FREE ESSAY ON DEMOCRACY MOVEMENTS IN CHINA

DEMOCRACY MOVEMENTS IN CHINA

Democracy Movements in China
Democracy Wall
In 1978, stimulated by the opening of China to the West and also by the reversal of
verdicts against the 1976 Tiananmen protesters (These demonstrations against the gang of
four had been condemned as counter-revolutionary at the time but were now declared a
revolutionary act), thousands of Chinese began to put their thoughts into words, their
words onto paper and their paper onto walls to be read by passers by. The most famous
focus of these displays became a stretch of blank wall just to the west of the former
forbidden city in Beijing, part of which was now a museum and park and part the cluster
of residences for China's most senior National leaders. Because of the frankness of some
of these posters and the message that some measure of democratic freedom should be
introduced in China, this Beijing area became known as Democracy Wall.
The background to the Democracy Wall movement was the Cultural Revolution, the Gang of
Four Period and the April Fifth movement, which opposed the Gang. Many of the views
expressed during the Democracy Wall movement regarding the corruption of the party and
its lack of legitimacy as a representative of the people are directly related to the main
concerns of the Cultural Revolution Rebels and indeed many of the same people, both
workers and former students were involved.
The Democracy Wall Movement was a movement for what its participants regarded as real
democracy. This was not generally the Western Parliamentary variety but was 
Described by Wei Jingsheng as the holding of power by the labouring masses themselves.
True Democracy for him was the right of the people to choose their own representatives
who will work according to their will and in their interests. Furthermore the people must
always have the power to replace their representatives so that these representatives
cannot go on deceiving others in the name of the people.
Primarily the movement demanded that the Chinese people be allowed to exercise the rights
which had long existed on paper, including the right s of free speech and freedom of
assembly, freedom of organisation and freedom of publication. Again the concern with
legal guarantees for these rights echoes the post-Cultural Revolution, early 1970s demand
for socialist Legality expressed by Li Yizhe, the legal protection of the people from
arbitrary arrest or political persecution.
The views of the Democracy wall Movement led them to oppose the remaining followers of
the Gang of Four. In this the movement was useful to Deng Xiaoping and he actually seems
to have encouraged it while it suited him. When questioned about democracy wall by
overseas visitors he reaffirmed more than once that the Chinese people had every right to
express their views and that the CCP was not in the least concerned with the criticism in
the posters. However he changed his view later on.
During 1979, the movement progressed from using wall-posters to publishing unofficial
journals. Again this was a national development and was not merely confined to Beijing.
Most Chinese cities had at least one journal and the bigger cities had as many as half a
dozen, including campus publications by students. Some journals were purely literary
others were mainly political, concentrating on politics, current affairs and social
issues such as poor living standards and youth unemployment. The problem of democratic
management in industry was widely discussed, not surprisingly since many of the editors
of these journals were themselves workers. Proposals for self-management by workers
without party interference found considerable support amongst journal writers. Many
journals focused on human rights, but this soon proved to be a touchy subject. Human
rights activists were criticised for slavishly following the Americans, and were told
that western-style human rights were inferior to China's existing socialist system and
had nothing to offer the country.
Posters and journals began to explicitly criticise Mao, with many arguing that the Gang
of Four could never have gained power and held on to it for so long without Mao's
backing. Although attacks on the Gang of Four were welcomed by Deng Xiaoping any
wholesale discrediting of Mao was not, since it called into question the legitimacy of
the whole Chinese revolution and was likely to alienate the army among whom respect for
Mao was still very high.
The official crackdown against Democracy Wall began as early as the spring of 1979
although the movement survived another two years after that, if in increasingly difficult
circumstances. As mentioned earlier Deng had at first found the movement useful because
it attacked his enemies and because it could be shown to the outside world as evidence of
the existence of freedom of speech liberalisation an important point as diplomatic
relations with Carter's America were being normalised. But once Deng had consolidated
power he had no further use for the movement and indeed it threatened his own rule as
criticism of the corrupt and elitist party mounted along with complaints over living
standards and industrial unrest. These complaints also applied to him and his supporters.
So Deng began suppressing the movement with the arrest of many prominent activists.
Wei Jingsheng was arrested at the end of March 1979 and sentenced to fifteen years for a
variety of offences ranging from being late to work at Beijing zoo to selling military
secrets to Vietnam. Given his outspoken criticism of Deng Xiaoping (for using the
time-honoured methods of fascist dictators) the length of his sentence was hardly
surprising. 
