Charter 8: The Latest Cry for Chinese Democracy

In February 2010, US Ambassador to China, Jon Hunstman, issued the following public statement on the detention and harsh sentencing of dissident and Charter 8 author, Liu Xiaobo:

"We are disappointed by the Chinese Government's decision to uphold Liu Xiaobo's sentence of 11 years in prison on the charge of "inciting subversion of state power.” We believe that he should not have been sentenced in the first place and should be released immediately.

We have raised our concerns about Mr. Liu’s detention repeatedly and at high levels, both in Beijing and in Washington, since he was taken into custody over a year ago. Mr. Liu has peacefully worked for the establishment of political openness and accountability in China. Persecution of individuals for the peaceful expression of political views is inconsistent with internationally-recognized norms of human rights.

We continue to call on the Government of China to release him immediately and to respect the right of all citizens to peacefully express their political views and exercise internationally-recognized freedoms."

Hunstman's is a rare plea and direct criticism of the United States of China's internal affairs. His words convey a genuine interest in the safety and rights of Liu Xiaobo, but more importantly they state in no uncertain terms the kind of freedoms that an international community expects all nations of the world, especially one of its leading partners, to uphold and to encourage. While not explicitly expressing support for Liu Xiaobo's controversial document, Charter 8, Hunstman's appeal to Chinese authorities clearly reinforces some of the document's chief principles: freedom of speech, the recognition and respect of human rights and the deconstruction of a single-party institution.

In this unit, we will examine Charter 8 as the most recent outgrowth of a 150 yr struggle by Chinese progressivists to modernize Chinese culture and politics, freeing it from its own millenial history of despotism and insularity and delivering it into an global community of internationally shared values and rights. The Charter is the late arrived textual progeny of the 1989 Tian'an men movement, and just as that peaceful protest was resisted and punished, so the Communist government has treated Charter 8 and its supporters and authors. Considering the populace's track record for fighting for non-conformists, Liu Xiaobo has little hope of any public support. A March 2010 blogpost by famous novelist Han Han explains the collective psyche that will more than likely numb it to Liu's plight and cause:

"Do Chinese people seek out dangerous universal ideals? Chinese people seek
them, but they seek them at their convenience. To a lot of Chinese people,
the value of seeking such things is not nearly as high as seeking an
apartment building or an online game to play. Because everyone's life is so
high pressure, they don't have any ideals. A mouthful of dirty rice is
enough. There's no big difference between eating it while kneeling or eating
it while standing up... This is a race of people who can eat genetically modified grain and oil distilled from recycled food scraps, drink melamine-infused milk, and take inferior vaccines. Their tolerance is higher than you can imagine. Their needs are lower than you can imagine."

The condemnation of Liu to 11 years in prison for "political subversion" is more than just an exaggerated attempt by the central government to preserve peace and to foster the proverbial harmonious 和谐 society. By comparing the articles and aims of the Charter to some of its referential sources in world history (e.g. US Constitution, Declaration of Human Rights, Czech Charter 77), we will seek to understand just how much Liu Xiaobo's imprisonment is a statement of Communist China's insistence on controlling the terms on which it internationalizes and modernizes. In other words, in a comparative examination of the Charter and its recent treatment by Chinese authorities we will attempt to define the nature of hybridization and intercultural exchange in contemporary Chinese society.

Texts:
*Charter 8 (2008)
*Czechoslovakia's Charter 77 (1977)
*Constitution of the United States (1787)
*French Declaration of the Rights of Man (1789)
*Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UN) (1948)
*Constitution of the People's Republic of China (1982)

Questions:
(1) Cite influential places in Charter 8's source texts that talk about human rights.
(2) Why is the issue of federalization so important to the Charter? Which source texts make this an important issue?
(3) What do you perceive are the underlying motivations for the document's appeal to an international liberalism? In other words, what is at stake for the Chinese in modernity by accepting or rejecting its conditions?
(4) What kind of unofficial and official motives do you see informing the Communist government's suppression of this document and its supporters?
(5) How do you imagine the future of intercultural exchange in China and the possibility of its liberalization?

Links:
Feng Chongyi's article on Charter 8 (Jan 2010)
Charter 8 Website

Liu Wins Noble Peace Prize (Oct 2010)

Noble Nomination Letter (Jan 2010)

Getting Around the Censors to Mention Liu's Noble (Oct 2010)