Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs | Spring 2017

Georgetown Journal of

ASIAN AFFAIRS POLICY FORUM History and the Making of Southeast Asia Mandy Sadan The Shifting Nature of Kashmiri Identity Politics and the Need to Reinvent the Past Rekha Chowdhary Modern Mongolia and Chinggis Khan Morris Rossabi

A New Policy Paradigm for ReorganizationReduction of the U.S. Bases in Okinawa Masamichi Inoue Controversies over Park Yu-ha’s Book: Another Twist in the Comfort Women Redress Movement Pyong Gap Min

Indigenous Reconciliation? The Case of Taiwan J. Bruce Jacobs

The Abdication Issue and the Future of the Japanese Imperial House Ken Ruoff

The Enduring Impact of Tamil Separatism Asoka Bandarage

Chinese Nationalism and U.S.-China Relations Jessica Chen Weiss

Bound by History Asia’s Enduring Past with an introduction by Alexis Dudden

Published by the Asian Studies Program in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service

Georgetown Journal of

ASIAN AFFAIRS Vol. 3 | No. 2 | Spring 2017

The Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs is the flagship scholarly publication of the Asian Studies Program housed within the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. Established in 2014, the Journal aims to provide a forum for scholars and practitioners in the field of Asian affairs to exchange ideas and publish research that further the understanding of the world’s largest and most populous continent.

The views expressed in this issue do not necessarily reflect those of the Journal ’s editors and advisors, the Asian Studies Program, the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, or Georgetown University.

Spring 2017 [i]

editorial board Editor-in-Chief

Jennifer R. Mayer Senior Editor

Managing Editor Abigail Becker

Daye Shim Lee

Associate Editors

Assistant Editors

Editorial Interns

Xinran Andy Chen

Melanie C. Berry

Kenneth Lee

Cole Florey

Julia G. Bowie

Jordan Sabourin

Lily McFeeters

J. Austin Lowe

Timothy Yin

Yuhao Du

Publisher

advisory board Amitav Acharya American University Charles Armstrong Columbia University Harley Balzer Georgetown University Carol Benedict Georgetown University Kurt Campbell The Asia Group Victor Cha Georgetown University

Philip Kafalas Georgetown University

Jordan Sand David Kang University of Southern California Georgetown University Christine Kim Georgetown University

David Shambaugh George Washington University

Diana Kim Georgetown University

Gi-Wook Shin Stanford University

Joanna Lewis Georgetown University

Sheila Smith Council on Foreign Relations

Kristen Looney Georgetown University

James Steinberg Syracuse University

Mike Mochizuki Bruce Dickson George Washington University George Washington University Andrew Nathan Evelyn Goh Australian National University Columbia University Michael Green Georgetown University Touqir Hussain Georgetown University Christopher Johnson CSIS Freeman Chair

Saadia Pekkanen University of Washington

Elizabeth Stephen Georgetown University Robert Sutter George Washington University

Irfan Nooruddin Georgetown University

Yuhki Tajima Georgetown University

Michael O’Hanlon Brookings Institution

Andrew Yeo Catholic University of America

Lynn Parisi University of Colorado

[ii] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

contents Volume 3 | Number 2 | Spring 2017

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Editor’s Note

POLICY FORUM Bound by History: Asia’s Enduring Past 5

Introduction History and Memory in the Raw Alexis Dudden

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The Past as Present History and the Making of Southeast Asia Mandy Sadan

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The Shifting Nature of Kashmiri Identity Politics and the Need to Reinvent the Past Rekha Chowdhary

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Modern Mongolia and Chinggis Khan Morris Rossabi

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Indigenous Reconciliation?

