Kyaw Tun
08 Apr 2015
China: Political and Human Rights Issues
People’s Republic of China emerges a new developed country in the world after its political and economic reforming. It has bloomed one of the super power countries in the region. However, China creates the problems with self-defeating and abuse of power: they occupied the Tibet; they occupied a part of India territory; they illegally proclaim to occupy maritime territory of South China sea; and they expend to build their influence into India Ocean via Burma and Siri Lanka. In fact, there are many political problems and human right issues are still happening in China.
According to BBC News “How China Rule,” China has been ruled by Chinese Communist Party since 1949. The standing committee of politburo, the most important decision-making body, has controlled the rest of power. Politburo members are not elected through competitive election. All power of communist party stems from Politburo like a pyramid type of rule. Formally, party’s policies are centralization and totalitarian. No one allows criticizing any party’s decisions. If someone makes criticism against them, he or she has faced worse punishments, including arresting (“How China Rule”). China way to Communalism is opposed to democracy “the rule of people.” It has definitely ruled in China with centralization and totalitarian. Communist government has strongly banned freedom of speech, freedom of press, and freedom of assemble.
According to “Chinese Cultural Studies: Concise Political History of China,” Mao Zedong took the country power after long march attack to KMT regime with the Red Army, later renamed the People Liberation Army. He established the People’s Republic of China in on Oct. 1, 1949 with the philosophy of communism: radical ideas, Marxism, Leninism, and Mao Thoughts. He formed the China Communist Party (CCP) and Communist government. And he made many reforms: Land reform, Social reform, Thought reform, Economic reform, the Great Leap Forward, and the Cultural Revolution.
First, as the land reform, the government redistributed the land from landlords to the peasants and the Agrarian Law, land reform, began in 1950 and it was completely written at the beginning of 1953.
Second, the government also made the social reform which erased the distinction between landlord and peasants with land reform, removed distinctions with family, new marriage law of 1950, and got the full equality of women with men in cases of marriage, divorce, dividing of properties. The children could denounce the parents who did not engaged to support the Communist plan.
Third, CCP launched the thought reform campaigns: four olds campaign, three anti’s movement, the Five Anti’s campaign, and for Chinese Christians campaign. The campaign of Four Olds eradicated the outdate ideas, habits, customs, and culture. Three Anti’s movement eliminated the corruption, waste, and bureaucratism. The purposes of the Five Anti’s campaign were businessmen and bourgeoisie: no bribery, tax fraud, cheating, and stealing state property and economic information. The government set up Three Selfs movement for Chinese Christians that pushed pressure self-government, self-support, and self-propagation. This aim was separation of churches from their parent denominations aboard.
Fourth, as the reform of economic planning, Chinese Communist government declared the first five-year economic plan that started in 1953. The plan objective was in order from agriculture to industrialization. The government created the land and farm as collectivization of agriculture and it controlled all heavy industry and light industry.
Fifth, the government tested the Great Leap Forward, which aim was to overcome backward China economy, industry, and technology in 1958. It was five-year plan. They thought their goal could be achieved through the manpower. It made small-scale steel production with the backyard furnaces and its production was no quality. And they created many communes to agricultural output. As the result of the Great Leap Forward experiment, Chinese people and its economy were devastating.
Finally, the communist government made a radical movement called the Cultural Revolution (1966-19690, also known as the Great Proletarian, which was closed schools, slowed production, and strongly tightened relations with the international. It was workers revolution against party officials. Really, this revolution was a power struggle between Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung) and his supporters and it affected to CCP leadership. During the Cultural Revolution, young generation had no education, many factories and farms were wasted, Chinese industrialization power stepped down, and Deng Xiaoping and other leaders, who were pragmatic, were detained as reestablishment. In 1970, Zhou Enlai was became a prime minister by the supporting of Mao. After dead end of the Cultural, Communist Party and its government totally controlled the rest of people power and some civil rights granted in a new constitution in 1975.
