Countries at the Crossroads 2005 - China

(Scores are based on a scale of 0 to 7, with 0 representing weakest and 7 representing strongest performance.)

Introduction

Author

Joseph Fewsmith is professor of international relations and political science at Boston University. His most recent books are China Since Tiananmen (Cambridge University Press, 2001) and Elite Politics in Contemporary China (ME Sharpe, 2001).

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, as socialism disappeared from large parts of the globe and as the Soviet Union itself broke up into its constituent units, the People's Republic of China defied expectations, first by crushing popular demonstrations in Beijing as well as many other cities throughout the country, and then by resuming a course of economic reform that has led to extraordinary growth. But neither the demands for political reform that emerged in the 1980s nor economic growth have led to democratic transition. The government's defenders point to gradual improvements in governance and the avoidance of the sort of chaos that might be expected to emerge in such a populous country undergoing rapid change and experiencing growing differences in income. Its critics, however, point to continuing abuses of power, including the stifling of dissent, to argue that China should embark on a program of political reform to bring democratic rights – not just improved standards of living – to its citizens.

In broad terms, one can identify three trends that have characterized China's governance in recent years. First, there has been a substantial withdrawal of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and state from the day-to-day lives of the Chinese people. No longer are citizens subjected to long harangues and study sessions. Entertainment and leisure activities have expanded greatly. The range of information available to citizens has grown substantially – despite government control of the media – in part because of the emergence of new media, such as the Internet, in part because of commercial pressures to sell newspapers and books, and in part because the state has enlisted the media in an effort to monitor the worst abuses in the Chinese system. Thus, for citizens who do not confront the state, the role of government in their lives has shrunk and the scope of their private lives has enlarged and improved.

Second, at the same time, China's political life remains monopolized by a single party, the media continue to be the voice of the party, the judicial system is still supervised by the political system (that is, the CCP) and government officials (most of whom are members of the CCP) who rule the country, and the interpenetration between the political system and the economy is substantial. These features have generated corruption and abuses of power that have undermined the legitimacy of the government, threatened social stability, and deprived citizens of their right to hold the government accountable. Efforts to create opposition political parties are suppressed, voices that are overly critical of the government are gagged, and citizens and even journalists who seek to protest or expose wrongdoing are frequently silenced, sometimes violently. Legal protections of citizens' rights remain inadequate, and abuse of prisoners, including the use of torture, continues to be common. Freedom of religion is severely restricted, with frequent arrests of leaders of house churches and other clergy. The suppression of religious freedom and minority populations tends to be blurred together in areas such as Tibet and Xinjiang where Buddhists and Muslims seek greater autonomy from Han Chinese rule.

Finally, there is a trend toward institutionalization. The CCP has repeatedly called for ruling through law and for building institutions that will curb abuses of power and prevent corruption. The past year has seen some substantial steps in this direction, including some innovations in local electoral practices. Such institution building, while still in its early stages, could improve governance. Nevertheless, its intent is clearly to enhance the control and legitimacy of the state, not to bring about democratic governance. Therefore, it is unlikely that the sorts of reforms China needs in order to bring about popular supervision of government will take place any time soon.

Accountability and Public Voice – 1.08

As a Leninist system, the People's Republic of China (PRC) has never made the holding of free and fair elections a goal; on the contrary, the government has repeatedly stated that it would never copy Western-style democracy, believing that to do so would lead to political disintegration and social chaos. Under China's Communist system, the leadership continues to be selected at party conclaves. Theoretically, the top leadership is chosen by a party congress – a meeting of party delegates representing lower levels and such functional groups as the People's Liberation Army (PLA) – which convenes in Beijing every five years and ratifies the selection of a Central Committee. In practice, the selection of party delegates is carefully controlled from the top. There has been some moves toward democratic choice in recent years as the number of people nominated for the Central Committee has exceeded the number named to the Central Committee by a small number (usually five – the current Central Committee is made up of 198 full and alternate members). The Central Committee then ratifies the Politburo, which in turn names the Politburo Standing Committee – the core of the political system – including the general secretary of the CCP (currently Hu Jintao) and the membership of such critical organs as the Secretariat, which oversees much of the day-to-day functioning of the political system, and the Central Military Commission, which oversees the PLA.

The legislative branch of government, the National People's Congress (NPC), is composed of about 3,000 delegates chosen by local people's congresses (though vetted by the CPP). The NPC promulgates important laws, although important policies can be conveyed directly by the CCP or by executive order of the State Council. Although the NPC has long had a reputation as a rubber-stamp body that consistently ratifies the policies of the central government, in recent years it has begun to express itself in the law-making process (in which its committees can have considerable input): questioning the reports of ministers, offering resolutions, and showing through its vote totals which nominees for office are more popular (although no one nominated for a position by the government has yet lost an election). Still, when the government wants the NPC to pass particular legislation, it always complies.

The State Council is the government side of the political system. Although most members, including all top leaders, are members of the CCP and are responsible to it, the State Council and its subordinate organs are not formally part of the structure of the CCP. Rather, the CCP rules through the government. The State Council is headed by the premier, currently Wen Jiabao.

The Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) is a so-called united front body that brings together the CCP with the eight democratic parties that are a legacy of China's civil war period (members of the non-Communist parties can, but do not necessarily, hold dual membership in the CCP). The CPPCC, particularly its Standing Committee, is a body that is often used to acknowledge the contributions of social notables in various fields, from politics to science and culture. In this sense, it is a body that co-opts some of China's best and brightest.

Although there is no intention to permit Western-style democracy (which the CCP distinguishes from socialist democracy, which they consider to mean rule by the party in the long-term interests of the Chinese people), the party has found it desirable to allow some degree of democracy at the village level. According to China's constitution, villages are below the formal government structure and are supposed to be self-governing, although in fact they are ruled by the village party secretary. The township (the form of government above the village) is considered the lowest level of state administration. The breakup of the commune system in 1983 created a substantial political vacuum at the local level as the relationship between the village party secretary and the village head (the government side of the local political system) became less than clear and relations between local cadres and villagers began to worsen. In response, the government began to introduce elections at the village level in the late 1980s. Such elections were limited in scope – only the village government leaders, not the party leaders, could be elected through popular voting. But the elections increased tension between village government leaders (primarily the village head) and the village party secretary, with the former claiming authority based on his (or, very rarely if ever, her) being popularly elected while the latter claimed authority by virtue of representing the CCP at the local level. Scholars vary in their estimation of how competitive such elections are and what percentage of villages hold such competitive elections. For some years Chinese reformers and foreign observers hoped that the competitive electoral mechanism introduced at the village level could be raised to the township level (and, eventually, to yet higher levels). Unfortunately, these hopes have not yet been realized.¹

Over the past year or so, some interesting breakthroughs in elections for local people's congresses have taken place at the township level. People's congresses are the legislative arm of government, corresponding to the NPC at the national level. Nominations are normally closely guarded by the CCP and voters generally vote through their danwei (work unit) or residence, making elections formalistic and easy to control. But the election law allows for candidates to be nominated through the petition of ten or more people and allows for representatives to be elected through write-in campaigns. This has opened the way for several novel elections for local posts around the country.² These innovations are obviously extremely limited in a country the size of China, and sometimes elections are negated after the fact.³ However, they do bespeak a changing political environment and citizen awareness.

China still has a very long way to go to establish a system of accountability through checks and balances, either among branches of government or through monitoring of government by citizen groups. In 2002, the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone in southeast China did begin an experiment in separating the powers of policy making, policy implementation, and supervision, but recent reports suggest that this limited reform has withered in favor of what officials refer to as streamlining and efficiency.⁴ In some areas, there seems to be real retrogression. For instance, whereas previously China's provincial people's congresses were headed by senior, often retired, cadres, today about three-quarters are headed by the provincial party secretary, thus concentrating political power.

Over the past decade and more, China has made substantial efforts to upgrade the quality and competence of its civil service. In the 1980s, efforts focused on developing and implementing a retirement system, and this has been increasingly effective over the years. Retired officials no doubt still play a role, but it is much reduced by comparison with years past. Also in the 1980s, a substantial effort brought in younger, better educated, and more professional cadres. Judging by the educational characteristics of the Central Committee and ministerial-level cadres, these efforts have been very successful. Still, the role of the CCP makes criteria for promotion as much political as professional.⁵

There has been a rapid development of nongovernmental organization (NGOs) in recent years (see "Civil Liberties"). NGOs are legally required to register with the government, but not all do. There have also been some experiments recently with a type of hearing system in which affected sectors of the public are allowed to comment on impending policy changes, but such a system is far from being universalized and NGOs have not been a part of this process.

China has long been characterized by tight control over the media, and this continues to be true, although the extent of the control varies with the type of media. All media are either owned directly by the CCP or government or are controlled by them through the governmental affiliations that every media outlet is required to establish. There is some ambiguity about what can be published and what cannot (for instance, if the government opposes corruption, can a publication expose it without seeking prior approval from higher-level authority?); in general, editors are trusted to know where the lines are. However, the job of knowing what to report and how to report it has become more complicated in recent years because the prevalence of the Internet, cell phones, and text messaging have made the former practice of simply not reporting incidents more difficult, especially when there is a major public safety issue involved.

The textbook case in this regard was the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) crisis in 2003. In that instance, media silence, then mendacity, clearly made SARS a more serious threat to public health than it otherwise would have been. Finally, in April 2003, the Minister of Health and the Mayor of Beijing were dismissed and the media were told to report the facts of the epidemic accurately. They did so, but the propaganda apparatus continued to set the themes in the campaign against SARS. The crisis did popularize a term, zhiqingquan (the right to know), which has reverberated through public discourse in the months since.

As government concerns have changed, the media have been enlisted to support the new agenda. For instance, in recent years, abuse of power and corruption, particularly at lower levels, have become major concerns, in part because they have led to the rapid growth of social disturbances. The official news weekly Liaowang recently reported that the number of what they called mass incidents (protests and demonstrations) in 2003 had increased by 14.4 percent over the previous year to some 58,500, involving more than 3 million people.⁶ Accordingly, the government has tasked the media with exposing corruption and the abuse of power, which allows the central government to be portrayed as caring about the welfare of the common people as well as to monitor the behavior of local officials. A large number of journalists have high professional ethics and hope to use their journalistic abilities to bring about a more just society. In some instances, such zealousness coincides with the desires of government – and sometimes it does not, leading to various forms of suppression of journalists.

