Democratisation a deeper issue in China, says geopolitical expert

As China faces challenges of administration and authority from Jong Kong and Xinjiang, an expert on Chinese politics, Manoranjan Mohanty views on how the Chinese leadership will battle its challenges

As China faces challenges of administration and authority from Hong Kong and Xinjiang, formerly Professor of Political Science at University of Delhi and an expert on Chinese politics, Manoranjan Mohanty tells Aditi Phadnis how the Chinese leadership will battle its challenges within the boundaries while maintaining its image in front of its neighbours as well as the West. Edited excerpts:
 
China is facing challenges of administration and authority from Hong Kong and Xinjiang. It is worried enough about the two to mount an aggressive defence. How do you read the problem?
 
Hong Kong and Xinjiang present two different kinds of challenges to China’s central leadership. Hong Kong is a case of demand for democracy and self-governance. On the other hand, Xinjiang is a long-standing case of demand for ethnic self-determination.

 

The campaign against the extradition bill that started in June which occasionally led to violent confrontation with police and other incidents has grown into a movement for substantive democratic practices. This included direct elections of the Chief Executive who is currently appointed by the Chinese government out of a panel submitted by an electoral college consisting of elected members as well as representatives of other sectors. Xi Jinping has refrained from deploying security forces to suppress the democracy movement in Hong Kong. The original bill which would have allowed Hong Kong to hand over fugitives to mainland China has been withdrawn. The demand for an independent investigation into police excesses may be acceded. District Council elections had been conducted peacefully on 24 November where pro-movement candidates got 55 per cent votes. Even though there was some disruption of business, the financial interests remained vibrant and the flight of capital to places like Singapore was insignificant. The framework of ‘One Country, Two Systems’ that Deng Xiaoping declared for Hong Kong’s return to China in 1997 has been reiterated by the Chinese authorities.

 
In Xinjiang, the policy is still one of ‘strike hard’ against ‘fundamentalism, extremism and secessionism’. Besides intensifying close surveillance and strong police action against dissidents, Xi Jinping’ signature focus on ‘poverty alleviation’ has been put into force in a massive way. That has involved putting thousands of Uighurs in what the Chinese call ‘Vocational Training Camps’and others regard as ‘Concentration Camps for forced labour and brain-washing’. Major companies from Eastern China are tied up with training programmes and have employed Uighurs in satellite enterprises which have come up in a big way in the rural areas.
 
Thus there is no likelihood of a new policy of ‘aggressive defence’ in the future.

 
The Hong Kong problem has not gone away, despite the withdrawal of the extradition bill. This suggests a deeper issue.
 
Indeed the deeper issue is that of democratisation not only in Hong Kong, but in China as a whole. But more than ever before, the Xi Jinping leadership believes that stability was the most important condition for China’s remarkable economic growth and that must be maintained at any cost. So the Chinese government blames the Western governments, civil society groups and media for fomenting the unrest in Hong Kong accusing them of envying China’s successful rise as a world power and trying to prevent that. When the US Congress passed the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act on 26 November on the initiative of President Trump, the Chinese government reacted sharply as interference in internal affairs. Hong Kong will continue to put the question of democratization of the Chinese system on the agenda.

 
Is containment of Xinjiang really a big issue for China? Or is it being exaggerated out of proportion by the United States and other interested parties?
 
Xinjiang is a major issue for China even though US and other Western countries fully exploit the tensions there.
 
The forces of religious fundamentalism are active in the region. But the way the government has enforced restrictions on women wearing veils, men sporting beards and similar such actions show that they are not addressing the roots of alienation of Muslims. There was a brief period in 1980s under Hu Yaobang under whose leadership Xi Jinping’s father former Vice-Premier Xi Zhongxun’s liberal approach to religious question and Xinjiang and Tibet that stressed tolerance and respect for minorities was in practice. But that perspective was debated under Jiang Zemin and was abandoned. After the rise of Al Qaeda and later ISIS the policy of comprehensively defeating fundamentalism and secessionism was in force. After the violent incidents of 2009 the policy has become even more stringent. But clearly this policy has not won over the people of Xinjiang. Even though the number of terrorist incidents has declined, alienation of the population persists.

 
How do you see the Xi regime handling the challenge?
 
Formally, the Xi leadership has followed a three-pronged strategy on Xinjiang which was was worked out in 2014 and  reiteratedrecently by Wang Yang, the Standing Committee Member who also chairs the CPPCC, the United Front organ: a) deradicalisation by educating the youth in skills and patriotic values, and weaning them away from religious extremism; b) poverty eradication by lifting the region’s 770,000 people above poverty line; and c) strengthening the Xijiang Production and Construction Corp which has been in charge of the security and economic development of Xijiang since the 1950s.

 
All three aspects are put into action in the so-called vocational training centres. According to Western reports as many as 1.8 million people are in these camps in mostly northeastern Xijiang. Many of them had got employment in rural enterprises after training. According to one account each company that takes people for training is paid 1800 Yuan (Rs 18000/-) per head as incentive and again 5000 Yuan ( Rs 50,000/-) for giving them a job. Most enterprises provide apparently satisfactory child care and elderly care facilities in their premises so that both male and female members of the family can work. Involving companies in training and employment is a rather new method of addressing poverty. Big foreign corporations such as Volkswagon which has a car manufacturing plant in Urumqi, the capital is also participating in this programme as also Adidas.

 
The Xinjiang Production and Construction Corp – actually a military organization has many agricultural firms, manufacturing enterprises and energy programmes among others. Xinjiang’s cotton industry involving many Chinese and foreign multinationals has a worldwide market. That has got additional encouragement both from government investment as well as private capital.
 
But whether the vocational training camps are sites of ‘involuntary labour’ and separating family members from one another is desirable are constantly questioned. The phenomenon of monitoring the behavior of each family to check if there was any element of extremism exhibits direct state control over the household. Migration of Uighurs for work within China is seen with suspicion. Refugees from Xinjiang paint a dismal picture of repression.

 
History of ethnic movements in the world shows that no amount of economic upliftment satisfies the minority nationality until they are treated with dignity by sharing political power. That has not happened in Xinjiang. For example, no Uighur has  everbeen appointed as the CPC Secretary thus far though the Governor of the Province, rather the Chair of the Autonomous Region is  one. But the Party leader manages the region.
 
Could China see a fall-out of its treatment of Muslim minorities in the Islamic world, especially its Belt and Road Intiative? What about BRI projects that pass through Xinjiang?

 
The Belt and Road Initiative indeed is a major instrument for the development of Xinjiang. The ancient Silk Road passed through this region linking Central Asia as well as Europe. The success of the BRI projects such as the sixty billion US dollar CPEC (China-Pakistan Economic Corridoor) depends a lot on the economic development and people’s participation in the various projects along the route. Indeed, there is a fall out of the Xinjiang situation in the neibouring Islamic countries. But China has deftly handled its relations with them by making SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) an active forum for combating terrorism and promoting economic copperation. Besides its close relations with Pakistan, it has extended development support to Afghanistan and Political support to Iran and even Turkey where a large number of Uighurs have found asylum. But the uneasy condition in Xinjiang is bound to adversely affect BRI.