Instability

Question 1

Central thesis of Lee and Zhang (Bargained Authoritarianism)

Answer 1

Argue for a system of ‘bargained authoritarianism’ (which has been surprisingly ‘resilient’ (Nathan)) in China and analyses its three microfoundations: protest bargaining (non-zero sum bargaining), legal-bureaucratic absorption, and patron-clientelism.

Question 2

Mechanisms for Lee and Zhang

Answer 2

1) Protest (non-zero sum) bargaining adopts logic of market exchange. Trying to form an alliance by a) throwing money at the problem (huaqianmai pingan), b) fragmentation and co-optation by making them elect representatives to begin process of orderly negotiations, c) using emotion control through empathy and ‘making friends’, d) using threat of force. This brings short-term stability but does nothing to tackle the root cause.
2) Legal-bureaucratic absorption is a rule-bound game where they deploy mediation and arbitration arbitrarily, with officials deploying ‘joint action’ across government institutions and arbitrarily invoking rules across different bureaus. The law is important, as officials get time and order without public disharmony; citizens get institutional protection and leverage. Can also substitute mediation for litigation, which ‘blurs citizens’ rights’ and law is ignored to achieve stability.
3) Patron-clientelism, utilising interpersonal bonds eg. elderly patronage for votes. They can mobilise and influence voters, and form a mass of volunteers, but this is porous.

Question 3

Lee and Zhang: What is the existing literature explaining the success of general authoritarianism? (four names)

Answer 3

1) Bellin - the state’s coercive capacity;
2) Nathan - elite cohesion;
3) Mann - ‘infrastructural power’, the capacity of the state to penetrate civil society and implement logistically political decisions throughout the country;
4) Slater and Fenner - coercing rivals, extracting revenues, cultivating dependence.

Question 4

Lee and Zhang: What is the existing literature explaining the success of specifically China’s authoritarianism?

Answer 4

1) Patron-clientelism - Walder argues the party-state organised the populace’s material, political and social dependence, with a stable network of party activists who exchanged political loyalty for material rewards and careers. Such power relations are based on ‘dependence, deference and particularism’.
2) Hidden bargaining - Burawoy and Lukacs uses ‘shop floor games’ to describe the power relation between the party-state and the working class. Such bargaining is fragile and subject to ‘perpetual threat’ (Sabel and Stark).
3) Bureaucratic absorption - using laws to diffuse conflicts, using depoliticisation to steer contestations away from political values and turning them into manageable, non-zero sum quid pro quo, legal-bureaucratic games.
4) Stability maintenance - codifying the responsibility to maintain social stability for local officials in eg. 2008 CCP decision on strengthening the implementation of integrated public security management.

Question 5

Lee and Zhang: What are the problems with existing ways of dealing with instability in China?

Answer 5

1) market economy reduced popular dependence on authoritarian state,
2) use of force politically undersirable,
3) ideological indoctrination ineffective

Question 6

Central thesis of Lee and Selden (on inequality, short)

Answer 6

Charts the changes in 1) patterns of inequality and 2) features of popular resistance in contemporary China.

Question 7

Lee and Selden: What are the features of this new inequality?

Answer 7

1) Durable hierarchies producing inequality in Chinese society are class, citizenship and locality. Class origin chengfen was fixed by birth, creating frozen categories so now-poor landlords are scapegoated as class enemies. Hukou system established rural-urban divide, with the practice of sending individuals from urban to rural areas, xiaxiang.
2) Party bradished class categories to attack and scapegoat the old bourgeoisie and landlords and mass mobilising protests against this, all while deliberately hiding new forms of inequality and corruption.
3) Changing rhetoric surrounding inequality, with class rhetoric being muted and replaced by discussions of legal rights and citizenship

Question 8

Lee and Selden: What have been the economic changes leading to new protest dynamics? (globalisation and reform)

Answer 8

Global market integration has the paradoxical effect of localizing and fragmenting class conflicts and protests. Provides evidence for the success during the change and reform period eg. by promoting rural collective industry, grain output increased by one third, oil crops more than doubled and cotton nearly tripled in just six years from 1978-84. Inequality increased

Question 9

Lee and Selden: Why have protests not increased despite increased inequality?

