quelquefois

Uyghurs are an ethnic minority of Turkic origin and Islamic faith that live in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR, or Xinjiang) in China, which today accounts for one-sixth of its land mass.   As of 1998, Uyghurs comprised 45 percent of the 18.5 million citizens in Xinjiang; the Han Chinese comprised 40.58 percent of Xinjiang’s population.  Two cultures, the Han Chinese represented by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Uyghurs (the largest minority group in China), provide two different interpretations of the history of the formation and maintenance of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR). The CCP and Chinese scholars argue that Xinjiang has always been a part of China.

Xinjiang has been under political contestation since the late eighteenth century, when the Qing reconquered the area. Political unrest became increasingly prominent since the late-1800s and sporadically manifests into violent opposition, especially during the late-1980s and early-1990s.  From the 1820s to the 1870s, the Uyghurs posed a significant challenge to Qing conquests in the area until the Qing re-conquered the majority of the land.   In 1884, the Manchu Qing empire brought Xinjiang under its control and incorporated it into the Chinese empire. The Manchus appointed hereditary princes and staffed local ethnicities, but never exercised much more than minimal authority in the area.  After the dissolution of the Qing dynasty, neither Uyghurs nor Chinese ruled Xinjiang. The Soviet Union exercised some influence in the area.  In the beginning of the twentieth century, sporadic violent uprisings occurred, but none that made a serious impact on the Chinese state.

The first documented incidents of violent separatist activity on behalf of the Uyghurs occurred between 1932–33, when ethnically Chinese Muslims and Uyghurs attempted to separate from the Chinese state and temporarily established an East Turkistan Republic. However, this resistance was crushed by February 1934, when the Chinese Nationalists (Guomingdang, or GMD) reestablished control over in the area.  In 1944, Uyghurs attempted once again  to rebel against the Chinese state.  Uyghurs established an “East Turkistan Republic,” which lasted until the Chinese Communist Party re-conquered the area in 1949. These sporadic violent outbursts that were aimed at establishing Turkish republics, James Millward argues, reflected “more the general anarchy of the warlord period  (1916–1928) and the weight of Soviet influence than any…Islamic or even ethnonationalist motivation.”

By 1949, the GMD were ousted from control and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) tried to quell and control Uyghur uprisings, and were largely successful. The PRC did not actively promote ethnically oriented policies towards the Uyghurs early on, but by the Great Leap Forward (1958–61) policies called for rapid cultural homogenization, and as many as 60,000 Uyghurs had been displaced. PRC policies began to have an assimilationist undertone, ethnicity was deemed an obstacle to progress, and Han in-migration increased.   Assimilationist and intolerant attitudes towards non-Hans increased throughout the 1960s and became the most extreme during the Cultural Revolution (1966–76).

After Mao Zedong’s reign over China ended in 1976, Deng Xiaoping relaxed the assimilationist aspects of cultural policy and brought more non-Hans back into government positions. This relaxation spurred demonstrations from the Uyghurs against the PRC. Tensions escalated and climaxed with several riots and protests in the 1990s. For example, a major Islamic-inspired insurrection in Baren county that was originally against family planning, weapons testing, and oil exploitation morphed into a violent uprising “with calls for ‘jihad’ and the overthrow of communism.”  Shortly after, China reacted with a crackdown on political activity with “Strike Hard” campaigns aimed at sweeping up political infidels.

Uyghur unrest resurfaced in the form of violent outbreaks in the 1990s, and prompted China to initiate its “Strike Hard” campaign in April 1996.   Their Islamic faith has put Uyghurs at odds with the Chinese government. Their religion has also made them susceptible to being labeled as religious terrorists who want to secede from China and establish an independent Islamic state called East Turkistan.

Strangely, prior to 2001, the Chinese state gave little lip service to anything related to East Turkistan. Anyone who even used the term could be subject to arrest.  The September 11, 2001 (9/11) terrorist attacks on several United States targets altered Chinese domestic and foreign policy, and reinvigorated China’s drive to counter terrorist, separatist, and splittist movements within and around its borders. In 2002, both the United States and the United Nations placed an organization known as the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM), a radical militant organization that uses violence to try to establish a separate Turkic republic, on the international terrorist watch list.  Post-9/11 policies and strategies are more widely publicized in both national and international media than those of the 1990s.