Some notable instances of media repression took place in 2003-2004. A hard-hitting investigative report on corruption and abuse of power in the countryside was banned after it became a surprise bestseller in late 2003. The authors were sued for libel by Zhang Xide, a former county CCP secretary who was criticized in the book and whose son is a local judge, raising concern that the authors would not receive a fair trial. In the south of China, the editor-in-chief of Nanfang dushi bao (Southern Metropolitan News), one of the most daring newspapers in the country, was arrested and charged with corruption in March 2004, and two other editors were sentenced to prison terms, allegedly for embezzlement and bribery. Only one was released as of September 2004. In May 2004, freelance journalist Liu Shui was sentenced to two years' administrative detention, allegedly for soliciting prostitution, but more probably for writing essays commemorating the June 4, 1989, Tiananmen Square crackdown, advocating the release of political prisoners, and calling for political reform. In September 2004, Huang Jinqiu, an Internet essayist, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for "subversion of state power." In addition, a news assistant for The New York Times was detained and charged with "providing state secrets to foreigners," charges The New York Times has vigorously denied.

One trend in recent years that does not bode well for the expansion of journalistic freedom has been the extent of violence perpetrated against journalists by private actors. In the past, journalists were protected by their status as employees of the state. In recent years, as the media have become more competitive, as journalists have developed a professional commitment to social justice, and as crime and corruption have emerged as big stories, those being exposed by journalists have retaliated, sometimes violently. Zhongguo Qingnian Bao (China Youth News) listed 19 journalists who had been beaten in 2003, although the reality went well beyond this documented few. The All-China Journalists Association reported in 2004 that it had been contacted more than 350 times since 1998 by journalists requesting protection. In addition, by the end of September 2004, 42 journalists were in jail in China, more than in any other country. Thus, as much as the Chinese government has tried to enlist journalists in its efforts to root out crime, corruption, and abuses of power, journalism has become a dangerous profession, the third most dangerous profession after police work and coal mining.⁷

Recommendations

• It is important to expand the role of elections, preferably to the township level. Those elected must be protected against arbitrary dismissal.
• Open hearings should be held on all pending legislation.
• The government should reduce the ability of leading cadres to promote subordinates by institutionalizing civil service procedures and enlarging the number of people who participate in promotion decisions.
• The public's right to know, which is increasingly recognized, needs to be institutionalized by allowing the press to report on corruption and abuses of power at higher levels as well as at lower levels.
• A press law protecting reporters from reprisals should be passed.

Civil Liberties – 1.61

The CCP and the Chinese state have gradually withdrawn from control of the day-to-day lives of the average citizen as consumerism and leisure activities have become more important. As the state has retreated, arbitrary intervention in the lives of most people has been substantially reduced. Nevertheless, abuse of power and the arbitrary and harsh administration of law remain substantial problems. Those who are arrested have no presumption of innocence, are frequently detained for long periods of time (exceeding the limits prescribed by PRC law), face harsh treatment (including torture), and have little access to legal counsel. Indeed, lawyers who are known to be too aggressive in the defense of their clients face intimidation and sometimes arrest.

Although the Chinese legal system has many shortcomings, perhaps the biggest problem lies in the attitude of low-rank law-enforcement personnel. One legal writer claimed that "the vast majority (jueda duoshu) of people's police who handle cases" believe that "torture is a fast and effective interrogation technique," and therefore "torture has existed for a long time on a large scale."⁸ As a result of such attitudes, according to official Chinese sources (which are usually understated), 241 persons were tortured to death over the two-year period from 1993 to 1994 (no more recent figures are available). If there is an upside in this picture of police brutality, it is that the law-enforcement community in China has begun to criticize such attitudes and practices in an effort to professionalize police work.⁹

Although China removed the crime of counterrevolution from the criminal code in 1997, the crime of endangering state security is almost as vague. Moreover, there are many problems with the administration of justice. Suspects are frequently held for long periods of time, much longer than the two and a half months the Criminal Procedure Law calls for. To China's credit, the public media carried out a campaign in 2003 to eliminate illegal detentions. In March 2004, the Supreme People's Procuratorate stated that it had handled some 30,000 cases of extended detention, clearing up most cases. This statement may have exaggerated the reality, but even critics concede the sincerity of the efforts.¹⁰

As a one-party state, China has harshly repressed political opposition. The crackdown in June 1989 is well known, as is the jailing of the organizers of the China Democracy Party (which was formed in 1998). Although some of the organizers of that party have been released recently – Xu Wenli in 2002 and Wang Youcai in 2004 – others, including Qin Yongmin, remain in jail. Still others who are viewed as potentially causing problems, or even just embarrassment, for the government are detained or removed from Beijing during sensitive periods, such as the anniversary of the Tiananmen crackdown. For instance, Jiang Yanyong, the doctor who blew the whistle on the SARS cover-up in April 2003 and again challenged the government in 2004 by writing a letter calling for a reevaluation of Tiananmen, was one of those detained in June 2004 as the 15th anniversary of Tiananmen approached.¹¹

One bright spot in the area of civil liberties is the use of the administrative litigation law, by which citizens can sue the government. Although it is written narrowly – courts cannot overturn the validity of regulations issued by the government – citizens have turned increasingly to the administrative litigation law. Since it took effect in 1990, some 730,000 cases have been filed. In 2004, 114,900 cases were concluded. Moreover, citizens win a healthy 31 percent of the time.¹² The law appears to provide at least some incentive for better governance, although abuses remain widespread.