The Case of Taiwan J. Bruce Jacobs

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The Enduring Impact of Tamil Separatism Asoka Bandarage

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On the Okinawan Multitude Toward a New Policy Paradigm for Reorganization-Reduction of the U.S. Bases in Okinawa Masamichi S. Inoue Spring 2017 [iii]

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Controversies over Park Yu-ha’s Book Another Twist in the Comfort Women Redress Movement Pyong Gap Min

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The Abdication Issue and the Future of the Japanese Imperial House Ken Ruoff

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Chinese Nationalism and U.S.-China Relations Jessica Chen Weiss

RESEARCH 77

China’s Public Security Intelligence Progress, Challenges, and Prospects Zi Yang

INTERVIEWS 103 President Trump’s Strategy for Asia: Expert Perspectives Franz-Stefan Gady, Peter Feaver, Robert Ross & Avery Goldstein

112 Perception vs. Reality: The State of Politics in China Andrew J. Nathan

121 Internationalizing International Relations: Developments in Asia L.H.M. Ling

Send inquiries to: SFS Asian Studies Program, Georgetown University Box 571040, 37th and O Streets, NW Washington, DC 20057 Email: guasiajournal@gmail.com [iv] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Editor’s Note

If you study Asia for any period, you are bound to come across the “Asian Paradox”— the idea that despite strong economic networks and overlapping interests, many states in Asia remain at odds on a range of important issues. The paradigmatic example is that of Japan and South Korea, who hardly communicate—much less cooperate—on the challenges that North Korea’s actions pose to the region. From Taiwan to Sri Lanka, Asia is filled with examples of stalled cooperation between and within states. Why? The answer to this paradox posits that historical grievances keep states in a constant state of conflict. The remembered past of Western colonialism, Japanese imperialism, and World War II remain as contentious issues in public policy debates. For South Korea and Japan, the issue of comfort women is at the core of the dispute. History and how it is remembered by the public has become an impediment to the normal course of international relations.

Yet, this conception of history and “paradox” itself results in weak policy. The December 2015 agreement between the Abe and Park administrations has not ended the debate over comfort women “forever,” but rather has reinvigorated the redress movement in South Korea and frustration in Japan. In this case, and in cases across Asia, policymakers have failed to see history as alive in the memories of the public. The past as recalled in the present sets the outer limits of what is possible, in the rest of the world as much as it does in Asia.

Despite the problems of the Asian Paradox, scholars, historians, and policymakers cannot work within what Masamichi S. Inoue calls “opposition only,” rather, an alternate conception of history’s importance as well as coherent policy recommendations are necessary to move forward. The underlying idea guiding this issue of the Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs is as follows: policy that incorporates memory and promotes social cohesion is crucial for cultivating cooperation in Asia. Time and again, this issue will feature a case study which demonstrates that the problems of Asia are neither intractable nor endemic, but only require innovative solutions. Rather than “getting over” history, the authors in this issue consistently advocate for integrating history into comprehensive policy recommendations.

Considering this framework, the Journal’s editorial board is pleased to present our Policy Forum, “Bound by History: Asia’s Enduring Past.” It is our hope that together, these case studies will illustrate the larger issues involved with history, memory, and policy, while providing real solutions that promote cooperation and cohesion.

In the introduction to the Policy Forum, Alexis Dudden explicates the living nature of memory in her article “History in the Raw.” She explores the usages of history in modern South Korea and Japan at a time when both nations are marked by deep social The most famous use of the Asian Paradox is in President Park Geun-hye’s speech to a joint session of U.S. Congress. For full text of the speech see: “Full text of Park’s speech at U.S. Congress,” Yonhap News, 8 May 2013.

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turmoil: in South Korea, due to entrenched inequality and memories of corruption, and in Japan, because of anxiety over a clash between widespread cultural pacifism and more assertive security policies.

In the first Policy Forum article, Mandy Sadan provides an insightful critique of the field of Southeast Asian studies. Sadan argues that the field is mired in questions over the very existence of Southeast Asia as a region, identity, and subject of inquiry, which obscures state use of history. To move forward, we must look beyond traditional questions of nationhood, and instead ask penetrating questions of the past. Such scholarly inquiry will help us better define the goal of social cohesion within the states of Southeast Asia.

Rekha Chowdhary follows with the article “The Shifting Nature of Kashmiri Identity Politics and the Need to Reinvent the Past.” By tracing the evolution of Kashmir’s politics over the past fifty years, Chowdhary isolates the moments in which the movement for autonomy and social inclusion were turned aside. The call for a “reinvention” of those historical values is a compelling response to the current state of division and violence.