Sources:
Graham E. Fuller and S. Frederick Starr, The Xinjiang Problem (Baltimore, Maryland: Central Asia-Caucasus Institute at John Hopkins University, 2004)
Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region Bureau of Statistics, Xinjiang Tongji Nianjian, 2001 (Xinjiang statistical yearbook, 2001) (Beijing: China Statistics Press, 2001)
Information Office of the State Council Of the People’s Republic of China, White Paper: History and Development of Xinjiang, May 2003, Beijing, http://www.china.org.cn/e-white/20030526/
Yongjiu Gao and Shangzhe Liu, “Lun ‘dongtu’ kongbu nuli dui guojia liyi de weixie yu pohuai” [On the "East Turkistan" terrorist forces in the national interests and the threat of destruction], Xinjiang shehui kexue [Social Sciences in Xinjiang] (May 2005)
Christian Tyler, China’s Wild West: The Taming of Xinjiang (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2004)
James Millward, “Violent Separatism in Xinjiang: A Critical Assessment,” Policy Paper 6 (Washington, D.C.: East West Center Washington, 2004)
David Wang, The East Turkistan Movement in Xinjiang: A Chinese Potential Source of Instability? EAI Background Brief No.7, East Asian Institute, (Singapore: National University of Singapore, 1998)
Gardner Bovingdon, “Autonomy in Xinjiang: Han Nationalist Imperatives and Uyghur Discontent,” Policy Paper 11
(Washington, D.C.: East West Center Washington, 2005)
Dewardric L. McNeal, China’s relations with Central Asian states and problems with terrorism CRS report for Congress, RL31213. (Washington, D.C.: Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, 2002)

First, Twitter did not revolutionize citizen protests.  If anything, it made for lazy journalism, wherein reporters and journalists spend time reading what other people have tweeted than providing their own analysis of the situation. It should be known that Iran still remains a vastly opaque country, with information becoming even more muddled as the Iranian government shuts down many communication services and blocks web access. Just today, reports of the Obama Administration scrambling for reliable information made the news.

While Twitter has provided breaking, up-to-the-minute news about what’s going on in Iran, is the source to be trusted? You have to wonder who on the “other side” is reporting. There have been many false reports of protest traps, Mousavi under house arrest, and election results . Additionally, there has also been speculation that Iranian hardliner elites are manipulating the protests to “hoist themselves back into power.” Just like any other news source, you cannot take what you read at face value.

What Twitter, YouTube, and 24-hour news syndicates have proven, though, is that media is very saturated in the average computer-user’s life. Thus, the repeated news stories from citizen journalists, bloggers, and reporters lead us to believe that much more is happening in Tehran than what may actually be transpiring. Additionally, there has been an uneven focus on the students and protestors, who by no means represent the majority political sentiment in Iran, yet many outside the country believe that sweeping political change (probably via Mousavi) is on the verge of dawning. That is not to say that there isn’t balanced news. For example, George Friedman at STRATFOR has released “The Iranian Election and the Revolution Test,” and provides solid analysis of the realities in Iran.

Second, I appeal to anyone with a green icon on their Twitter account to explain to me a) why they did that, b) who they support, c) why they support him, and most importantly, d) to name one policy issue of the candidate in question. Why? Because I believe that people are conflating election freedom with who we feel we (as the West) want as President of Iran. It’s turned into an anyone-but-Ahmedinejad mindset. We in the West hopelessly believe that radical changes will occur once Mousavi is given the seat as President.

Third, while there are some parallels between the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident in China and what’s currently unfolding in Tehran, it is not the 2009 [Twitter] Tiananmen. Yes, both states have cracked down on foreign and domestic media, both states have turned against their own citizens, both states have citizens that were frustrated and muffled by the current regime. Fundamental differences also exist between the two acts of mass citizen action, and although I don’t agree completely with this post, it does provide some sound reasons on why Tehran 2009 cannot be equated with Tiananmen.

Don’t get me wrong–from what I know, the election results do seem fraudulent. What the Iranian government is doing to its people is despicable, and a desperate attempt to protect the status quo. I do sympathize with the protesters–I fear for their safety and for their political freedom. But I also fear that those of us outside of Iran are looking at the situation with colored glasses, as well.