Answer 9

protests became much more cellular with less overall solidarity due to uneven outcomes

Question 10

Lee and Selden (2009) - What are new forms of income and property-based inequality based on? (economic reasons)

Answer 10

a) dismantling of collectives,
b) privatisation of state enterprises,
c) triumph of market mechanisms (eg. 10 out of 12 mil TVEs in mid-1980s was private),
d) end of lifetime employment in cities, and
e) growth of corruption between government and business

Question 11

Whyte: Why the Chinese are accepting of inequality and are unlikely to launch social revolt? (compared to Mao)

Answer 11

1) Where the equality of the Mao period (largely within rather than across work units) was frequently unjust, now people see inequality as largely resulting from individual efforts and thus largely just;
2) Where farmers under Mao were virtually bound to the land through the household registration system in a nearly feudal fashion, now they are free to leave the countryside and seek employment elsewhere; and
3) Chinese economic growth has been so massive that it is a nonzero sum game in which there was, at least initially, ‘reform without losers’ so there is no large class of ‘losers of capitalism’, and rural poverty has been reduced by some 90%

Question 12

Whyte: Why are the rural poor less concerned with inequality?

Answer 12

1) Perhaps because rural workers and farmers in particular are quite optimistic about their conditions improving.
2) China’s peasants more likely than anyone else to say hard work is rewarded and becoming rich or staying poor is one’s own fault.
3) Possible that those most favoured by the socialist system are most bitter about what they’ve lost. The farmers never had anything!

Question 13

Central thesis of Martin Whyte

Answer 13

Argues against the ‘myth of the social volcano’ and demonstrates that the Chinese are mostly satisfied with the Chinese social system. Citizens do not like inequality (large majority thinks level of inequality is excessive) but are happier than citizens in eg. US and favour a state with safety net rather than socialist redistribution.
Why? 1) inequality an inevitable outcome of meritocracy and a by-product of economic development;
2) optimistic about their own chances for mobility - Chinese society is fair enough to enable ordinary citizens to get ahead and prosper based on hard work, talent, and training. Many support affirmative action to promote equality.
The only inequality large majorities disliked was the hukou system and its effect on migrant workers.
Contrary to popular belief, under socialism there were still stark material differences of different cities and rural residents lived a poor life with rigid social hierarchies. Most rural protest incidents in recent years have involved procedural injustices rather than distributive injustice.

Question 14

Whyte: Why are urbanites more likely to be dissatisfied?

Answer 14

1) they have more to lose - eg. could lose jobs, benefits etc; 2) have more examples close at hand of new millionaires and their lavish and segregated lifestyles; 3) subjective comparisons to the past and to others in local communities mean they will be more unhappy

Question 15

Central thesis of Ya-wen Lei

Answer 15

Revisits Whyte’s discussion of China’s social volcano with three findings: 1) critical attitudes toward inequality correlate with a structural understanding of inequality and skepticism of procedural or institutional justice; 2) Chinese people’s attitudes toward inequality changed little between 2004-09 but between 2009 and 2014, there was increasing criticality of both inequality and its seeming disjuncture with China’s socialist principles. 3) Discontent with inequality increases distrust of local government, and those who use socialism to critique inequality are more likely to distrust the central and local governments.

Question 16

Lei: What are the responses to Whyte?

Answer 16

1) Larsen suggests that China is in the middle rather than at the top of acceptance of inequality compared to similar countries;
2) argues that even though many believe hard work and effort are necessary conditions for economic success, they are not sufficient conditions. Even if they believe in meritocracy, this may overestimate their acceptance of inequality.
Hence 3) early hints that the social volcano might be forming

Question 17

Central thesis of Youngshan Cai

Answer 17

Analyses why grassroots protests succeed/fail. Argues 1) a protesting group’s ability to create and exploit the divide within the state, 2) mobilize participants, or 3) gain extra support directly affects the outcome of its collective action.
Protest outcomes are a function of two factors: 1) the cost of concessions for the authorities (political and monetary) and 2) the ‘forcefulness’ of protesters’ actions. If a protest has more than 500 participants, involves casualties, or receives media coverage, the authorities are likely to make concessions. One method of resistance is ‘issue connection’ and exposing local governments to central to extract concessions. Decentralisation also protects the central government’s image by distancing themselves from suppression, or pretending not to know if they don’t want to intervene. Concludes there is significant flexibility in dealing with protests, especially with the distance of the central government.

Question 18

Cai: What are some examples of government concessions with large-scale protests?

Answer 18

1) abolition of the much-hated agricultural tax in the early 2000s and 2) the enactment of a new labor law in 2008

Question 19

Cai: What are the local government responses to protests?（four short）

Answer 19

1) concessions, 2) concessions with discipline, 3) tolerance, and 4) suppression, different when costs are high (land disputes) vs non zero-sum like mediating labour disputes.