The issues inherent in the state’s usage of history are clear in Morris Rossabi’s article on Chinggis Khan’s image in modern Mongolia. The warlord’s ever-changing status as national hero, outcast, god, or pride of Mongolia is tied to social and economic conditions, not to his actual behavior. The state’s use of Khan’s image leads to rhetorical hypocrisies—such as the advertisement of Chinggis as a feminist—that do not solve the public’s underlying concerns with their country. Pacifying the public by cynically bolstering the state with historical references may only work for so long.

The question then bears asking: how do states try to “move on” from contentious historical issues? J. Bruce Jacobs provides one answer in his case study of Taiwan’s official state apology to the island’s aboriginal population. The rhetoric of apology is tempered

by Tsai Ing-wen’s actual policies regarding aboriginals, and the policies are regarded as the true measuring stick for “indigenous reconciliation.”

Reconciliation is also the driving theme in “The Enduring Impact of Tamil Separatism”

by Asoka Bandarage. The article argues that the Sri Lankan government—supported by the UN and international community—are incorporating the Tamil separatist movement into society in a way that fails to include non-Tamil populations. These policies will likely result in a chaotic and divided state, controlled by external powers.

Bandarage suggests that historical accountability and inclusive solutions are critical in a world rife with ethnic separatist movements.

When states create solutions without incorporating the public’s perception of historical experience, it can backfire. Masamichi S. Inoue explains that resistance to U.S. bases in Okinawa is rooted in historical memories of domination. Inoue posits that the “Okinawan multitude” can access these memories to advocate for security policy without U.S. bases; such a solution in accordance with the will of the public could establish [2] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Editor’s Note

a paradigm solution for the world.

Pyong Gap Min explores how citizens can reject the versions of history that affect policy. Min criticizes the facts and intent of Park Yu-ha’s recent book on comfort women, and connects it to the government’s December 2015 passage of the comfort women agreement. Min advocates for an accurate historical record that puts victims first. Only such a policy will satisfy the redress movement, and permit the security and economic cooperation that both governments desire.

The article “The Abdication Issue and the Future of the Imperial House” by Ken Ruoff addresses a situation in which history and politics impact political elites, in this case, the emperor of Japan. Memory of the role of past emperors and beliefs about the imperial house are preventing abdication, while also reinforcing traditional gender roles that are out of step with modern policy.

Finally, Jessica Chen Weiss rounds out our Policy Forum with an interview on Chinese nationalism. Though nationalism is both a foreign policy tool and a liability, Weiss argues against its use in China’s current disputes, implying that control of the Chinese state over the public includes the expression of historical grievances.

Appearing alongside the Policy Forum is an incredibly thorough research article by promising scholar Zi Yang on China’s Public Security Intelligence. Drawing on Chinese-language materials heretofore unexplored by outside researchers, this article fills a large gap in knowledge on the state of China’s PSI. Beyond elucidating the status and limitations of current PSI reform, Yang also plots a map for future researchers of intelligence and of China.

At the conclusion of the issue, it is the Journal’s tradition to include a set of interviews on timely topics. First, we are pleased to feature Franz Stefan-Gady, Peter Feaver, Robert Ross, and Avery Goldstein on President Trump’s likely foreign policy in Asia. Next, renowned China scholar Andrew J. Nathan reviews the state of China’s domestic politics, from the mainland’s relationship with Taiwan to Chinese exceptionalism. Finally, L.H.M. Ling anchors the issue with a thought-provoking exploration of alternative international relations theory as it relates to Asia.

I cannot help but conclude with a sincere expression of gratitude for the many individuals who made the Spring 2017 issue of the Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs possible. Senior Editor Yuhao Du was instrumental in shaping the overall direction of the issue, while Managing Editor Abigail Becker helped animate the entire editorial team. Moreover, this edition was graced by the sharp, analytical minds of our Associate Editors and by Assistant Editors indefatigable in tackling the Journal’s most difficult problems. Special thanks go to the Editorial Interns whose skills and ideas far exceeded their level of experience. The dedication of the entire editorial team is, in my experience, unmatched.

I would also like to thank Diana Kim, Dennis Wilder, Christine Kim, Michael Green, Spring 2017 [3]

Editor’s Note

and Victor Cha for providing advice and assistance along the way. The Journal is grateful for the anonymous reviewers whose thoughts and expertise were invaluable in developing the issue; we would also like to thank our advisory board for their support and guidance. Finally, many thanks to publisher Daye Lee, without whom this publication would likely not exist.

