China’s Bully Tactics

Defining Ideas, May 10, 2012

-Article by Ying Ma

Modern China is a place of incongruity. Gruesome political repression occurs alongside glitzy economic transformation. Massive corruption permeates the explosive growth in national wealth. Unprecedented environmental degradation coexists with the glamour and magic of ultra-modern metropolises.

This incongruity touches every aspect of daily life, and it is evident in the now widely reported case of the blind dissident Chen Guangcheng, who has been persecuted for his advocacy on behalf of women subjected to forced abortions and forced sterilization. China’s incongruity is also apparent in that space between political dissent and silent submission, between open opposition to the regime and fearful acceptance of its edicts. Once, not too long ago, another Chinese dissident, one of China’s best contemporary writers, wrote about the anger, sadness, resignation, and desperation of this incongruity. Earlier this year, China chased him away.

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