs that they have been colonized by China.[8] There are a number of possibilities for China to resolve its Xinjiang problems and calm tensions. First, China could follow the ‘Alaska model’: using the proceeds from natural resources in Xinjiang to pay its residents dividends, as is done by the United States in the state of Alaska. This will benefit the Uyghur and other minority groups, and help them to feel that they have a stake in the peaceful development of the region. In particular, it will assuage their grievances about development only benefiting the Han Chinese. This approach has much to recommend it: if followed, it would constitute a recognition by China of the rights of local peoples in Xinjiang to benefit from the resources of their land.[9]

A second option would be for China to follow the example of the United Kingdom with respect to Scotland. China could follow this example by granting Xinjiang real autonomy, the ability to govern itself and control its resources in many ways, while China would retain sovereignty and its important associated functions. Not only would this be a very modern thing for China to do, it would also follow the patterns of Chinese imperial control under the Qing Dynasty. Still another option comes from the American state of Hawaii: China could recognize an official and special place for elected indigenous leaders, who would be supported by governmental funding. These leaders could then give input to the drafting of laws and the formulation of policy, much like the elected Office of Hawaiian Affairs. A somewhat similar model comes from Australia: for China to follow this model would entail granting the Uyghur and other groups indigenous to Xinjiang special rights as indigenous groups, particularly with regards to land and environmental issues. As things stand now, Uyghurs are not recognized as a protected minority, and China does not have indigenous rights laws. Finally, if China fails to adopt any of these policies or some other conciliatory policy to make the Uyghurs and other groups of Xinjiang happy, then Xinjiang may end up like the West Bank: a disaffected hotbed of violence and separatist activity.[10]

Taiwan presents a very different case: unlike Xinjiang or Tibet, it is actually politically separate, in the form of the Republic of China. As any student of modern Chinese history knows, in 1949 the Chinese Communists defeated the Kuomintang under Chiang Kai-shek, forcing them from the mainland to Taiwan. Ever since, Taiwan has been separate, though it has never declared independence, both because this would draw the ire of the People’s Republic of China, which claims Taiwan as a breakaway province, and because this would obviate the long-standing claims of the Taiwanese government to represent the legitimate government of the whole of China. A United States guarantee of military security has kept Taiwan free from absorption into the People’s Republic of China thus far, but this only highlights why China would want to retake Taiwan: Taiwan is well-armed, and near a part of coastal southern China that is prosperous and that would be hard to defend if it was invaded.[11]

Moreover, Taiwan, unlike China, is democratic, and because it combines this political system with a Chinese character and a historic claim to rule all of China, it poses a threat of political subversion to China. Taiwan stands as an example to every democratically-minded citizen of the People’s Republic of China, an example of what China could conceivably become.[12] Taiwan’s democracy is a considerable achievement in its own right: the Kuomintang preached the virtues of democracy, but claimed that democracy had to be delayed for security reasons, first on the mainland and then on Taiwan. Economic and social development, however, created widespread pressure for democratization.[13] Not surprisingly, China has made concerted efforts to reclaim Taiwan: Deng Xiaoping’s government in particular attempted to win Taiwan over peaceably, by promising that the ‘One Country, Two Systems’ model Deng was already articulating for Hong Kong would apply to Taiwan as well. Deng went so far as to promise that the KMT would be able to continue to rule Taiwan and even maintain defense forces, while coming under the sovereignty of China.[14]

Davis argues that a system of federalism would solve many of these security problems for China. Firstly, there is the case of Hong Kong, a region with strong democratic aspirations, bringing it into conflict with Beijing’s authoritarian rule. China finds these democratic elements immensely threatening, and has done its best to try to ‘contain’ the influence of Hong Kong’s democratic characteristics in order to prevent them from spreading. As will be discussed below, this is a clear sign of the limitations of the “One Country, Two Systems” policy. Taiwan poses somewhat similar challenges, or would if reunification were achieved. However, if China itself were to democratize, the picture would change tremendously. For one thing, China would be in a much better position to offer regions like Xinjiang and Tibet real autonomy and even democracy, which would ease many of the tensions in these regions and make them more amenable to remaining part of China. For the first time, the peoples of Xinjiang and Tibet could truly run their own affairs within China, while participating in China’s national institutions.[15]

Such a system could profoundly change relations between regions like Xinjiang and Tibet on the one hand, and Beijing on the other. As Davis explains, a China embarking on a democratic transition could adopt a federal system, delegating most powers to regional governments. This would leave the federal government in charge of affairs that are pertinent to the nation as a whole, including defense, the monetary system, etc. And what applies to regions like Xinjiang and Tibet should, if anything, work even better for Hong Kong and Taiwan, since the latter two are overwhelmingly Han Chinese and far more democratic and prosperous already. In fact, China could go further with regions like Hong Kong and Taiwan, by offering them confederal status: expanded rights of autonomy, meaning more control of their own affairs. As things stand, the main obstacle to reunification with Taiwan right now is Beijing’s continued insistence on its authoritarian dominance of all peripheral territories.[16]