Thus, I conclude both this editorial note and my time as an editor for the Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs. Over the past three issues of my tenure, the Journal has grown and changed for the better. I look forward to many future editions driven by the same curiosity and passion that created this issue. With great pleasure, I present “Bound

by History: Asia’s Enduring Past.” I hope you enjoy reading it as much as we enjoyed curating its contents.

Jennifer R. Mayer Editor-in-Chief

[4] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Dudden | Introduction

policy forum Bound by History: Asia’s Enduring Past

Introduction History and Memory in the Raw Alexis Dudden History and memory are very much in the raw throughout Asia today. In Seoul, Taipei, and Tokyo, collective memories of particular national pasts are threading themselves into actions taking place on the streets and in parliament, which are themselves making history. The process underscores the power of some historical events to shape national identity and compels a realization that history is more than just background music to the present.

To some, it may seem an obvious reminder that memory and history are different, however intangible or inert each is to the present. Yet, when memory stands in for history, a collective perception of the past can obstruct pressing economic and security concerns.

In some cases, denying events in history and whitewashing at the highest levels can lead to sanctions and sail-bys. As Russian historian Nikolay Koposov pithily explains, “The difference between a memory war and a history war is that memory wars can cause shooting wars.”

In this light, the speed with which popular invocation of specific histories appears to cause social chaos or cohesion makes it more important than ever for policymakers to grapple with the fundamental reasons why particular events hold such sway. If they fail to confront deeply troubling pasts, certain memories may become ever more potent weapons of differentiation and politicization rather than a means to building a more productive future.

History, Memory, and Social Division in Democratic Asia In the capitals of Asia’s most open societies—South Korea and Japan—there is greater social division today over the future course of each country than at any other time in recent memory. In Seoul, an uneasy public has taken to the streets every week to hold candlelight protests. Beginning in October 2016, hundreds of thousands of people (totaling more than ten million by 31 December 2016) have routinely and peacefully filled the downtown areas of cities throughout the country to call for the impeachment Spring 2017 [5]

Policy Forum

of President Park Geun-hye. By contrast, in Tokyo, the massive, peaceful protests in the summer of 2015 have now taken a quieter but no less potent form during parliamentary debate over possible revisions to the nation’s constitution—especially its famous war-renouncing clause, Article 9.

Ironically, in many ways the divisions in both societies squarely center on collective understandings of the history that define each nation for a majority of its citizens. For South Koreans, the first achievement of accountable democratic governance beginning in 1987 currently propels citizens of all political persuasions to demand an end to cronyism and elite privilege, with stated awareness that domestic and international policies—like them or not—be answerable to the South Korean people. For the Japanese, the majority’s commitment to the nation’s pacifist international posture is at stark odds with the current administration’s determination to rid Japan of the American imposed “masochistic” postwar, 1945 system (in its leadership’s words).

Looking at a regional neighborhood armed with nuclear weapons and outsized bellicose ambitions, many Washington thinkers may sigh at the news of South Korea’s Saturday night candle marches, and of Japanese college students and academics armed with hip hop anti-war songs and speeches: “Why can’t they just get on with it?” Yet, taking seriously the issues that inform these historical moments in the making—especially collective notions about “who we are as a people” based on respective historical experience—will likely guide the success or failure of future U.S. policy towards Asia.

The Candlelight Revolution: “Towards A Country of Equal Opportunity” To consider the memory and history at play now in Seoul, a key aspect lies in the issue that initially gave traction to the ongoing protests. In the broadest strokes, “regular” South Koreans—some of whom were jailed during the dictatorship era, including under President Park’s father, Park Chung-hee, but who overwhelmingly are citizens of a democratic state and work extremely long hours for middle class existences—took one look at the contours of an all too familiar corruption scandal and said, “Enough!” On the one hand, the known money involved in this current event—roughly $69 million— is not much in the context of South Korea’s past. For example, in 1965, President Park Chung-hee received $800 million in “economic cooperation” money from the Japanese government in lieu of formal compensation for brutalities that Koreans suffered during the era of colonial occupation, which he transferred not to victims but to the Pohang Iron and Steel Company. In 2001, President Kim Dae-jung apparently paid $500 million to North Korean leader Kim Jong-il to hold a summit. On the other hand, President Park Geun-hye’s distinguishing feature thus far had been her supposedly clean slate in regards to corruption. The country’s constitutional court is now hearing abundant evidence to the contrary; worse still has been the president’s entirely aloof response to the charges. The tawdry details of the consumptive excesses that surround others involved in the scandal—horseback riding, vacation houses, luxury cars— further fuel the fires of discontent.

