g**1
发帖数: 10330 | 1 http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Global-Viewpoint/2010/1012/Liu-
Xiaobo-and-the-West-s-naive-beliefs-about-freedom-in-China
Liu Xiaobo and the West's naive beliefs about freedom in China
Since the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, the West has naively thought that
economic prosperity would inevitably lead to democracy in China. The
case of Liu Xiaobo, who just won the Nobel Peace Prize, shows it hasn't.
Human rights are the prerequisite for the 'fraternity between nations.'
I heartily applaud the Nobel Committee for awarding its Peace Prize to
the imprisoned Liu Xiaobo for his long and nonviolent struggle for
fundamental human rights in China. In doing so, the committee has
challenged the West to re-examine a dangerous notion that has become
prevalent since the 1989 Tiananmen massacre: that economic development
will inevitably lead to democracy in China.
Increasingly, throughout the late 1990s and into the new century, this
argument gained sway. Some no doubt believed it; others perhaps found it
convenient for their business interests. Many trusted the top Chinese
policymakers who sought to persuade the outside world that if they
continued pouring in their investments without an embarrassing “linkage”
to human rights principles, all would get better at China’s own pace.
More than 20 years have passed since Tiananmen. China has officially
become the world’s second-largest economy. Yet the hardly radical Liu
Xiaobo and thousands of others rot in jail for merely demanding basic
rights enshrined by the UN and taken for granted by all Western
investors in their own countries. Apparently, human rights have not
“inevitably” improved despite a soaring economy.
Democracy will not automatically emerge
Liu Xiaobo’s own experience over the last 20 years ought to be enough
evidence on its own to finally demolish any idea that democracy will
automatically emerge as a result of growing prosperity.
I knew Mr. Liu in the 1980s, when he was an outspoken young man. He took
part in 1989 in the peaceful protests at Tiananmen Square and was
sentenced to two years in prison for his efforts. From then until 1999,
he was in and out of labor camps, prisons, detention centers, and house
arrest. In 2008, he initiated the “Charter 08” petition calling for
China to comply with the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human
Rights. Consequently, he was again arrested, this time sentenced to a
particularly harsh 11 years in prison for “inciting subversion of state
power” — even though China is a signatory of the UN Declaration.
According to human rights organizations that monitor the situation in
China, there are about 1,400 political, religious, and “conscience”
prisoners spread around in prisons or labor camps across China. Their
“crimes” have included membership in underground political or religious
groups, independent trade unions and non-governmental organizations, or
they have been arrested for participating in strikes or demonstrations
and have publicly expressed dissenting political opinions.
A wake-up call
This undeniable reality ought to be a wake-up call to anyone who naively
believes the autocratic rulers of China will alter their disregard of
human rights just because the country is richer. Regardless of how
widely China’s leaders have opened its market to the outside world, they
have not retreated even half a step from their repressive political
creed.
On the contrary, China’s dictators have become even more contemptuous of
the value of universal human rights. Still under pressure in the decade
after Tiananmen, the Communist government released 100 political
prisoners in order to improve its image. Since 2000, as the Chinese
economy grew stronger and stronger and the pressure from the
international community became less and less, they have returned again
to hard-line repression.
The international community should be especially concerned over China’s
breach of international agreements to which it is a signatory. Besides
the UN Declaration on Human Rights, China also signed the UN Convention
Against Torture in 1988. Yet, torture, maltreatment, and psychiatric
manipulation are extensively used in detention and prison camps in
China. This includes beatings, the use of leg shackles and/or handcuffs
for prolonged periods, extended solitary confinement, severely
inadequate food, extreme exposure to cold and heat, and denial of
medical treatment.
As the power of the regime grows with prosperity, the Communist Party
feels confident in its immunity as it violates the strictures of its own
constitution. Article 35 of China’s constitution, for example, says that
“citizens of the People’s Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of
assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration.” Yet, can
anyone doubt government’s crackdown on these rights, not to speak of
regularly blocking the Internet, including denying access in a whole
swath of China after the incidents between Han and Uighurs in western
China? Censors can easily locate e-mails and their authors using
sensitive words like “Liu Xiaobo” and filter them out.
The link between human rights and world peace
As the unfortunate history of Japan during the first half of the 20th
century illustrates, a power that marries economic strength and human
rights violations is a threat to peace.
Thankfully, the courageous Nobel Committee has exposed this link once
again in the case of a prospering China. The committee is absolutely
right to make a connection between respect for human rights and world
peace. As Alfred Nobel so well understood, human rights are the
prerequisite for the “fraternity between nations.”
Fang Li-Zhi, a dissident physicist widely regarded as “China’s Sakharov”
and the mentor to the student protestors at Tiananmen Square in 1989,
now lives in exile in the United States, where he teaches at the
University of Arizona. Before he was expelled from China, he spent over
a year in protective custody in the US Embassy in Beijing, where he had
fled after the Tiananmen crackdown. | n*******n
发帖数: 7628 | 2 老方还是挺牛的，到现在每年还在出paper么
http://www.physics.arizona.edu/~fanglz/publication/publication.html
【在 g**1 的大作中提到】
: http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Global-Viewpoint/2010/1012/Liu-
: Xiaobo-and-the-West-s-naive-beliefs-about-freedom-in-China
: Liu Xiaobo and the West's naive beliefs about freedom in China
: Since the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, the West has naively thought that
: economic prosperity would inevitably lead to democracy in China. The
: case of Liu Xiaobo, who just won the Nobel Peace Prize, shows it hasn't.
: Human rights are the prerequisite for the 'fraternity between nations.'
: I heartily applaud the Nobel Committee for awarding its Peace Prize to
: the imprisoned Liu Xiaobo for his long and nonviolent struggle for
: fundamental human rights in China. In doing so, the committee has
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