Gender equality has been elusive in China. Women suffer obvious discrimination in the political arena; currently only 5 of the 198 full members of the Central Committee are women. Women constitute 38.6 percent of the workforce. In a period of industrial restructuring, women are often the first to be laid off and the last to be re-hired.

Suicide is surprisingly common in China; although estimates vary, it is about 20 per 100,000 population, about twice the rate in the United States and neighboring Chinese populations in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Suicide is gender biased. Young rural women are particularly vulnerable, accounting for 20 percent of all suicides. As Sing Lee and Arthur Kleinman note, "China is one of the very few countries in the world to report higher rates of completed suicide in women than in men,"¹³ usually because women are forced into marriages they do not want.

China's religious policy reflects both its history and the practices of post-1949 China, with the government working to bring religious observances under the purview of the state or, failing that, repressing heterodox religions that the state sees as a potential threat.¹⁴ The Chinese state recognizes five religions: Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Protestantism, and Catholicism. Each is headed by an official patriotic organization, supervised by the State Administration for Religious Affairs (SARA), which is, in turn, under the CCP Central Committee.

Religious observances are required to take place in officially recognized churches or temples, although the 1997 PRC White Paper on Religious Freedom does state that "There is no registration requirement for, to quote from Chinese Christians, 'house services,' which are mainly attended by relatives for religious activities such as praying and Bible reading."¹⁵ Larger house churches, involving more than a family and its relatives, are expected to register, although many do not. In practice, such non-official house services have come to dominate Christian religious practices. For instance, there are about 4 million registered and an estimated 8 million unregistered Catholics in China.¹⁶ Similarly, there are some 13 million registered Protestants but perhaps 50 million who worship in illegal house churches.¹⁷ The relations between these official and unofficial forms of worship are often complex, for frequently unregistered Protestants will worship in officially sanctioned churches and registered Protestants will worship in illegal ones. Although relations between Beijing and the Holy See are frequently strained, the Chinese government in January 2004 nevertheless permitted the consecration of Feng Xinmao, who had been approved by the Pope, as bishop of the Hengshui diocese in Hebei province.¹⁸

Religious repression appears to come in waves. In 1999, the Falungong religious movement challenged the government by rallying some 10,000 practitioners to stage a silent protest outside CCP headquarters in Beijing. This demonstration showed the government that a large number of Falungong practitioners were well organized and spanned across county and provincial boundaries. The demonstration came only weeks before the very sensitive 10th anniversary of the Tiananmen student protests, but Falungong was nevertheless able to stage it without the security forces knowing in advance. This ability scared the CCP, and in July 1999 it launched an extensive and harsh crackdown on Falungong. The crackdown continues, although it is less active since Falungong appears to have been effectively suppressed on the mainland.

Following this crackdown and the general prohibition of cults that accompanied it, other religious practices were repressed as well. For instance, in late 2000 and early 2001 hundreds of Buddhist temples, Daoist shrines, and Christian churches were demolished in the city of Wenzhou, Zhejiang.¹⁹ Similarly, 2003-2004 witnessed another wave of repression. For instance, in March 2004, Wei Jingyi, the Bishop of Qiqihar, Heilongjiang, was arrested.²⁰ In April, the government began cracking down on the Three Class Servants Church – a Protestant house church in Heilongjiang – seizing its leader and allegedly holding him for ransom.²¹ In August 2004, the government in Inner Mongolia seized a Buddhist temple that had been under renovation. Police seized 70 lamas and arrested the spiritual leader.²²

Freedom of religion faces special difficulties in the minority areas of Tibet and Xinjiang, where religion, national culture, and politics are intertwined. Both Tibet and Xinjiang are organized as autonomous regions, which in theory recognizes the special role of religion and ethnicity in these areas. The Chinese government recruits local ethnic minorities into the autonomous regional governments, but in reality power is tightly controlled by the central government, including the use of various police and security forces. Both Tibet and Xinjiang are represented on the Central Committee, but because that body does not meet in regular session it is not an effective forum for voicing concerns or demands. A Nationalities' Affairs Commission under the State Council has the difficult task of attempting to reconcile the concerns of nationalities, including Tibetans and Uighrs (the dominant group in Xinjiang), with Chinese political control.