In short, the lived memory and ongoing reality of social inequality in South Korea have [6] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Dudden | Introduction

turned into a truly historical event. In a country still haunted by its recent past of violent domestic upheaval, including internationally famous moments such as the 1980 Gwangju uprising as well as the less televised but constantly occurring democracy demonstrations from 1960 through the mid-1990s, entirely non-violent mass protests resulted in a parliamentary motion to impeach a democratically elected president. The date of the landslide impeachment vote, 9 December 2016, became immediately historicized as the “Candlelight Revolution.” It sprang from the collective realization that if you were not richly connected you still could not “get in” to society; worse, your kids could not “get in” no matter how hard you worked.

Informed by the memory of tear gas and police truncheons that defined much of their country’s post-Korean War era of division, the recent demonstrations remain largely “pro-Korean” and in the present tense—no burning of American flags and scant denunciation of Japanese imperialism. Small children attend with their parents and secondary school students in uniform willingly state their names to television cameras to explain that they are out on the streets to make it possible for everyone to have a chance in South Korea. One of the more popular protest placards reads, “Towards A Country of Equal Opportunity.”

Photograph by the author in December 2016 in Seoul, Korea. The signs read, “Towards a country of equal opportunity.”

The direction of this historical moment is unpredictable, especially in the coming months as rival politicians refashion core policies such as economic distribution, educational objectives, and diplomatic relations with Japan, the United States, China, and (most importantly) North Korea. Key, though, is how a general history of inequality—lived for many in memory and in ongoing reality—shapes the particular history unfolding in South Korea today.

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Policy Forum

Pacifism and Identity in a New Political Era Matters are a little different in Tokyo. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his administration enjoy strong popular support for its economic promises, regardless of their efficacy.

Common to the global nationalist moment of Donald Trump supporters and “Brexiteers,” many Japanese seem pleased simply to hear Abe promise to “take back Japan.”

Nonetheless, a majority of Japanese differs significantly on the issue of transforming Japan’s constitution, particularly regarding the matter of dispatching Japanese troops to fight in wars beyond Japan’s borders. Throughout the summer of 2015 and for the first time in more than fifty years, Japanese citizens of all ages poured onto the streets in regular protest. They began in groups of several hundred and culminated in a demonstration of more than 100,000 on the eve of a highly contentious vote concerning new security legislation. That moment is forever recorded in photographs on front pages around the world of a fist-fighting melee inside parliament while tens of thousands stood outside in the rain shouting, “No way! No war!” Theoretically, regional tensions with North Korea and China could boost public support for changing Article 9, yet popular opposition continues to make clear that most Japanese do not want to revise the constitution in such a manner. An October 2016 Kyodo News survey found that 55 percent of Japanese respondents are opposed to constitutional revision under the Abe administration, with 49 percent stating specifically that there is no need to change the antiwar article, and 45 percent seeing the need to discuss ways to modernize Article 9 but not scrap it.1 Of paramount concern is that most Japanese view their nation’s nonmilitary outlook as essential to their national identity, a present reality that stems from a socially inculcated awareness of the horror that war entails. Albeit to the dismay of many outside Japan, this sentiment does not necessarily take the form of a direct apology for Japanese aggressions in Asia during the 1930s and 1940s—let alone for its colonies in Asia—but rather manifests in a commitment to a future without war, or, at least, a future in which Japanese are not causing war. Thus, the significant resistance to the Abe administration’s proposed changes to Japan’s renunciation of war as a sovereign right is best seen through a historical prism, not through a security lens. For one, a majority of Japanese legal experts, including professional organizations such as the Japanese Bar Association, regard the nation’s recently enacted security legislation as unconstitutional and publicly oppose it. A new political party called the Minshinto appeared in March 2016—through the merger of the nation’s two largest opposition parties—with the primary goal of rescinding these bills, which came about in a manner designed to obviate the need for constitutional change. Moreover, a host of lawsuits that challenge the constitutionality of these new laws are currently underway against the Japanese government. Together these lawsuits—and others in the works—represent a profound “Majority against constitutional changes while Abe in office: poll,” The Japan Times, 29 October 2016, Internet, http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2016/10/29/national/majority-constitutional-changes-abe-office-poll (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

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Dudden | Introduction

social understanding shared by politicians and policy planners in the opposition parties that the right not to wage war is axiomatic to the definition of Japan.

