The Hunt for Dissidents in China

 

1.   NATURE AND PURPOSE OF THE HUNT FOR DISSIDENTS

The spring 1989 demonstrations throughout China, which brought together students, intellectuals, artists and workers from all sectors, posed a serious threat to the absolute power of the Chinese Communist Party. Although the 1989 demonstrations were part of the student protest movement which began in the mid-1980s, their extent, the rapid growth of popular support for the democratic cause, the supportive response of foreign powers, and intense international media coverage forced authorities to react with resolve to consolidate their power and crack down on dissidence (Freedom at Issue Sept.-Oct. 1989, 12). This reaction entailed a regular combing out of the Chinese population, which was subjected to self-criticism, political education (the vigorous reinstatement of ideological education classes) and tighter social control (the reinforced application of residence cards, work units and neighbourhood committees). The ultimate goal of this ideological purge campaign, initiated subsequent to the Tiananmen Square incidents in June 1989, is to identify citizens with "counter-revolutionary" tendencies and then to classify them into categories ranging from those who demonstrated or expressed support for leaders of the pro-democracy movement to those who committed acts of violence during the demonstrations (Chenming Monthly Magazine Oct. 1989, 4-5).

Ten categories of individuals among the most active in the demonstrations make up first target group to be fought, reformed or neutralized. Another nine categories, composed of those who have links with "counter-revolutionaries," who demonstrate anti-Party and antisocialist attitudes or have supported the pro-democracy movement financially or otherwise, may be subjected to close scrutiny designed to correct their ideological position (Ibid.; The Globe and Mail 10 Aug. 1989, A5).

According to a document made public by a Chinese diplomat who recently defected to the United States, the Chinese government "will not allow evil leaders to return to China before they abandon their anti-government position and commit to concrete acts of repentance" (The Calgary Herald 3 June 1990, C1; Far Eastern Economic Review 5 July 1990, 11). Since June 1989, Beijing has in fact refused permission to return to China to about a hundred pro-democracy militants living abroad (The Toronto Star 2 July 1990).

2.                METHODS USED TO ROOT OUT DISSIDENTS

2.1                Self-criticism and political education

Following the events of April, May and June 1989, Chinese authorities bolstered the practice of self-criticism in order to assess the ideological position of the Chinese population. President Deng Xiaoping broke his silence on 9 June to deliver a speech on the spring 1989 counter-revolutionary rebellion. Prime Minister Li Peng decreed three study sessions per week on Deng's speech for cadres and State employees (Le Point 19 June 1989, 46). All public servants (who constitute a high proportion of the labour force in a country where the state sector is very large) had to submit a written statement of their ideological position regarding the spring 1989 pro-democracy movement (FBIS-CHI-89-112 13 June 1989a, 18-19). The Party also required that workers report their own participation in the demonstrations, in this way exposing them to military law penalties (Ibid.). All students were required henceforth to produce a written statement on the rebellion before they could graduate (Simmie and Nixon 1989, 200). Prime Minister Li Peng warned all those who had taken part in the demonstrations and sided with the students that they "would have to change those opinions" (Ibid., 199). A recent report states that work units, offices and schools still require their members to write self-criticism for at least one afternoon a week (The Toronto Star 19 Mar. 1990).

The Guangzhou region received particular criticism for its swift "plunge" toward a social system and economy too "capitalist" for authorities' tastes (The New York Times 28 June 1989). On 11 June 1989 the Guangzhou Communist Party Committee released a communiqué asking all Party members to rally to the support of communist ideology. The communiqué also stated that those who refused to comply would be "seriously punished" (FBIS-CHI-89-112 13 June 1989a). Guangdong provincial authorities as well threatened Guangzhou student ringleaders with severe punishment if they refused to report to the Public Security Bureau (Chinese police) to produce a statement on their participation in the pro-democracy movement (FBIS-CHI-89-128 6 July 1989). Students from Zhongshan University in Guangzhou were imprisoned "because of their refusal to report to the Public Security Bureau to make their statement" (Chenming Monthly Magazine Oct. 1989, 2). Military personnel have also been required to perform self-criticism, on penalty of punishment by military law (FBIS-CHI-89-112 13 June 1989a, 1). The provincial Party committee's secretary, Lin Ruo, launched a general appeal for in-depth political education on 15 June 1989, stressing the necessity to study in detail Deng Xiaoping's speech of 9 June 1989 on the "counter-revolutionary" rebellion (FBIS-CHI-89-119 22 June 1989). In February 1990, after military law was lifted, Guangdong provincial authorities reaffirmed the importance of ideological education in the schools (FBIS-CHI-90-044 6 Mar. 1990, 42). In April, the Party organized a major symposium on political propaganda in the city of Guangzhou (FBIS-CHI-90-067 6 Apr. 1990, 41-42).

