Making sense of 'mass incidents'
- Source: The Global Times
- [20:15 May 30 2009]
- Comments
Riot
Party secretary Shi, an important figure in Liu’s book, said that behind the girl’s death simmered unaddressed, deeper problems including disputes between mine owners and farmers, between local government and migrants in Weng’an. These issues, deep and with profound implications, would escalate into a full-scale riot involving more than 30,000 people.
Weng’an’s GDP had doubled between 2000 and 2007. Fiscal income increased almost three times during that period, according to Liu. Mining entrepreneurs and local government officials grew rich at the same time as local people lived on in misery, failing to benefit from any improved economic largesse, Liu claimed in the book.
Mining in Weng’an also blocked the villagers’ drinking water, forcing them to drink water drawn from ditches tainted with garbage. In response, the local government in May 2007 spent 700,000 yuan ($102,500) on a new drinking water project, without any results.
Mining near the villagers’ houses caused cracks in their homes, but only 70 of 1,000 affected households were reportedly compensated. The mining company repaired a dozen.
Villagers also had to borrow money at high interest to pay for their children’s schooling, said Liu, a veteran journalist based in Guizhou for over two decades.
Liu cited an official who had been transferred from Longli County to Weng’an: for every 10 Weng’an officials, the official said, seven or eight were involved in business or setting up a business.
Economic unfairness and growing social inequality were the root causes of a growth in protests, both Shi and Liu agreed.
“China has entered a golden age of economic development,” said Liu. “Meanwhile it is also a peak time for societal contradictions.”
The Gini coefficient measures the widening gap between the rich and the poor. China’s figure since 2000 has been higher than 0.4 percent, the international alarm level. When the coefficient hits alarm levels, social stability is endangered, said Li Yingsheng, a sociology professor with Renmin University of China.
Hatred towards the rich among everyday Chinese people reflected a hatred for unfairness in society, according to Mao Shoulong, professor at Renmin University of China.
Land grabs
Local governments who sequestered land or property from their own people were the spark behind many a mass incident, the report found. Local governments often overemphasized ecnomic development at the expense of their public service responsibility, it concluded.
The academy report mentioned more than 30,000 illegal land grabs involving more than 220,000 hectares last year. Land disputes have become the prime problem affecting the stability and development of rural areas.
Conflicts over land requisitions and the operating rights of contracted land as well as disputes between capital and labor will become increasingly significant, said Yu Jianrong, a researcher with the Rural Development Institute at CASS.
“Only when things become big trouble are problems solved in China,” said Ding Gang, a senior editor at People’s Daily in Beijing. “That proves something is wrong with the management mode.”
China’s “social management mode” – the official euphemism for government’s handling of society – should be reformed, said Ding. Government should research problems to prevent them escalating into mass incidents.
To reduce complaints, government should switch its focus from economic development towards the welfare of its people, Liu suggested.
Liu advocated democratic supervision to reduce mass incidents.
“The absence of effective democratic surveillance caused the accumulation of a large number of complaints,” Liu reportedly said in an interview with Phoenix Weekly.
“Power without supervision surely produces corruption. The ruling party should have their rights effectively supervised,” he said.
“Bureaucrats shield one another, and Criminal Law should not be applied to senior officials” is part of ancient Chinese officials’ culture, Liu wrote in the book.