The multiple valences of Japan’s internal divide could lead to a collective failure—on the part of the U.S., Japan, South Korea, China, and the international community—to understand the country’s national memory. Japan’s total war in the Asia-Pacific region in the 1930s and 1940s as well as the history of the past three generations not waging war is foundational to its present, historical moment. Results could range from the unintentional encouragement of unwarranted, regionally destabilizing militarist impulses at one end of the spectrum to an equally unintentional encouragement of anti-American sentiment at the other. Both outcomes are contrary to U.S. security interests.

Singular Memories, Collective Consideration The essays in the following pages highlight similarly contoured and related tensions throughout Asia. From Mongolia’s national embrace of historical warlord Chinggis Khan to purge the nation of its Soviet-era imprimatur to a consideration of Sri Lanka’s efforts to ease Tamil separatism, a common theme emerges throughout this volume.

Masamichi Inoue expresses this theme best in his quotation of Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s understanding of the multitude: “singularities that act in common.” As such, through a wide range of examples from North and Southeast Asia, this lucid collection brings into relief how particular and often individual memories come to shape a collective consciousness, drawing on historical events which live for that multitude into the present. Each of these brief studies introduces significant “singularities” that merit thoughtful consideration as we collectively chart new territory in Asia today. If South Korea and Japan currently stand as a measure of the moment, it is clear that certain histories are at once living realities, as well as deeply entrenched common memory.

Alexis Dudden is Professor of History at the University of Connecticut. She publishes regularly about Japan and Northeast Asia, and her books include Troubled Apologies Among Japan, Korea, and the United States (Columbia University Press, 2014) and Japan’s Colonization of Korea (University of Hawaii Press, 2006). Dudden received her B.A. from Columbia University in 1991 and her Ph.D. in History from the University of Chicago in 1998. She has lived and studied for extended periods of time in Japan and South Korea, with awards from Fulbright, ACLS, NEH, and SSRC and fellowships at Princeton and Harvard. She is also the recipient of the 2015 Manhae Peace Prize.

Spring 2017 [9]

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The Past as Present History and the Making of Southeast Asia Mandy Sadan Specialists of Southeast Asia, particularly of its history and culture, must be some of the most self-critical of all regional or area studies communities. There is rarely a conference that goes by without at least one panel dedicated to asking what Southeast Asia is, whether it is a coherent entity, whether it should “cease” to exist as notion, or whether it has justified its contested origins as an Area (with a capital “A”). In part this reflects the lack of confidence that many of us feel in what is an increasingly integrated post-Internet world about Area Studies as a disciplinary focus that helps to explain the modern world. The origins of Southeast Asia as a region of study in part explain this dilemma—the region is deemed to have become consolidated as an object of inquiry more fully after World War II. When the regional map became defined through Cold War interests, Southeast Asia found intellectual substantiation through Area Studies in the higher education institutions of the United States. Southeast Asia as a modern concept, therefore, was inherently defined by the states that emerged after World War II as independent entities.

That states had modern borders that did not map easily against the historic states of previous centuries created an analytical problem for the mapping of histories upon modern territories. Looking back through history, all the modern states of the region sought confirmation of their historical authenticity by laying claim to entities that became the genealogical progenitor of the modern nation: the Khmer kingdoms for Cambodia; Pagan for Mandalay; Srivijaya for Indonesia. This had not been a “stateless” region for more than a millennium, but the modern states and the historical states did not converge. The historical claims of the modern states had to be constructed more rapidly than in parts of the world where modern states and nations were rooted in longer territorial histories. Perhaps, in focusing on the perceived problem of “what” is Southeast Asia ad inifinitum, regional specialists have failed to pay enough attention to the problem of history itself in the post-colonial transitions to modern, independent states. Rather than seeing problems of internal cohesion in some nations of the region as evidence of a deeper history of “statelessness” that works constantly to undermine the fabric of contemporary political life, subtler narratives need to emerge about the [10] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Sadan | History and the Making of Southeast Asia

layering of historical experience in the production of modern states, and the ways in which anti-colonial and post-colonial nationalisms have configured these histories to their own ends.