Various Democracy Wall publications and organisations tried to register with the
authorities (because under the constitution they had every right to exist provided they
were legally registered.) But they were refused registration on a variety of pretexts and
were banned in the early 1980s. Mainly for self protection, to ensure the continued
existence of the movement, moves began in 1980 to form a national organisation of
publishers of independent journals and a national federation was eventually formed by
those still at liberty in September 1980 This move to national organisation was perceived
by the party leadership as a great threat, and this development helped to precipitate the
final suppression of the movement.
Another development had a similar effect. From late 1980 onwards, the Democracy Wall
Movement was accompanied by outbreaks of industrial unrest as well, including strikes in
some areas. Some striking workers demanded free trade unions and in some cases
independent unions were actually formed (although they didn't last long) Some of the
Chinese unofficial Chinese journals had reported on solidarity in Poland including the
organisation's 21 demands the first of which was for free trade unions. So Democracy Wall
was blamed for inspiring and organising the strikes and seen as a bigger threat. The
party feared a Chinese solidarity with workers linking up with the Democracy wall
Movement and so providing a base of mass support. This was behind the party's promises of
democratic management for industry.
There was no solidarity in China and the final crushing of Democracy Wall came in early
spring 1981. The movement was put down on the grounds that it threatened the unity and
stability of China which was vital if the economic reforms were to succeed. The party
also claimed that the movement had violated Deng's four cardinal principles (support for
Marxism-Leninism/Mao Zedong thought, the dictatorship of the proletariat and the
leadership of the CCP) On these criteria many people had indeed overstepped the bound and
the movement was thoroughly suppressed.
Student Demonstrations 1986-1987
Part of the background to these events was the conflict going on within the party over
how far and how fast economic reform ought to go. At the party Congress in 1985, Chen Yun
had spoken for the more conservative old guard of the party when he called for a return
to communist ideals and complained about all the talk about the desirability of markets,
and about the over-heating of the economy caused by a period of extremely rapid growth.
This group in the leadership also complained about the inequality of reform with a
disproportionate amount going to the coastal regions. There were also worries that the
centre was giving up to much control over the provinces and that those provinces doing
well were avoiding paying taxes to the centre, reducing government funds. The old guard
called for a retreat or at least a slow down in reform. But the reformist faction led by
Hu Yaobang (head of the party) and Zhao Ziyang (premier) (Deng's two proteges) was keen
to press on. Not only did they keep the economic reforms going but they restarted the
debate on political reform which had been stifled when Democracy Wall was crushed. 
Once a high level signal had been given that political reform might be on the agenda, a
few prominent people spoke out notably astro-physicist Fang Lizhi who addressed audiences
at several universities and called for far-reaching political change in China and for
people to be able to exercise their human rights. Fang became something of a student hero
and it is no co-incidence that the student demonstrations broke out first in Hefei where
Fang was vice-president of the University of Science and Technology. The demonstrations
began here in December 1986 and spread to universities in other cities.
The demonstrations called for more democracy and more public participation in political
life and for an end to corruption amongst party officials. So in terms of their main
concerns they can be seen as a direct forerunner of 1989. But the main event that sparked
off the demonstrations shows that political democracy was a very important concern. 
Towards the end of 1986 elections were held for local people's congresses (the main organ
of local government across china). There was a precedent for using elections to express
dissent. Democracy Wall activists had stood for election to the local people's congresses
in 1980 and had made a very good showing despite party harassment and intimidation of
them and their supporters. In a number of cases the elections had to be blatantly rigged
or the results disregarded to prevent democracy activists actually winning seats.
After 1980 control of election was tightened up again. But by 1986 there was talk of
political reform and there were hopes mainly amongst students and intellectuals that
something might come of it this time. So when in November the National People's Congress
tightened the rule governing independent candidates for local elections thus making it
harder for those not approved by the party to stand there was a great deal of anger and
frustration. 
In the elections a certain amount of passive resistance was noted by the dissident and
writer Wang Ruowang of Shanghai. He reported that in one Shanghai district the first
round of elections was declared void due to the high number of spoiled ballot papers.
People had written in names like Donald Duck or Mickey Mouse or names of characters from
popular Chinese fiction. Sometimes the names written in were more obviously political at
one mechanical Technical School the invalid ballots contained the names of Fang Lizhi,
Liu Binyan and Wang Ruowang. Also instead of dispersing after voting people stayed to
hear the results. Election in factories were disrupted and in some cases workers had to
be forced to vote with the threat of fines. 