UPDATE (26 June 2009)
I happened upon this Slate article by Daniel Byman, “Is Iran ripe for revolution?” which provides excellent analysis on the political situation in Iran.

James Fallows painted a bleak picture of what it’d be like to visit TAM Square on June 4. So when I decided to visit today, I decided to forgo bringing my Canon 5d and brought my compact camera, instead. Indeed, more plainclothes security than visitors that day. Some followed us, others tried to photograph us, but all-in-all a very uneventful day (as expected).

Guard standing at one of the entrances to the Square

Sea of umbrellas

Just standing around with umbrellas, very inconspicuous

Tons of 武警 (wujing, special police forces)

Let today be known as the day the Chinese government impaled the internet with its mighty spear of technology and added Flickr, Twitter, Hotmail, bing.com, live.com to its repertoire of blocked sites. Other sites blocked in China include: Blogspot, Tumblr, YouTube, WordPress, China Digital Times, and Huffington Post.

56minus1 speculates this may have to do with Ai Weiwei joining Twitter. Lostlaowai says it has to do with that special 20th anniversary on Thursday.

Whatever the reason, this isn’t making my “I hate China” week any better.

Edit: an exhaustive list of all the websites “down for maintenance” has been compiled. Check it out here.

Yesterday, the WSJ posted an article called “An Expat’s Exotica.” It basically contends that expat havens such as Beijing and Shanghai are no longer considered “exotic” by Western standards because so many Westerners now live there and because these cities can now accommodate the familiar Western lifestyle. The author exalts those who veer off the beaten path, living in exotic places such as Changsha, Hunan or Wuhan, Hubei. He highlights a woman named Janie Corum, who is “pioneering the vast region for American businesses, striving to create a more comfortable environment (emphasis added),” paving the way for Westerners to discover China’s “remote corners.”

This is the most ridiculous piece of journalism I have encountered in a while. That people still label countries (or parts of countries) as “exotic” is beyond me. Granted, much of Asia is still a mystery to many Westerners, but that is no excuse to call a culture exotic.* If anything, it a) just proliferates the need among Westerners to “understand” a supposedly mysterious and remote culture by infiltrating or dominating a foreign civilization (a la imperialism, colonialism), and b) perpetuates the notion of “Orientalism,” a European concept invented to label Asia as a place of exoticism, romance, and ancient mystique (see, for example, Edward Said’s Orientalism).

While there is a need to understand different cultures, and while a great way to understanding those cultures is to immerse yourself within it, it is not acceptable to frame those cultures as “the other,” something so profoundly new and in contrast to ordinary Western customs. The colonialistic/taming-the-exotic-for-the-West actions that follow this mindset that this article suggests we (as Westerners) do should not be spread, but countered.

Any thoughts, comments, critiques, counter-arguments welcome.

*I admit, Chinese people also exotify Westerners to some extent. To many Chinese, they are all blonde-haired, blue-eyed moneyed beauties. However, in my experience I have yet to encounter a Chinese person who has wanted to explore the free West and debunk their mysterious, rich, contemporary lifestyle.

It is almost inevitable that when you mention “America” to an older generation of Chinese people (30 and up), a discussion of differences between their motherland and the West will come up. There is a story that Chinese people like to tell about the differences in 消费 (xiao1fei4, consumption) between the U.S. and China:

There are two old women, one is Chinese and the other is American. The American put out a mortgage for her home, lived in it, and right before she passed away, she finished paying her mortgage. The Chinese woman saved until she was about to pass away, and finally saved enough money to buy a house.

China Journal reports that China’s economy is a rare case in the world right now, in that it has a “relatively robust banking system and sound government finances.” However,

The problem is too little private consumption, despite encouraging signs from shoes to appliances that retail sales are holding up well. Instead of unlocking the buying power of its 1.3 billion people, for instance by deregulating services like health care or media, the government takes the lead with often billion-dollar bets. It was a good strategy to get infrastructure built, but it is an expensive one to sustain.

At around 35% of GDP, China’s private consumption in 2007 was less than those of other major countries: 71% of GDP in the U.S., 64% in the U.K. and around 56-57% in Australia, Canada, France, Germany and Japan, according to JP Morgan .