The Chinese government has continued tough measures to prevent Tibetan independence, including jailing many monks and nuns. According to the Tibetan Information Network (TIN), instances of political imprisonment in Qinghai and Gansu provinces have fallen to low levels, but arrests of Tibetans in Sichuan province have risen. About 75 people are believed to be imprisoned in Tibet.²³ In September 2004, representatives of the Dalai Lama visited China, the third such delegation to do so in recent years, suggesting some easing of tensions between the Tibetan community and the Chinese government.

Tensions between the Chinese government and the Muslim population (mostly Uighur) of Xinjiang Autonomous region have been high for a number of years. The Chinese government prohibits private madrassas and mosques, and it imposes strict travel restrictions on imams in Xinjiang. The state-controlled China Islamic Association attempts to impose interpretations of the Koran that are acceptable to the party. Separatist movements have been known to carry out bombings in Beijing and elsewhere, and state authorities have cracked down harshly. In the wake of the September 11 attacks in the United States, the Chinese government has repressed religious activities in the name of opposing terror, although many outside observers believe that repressive measures have gone far beyond what is needed to curtail separatist or terrorist activities.²⁴

[Editor's note: The Regulations on Religious Affairs issued by the Chinese government in December 2004 appeared to mark a step backward. Under the regulations, the state protects "normal" religious activities, but the definition of normal appears to be subject to state interpretation. The regulations evince great state concern about religion being used to subvert state control. They appear to tighten restrictions on religious activities, although they may prove difficult to implement given the burgeoning of religious sentiment in China today.]

A 1991 law mandates equal treatment for the approximately 60 million disabled Chinese and provides for penalties against discrimination. State organizations must fill hiring quotas for the disabled, and collective economic organizations are given bonuses for hiring and training disabled employees.²⁵ The state has made efforts to provide medical assistance and access to government services to the disabled, but progress has been slow in rural areas. Disabled people are often hindered by traditional attitudes, which view congenital disability and disabling illness as shameful or blameworthy.

Although China has seen an unprecedented growth in the number of NGOs, most – and the most important in terms of membership and dissemination of government policy – remain either an arm of the government (such as the All-China Federation of Trade Unions) or attached to some governmental organ (which is what the Ministry of Civil Affairs requires). Some 130,000 NGOs in China have registered with the government, but many if not most of these should be considered government-organized nongovernmental organizations (GONGOs). Despite legal requirements to register, perhaps as many as 300,000 NGOs in China are unregistered. But most of these are small-scale, local NGOs that play little role in government. Some people argue that the important issue is not whether China's NGOs have registered but the social capital they create in society. Collectively, these groups do seem to have an impact on state-societal relations.

Particularly since the 1999 Falungong protest, the government has cracked down on organizations that it feels would challenge the state. Thus, while small-scale, informal organization is allowed to exist outside the control of the state, particularly at the local level, NGOs are not permitted to be vehicles for organizing political or religious movements. Demonstrations have been increasing in recent years and are now a common occurrence. However, force is used if these grow to a scale that, in the eyes of the government, appears to threaten social order or the government.

China has long had labor unions, organized by the party-state and coordinated by the All-China Federation of Trade Unions. In recent years, officials of China's labor unions have been critical of state policy. But the voice of China's labor unions is limited, and their role ultimately is to support state policy. As a result, workers frequently see the labor union as opposed to their interests, making it more difficult for labor unions to bridge the gap between the state and the workers. As China's private economy has expanded, there has been even less of a role for labor unions to play. Efforts to form independent unions are repressed by the state.

Recommendations

• There must be legal penalties when cases of torture occur. Even the Chinese legal community recognizes that torture is wrong.
• Courts must penalize local police in violation of the law against long-term detention, and the media should publicize violations of the law.
• Freedom of religious belief, already guaranteed by the Chinese constitution, should be enforced.
• Freedom of association, including labor unions, must be recognized.

Rule of Law – 1.76

China has come a long way since the days when Mao Zedong declared that he was like a "monk holding an umbrella," unrestrained by "law or heaven." Building a legal system in China has been a slow and difficult process, and it has a long way to go. It was something of a breakthrough when, in 1997, the 15th Party Congress called for ruling the country through law. And since being appointed general secretary of the CCP in 2002, Hu Jintao has repeatedly emphasized the importance of law and building institutions. Nevertheless, the distinction between "rule of law" and "rule by law" is not very clear in China, in theory or in practice. There is no question that the government has favored "rule by law," seeking to keep itself above the law.

China has an authoritarian system, one that has explicitly rejected "checks and balances," including judicial independence. At all levels of the system, courts are subordinate to the political power at the same level – this power appoints the judges and allocates operating funds. Politically important and sensitive cases are also considered by the party Political and Legal Commissions and Discipline Inspection Commissions at different levels, further reducing the independence of judges. The fact that judges are frequently under-trained – many being demobilized military officers – and corrupt makes the administration of justice difficult at best. The implementation of judicial decisions, particularly outside the jurisdiction in which they are made, is also problematic.

