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Tuesday, April 3, 2012

Signs of a New Tiananmen in China

Signs of a New Tiananmen in China

The Western media has largely missed the most significant development in Chinese politics these days.  It’s not the dramatic downfall of Bo Xilai, although the incident is one of the most important events in elite politics in post-Deng China.  Rather, it’s the stirrings that have revived contentious political issues banished from polite society in China since the Tiananmen crackdown more than two decades ago.  Of course, one is unlikely to find the discussion of such sensitive issues in most official publications (although some media outlets affiliated with official publications have been particularly adventurous in carrying articles on these topics in the past few months). The range of issues is wide and diverse. Despite disagreement among participants in this incipient post-1989 Chinese intellectual renaissance, the discussion is fast converging on three critical issues. First, there appears to be a widely shared consensus among China’s thinking class that the country’s economic reform is ... Read More...

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