So demonstrations were held by the students of the Science and Technology University in
Hefei to protest against party interference in the election and these soon spread to
Shanghai and throughout China. Hu Yaobang tended to take a conciliatory line but the
conservatives favoured a crackdown. Deng Xiaoping stepped in and said Bourgeois
Liberalisation had gone too far and ordered the local party authorities to end the
demonstration which they did. Hu Yaobang resigned as head of the party, taking
responsibility for the demonstrations. He became something of a hero to students since he
was thought to have been sympathetic to the demonstrators Hu had earlier in his career
been an official in the Communist Youth League so he was seen as the student's friend.
This was ironic because Hu had been at the forefront of the crackdown on the democracy
wall movement and one of the first to condemn the participants in that movement as
counter-revolutionaries.
1989 Democracy Movement
15 April 1989 Hu Yaobang died as I mentioned Hu was respected by students he was believed
to have supported student calls for democracy and opposed campaigns against spiritual
pollution and bourgeois liberalisation.
The demonstrations were ostensibly to show respect for Hu but quickly developed into a
large scale movement criticising the party for its corruption, mismanagement and failure
to establish democracy. Very large demonstrations took place not only in Beijing but in
cities and towns all over China; the biggest were over a million strong the two main
groups of protestors were students and workers. The students were something of a
proto-elite supporting the reform movement within the party led by Zhao Ziyang. Not many
intended for democracy to include the Chinese masses, they were often scornful of the
ability of peasants and workers to play any political role but they wanted an end to
political corruption, control of inflation and an increased political role for
themselves. Their groups seem to have been troubled by concerns about personal prestige
with several different people claiming to have been the Commander in Chief of Tiananmen
Square
The workers were more sceptical of all top leaders for example they criticised Zhao
Ziyang for his and his families wealthy and bourgeois lifestyle (golf habit). The Workers
were unwilling to accept student dominance over worker's organisations. Their shop floor
organisational efforts were hampered especially after martial law and they were kept out
of Tiananmen Square itself by the students until the last days of occupation. But they
did form independent unions which also had a political function, being intended to give
workers a collective voice in national and local decision-making as well as protecting
their interests at work. The Workers still saw Poland's solidarity, which was legalised 2
days after Hu Yaobang's death, as a model to follow. The Workers targeted the system from
the beginning whilst many students seemed to want to join the system and reform it from
within. Workers called the party elite a bourgeoisie and quoted the Communist Manifesto
workers of the worlds unite... 
Unlike its predecessors the 1989 democracy movement enjoyed great popular support.
Student groups received food and other supplies and money. People saw more and more
corruption amongst the party elite and were angered by falling wages and living standards
despite party promises to the contrary. Meisner paints a picture of China at this time
which shows a country in moral chaos. The government had basically lost control of
officials in the southern coastal regions where there was cut-throat competition for
scarce raw materials. Officials had access to supplies at low state-regulated prices, and
they caused there to be an overproduction of consumer goods, while necessities were in
short supply. Basically, the economy was out of control. For example, the government gave
out promissory notes instead of cash payment for grain. 
The Deng era in the history of the People's Republic began in late 1978 with the new
regime broadly supported by intellectuals who rallied around the promise of socialist
democracy A decade later the most vocal intellectual partisans of the regime were
advocates of a capitalist autocracy. By 1989 neither socialist nor democratic goals had
survived Deng Xiaoping's reform program, at least not in official circles (Meisner, 1996;
p. 395).
The intellectuals of China did not participate in earlier democratic demonstrations. The
reasons for this lack of activity are various. For a long while, they were still seduced
by Deng's program of reforms, and they were told that, as a class, they would play a
prominent role in the Four Modernisations. There was also a certain air of snobbishness
in that the intellectuals felt that early movements were really led by self-educated
workers and not students. By early 1989, this was beginning to wear on the collective
conscious and the government began to receive well-publicised letters from famous
intellectuals calling for the release of political prisoners.
The intellectual element also began to challenge the government on other fronts. It began
to challenge the government's position as the sole interpreter of Marxist doctrine.
Beginning around 1987, dissident political literature could be bought right on the street
from book carts along with pornography imported from Hong Kong. According to Meisner,
Deng made a serious error when he allowed the standard of living to go down for
intellectuals after 1985. 
Thus, it can be seen that pressures toward some sort of political unrest had been
building for quite sometime. The students knew that the death of a Party leader was one
of the rare occasions when the regime would tolerate a symbolic political action and
spontaneous gatherings. 