The debates are rife that Southeast Asian studies require refinement if not complete reconfiguration to be meaningful in the face of globally-oriented studies. But these questions seem to be part of the core critique of Southeast Asian studies with a sense of crisis that is not so apparent (at least to this author) among other regional specialists. Books have been dedicated to the subject; numerous articles and special editions have taken up the “problem” of Southeast Asia in a variety of (very interesting) ways.

Indeed, figures such as Willem van Schendel on the concept of Zomia, have been so erudite that they have sometimes established a new and world-leading critique of the region.1 Zomia, the “anti-region” region, has influenced many beyond Southeast Asian studies in a contemporary take on Braudelian connections produced through environmental contiguities—here mountains, there seas. The work of James C. Scott,2 which has developed this idea further and in a slightly different direction as a region rather than simply as an argument against the failings of Area Studies, has in turn taken the “problem” of Southeast Asian history to a whole new set of audiences and established its own fan base of anti-state historical interpretations (although rarely, it must be noted, lauded by historians themselves).

One of the critiques levelled at the region as an object of study is that it is remarkably difficult to pin down its internal coherence. O.W. Wolters established the wider meta-narrative of what he thought made Southeast Asia into Southeast Asia, and we have not really moved very far beyond that in discussions on the wider connections across time and space of obviously very disparate modern nations.3 A deep cultural past rooted in the expansion and hybridization of global religions and the oft-repeated trope of the mandala as the model of statecraft have therefore come to dominate the conversation. Yet, it is often said that Southeast Asian people do not particularly aspire to this identity (just as there is no such a person as a self-referencing Zomian, unless they deploy the term with political significance after a reading of Scott’s The Art of Not Being Governed) and this is sometimes used as proof of the inherent inauthenticity of the region as a whole. It is tempting to say that this simply does not matter. However, perhaps post-Brexit we should take such issues more seriously; perhaps affiliations to regional identities are significant in the wider politics of integration in the economic and political zones of the post-World War II world, if not in times past. However, I would even question this assertion of the lack of self-identification as Southeast Asian as accurate in many contemporary urban groups. While the students from the region in See for instance: Wille van Schendel, “Geographies of Knowing, Geographies of Ignorance: Jumping Scale in Southeast Asia,” in P. Kratoska and H. Nordholt, eds., Locating Southeast Asia: Geographies of Knowledge and Politics of Space (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 2005).

2 As referenced here and below, see: James C. Scott, The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010).

3 For instance, see: O.W. Wolters, History, Culture and Region in Southeast Asian Perspectives (Ithaca: Cornell Southeast Asia Program Publications, 1999).

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my classes at SOAS certainly do not rise every morning singing the ASEAN national anthem, they seem to have no difficulty as identifying themselves as Southeast Asian.

While they may be a particular and largely non-representative group placed in an unusual environment in which such identities have relevance in a broader community, it is also clear that the identity “Southeast Asian” is not a particular problem for them, and neither does it seem to force them into myopic self-reflection on whether their self-reference is historically relevant.

So what does seem a problem for these Southeast Asian students in my classes on Southeast Asian history? In many respects, the issue that seems easiest to express at the outset (for example, “I am from Thailand” or “I am from Indonesia”) becomes a more penetrating problem during the course of their studies, especially when identity is translated into a more personalized pronoun (“I am Thai” or “I am Indonesian”). The nature of their civic identities within the states in which they were born and the meaning of that identity map onto much more penetrating problems that are unearthed in their studies: the relationship of the nation to their own sense of national identity, its inclusions and exclusions, and where the ruptures in social cohesion map onto the histories of state expansion into areas where being “Thai” is a more difficult primary self-reference. It could easily be said that this is a small, self-selecting group of people who are predisposed to such angst by interest in the subject matter of a course intended to explore such issues—which can hardly be denied. But there may be more to it than this.