Question 20

Central thesis of Madsen (2011)

Answer 20

Tries to square the findings of Whyte and Cai, concluding they are surveying different things, as it is not mutually exclusive that most people in China are satisfied with the government despite increased inequality and other social problems, and that lots of grassroots protests are happening because of concretely experienced injustice eg. confiscation of farmland without fair compensation, layoffs, and home demolitions

Question 21

Quotation about why the poor should protest

Answer 21

Piven and Cloward - ‘a placid poor get nothing, but a turbulent poor sometimes get something’

Question 22

Central thesis of Chung et al (2016)

Answer 22

Argue for three dimensions of social instability in China: (1) intensifying popular protests in both rural and urban areas; (2) rise of ‘unofficial’ religious groups that continue to flourish; and (3) expanding criminal networks. These lead to increased ‘collective public security incidents’, where ‘a group of people illegally gather to disrupt public order and destroy public properties’

Question 23

Chung et al: What are the causes of protest?

Answer 23

1) economic difficulties caused by unemployment/bankruptcy,
2) delayed salary payments,
3) excessive taxation and surcharges,
4) illegal financial scams

Question 24

Chung et al: What are the causes of rural protest?

Answer 24

1) disputes over land division and appropriation, 2) excessive taxation and 3) irrigation rights

Question 25

Chung et al: Describe religious and criminal instability and interconnectedness

Answer 25

1) Religious sects eg. Falun Gong had a following of at least several million before it was banned in 1999, and now have formed horizontal linkages, with a four-tiered, nationwide organisation.
2) Criminal underworld heishehui reappeared post-Mao, have evolved into syndicates seeking protection from the Party with a political-criminal nexus, either buying law enforcement or embedding their bosses in state organs.
3) Interconnectedness across three sources of instability through popular protest-religious belief-anti-state rituals eg. White Lotus or Taiping Rebellion.

Question 26

Chung et al: Example of countryside instability

Answer 26

Henan countryside, where religion is competing for and even replacing township and village governments as institutions with legitimacy - when peasants converted, resist procurement of state grains, tax collection, and birth control.

Question 27

Central thesis of Göbel (2020)

Answer 27

Repression is closely correlated both with the cost of concessions (cost-benefit analysis) for local governments and protest intensity. A small-scale and peaceful labor protest in an urban locality very seldom encounters repression, but rural riots against land grabs, evictions or environmental pollution are nearly certain to experience state-sanctioned violence even if the number of participants is low. Investigates the impact of two factors on the likelihood of repression: protest intensity (instead of forcefulness, with the use of protest issue as a proxy), and the costs local governments would have to bear if they conceded to the demands of protesters. Concludes from 70,000 protests that if protests aim at financial concessions from local governments, repression is far more likely (>50%) than if protests are directed against non-government entities (<20%)

Question 28

Gobel: Existing research on responses to protests

Answer 28

1) Physical coercion is a last resort, only happens when repression and other measures have failed (Chen 2012).
2) Repression is a strategic deterrent to raise the opportunity cost of participating in social unrest (Lorentzen 2017) (but if this was the only variable, repression would happen randomly).
3) Repression is a function of cost/benefit calculations by local officials and the ‘forcefulness’ of a protest (including protest size, protester violence and media coverage) (Cai 2010)

Question 29

Central thesis of Truez (short)

Answer 29

Anti-regime protests are especially likely to incur government repression

Question 30

Central thesis of Klein and Regan

Answer 30

Draws a distinction between concession costs and disruption costs. Concession costs are high when protesters express ‘maximalist’ demands such as ‘high-level resignations or changes in political representation’, use violence, or make repeated demands (leads to repression). Disruption costs are high when protest activities disrupt business, endure for a long time and attract a large crowd (leads to concession and accommodation)

Question 31

Central thesis of Xi Chen

Answer 31

Popular protests are not necessarily a threat to, but can instead help stabilize China’s one-party authoritarian regime. The CCP opens limited space for protests so people can protect their rights and interests. Protests provide higher levels with insights into severe grievances that lower level governments would try to hush up. Repression is ‘infrequent’ and, if it occurs, ‘restrained’

Question 32

Central thesis of Tanner (2004)

Answer 32

written during Hu administration, showing alarming changes in protests: 1) increased size, 2) improved communication through Internet hence better coordination, 3) improved strategy, 4) increased violence. BUT protesters are restraining their own actions post-1989 and making sure they are targeting concrete local grievances instead of broad systemic changes, even reaffirming their support for the CCP and claiming they only want local officials to obey Beijing

Question 33

Central thesis of O’Brien (1996)

Answer 33

Argues that protest strategy is ‘rightful resistance’ which allows Beijing to solve and act as saviour against corrupt local officials. Also coins term ‘political opportunity structure’ - the ‘external factors that facilitate or impede claims making’. Some features of a political system or of critical political moments provide ‘openings’ for behavior antagonistic or disobedient to the government

Question 34

Tanner: What are the three main reasons for increased protests?