Despite a stable domestic banking system and government finances, the global recession has undoubtedly affected Chinese people. For example, users on a BBS-oriented networking site called douban.com “have formed a number of groups devoted to sharing ways of saving money.” 56minus1 highlights some user groups, ranging from hundreds of members to over 12,000 members; these groups all share strategies and know-how on saving money in day-to-day life.

On the other hand, despite the recession inciting more Chinese people to save, it is true that China has a culture of saving that outlasts the global recession. Despite many efforts to encourage spending (e.g., tons of sales and endless specials), Chinese people still, relatively speaking, spend much less than residents of other countries. Part of it is a generational issue; the ageing population may not spend much (nor may they have much to spend), but younger generations, and perhaps those set out to bribe government officials, seem to have no problem spending. I suggest analysts break down spending in China by age groups and see if there are different results. Of course, there are many other reasons why Chinese people have been saving more recently. This WSJ article highlights a few issues: oversupply, government policies, and the global recession.

It is also clear that as some Chinese people get richer, many more are left behind; the wealth inequality in China is a huge issue (searching “wealth inequality in China” will give you over 80,000 articles in Google Scholar). While statistics may show that private consumption is relatively low, it may be because that many of the 1.3+ billion people in China just do not have the means for spending. And with the strained welfare system (too many people, too little money), many Chinese are also saving up what little money they do have to pay for their child(ren)’s education, medical bills, housing, and food.

In related news, Chinese women are supposedly finding their foreign sugar daddies less attractive, with the proportion of women willing to marry a foreign man dropping from 42.5 percent (before the financial crisis) to 16.8 percent (after). In the face of a global financial crisis, Chinese women are being more conscious about the accumulation of wealth/saving, and since “most foreigners did not care that much about saving,” women have been turning to Chinese males.

This past week, Yves St. Laurent’s art collection was auctioned off, including two fountainheads (for $39 million) that were supposedly looted from the “Old Summer Palace in Beijing in 1860 when it was sacked and burnt by French and British armies during the Second Opium War.”  China tried to stop the auction last Thursday, but was rejected by the Paris court.

During this quarrel, St. Laurent’s partner, Pierre Berge, insisted that the artifacts were acquired legally. He is also reported to have said he “would agree to give them back – if Beijing gave Tibet its freedom.”

He is quoted in the Telegraph as saying:

“All they have to do is to declare they are going to apply human rights, give the Tibetans back their freedom and agree to accept the Dalai Lama on their territory.

“If they do that, I would be very happy to go myself and bring these two Chinese heads to put them in the Summer Palace in Beijing. It’s obviously blackmail but I accept that.”

Are you kidding me?! I have to agree with Xinhua here in saying that that is an incredibly stupid thing to say. First, you cannot mix two political messages together like that (even though it is oft practiced), especially with blackmail and by using cultural relics as a bargaining chip. Second, what does this guy know about Tibet? If, in the case that China agreed and it got its freedom, how would it run itself? Is it in a state where it can effectively govern its people?

I’m not going to get into it, but I hate when Westerners blindly tout “Tibetan freedom” when they don’t even know what it entails. I’m not saying that the situation isn’t deserving of attention, it just needs to be approached with caution and awareness.

Edit: ChinaSMACK covers Chinese reactions to the auctioning of the relics.

As most of the world knows by now, part of the CCTV complex (Mandarin Oriental Hotel, TVCC) burst into flames after an illegal fireworks show on February 9.

The building ablaze as seen from my apartment window

The aftermath

Only a skeleton remains

Official business (note how the official/guard has three walkie-talkies)

A few thoughts:

• If something like this happened in the U.S., CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, local news, the Twitterati, everyone would be on it. CCTV, on the other hand, is infamous for controlling what news gets broadcasted, though it is clear that with the Internet, news dissemination has become increasingly difficult. As the fire blazed into its third hour, my friend and I turned on CCTV to look for any breaking news regarding a fire. Nothing. Chinese Lantern Festival performances, sports, talk shows, television series, commercials. What if there had been people in that building? How would the news broadcasting companies (including Xinhua) reacted? What were they worried about in the first place?

• I’m a little worried that, if a fireman died from toxic fume/smoke inhalation, how will the rest of us be affected? Granted, he was on-site and probably inhaling a lot of it, but the smoke lingered and floated around Beijing for the next 24 hours or so. Is anyone looking into it?