Post War II, Sino-Soviet had established the good relation against the west countries. However, it was broken after China accused USSR of betraying communism and Soviet withdrew its technical advisors in 1960 (Webster’s New Universal Encyclopedia 239). In 1962, Sino-Indo border war briefly broke out and Sino-Soviet border clashed on Ussuri River in 1969 (2). In 1971, China admitted to United Nation during the Prime Minister Zhou Enlai, whose regime announced Four Modernizations: agriculture, industry, national defense, and science and technology (“Chinese Cultural Studies: Concise Political History of China”).
In 1976, when Mao Zedong passed away, Den Xiaoping became a supreme leader in China and he reformed Chinese economic policies, introduced market incentives, and opened new chapter international trade and foreign diplomacy relation (Webster’s New Universal Encyclopedia 239). China established the full diplomatic relation with United States of America in 1979 (2). As the result of good relation between China and United States of America, China economy growth rate is high with the trade of U.S.A. But United States faced trade issue of imports and exports with China. Exports to the United States exceeded than imports.
In fact, “China was largely isolated from the rest of the world during the heights of the Cultural Revolution, but when the upheaval subsided it began to take a more practical foreign policy line. Trade was opened up with a number of Western countries. China started to play an active role in international organization,” according to Chinese Cultural Studies: Concise Political History of China.
In addition, China Human Rights violation records are unacceptable, according to Human Rights Watch. Especially, Human Rights Violation in Tibet is systematically violated by Chinese authorities. There are many types of violation in Tibet: Making Religion Serve Politics, Torture and Abuse in Prison, the Individual Experience of Human Rights Violation (“Human Rights Violation in Tibet”).
Many centuries, Tibet was an independent kingdom and it was brutally occupied by Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) between 1951 and 1959. It is now became an autonomous region under the control of Communist Party of China. After Tibetans uprising suppressed by PLA, Tibetans spiritual leader Dalai Lama and his 9,000 lay people fled to North-East India in 1959. Exile-Dalai Lama and his Tibetans are working very hard for “free Tibet” with non-violent movement. There are no rights to protest in Tibet, they do not speak out freely about their present situation and any peaceful demonstrations are definitely blocked by Chinese government. In 2008, thousands of Tibetans marched protests against Chinese rule in Tibet over 50 years. Estimated 6,000 demonstrators arrested and the fate of arresting 1,000 are still concerned unknown (“Human Rights in Tibet”).
On the other hand, Chinese Communist government inhumanly suppressed the students who demonstrated to outcry for democracy in Tiananmen Square in 1989. According to CNN, “Estimates of death toll range from several hundred to thousands. It has been estimated that as many as 10,000 people were arrested during and after the protests. Several dozen people have been executed for their parts in the demonstration” (Tiananmen Square Fast Facts). Over 2,000 protestors killed in Tiananmen Square when the Chinese Army crushed pro-democracy movement in 1989, according to Webster’s New Universal Encyclopedia.
Finally, Democracy in Hong Kong is still under threat since it has had handover to China from Great Britain in 1997. Recent year, its rule of law is increasingly strict by police control. Police bans on assemblies and processions. Immigration Department also strongly prohibited who are belonging to a member of the Falun Gong and exiled dissidents in 1989 democracy movement (“World Report 2014: China.”).
In spite of the fact Chinese economy is a speedy growing in the world, it has built the military power which threatens to neighboring countries, including Vietnam and Philippine. At the same time, China’s political and human rights issues are still concerned in Tibet, Hong Kong, and inner cycle of China.
Works Cited
“Chinese Cultural Studies: Concise Political History of China.” Compton’s living
Encyclopedia. America Online, Aug, 1995. Web.30 Mar. 2015.
“How China Is Ruled.” bbc.co.uk. BBC NEWS. Web. 30 Mar. 2015.
“Human Rights in Tibet.” Freetibet.org. Free Tibet. Web. 30 Mar. 2015
“Human Rights Violation in Tibet.” hrw.org. Human Rights Watch, 12 Jun. 2000. Web. 30 Mar.
2015.
“Webster’s New Universal a New Standard in Single-Volume Encyclopedias.Webster:” Barnes
& Noble Books: USA, 1997. Print.
“World Report 2014: China.” hrw.org. Human Rights Watch.2014. Web. 30 Mar.2015.