Answer 34

1) Protests especially bad in China’s aging northeastern industrial region, where free-market reforms have badly hurt workers in inefficient state enterprises, such as Liaoning province. Economic growth is also hampered by political concerns and wish to limit dissent eg. refusing to close down insolvent banks
2) Protests due to ‘imperfect political structures’ that provide inadequate avenues for voicing problems.
3) More permissive strategy because they fear being held responsible for botched operations or citizens enacting revenge.

Question 35

Central thesis of Tsai (Solidary groups)

Answer 35

Argues solidary groups which are 1) encompassing (open to everyone under the local government’s jurisdiction) and 2) embedding (incorporate local officials into the groups as members) are informal institutions of accountability which increase provision of public goods, even when formal democratic and bureaucratic institutions of accountability are weak. For example, village temples are encompassing and embedding institutions - in West Gate, Fujian, all local officials take care to be upstanding members of the temple, so it improves public goods provisions. Hence temples have a positive effect, while churches have a negative effect (not embedding because party members are expressly forbidden from being members). If institutions are not encompassing, they can still contribute to the good of the group, but not necessarily public good. Also important to incorporate agents of the state and offer moral standing, which depends on 1) shared sense of morals and 2) publicised behaviour as an incentive to contribute to the public good. The effects of implementing democratic institutions on village governmental public goods provision were actually very small and statistically insignificant.

Question 36

Tsai: Problems with relying on informal solidary groups?

Answer 36

1) difficult to scale up, 2) may be less good than what formal institutions can provide, and 3) may forestall institutional changes in long term

Question 37

Central thesis of Charles Tilly

Answer 37

The more powerful the group, the less repression it receives. On the flip side, groups with a little power suffer more repression than do the completely powerless because the latter pose no threat to the government and their small-scale collective actions are too weak to bother with.

Question 38

Central thesis of Yao Li

Answer 38

looks at an original data set of 1418 protests in China, showing that the Chinese state permits some (albeit limited) space for protest and that most protesters confine themselves to this space. Nearly two-thirds of protests were tolerated by authorities! Quantitative evidence that popular contention in China is featured by a non-zero-sum game, instead of a zero-sum game where either the regime is overthrown or the protest is stifled. Rebuts much research on contentious politics that authoritarian states use harsh repression. Shows most protest events did not take transgressive forms - 1) staying away from violence, 2) from radical political claims (eg. opposing Communist rule), and 3) from linking organizationally with other protests. Interesting finding that protests by ethnic minorities are not likely to be more harshly repressed; there is no extra repression for these ethnic minority groups because they have super political claims on ethnicity and separatism which would be clamped down on anyway

Question 39

Central argument of the Communique

Answer 39

Communique on the Current State of the Ideological Sphere (2013) - summarises the main threats to the CCP as of 2013, including the spread of Western propaganda such as constitutional democracy, promoting ‘universal values and civil society to undermine CCP leadership, or promoting neoliberalism to undermine China’s Basic Economic System.

Question 40

King et al (Censorship): What are the two existing theories of the CCP’s goals in censorship program?

Answer 40

1) State critique theory, to suppress dissent and faults of Chinese state, its policies, or its leaders, such that the sum total of available public expression is more favourable to those in power. MacKinnon (2012) shows that during the Wenzhou high speed rail crash, Internet content providers were asked to track and censor critical postings.
2) Theory of collective action potential, where censorship is for those who join together to express themselves collectively and might create collective action, and praise or fault is irrelevant. The CCP’s view is that collective expression organized outside of governmental control equals factionalism and ultimately chaos and disorder. Esarey and Xiao (2011) - party leaders are most fearful of concerted efforts by influential netizens to pressure the government to change policy, but identify these pressures as criticism of the state. Similarly, Shirk (2011) - the aim of censorship is to constrain the mobilization of political opposition, but her examples suggest that critical viewpoints are those that are suppressed.
But not mutually exclusive - Marolt (2011) - online postings are censored when they either criticize China’s party state and its policies directly or advocate collective political action

Question 41

Quotation by King et al on expression and censorship

Answer 41

Chinese people are individually free but collectively in chains

Question 42

King et al: How the CCP censors free speech

Answer 42

1. The Great Firewall of China, which disallows certain entire Web sites from operating in the country
2. ‘keyword blocking’ with banned words, such as using homophones.
3. (me) shadow-banning, where it looks like a post has gone through, but others cannot see or search for it.