After the government violence which brought the student democracy movement to a bloody
and tragic end, one U.S. magazine, The National Review, criticised the students for not
foreseeing that the government would eventually resort to violence. However, it is easy
to see how this could happen. On April 27, the students enjoyed a major victory when the
government agreed to meet with them and listen to their demands. On April 28, the
government conceded another demand and gave local newspapers permission to cover the
political unrest. The student who was the leader of the Federation of Beijing University
Students, Wuer Kaixi, debated the Prime Minister, Li Peng, on national television. 
The government was taking a very conciliatory tone in all of its public statements.
Government officials actually allowed themselves to be questioned publicly about the
alleged corruption. To the young, and for the most part, inexperienced students it looked
as if the impossible was happening the government teetered on the brink it looked as if
it would capitulate. A second meeting was set up between the student activist and
government officials on April 30.
Zhao Ziyang had been on a diplomatic trip to Korea during this time. He returned to China
just as the government really started to get desperate and instituted marshal law. The
government essentially was frozen after the institution of marshal law for two weeks
while Ziyang and Deng confronted each other over what to do next. Ziyang cautioned
against violence, but Deng and other government leaders were absolutely certain that by
threatening the authority of the Communist party if they did not act boldly the entire
country would be thrown into chaos. The wholesale massacre of the student demonstrators
started around 6 p.m. on the evening of June 3, 1989. 
The decision to use violence against the Chinese people was not made rashly, or within
the context of some violent emotional response. Meisner writes, rather, it was a coldly
deliberate decision that Deng and his old comrades were determined to carry out...They
thus ignored one opportunity after another to peacefully resolve the crisis because they
were intent on terrorising the population, they wanted to punish the people for their
transgressions (p. 466).
The actual events began with very large demonstrations. On April 26 the People's daily
editorial condemned the demonstrations. The demonstrators demanded it be repudiated.
Martial law was declared immediately after Gorbachev's visit ended in the early hours of
May 19. The demonstrators took steps to forestall military intervention by setting up
barricades and by talking to soldiers and explaining that they were not
counter-revolutionaries but a patriotic democratic movement supported by the whole of the
urban citizenry. Thus the first few attempts at military intervention were rebuffed by
the sheer extent of public support for the demonstrations.
But decisive military action was perhaps inevitable despite apparent disagreement among
the party leadership over how to deal with the movement and rumours that some sections of
the army did not want to be involved in the suppression. The final military intervention
began on the night of June 3rd. The earlier conscripts were replaced with more
experienced troops whose loyalty was assured. Tanks and armoured personnel carriers
rolled in, smashing through the barricades. Demonstrators fought back and the massacre
continued throughout the night and there were armed mopping up operation for days after
in Beijing, shots still being heard ten days after the square was cleared.
Outrage at the massacre gave renewed impetus to demonstrations in other cities. In
Shanghai, Guangzhou, Xi'an and many other cities, there were strikes in the days
following the massacre and main streets and bridges and railway lines were barricaded.
But the suppression continued throughout June and July. Different tactics were used in
handling students and workers. Students were given the chance to repent their errors
whilst workers organisations and individuals were much more likely to be condemned as
criminal hooligans and incarcerated or executed. (Fear of solidarity)
The Future of Democracy in China
There is still discontent: inflation is rising rapidly Asian financial crisis etc. 
Since Tiananmen there has not been any mass movement against the communist party. However
the party has moved against Underground democracy workers groups which have been banned
and their members arrested for example in March 1994 League for Protection of Working
People in China 
The party has now gone so far away from socialism and towards the Market that it is now
hard for the party to bring out the old argument that Socialism provides better security
and benefits than do the rights and freedoms they would enjoy under a Western-style
liberal democracy e.g. League for Protection of Working People in China argued that
workers need to be able to strike and form independent unions to protect themselves in
the new market-socialist China
Saturday clampdown on Sino-Overseas publications (censorship)
Monday Zechen & Wenjiang face trial (China Democracy Party)
CCP still in control Jiang Zemin, China's current leader, has currently dismissed human
rights concerns as something which an emerging China doesn't have time for right now.
Only quite recently, standing beneath a massive portrait of Deng Xiaoping, has the
Chinese leader tried to put any distance between himself and the events in Tiananmen
Square 
Democracy Movements in China
Democracy Wall
In 1978, stimulated by the opening of China to the West and also by the reversal of
verdicts against the 1976 Tiananmen protesters (These demonstrations against the gang of
four had been condemned as counter-revolutionary at the time but were now declared a
revolutionary act), thousands of Chinese began to put their thoughts into words, their
words onto paper and their paper onto walls to be read by passers by. The most famous
focus of these displays became a stretch of blank wall just to the west of the former
forbidden city in Beijing, part of which was now a museum and park and part the cluster
of residences for China's most senior National leaders. Because of the frankness of some
of these posters and the message that some measure of democratic freedom should be
introduced in China, this Beijing area became known as Democracy Wall.