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Kyaw Tun
0 6 May 2015
The United Nations Need to Reform
United Nations, the world largest international organization, was established on October 24, 1945 with the singing of five Great Power and 51 majority states. It was emerged as following of the Yalta Conference, Atlantic Charter, and League of Nations of World War 1, The United Nations was initiated by President Roosevelt declaration, on January 6, 1941, of Four Freedoms: Freedom of speech and expression, Freedom of every person to worship God in his own way, Freedom of want, and Freedom of fear. The two leaders, Roosevelt and Churchill signed the Atlantic Charter on August 12, 1941. The Charter was eight basic principles, including “First, their countries seek no aggrandizement, territorial or other.” “Second, they desire to see no territorial changes that do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the people concerned.” And “Third, they respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live, and they wish to see sovereign rights and self-government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived them…” According to Article 1 of the UN Charter, the purposes of UN are: to maintain international peace and security, to develop friendly relation among the nations, to achieve international cooperation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character, and to be a Centre for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends.
The structures or organs of the United Nations are: The General Assembly, The Security Council, The Economic and Social Council, The Trusteeship System, The International Court of Justice, and The Secretariat. There are many agencies: World Bank Group, the World Health Organization, UN World Food Programme – WFP, UN Refugee Agency – UNHCR, UN Children's Fund – UNICEF, and UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization –UNESO. Non-governmental organizations—in U.S.A. Non-profit organizations—are participating in the UN and its agencies with granting consultative status.
UN Security Council has five permanent members, U.S., UK, Russia, China, and French, with unilateral veto right when the General Assembly, members are now 193 states, each member is only one vote. In fact, there are serious structural problem in UN—the problems of veto. According to UN Chapter V, Article 27:
- Each member of the Security Council shell have one vote.
- Decisions of the Security Council on procedural matters shall be made by an affirmative vote of nine members.
- Decisions of the Security Council on all other matters shall be made by an affirmative vote of nine members including the concurring votes of the permanent members; provided that, in decisions under Chapter VI, and under paragraph 3 of Article 52, a party to a dispute shall abstain from voting.
However, UN’s SC veto, the five SC permanent members have no longer reflect power
realities, and the one-nation-one-vote formula of General Assembly. The early UN tried to solve the Palestine problem with the partition plan 33-13 by the supported of U.S. But it was rejected by the Arabs. The UN’s Ralph Bunch mediated a truce to the first Arab-Israeli war in1949. When the UN endorsed action against North Korea in 1950, Soviet Union was absent from the SC and the most troops were American.
The UN set the first two secretaries general: Trygvi Lie of Norway and Dag Hammarskjold of Sweden were vigorous and asserted the UN’s peacekeeping mission. Their successors, U Thant of Burma (Myanmar) and Kurt Waldheim of Austria, were more timid. U Thant took over peacefully Cuba crisis in 1961,
UN has own way as its uses, even though U.S. Congress dislike it. UN does international politics and public relations and it is a place of third-party diplomacy, good offices and arbitration, and fabulous listening post.
Ban Ki-moon has held as Secretary-General of UN office since 2007. UN won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001 and some of its agencies and officers have also taken as prize winners. Some people’s views optimize as UN is very important force for peace and human development. The many UN affiliated agencies do good work-in fighting plagues and famine and promoting international trade and contacts, but there has been no noticeable spillover effect. Some is believed to UN’s effectiveness have been mixed. Some others have widely called the UN is ineffective, huge corrupt, and big biased.
Finally, many critics expect too much from the UN and then denounce it for not delivering. The UN was made deliberately weak because the major powers went no infringement on their sovereignty. So far, UN works only five permanent members of Security Council. In addition, many nations have suspected that UN role under the Ban Ki-moon is totally subjugated to the wishes of U.S. foreign policies. Ban Ki-moon is also timid and worked under the pressure of super power countries which are playing political intrigue and interference for their interests.
As the conclusion, the United Nations need to reform its sprawling agencies which have become corrupt political footballs, unfair dues formula, unweighted General Assembly voting, and SC membership and return to its core competencies, namely, dispute resolution.
Reference:
http://www.un.org/en/
Module Seven: Chapter 21 the United Nations
Atlantic Charter-World War II, HISTORY.com
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