Question 43

Central thesis of King et al (2013) (Censorship)

Answer 43

CCP doesn’t ban all forms of online criticism against the state and in fact may be strategically allowing some criticism as effective feedback, or to let people vent; the type of online action they care the most about is that which can realistically threaten regime stability through collective action.
Censorship program is aimed at curtailing collective action by silencing comments that represent, reinforce, or spur social mobilization, regardless of content.

Question 44

King et al (Censorship): Why does CCP allow some criticism of the state? (and evidence, quotes)

Answer 44

So long as collective action is prevented, social media can be an excellent way to obtain effective measures of the views of the populace about specific public policies and experiences with the many parts of Chinese government and the performance of public officials. Dimitrov (2008) argues that regimes collapse when its people stop bringing grievances to the state, since it is an indicator that the state is no longer regarded as legitimate - optimal strategy for state to hold onto power. Lorentzen (2012) develops a formal model in which an authoritarian regimes balance media openness with regime censorship in order to minimize local corruption while maintaining regime stability

Question 45

Central thesis of King et al (2017) (Fabricating posts)

Answer 45

Argue Chinese government fabricates social media posts for strategic distraction and not engaged argument. These 50c posters (around 448 mil social media comments a year) distract the public and change the subject, as most of these posts involve cheerleading for China, the revolutionary history of the Communist Party, or other symbols of the regime. Thie strategy of ‘astroturfing’ or reverse censorship avoids controversial issues entirely and do not vociferously argue for the government’s side in political and policy debates. Authors differentiate between 1) knowledge of grievances and 2) knowledge of collective action potential, arguing that knowledge of grievances is already commonplace, so allowing more information is of little risk to the regime.

Question 46

King et al (fabricating posts): Why do they use distraction as a strategy?

Answer 46

1) can let an argument die down quickly,
2) distraction reduces anger,
3) enabling the government to actively control opinion without having to censor as much as they might otherwise (censoring makes people angry!)

Question 47

Central thesis of Esarey and Xiao (2008)

Answer 47

Chinese bloggers use satire to convey criticism of the state in order to avoid harsh repression

Question 48

Central thesis of Guobin Yang

Answer 48

Looks at citizen activism online, arguing that state efforts to constrain activism have only led to more creative acts of subversion. 1) Transnationalism provides cultural and social resources to online activism, and 2) even internet businesses have encouraged contentious activities, generating a synergy between commerce and activism. Eg. The widespread ‘cao ni ma’ (grass-mud horse), a mythical beast that resembles an alpaca, is a Chinese pun for the swear word that means someone who has sex with his or her mother.

Question 49

Central thesis of Rebecca MacKinnon (2011)

Answer 49

Coins the term ‘networked authoritarianism’, using the case of China to show that authoritarian regimes can embrace and adapt to the Internet, and even use networked technologies to bolster legitimacy. Even though citizens may feel a greater sense of freedom, the single ruling party remains in control. Eg. in 2009, when all university students in Beijing had Internet access, they did not recognise the 1989 Tiananmen Square photo. Hence cannot assume that access to Internet and social networking platforms are sufficient for democratising such regimes.

Question 50

MacKinnon: What are the two types of activism?

Answer 50

Distinguishes between exit activism and voice activism. Exit activism calls for end to one-party rule and political autonomy or independence for ethnic groups, which is eliminated. But most are voice activism, or online insurgencies to provide ammunition to reformist leaders or liberal local bureaucrats in power struggles against hardline conservative colleagues. This reduces political risks to reformist officials and allows them to justify their platform.

Question 51

Central thesis of Tyrene White (2006)

Answer 51

Analyses China’s ‘longest campaign’, the one-child policy in the late 1970s based on a Malthusian view of economic growth. Attitudes towards birth control: evasion, collusion, coverup, confrontation, and accommodation. Individual coping/survival strategies: corruption, temporary exile, non–registration, or direct confrontation with the authorities. The role of regular massive propaganda campaigns was crucial.
Effects: infanticide, infant abandonment, and sex-ratio imbalances