Another problem in the administration of justice is the tendency to carry it out through campaigns. Specifically, China implements periodic strike-hard campaigns, including one in 2003-2004. Such campaigns are organized at times when the crime rate goes up, and they put pressure on local police and judges to arrest and convict more people. These campaigns are generally popular with the public, which favors cracking down on crime, but they frequently result in higher rates of prisoner abuse, including torture, and miscarriages of justice. In 2003, Chinese courts handled 735,535 criminal cases and investigated 43,490 officials for abuse of power and dereliction of duty.²⁶

Perhaps the most pervasive abuse of citizens' rights occurs through the re-education through labor system. Individuals can be sentenced to up to three years of labor, with the possibility of a one-year extension, without a court trial. Although this system is much criticized, in China and abroad, its use has actually expanded in recent years. Whereas the number of detainees was 150,000 to 200,000 in the mid-1990s, the figure now has risen to about 300,000. It has been estimated that 2 percent to 10 percent of these detainees are political prisoners.²⁷

One encouraging sign is the end of the custody and repatriation system. Under this system, migrants without the proper residence permit could be detained by the local police and sent back to their home village. This system was already controversial when Sun Zhigang, a college student who had forgotten to carry his ID, was detained and beaten to death in Guangzhou in 2003. This case, which was widely publicized on the Internet, led to the repeal of the custody and repatriation system, as well as the conviction of those responsible for his death.

Naturally, one difficulty in trying to build a legal system that is transparent and fair is that important sectors of society are effectively off-limits to public scrutiny. Although there is a tradition of the party controlling the gun (as the party puts it), the military and security forces tend to be independent arenas. The party can and at times does exert its will over the military – as when the party felt it had to curtail corruption in the military and therefore decided to get the military out of business (many in the military agreed) – but in general the military is supposed to supervise itself. The military is a clear component of the political system. Representatives of the military sit on the Politburo, and 22 percent of members of the Central Committee are from the military. In recent years, the military budget has increasingly come under the control of the State Council, but that, too, is subject to negotiation.

Private property is a relatively new phenomenon for China. Since the early 1990s, people in the cities have been encouraged to buy their own housing, and now some 70 percent of Beijing residents own their own apartments. Such rapid privatization (the word still cannot be used in the media) in China has brought many conflicts as new property owners try to hold property developers accountable for promises made or for repairs. Such conflicts have ballooned in recent years. At least one lawyer has been jailed for his vigorous defense of displaced householders. He was charged with leaking state secrets, but he appears to have been arrested primarily because of his efforts to help people evicted by Zhou Zhengyi, a powerful land developer in Shanghai, since convicted of corruption. In a positive development, revisions to the Chinese constitution passed in March 2004 now recognize the inviolability of private property.

In the rural areas, farmers own the plots on which their houses are built and a small amount of land suitable for raising vegetables and chickens or pigs. However, the land they cultivate for rice or wheat is owned by the collective and assigned for long periods of time (30 years) to individual households.

In recent years, the private economy has been the fastest growing sector of the Chinese economy. There are currently about 2.5 million private enterprises and another 46 million individual entrepreneurs (small-scale enterprises with fewer than eight people.) Private entrepreneurs have become increasingly active in local politics, taking up positions in local people's congresses and especially local CPPCCs. This group, however, has not supported democracy, preferring to work through close personal relations with local political authorities. Between 20 and 30 percent of China's private entrepreneurs are members of the CCP, most joining the party before going into business.²⁸

Recommendations

• The courts must be separated from the supervision of party committees at the same level and their judgments made applicable in other jurisdictions.
• The training of judges, while improving, needs to be further upgraded.
• Defendants need ready access to lawyers, and lawyers who defend clients must not be subject to harassment or arrest on trumped-up charges.
• Chinese law should extend a presumption of innocence.
• The re-education through labor system should be abolished.

Anticorruption and Transparency – 2.18

For many years, corruption has been recognized as a serious problem by observers both within China and without. Causes of corruption include the power given to party and government, the lack of transparency, the continued involvement of the state in the economy (both public and private), the lack of clear disclosure regulations, the restrictions on the media that prevent independent disclosure of high-level corruption, and the absence of an electoral mechanism that would allow voters to punish perceived violators of the public trust. Although the problem of corruption has long been recognized, the issue has continued to worsen in recent years. In 2003, Qinghua University professor Hu Angang gave a widely quoted estimate of corruption costing some 15 percent of GDP every year from 1999 to 2001.²⁹ Such an estimate can only be a guess, but it suggests the severity of the problem.

In the edition of the annual Blue Book on social conditions that the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences published in early 2004, Wen Shengtang of the Supreme People's Procuratorate wrote that the problem of corruption continues to worsen. In the first nine months of 2003, the people's procuratorate at various levels investigated 32,759 cases, of which 905 involved sums of over 1 million yuan (approximately US $120,000). According to Wen, some new tendencies in official corruption are particularly noteworthy. First, the number of cases involving the yibashou (number-one person) has increased notably, presumably because they have become more corrupt. For instance, in the past 10 years, Guizhou province has prosecuted 103 people at the ting (prefecture/office) level and above; 54 (52 percent) of these were number-one leaders. Second, the length of time during which corruption goes undiscovered has been growing longer. Of the seven cases involving corruption at the vice ministerial level or above between 1980 and 1988, the average length of time corruption continued before discovery was 1.43 years. In the 16 similar cases in the 1998 to 2002 period, the average length of time was 6.31 years – with the longest case continuing undetected for 14 years. Third, the illegal selling of office has been increasingly concealed behind a facade of correct procedure.³⁰According to official figures, between 1998 and 2002, 846,000 CCP members were disciplined and 137,700 expelled from the party, of whom 28,996 were officials at the county level, 2,422 at the bureau level, and 98 at the provincial level.³¹