As things stand now, the Hong Kong “One Country, Two Systems” policy has succeeded in challenging Beijing, but Beijing has also succeeded in whittling away at the foundations of Hong Kong’s democratic characteristics. The current system as it stands is at an impasse, precisely because Hong Kong is a small, prosperous territory that is highly capitalist and leans democratic, within a vastly larger country that is leaning capitalist after a socialist past, but remains authoritarian. Hong Kong is democratic enough to be a threat to Party control in the People’s Republic of China, but it is sufficiently under Beijing’s control to compromise the quality of its democracy, since Beijing has proved it can still redefine the provisions of Hong Kong’s Basic Law, and Beijing has stubbornly defended its right to approve elected officials. Hong Kong residents favor democracy by majority vote, and the spread of capitalism on mainland China is beginning to make the Party’s control seem outdated.[17] Given the profound shortcomings of this policy with respect to Hong Kong, it is obvious that it would be even more unfeasible if applied to Taiwan: Taiwan is if anything considerably more democratic, as well as much larger, and possessed of several decades of separate development. Thus, the “One Country, Two Systems” policy is not preferable to federalism.

If the “One Country, Two Systems” policy is a failure in Hong Kong, this begs the question as to whether it could be hoped that it would produce better results in the territories of Tibet and Xinjiang, with all of their ethnic and religious differences from mainstream China, or Taiwan, with its decades of political separation and its democracy. The problem with the One Country, Two Systems policy applied to Hong Kong is that the two systems, authoritarian Party rule and democracy, are fundamentally incompatible. The result is a messy and acrimonious compromise fraught with tension. By contrast, the federalist option holds considerable promise if China were to democratize. This is because the federalist approach might be described as One System, Many Regions: a system that enshrines democratic political rights across the whole country, and that decentralizes power from Beijing to the various provinces. Such a system could go very far indeed in resolving the tensions between Beijing and the restive peripheral regions of Xinjiang and Tibet on the one hand, and Hong Kong on the other. If formulated as an offer of autonomy more generous than Beijing has so far been willing to concede, it might even serve to bring Taiwan back to China.

Bibliography

Bovingdon, Gardner “The Not-So-Silent Majority: Uyghur Resistance to Han Rule in Xinjiang.” Modern China 28, no. 1 (2002): 39-78.

Davis, Michael C. “The Case for Chinese Federalism.” Journal of Democracy 10, no. 2 (1999): 124-137.

Davis, Michael C. “The Quest for Self-Rule in Tibet.” Journal of Democracy 18, no. 4 (2007): 157-171. DOI: 10.1353/jod.2007.0066

Gladney, Dru. “Xinjiang: China’s Future West Bank?” Current History 101, no. 656 (2002): 267-270.

Nathan, Andrew J., and Andrew Scobell. China’s Search for Security. New York: Columbia University Press, 2012.

Pepper, Suzanne. “2047: The Writing on the Wall.” Hong Kong Journal (2007): 1-7.

Rigger, Shelley. “Taiwan’s Best-Case Democratization.” Foreign Policy Research Institute (2004): 285-292.

[1] Andrew J. Nathan and Andrew Scobell, China’s Search for Security (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012), 195-197.

[2] Nathan and Scobell, China’s Search for Security, 196-197.

[3] Nathan and Scobell, China’s Search for Security, 200.

[4] Michael C. Davis, “The Quest for Self-Rule in Tibet,” Journal of Democracy 18, no. 4 (2007): 159-161. DOI: 10.1353/jod.2007.0066

[5] Nathan and Scobell, China’s Search for Security, 200-202.

[6] Davis, “The Quest for Self-Rule in Tibet,” 160-167.

[7] Dru Gladney, “Xinjiang: China’s Future West Bank?”, Current History 101, no. 656 (2002): 269; Nathan and Scobell, China’s Search for Security, 205-208.

[8] Gardner Bovingdon, “The Not-So-Silent Majority: Uyghur Resistance to Han Rule in Xinjiang,” Modern China 28, no. 1 (2002): 55-57.

[9] Gladney, “Xinjiang: China’s Future West Bank?”, 270.

[10] Gladney, “Xinjiang: China’s Future West Bank?”, 270.

[11] Nathan and Scobell, China’s Search for Security, 212-213.

[12] Nathan and Scobell, China’s Search for Security, 215-218.

[13] Shelley Rigger, “Taiwan’s Best-Case Democratization,” Foreign Policy Research Institute (2004): 287-291.

[14] Nathan and Scobell, China’s Search for Security, 215-218.

[15] Michael C. Davis, “The Case for Chinese Federalism,” Journal of Democracy 10, no. 2 (1999): 126-130.

[16] Davis, “The Case for Chinese Federalism,” 131-132.

[17] Suzanne Pepper, “2047: The Writing on the Wall,” Hong Kong Journal (2007): 1-7.