The Non-Existent Space for Ethnic Minorities in China Amid Han Chauvinism

On October 8, Wu Bangguo, the former third in the Communist hierarchy and head of China’s top legislature, died in Beijing at the age of 83.

An official obituary by Xinhua described Wu as an ‘outstanding leader’. The South China Morning Post observed: 

“Wu was best remembered for his strong opposition to the Western political system. At an NPC [National People’s Congress] seminar in 2011, Wu identified five political arrangements that China cannot implement: a multiparty system, pluralistic ideologies, federalism, privatisation, and the separation of powers and bicameralism.” 

“We will absolutely not copy models in the Western political system,” Wu had argued. This raises the question of what the Chinese system is. Is it really superior? We shall see that it is not.

Unrest in Minorities’ Areas

According to Chen Wenqing, head of the Communist Party of China’s Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission (CPLAC), the Party’s top security body, who recently visited Tibet, “Maintaining stability and guarding against independence activities are the top priorities for security personnel in Tibetan areas… Security forces must resolutely crackdown on separatist and destructive activities.” He added that the Party must “resolutely manage religious affairs while resolutely protecting normal religious activities, so as to prevent risks, crack down on crimes, and maintain stability.”

During his tour, while visiting security units in Lhasa and Chamdo, Chen ‘ordered security personnel to carry out more propaganda and education campaigns to increase awareness of national identity among the people of all ethnic groups’.

It means that the Tibetans are first Chinese and only then Tibetans.

That is not all. Around the same time, Zhang Jun, president of the Supreme People’s Court, while inspecting some courts in Tibet, stated that it was necessary to hand down “tough punishment to keep up the pressure on violent terrorism, ethnic separatism, and other serious criminal crimes”. A month earlier, Ying Yong, head of the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, while in Lhasa, stressed the need for prosecutors to “harshly crack down on all kinds of separatist infiltration, sabotage activities, and crimes endangering national security in accordance with the law”.

What is so superior in this political system where the Tibetans need to be so harshly treated? 

Where is the genuine autonomy asked for by the Dalai Lama?

Nevertheless, from 22-28 September, Wang Junzheng, Party Secretary of the Tibetan Autonomous Region, on a visit to Mongolia and South Korea to ‘comprehensively’ publicise: “Xi Jinping’s diplomatic thought, enhance and deepen cultural and economic exchanges, and jointly create a new situation of win-win cooperation,” claimed that Xi “attaches great importance to Tibet work and deeply cares about the people of all ethnic groups in Tibet”.

Will China Change?

Some observers believe that China should be given time to change and progressively evolve into a democratic system. They refuse to see that the ‘time’ is also ticking against the minorities, and that in any case, China does not want to change.

Some 40 years ago, I had asked the Dalai Lama how Tibet would regain its independence (or autonomy); at that time, he answered, “It does not depend on us Tibetans; changes will come from within China”. He repeatedly said that the people of China will bring about changes in their own country, which will give a chance to the people of Tibet to fulfil their aspirations.

It still seems so far away.

In this context, three letters addressed twenty years ago to then president Hu Jintao by the veteran Tibetan communist leader Phuntsok Wangyal, who had led the Chinese troops into Lhasa in September 1951, should have triggered a larger debate in China. It did not.

Wangyal (known as Phunwang by the Tibetans) told Hu several interesting things: the Dalai Lama’s demise would only radicalise young Tibetan hardliners frustrated with his ‘middle way’ approach; he reminded Hu about his own objective to establish a ‘harmonious society’; and that if Hu would strive for the return of hundreds of thousands of exiled Tibetans, he could turn ‘confrontation into harmony’.

The Tibetan Flag

Another historical incident involving Wangyal gives an indication of the direction in which the issue could have gone.

In the 1990s, during an interview with Phuntso Tashi Takla, the Dalai Lama’s brother-in-law who was in charge of the Tibetan leader’s security when the latter visited China in 1954–55, he said: “At that time [in 1954] because the Chinese occupation of Tibet was not complete, the Chinese extended full courtesy and cooperation to the Dalai Lama. On some occasions, Mao Zedong came himself to the Dalai Lama’s residence [in Beijing]. During one of the several discussions that the Dalai Lama and Mao Zedong had, they were talking on some subject when Mao [suddenly] said, “Don’t you have a flag of your own? If you have one, you can hoist it here [on the guest house]”.

Takla was surprised to hear Mao Zedong saying this.

When I later read Phunwang’s biography, I understood better the incalculable implications of the Chairman’s statement.

It is worth quoting Phunwang: “One day, Mao unexpectedly came to visit the Dalai Lama at his residence [guest house]… During their conversation, Mao suddenly said, “I heard that you have a national flag, do you? They do not want you to carry it, isn’t that right?”

Phunwang further recalled: “Since Mao asked this with no warning that the topic was to be discussed, the Dalai Lama just replied, “We have an army flag”. I thought that was a shrewd answer because it didn’t say whether Tibet had a national flag. Mao perceived that the Dalai Lama was concerned by his question and immediately told him, “That is no problem. You may keep your national flag”. Note that Mao said “national flag”.

The Chairman added that in the future, the Communist Party could also let Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia have their own flags. He then asked the Dalai Lama if it would be fine for him to host the national flag of the People’s Republic of China in addition to the Tibetan flag. Phunwang says that the young Lama nodded his head and said “yes”: “This was the most important thing that Mao told the Dalai Lama, and I was amazed to hear it,” Phunwang later wrote.

The Great Han Chauvinism

Phunwang was not sure if Mao had discussed this with other leaders in the Politburo or if it was his own idea: “As I had always paid great attention to the Soviet Union’s nationality model, I was excited because I took Mao’s comment that Tibet could use its own flag to mean that China was contemplating adopting the Soviet Union’s ‘Republic’ model, at least for these three large minority nationalities.”

Phunwang realised that the innocuous remark of the Great Helmsman had far-reaching consequences for the future of China and particularly for the Tibetans. Unfortunately, Phunwang was arrested in April 1958; he spent the following 18 years in solitary confinement, during which his studies of Marxism led him to believe that the relationship between nationalities in a multiethnic state should be one of complete equality.

Till date, Tibet has only had Han Party secretaries; the Chinese leadership still does not trust the Tibetans and other minorities. Most of the problems faced by China today are due to this Great Han Chauvinism.

Wu Bangguo may have believed that the Chinese system is superior, but minorities have no place in China today, except in the Party’s propaganda.

When will we see a Tibetan flag on the Potala in Lhasa?

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This is a modified version of the article originally published as Claude Arpi. 2024. ‘The Great Han Chauvinism: Why China Doesn’t Have Any Place for Minorities’. Firstpost. 14 October.