The background to the Democracy Wall movement was the Cultural Revolution, the Gang of
Four Period and the April Fifth movement, which opposed the Gang. Many of the views
expressed during the Democracy Wall movement regarding the corruption of the party and
its lack of legitimacy as a representative of the people are directly related to the main
concerns of the Cultural Revolution Rebels and indeed many of the same people, both
workers and former students were involved.
The Democracy Wall Movement was a movement for what its participants regarded as real
democracy. This was not generally the Western Parliamentary variety but was 
Described by Wei Jingsheng as the holding of power by the labouring masses themselves.
True Democracy for him was the right of the people to choose their own representatives
who will work according to their will and in their interests. Furthermore the people must
always have the power to replace their representatives so that these representatives
cannot go on deceiving others in the name of the people.
Primarily the movement demanded that the Chinese people be allowed to exercise the rights
which had long existed on paper, including the right s of free speech and freedom of
assembly, freedom of organisation and freedom of publication. Again the concern with
legal guarantees for these rights echoes the post-Cultural Revolution, early 1970s demand
for socialist Legality expressed by Li Yizhe, the legal protection of the people from
arbitrary arrest or political persecution.
The views of the Democracy wall Movement led them to oppose the remaining followers of
the Gang of Four. In this the movement was useful to Deng Xiaoping and he actually seems
to have encouraged it while it suited him. When questioned about democracy wall by
overseas visitors he reaffirmed more than once that the Chinese people had every right to
express their views and that the CCP was not in the least concerned with the criticism in
the posters. However he changed his view later on.
During 1979, the movement progressed from using wall-posters to publishing unofficial
journals. Again this was a national development and was not merely confined to Beijing.
Most Chinese cities had at least one journal and the bigger cities had as many as half a
dozen, including campus publications by students. Some journals were purely literary
others were mainly political, concentrating on politics, current affairs and social
issues such as poor living standards and youth unemployment. The problem of democratic
management in industry was widely discussed, not surprisingly since many of the editors
of these journals were themselves workers. Proposals for self-management by workers
without party interference found considerable support amongst journal writers. Many
journals focused on human rights, but this soon proved to be a touchy subject. Human
rights activists were criticised for slavishly following the Americans, and were told
that western-style human rights were inferior to China's existing socialist system and
had nothing to offer the country.
Posters and journals began to explicitly criticise Mao, with many arguing that the Gang
of Four could never have gained power and held on to it for so long without Mao's
backing. Although attacks on the Gang of Four were welcomed by Deng Xiaoping any
wholesale discrediting of Mao was not, since it called into question the legitimacy of
the whole Chinese revolution and was likely to alienate the army among whom respect for
Mao was still very high.
The official crackdown against Democracy Wall began as early as the spring of 1979
although the movement survived another two years after that, if in increasingly difficult
circumstances. As mentioned earlier Deng had at first found the movement useful because
it attacked his enemies and because it could be shown to the outside world as evidence of
the existence of freedom of speech liberalisation an important point as diplomatic
relations with Carter's America were being normalised. But once Deng had consolidated
power he had no further use for the movement and indeed it threatened his own rule as
criticism of the corrupt and elitist party mounted along with complaints over living
standards and industrial unrest. These complaints also applied to him and his supporters.
So Deng began suppressing the movement with the arrest of many prominent activists.
Wei Jingsheng was arrested at the end of March 1979 and sentenced to fifteen years for a
variety of offences ranging from being late to work at Beijing zoo to selling military
secrets to Vietnam. Given his outspoken criticism of Deng Xiaoping (for using the
time-honoured methods of fascist dictators) the length of his sentence was hardly
surprising. 
Various Democracy Wall publications and organisations tried to register with the
authorities (because under the constitution they had every right to exist provided they
were legally registered.) But they were refused registration on a variety of pretexts and
were banned in the early 1980s. Mainly for self protection, to ensure the continued
existence of the movement, moves began in 1980 to form a national organisation of
publishers of independent journals and a national federation was eventually formed by
those still at liberty in September 1980 This move to national organisation was perceived
by the party leadership as a great threat, and this development helped to precipitate the
final suppression of the movement.
Another development had a similar effect. From late 1980 onwards, the Democracy Wall
Movement was accompanied by outbreaks of industrial unrest as well, including strikes in
some areas. Some striking workers demande