2.2   Methods of identifying dissidents

One of the main methods used by the Chinese Government to identify dissidence, whether actual (active participation in pro-democracy demonstrations) or potential (favourable response towards dissidents' ideas), is to encourage denunciation. In the weeks following the Tiananmen Square events, the government made several statements on Chinese television calling on citizens either to denounce those who took part in or supported the pro-democracy movement, or face penalties (Le Monde 24 Aug. 1989; The Economist 17 June 1989, 39). Those who failed in their duty to denounce "counter-revolutionaries" would be liable to arrest or imprisonment (Amnesty International, AI Index: ASA 17/09/90, 36). Incitement to denounce was accompanied by a campaign of terror on Chinese television, which repeatedly showed counter-revolutionaries with their hands bound and their faces covered with wounds, together with photographs of China's 21 most-wanted student leaders (Ibid., 37).

According to an independent source, Chinese police laid charges of antigovernment activism against "anyone who could be identified" on videotape (even from traffic control cameras) or photographs taken by security forces or published by international press and television (China Review Aug. 1989a, 5). One source reported that even people who were passing in the street during demonstrations and appeared in such pictures could have been arrested, interrogated and, in some cases, sent for re-education (Amnesty International 28 Feb. 1991). The Public Security Bureau was very active in the spring of 1989 filming and photographing demonstrations all across the country in order to use the pictures in its fight against dissidents (China Review Aug. 1989b, 9).

2.3          Tightening social control

Following the spring 1989 unrest, three institutions of social control played a leading role in the hunt for dissidents: the hukou (residence card), the danwei (work unit) and the jumin weiyuanhui (neighbourhood committee).

As one source affirms, "during the terror which reigned following the massacre of 4 June 1989, the hukou was obviously an important element in the arsenal of repression" (Béja 1989, 253). The hukou, introduced in the sixties all across China, binds each citizen to a specific place of residence which in theory must remain the same throughout his or her lifetime. In addition, any information concerning the person's "attitude towards the community," "social relations" and denunciations is included in the file attached to the hukou and never deleted (Ibid.). The strict control over citizens' mobility exercised by the hukou thus makes it easier for the Public Security Bureau to arrest dissidents (Whyte and Parish 1984, 19, 21). It is difficult to evade residence control, since everyone must register with the Public Security Bureau, even to spend a night away from his or her regular residence (White 1977, 155; Jeune Afrique 21 June 1989). However, large floating underground populations congregate in China's major economic centres, such as Guangzhou and Shanghai (Country Reports 1989 1990, 816).

The danwei, or work unit, is located in every place of work or study. It is the body which provides the letters of introduction required for every administrative action such as changing jobs, permission to travel or marry, etc. (Béja 1989, 254). Like the hukou, the danwei controls its members' mobility and maintains close contacts with the Public Security Bureau. The danwei's control over travel was tightened in June 1989 by stricter use of identity cards which had been tested all across China for five years (Country Reports 1989 1990, 816). In addition, the danwei is responsible for organizing political re-education classes and "correcting" ideological deviations among the Chinese population.

Following the events of 4 June 1989, authorities informed neighbourhood committees (jumin weiyuanhui) that in future they should work more closely with the Public Security Bureau to control citizens' activities and attitudes (Country Reports 1989 1990, 808). Neighbourhood committees, which no citizen can evade, can thus play "an important role as an informant in hunting down demonstrators" (Béja 1989, 255).

3.                RESULTS

The results of the hunt for dissidents have been decisive, as the number of people arrested in purges ranges from a few thousand (according to government sources) to tens of thousands (according to independent sources) (Amnesty International, AI Index: ASA 17/09/90, 37). The hunt for dissidents in Guangzhou and the rest of the province of Guangdong, from where most asylum seekers originate, also took its toll, as attested by the appendix.