In 2003-2004, there was evidence both of the continuing scale of corruption and of serious efforts to combat it. In the first six months of 2004, 24,247 people were questioned in regard to 21,164 cases of corruption, about 4 percent of which involved sums of more than 1 million yuan (US $120,000). About 1,700 of those being investigated were officials at the county level or higher.³²

In June, the director of the national audit office, Li Jinhua, gave a report on the implementation of the 2003 budget that revealed extensive problems in the misuse of funds and the lack of oversight. He told China's legislature that embezzlement of public funds occurred in 55 ministries and commissions of the State Council. Some of the abuses noted were: the amount of central government subsidies to localities was understated by 77.5 percent in the provincial budgets surveyed by the audit office (a sum of 321.3 billion yuan, or about US$38.7 billion); the State Forestry Administration Survey, Planning and Design Institute and four other units drafted or altered seven false "Forestation to Prevent Desertification" projects to misappropriate 4.15 million yuan (US$500,000); the former State Power Corporation had losses of some 7.84 billion RMB yuan (US$945 million).³³ Among those convicted of corruption was Wang Zhonglu, who was said to have taken bribes of 390,000 yuan (US$47,100). Wang is a former deputy governor of Zhejiang province who was also president of Zhejiang International Trust and Investment Corporation, where he reportedly cost the company over 44 million yuan (US$5.3 million) in losses. This suggests an endemic problem of public officials holding simultaneous positions in economic institutions.³⁴ In addition, the Chinese press reported in 2004 that some 4,000 corrupt officials had fled abroad with more than 5 billion yuan (US$600 million) over the past 20 years.³⁵

As an unusually explicit and detailed report by Auditor General Li Jinhua suggests, 2004 witnessed a new openness in discussing corruption as well as new and apparently more vigorous efforts to combat it. For instance, the national audit administration has worked to build a national auditing system to fight corruption, touted as the first of its sort in the country. At the same time, the CCP has adopted a number of new regulations that aim to improve cadre selection and prevent corruption in the party. These regulations include Provisional Regulations on the Public Selection of Party and Government Leading Cadres, Provisional Regulations on Contested Appointment in Party and Government Organs, and the Regulations on Inner-Party Supervision of the CCP (for Trial Implementation). Such regulations, at a minimum, reflect a desire in the CCP to regularize the cadre system, to make the selection and promotion of cadres more subject to rules and less subject to personal favoritism, and to improve relations between the cadres and the public. However, the CCP has adopted other regulations in the past in an effort to curb corruption; whether these new ones prove any more successful remains to be seen.

There has been an effort in recent years to inject more transparency into government. Most municipal and provincial governments maintain websites, as does the central government and ministries of the State Council. Policies and laws are generally given wide publicity, although a few years ago local governments tried hard to stop the circulation of regulations governing the taxation of peasants. New laws and regulations are also intended to increase transparency, at least to some extent. These efforts face considerable resistance, both because of the nature of the political system and deeply imbedded habits. For instance, although the decisions of the CCP are widely disseminated, the process by which those decisions were reached, including different perspectives on what should be done, are not revealed to the public. The media is not allowed to probe such issues. Alternative forms of media, particularly the Internet and cell phones, allow information to circulate more freely (although these too are subject to being blocked by the state), but this has not led to significant transparency of government operations.

Recommendations

• The press must have more freedom to report on the corruption of officials.
• Government officials should be required to make public financial disclosure statements to improve transparency and reduce corruption.
• Whistle-blowers should be protected by law.

Notes

1 Li Lianjiang, "The Politics of Introducing Direct Township Elections in China," China Quarterly, no. 171 (September 2002): 704-23.

2 Li Fan, ed., Zhongguo jiceng minzhu fazhan baogao [Grassroots democracy in China] (Beijing: Falu chubanshe, 2004).

3 Huang Guangming and He Hongwei, "Striking Dilemma in Grassroots Administration in Dianjiang [sic, Qianjiang] Village [sic, City], 187 Elected Village Officials Dismissed in Three Years," Nanfang zhuomo, 12 September 2002, trans. FBIS CPP-2002-0916-000029; Dang Guoying, "The Reality and Future of Villagers' Autonomy," Nanfang zhuomo, 30 September 2002, trans. FBIS CPP-2002-1008-0000051.

4 "China Said to Allow 'Limited' Political Reform in Shenzhen," Hong Kong Daily Mail, 23 January 2002; and Chow Chung-yan, "Shenzhen 'Still the City of Tomorrow,'" South China Morning Post, 28 June 2004.

5 John P. Burns, "Governance and Civil Service Reform," in Jude Howell, ed., Governance in China (New York: Roman and Littlefield, 2003), 37-57.