• I’m hoping that the defiant CCTV officials who ruined a building, threatened public safety (for the time being and possibly long-run, too), and thought they could get away with it are punished accordingly.

• Wondering if this is considered a big blow to state-run media company, as many Chinese netizens have been ridiculing CCTV over the many ironies and catastrophes surrounding the event. Did CCTV get what they deserved?

I can’t wait until reconstruction (if there will be any), because that means DEMOLITION.

I was listening to a Radio Free Asia podcast about Charter 08 and heard this quote by City University of Hong Kong Professor Yushuo Zheng: “这些…异见分子，其实他们也是爱国的，就是提出不同的意见.” This translates roughly to: “These activists, they are actually patriotic, but they are just putting forward different viewpoints/suggestions.”

It used to be that the majority of Chinese people were apathetic or ignorant about politics, but now more and more are becoming interested and active in politics. However, while all of the politically active/vocal Chinese people are patriotic and nationalistic, they are polarized between neoconservatives and liberals.

Neoconservatives in China tend to support the current government, distrust foreign states (e.g., Japan, Western democracies), and promote the territorial and political sovereignty of China (e.g., Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang). The New Yorker wrote a very interesting article this summer about Chinese neocons. It profiled one man in particular, Tang Jie, who defends China against criticism, opposes Western political ideals, and supposedly represents the many 愤青 (angry youth) whose presence seems to increase as China continues to develop. The article seems to show a general trend of Chinese youth who believe that foreign countries have agendas against China’s rise, which incites a nationalistic and defensive reaction.

Here is another example of nationalistic Chinese students reciting a poem titled《2009中国加油》(”2009, Go China!”), written by their teachers. Lyrics (transcribed/translated by China Digital Times) include lines such as:

Lead: Earthquakes, shifting back and forth like the positions of Sarkozy, with his dirty tricks, trying to shake the great China
Lead: Did China retreat?
All: No. The Shenzhou-7 launched. We are victorious!
Lead: Pathetic Europe will never stop the insurmountable force of our great dynasty
All: Just the aftershocks from the earthquake would destroy France!
甲：地震，像萨科奇的立场，用猥琐的伎俩，摇晃着巍巍中华。
甲：中国退缩了吗？
全：没有！神七飞天了！我们胜利啦！
甲：瘦瘦的欧罗巴，挡不住天朝的金戈铁马，
全：地震的余波也能把法兰西催垮！

Lead: Do not waver, do not slow down, do not make big changes
Lead: Do not change the flag, Do not turn back
All: Step ruthlessly over all anti-China forces
甲：不动摇、不懈怠、不折腾
乙：不改旗、不易帜、不回头
全：将反华者狠狠的踏在脚下

Naturally, the government most often sides with those who defend its own actions, and most of the time, liberal or pro-democracy activists are not on that side. Even though Professor Zheng said that Charter 08 represents a different viewpoint of how to reform Chinese politics, in the eyes of the Central Party, it is interpreted as a challenge to CPC rule. Thus, they will take any measure necessary to mitigate the threat. It is unfortunate that they so swiftly dismiss and destroy any vestige of protest or dissatisfaction with the central government, because I do believe that the CPC can learn from the suggestions that intellectuals offer and improve the condition of their country, too.

In related news, when I tried to Google the drafter of Charter 08 (I am omitting his name to prevent my website from getting blocked), I got this immediately (usually if a website is blocked, it “times out,” meaning it takes about 30 seconds and then shows up as a network time out):

I know that I can easily bypass this obstacle via proxy, but I don’t really understand the government’s objective in blocking websites. Perhaps research has shown that most people are just too lazy to take the extra step and access the site via proxy?

Last week, the central government blocked access to the New York Times. Then a few days later, unblocked access. No one really knows why, but personally I think it has something to do with negative coverage of China on the website. Right after access is restored, the Times publishes an article about releasing a political dissident in China. The site hasn’t been blocked again, but I thought it was ironic that:

a. the Times posts a politically sensitive article after it was blocked for political reasons
b. the indirectly anti-China article was surrounded by a pro-China advertisement:

 
According to the Shanghaiist, these ads are paid for by the Chinese government to spread their interpretation of Tibetan history and development. 

I wonder how East-West tensions will escalate (or ease) as a new President transitions into power, as the financial crisis continues, and as China transitions into post-Olympics 2009.