In early September 1989, Li Peng confirmed the hunt for dissidents by rejecting all possibility of an amnesty for demonstrators (FBIS-CHI-89-171 6 Sept. 1989). According to an official Chinese government estimate, only 355 participants in the spring 1989 demonstrations are still in prison in Beijing (News from Asia Watch 1 Aug. 1990, 1). However, the number of people suspected of "counter-revolutionary" activities still held in other parts of the country or in re-education camps remains unknown. Reports from the Chinese Ministry of Public Security, moreover, reveal that only suspects who have confessed their crimes and shown "concrete" signs of repentance have been released (Ibid., 2). Although the release of certain dissidents has enabled the Chinese government to win back some international support (not the least being the recent restoration of the United States' Most Favoured Nation status), additional persons were arrested on the first anniversary of the massacre of 4 June 1989 for trying to organize pro-democracy demonstrations (News from Asia Watch 1 Aug. 1990, 4-5). Recently, an extensive cross-country campaign against crime led to the execution of tens of thousands of people (Libération 28 Aug. 1990). However, the death penalty and trials for what are usually considered to be common-law "offences" are often used for political purposes in China (The Independent 5 July 1990, 8), and the courts remain entirely bound by Party directives (The Los Angeles Times 16 Jan. 1990, A6).

4.           CONCLUSION

The hunt for dissidents which followed the military operation on 4 June 1989 belongs to an older current of Chinese history: since 1949, various campaigns of relative ideological openness have served to stifle dissidents. The concept of a "counter-revolutionary" in China encompasses many elements considered potentially dangerous to socialist order and the dictatorship of the proletariat (Lau Yee-Fui et al. 1977, 328), whose "crimes" are liable to penalties ranging from a year in prison to the death sentence (The Criminal Code 1982, 49-52). Today's hunt for dissidents has made "counter-revolutionary crime" current once again. In order to understand Chinese society, this concept is thus more relevant than ever.

In view of the tense situation which prevails in China, the repression of democratic ideas remains a priority for the Chinese Communist Party. The institutions of social control implemented by the Party are now more than ever omnipresent in Chinese social and political life. In post-Tiananmen China, where conformity with Party ideas remains imperative, dissidents continue to be tracked down.

5.          APPENDIX A: THE COMBING OUT MOVEMENT IN GUANGDONG

Guangzhou

On 7 June 1989, police in Guangzhou arrested over a hundred workers who expressed their anger at the 4 June repression by blocking the Haizhou bridge (FBIS-CHI-89-112 13 June 1989b).

A member of one of the suicide commandos associated with Spring 1989 turned himself in to authorities in Guangzhou on 14 June and confessed his "counter-revolutionary crime" (BBC Summary 19 June 1989).

The Guangzhou Patriotic College Students' Federation, an independent organization with democratic leanings founded in the spring of 1989, was banned in mid-June and its leaders ordered to surrender to authorities (FBIS-CHI-89-117 20 June 1989b; FBIS-CHI-89-115 16 June 1989).

In August 1989, again in Guangzhou, prisoners were executed shortly after the Cantonese reaction to the Beijing massacre (Libération 30 Aug. 1989; Libération 10 Aug. 1989).

At the end of the month, three Jinan University students were arrested for their "counter-revolutionary" activities in the spring demonstrations (FBIS-CHI-89-163 24 Aug. 1989).

Again in Guangzhou in late summer some of China's 21 most wanted student leaders were arrested (FBIS-CHI-89-116 19 June 1989; Reuters 25 Aug. 1989).

In September 1989, a Guangzhou University student was detained for fifteen days for distributing "reactionary" pamphlets (FBIS-CHI-89-191 4 Oct. 1989, 4).

Elsewhere in the province of Guangdong

In late June 1989, "suspicious elements" charged with participation in pro-democracy riots were arrested at the border between Shenzhen and Hong Kong (FBIS-CHI-89-117 20 June 1989a, 1, 8).

In early August, special investigators were sent to the Shenzhen University campus (located in China's oldest special economic zone, south of Guangzhou) to root out student dissidence in that university. The university president was to be dismissed soon afterwards for having expressed excessive enthusiasism towards the pro-democracy movement (FBIS-CHI-89-146 1 Aug. 1989, 6).

The leader of the Shenzhen Communist Party was also dismissed for having participated in the pro-democracy movement, making the special economic zone more suspect in the government's eyes (FBIS-CHI-89-178 15 Sept. 1989, 1, 10).

In October, alleged spies from Taiwan who had come to Guangzhou to pass on information on the pro-democracy movement were sent to a provincial prison, one for thirteen years and the other for ten (The Associated Press 24 Oct. 1989).

In December, following a report stating that student leader Chai Ling was in the province of Guangdong, authorities launched a full-scale hunt, which failed (FBIS-CHI-89-242 19 Dec. 1989, 1).

Shortly afterwards, news reached Hong Kong that an editor's son had been arrested for assisting "democratic elements" (dissidents) to escape

(FBIS-CHI-89-245 22 Dec. 1989, 6).

In May 1990, the trial of about ten people involved in the "counter-revolutionary" rebellion of spring 1989 ended in prison sentences of five to ten years (FBIS-CHI-90-094 15 May 1990, 2).

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