6 "Economic Reform Causing Social Unrest and Crime in China: Report," Agence France Presse (AFP), 9 June 2004.

7 Sophie Beach, "In China, New Journalism and New Threats" (New York: Committee to Protect Journalists [CPJ], 24 August 2004), http://www.cpj.org/Briefings/2004/China_8_04/China_8_04.html.

8 Du Jingji, "Qianlun xingxun bigong de chansheng ji qi duice [A superficial discussion of the sources of tortured confession and policies to deal with it]," as quoted in Murray Scot Tanner, "Torture in China: Calls for Reform from within China's Law Enforcement System" (Washington, DC: U.S. Congress, prepared statement to accompany testimony before the Congressional-Executive Commission on China [CECC], 26 July 2002).

9 Murray Scot Tanner, "Torture in China," prepared statement to accompany testimony before the China-Executive Committee on China, 26 July 2002, http://www.chinaaid.org/English/Advocacy/CAA%20PRESS%20RELEASE%20ON%20100%20CHURCH%20LEADERS%20ARREST%20In%20TONGXU%20HENAN%2008-6-04.htm.

10 Congressional Executive Commission on China 2004 Annual Report (Washington, DC: U.S. Congress, 5 October 2004), 16.

11 Jim Yardley, "China Hides Dissidents for Tiananmen Anniversary," The New York Times, 4 June 2004.

12 Hu Hong, "Empower Administrative Litigation," China Daily, 14 November 2004, http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-11/14/content_391269.htm.

13 Sing Lee and Arthur Kleinman, "Suicide as Resistance in Chinese Society," in Elizabeth J. Perry and Mark Selden, eds., Chinese Society: Change, Conflict and Resistance, 2nd ed. (London and New York: Routledge, 2000), 292-293.

14 Anthony Yu, State and Religion in China (Peru, Ill.: Open Court Publishing, 2005); Pitman Potter, "Belief in Control: Regulation of Religion in China," The China Quarterly 174 (June 2003): 317-37.

15 "White Paper – Freedom of Religious Belief in China" (Washington, DC: Chinese Embassy, 1997), http://www.china-embassy.org/eng/zt/zjxy/t36492.htm.

16 CECC 2004 Annual Report, 327-28, fn 326.

17 "Remarks by Paul Marshall, Senior Fellow, Center for Religious Freedom, Freedom House, Before the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, Roundtable on Religious Freedom in China" (CECC, 25 March 2002), http://www.cecc.gov/pages/roundtables/032502/marshallRmks.php?mode=print&PHPSESSID=9.

18 On Feng Xinmao see, "First Bishop Ordained in Decades With Graduate Degree," AsiaNews, 8 January 2004, http://www.asianews.it.

19 John Fisher, "China: Official Press Confirms Wenzhou Destruction Campaign," Keston News Service, 31 May 2001, http://www.starlightsite.co.uk/keston/kns/2001/010531CH.htm.

20 Magister, "The Bishop of Xi'an's Long March."

21 "China Moves to Crush Millions-Strong Christian House Church" (Washington, DC: Center for Religious Freedom, 19 May 2004), http://www.Freedomhouse.org/religion/news/bn2004/bn-2004-05-19.htm.

22 Jim Yardley, "In Crackdown, China Shuts Buddhist Site and Seizes Catholic Priests," The New York Times, 19 August 2004, 7.

23 "New Cases of Tibetan Political Imprisonment," Tibet Information Network [TIN], 8 July 2004.

24 Dru Gladney, "Cyber-Separatism and Uyghur Ethnic Nationalism in China" (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies [CSIS], Forum on The Role of Xinjiang in China-Central Asia Relations, 5 June 2003), http://www.csis.org/china/030605.cfm.

25 Center for International Rehabilitation, International Disability Rights Monitor, China 2003 Compendium Report http://www.cirnetwork.org/idrm/reports/china.cfm

26 CECC 2004 Annual Report, 12.

27 Ibid., 17.

28 Bruce Dickson, Red Capitalists in China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003).

29 Shanghai Star, 19 June 2003, http://app1.chinadaily.com.cn/star/2003/0619/fe21-1.html.

30 Wen Shengtang, "2003 nian de fanfubai douzheng [The struggle against corruption in 2003]," in Ru Xin, Lu Xueyi, and Li Peilin, eds., 2004 nian: Zhongguo shehui xingshi fenxi yu yuce [China's Social Situation: Analyses and Forecasts, 2004] (Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe, 2004).

31 "Hu Warns Against Aping Western Politics," The Straits Times, 16 September 2004.

32 Cao Zhe, "Prosecutors Confirm Big Graft Cases Increase," China Daily, 9 August 2004.

33 "Li Jinhua shenjizhang zuo 2003 niandu shenji gongzuo baogao," 24 June 2004, http://www.xinhuanet.com/zhengfu/2004-06/24/content_1543949.htm.

34 "Former Official Sent to Prison for Corruption," China Daily, 3 September 2004.

35 "Corrupt Officials Flee China," BBC News, 19 August 2004, http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/hi/world/asia-pacific/3579992.stm.