Clearly Southeast Asia taken as a collective of different nations is comprised of modern states that are enormously diverse in their linguistic, ethnic, and religious composition. Books on Myanmar, for example, invariably refer to an extensive list of linguistic groups, mapped onto an equally imposing list of “official” ethnicities, as if this in and of itself should explain why the country has been locked into a series of endless and repetitive cycles of violence, especially in its peripheral states and divisions. The same trope of “diversity” typically is used to introduce the wider landscape of the Philippines. That both Myanmar and the Philippines have been host to two of the longest continuing internal conflicts in the modern world (in the Karen and Mindanao regions respectively) is seen somehow as a validation of the impossible challenge of correlating modernity and the nation with the desires of “minority” groups with opaque histories.

In this respect, Scott’s The Art of Not Being Governed has done no great service to our historical understanding to the extent that it naturalizes these conflicts as historically produced, exceptionalizing them from the responsibilities of the modern state in not just “dealing with” these histories of conflict, but actually creating them.

Yet, across the region all the modern states have faced challenges in incorporating diverse communities around a newly articulated sense of national identity within borders that have only been legally confirmed in modern times. Even Thailand—where the experience of direct colonial rule is clearly absent—nonetheless reinvented its national civic model of “Thai-ness” from the 1930s onwards, and has reified the core elements of this model since World War II. Each nation has struggled to define citizenship in ways that could produce cohesion yet also secure protected groups, who retained a primary [12] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Sadan | History and the Making of Southeast Asia

control over national identity. Sometimes this related to a clear majority population (Vietnam, Cambodia) and sometimes not (Laos, Indonesia). But what is perhaps most striking when this is viewed comparatively is that there has been such a diverse range of responses to this challenge. Each country has produced idiosyncratic models of citizenship and blended civic-ethnic national identities that are in themselves highly local and historically contingent. From the Laotian concern with geographically-stratified integration of national identity around a core group that is actually a minority, to the Soviet-influenced a-moralizing discourse of ethnic difference in Vietnam, and the racially-bounded constitutional framework of Malaysia, there are distinct and fascinating problems that are unearthed through exploring these comparisons. In none of them can you escape from the need to understand the historical conditions in which they were produced—and the traditional tropes of regional historiography provide severely limited insights.

It is often also said that the problems of history in this region, especially the production of conditions of social incohesion and conflict, lie firmly at the door of the colonial powers that had increasing dominance in the region’s historical meta-narrative since the sixteenth century. Beyond this, the influences of China and India are referred to as a separate historical thread, leading back into the early and early-modern periods rather than the histories of modern states (with histories of more recent migration interpreted as an aberration wrought by colonialism). The lack of texture to the colonial narrative is noticeable in many states. Yet, what is perhaps truly distinctive about Southeast Asia as a whole is that the range of imperial systems with which it had to engage in modern times is perhaps exceptional. In Southeast Asia, the Spanish, Portuguese, French, British, Chinese, American, and Japanese imperial systems all collided in a way that was perhaps globally unique relative to any other region. The presence of many colonial powers left diverse legacies for the development of policies of social cohesion in the post-colonial state. Shining a light on a singular nation (paradoxically the default position of the Area Studies specialist) seems to be an inadequate way of illuminating problems of national integration and civic cohesion on a local, regional, and global scale set against this background of colonial experience.

Where does this lead us in terms of appreciating the “past as present” when we seek to understand some of the region’s entrenched difficulties in stabilizing contentious identity politics and allowing a national civic consciousness to predominate? We could continue to utilise the traditional frameworks provided by the core narratives of the region’s past. This tells us that there were states that were internally weak and succumbed in the face of the changes wrought globally by European expansion and transformations in technologies that permitted these external powers to dominate by force. Encircling these states was a historical netherworld of communities, today’s marginalized areas full of “minorities” and conflict, that were incapable of developing state-like capacities and remained largely ungoverned and ungovernable. “Colonialism” (perceived generically as an unequal set of power relations and militarized control) established systems of power that played on divisions, eventually consolidating these divisions into structures of modern political systems that became inextricably combined in the framework of modern, independent states. The difficulty in overturning these simplifications is Spring 2017 [13]

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that the historical narratives of many, if not all, of the region’s modern nations also perpetuate this meta-narrative. It provides the justification of anti-colonial movements that became the ideological basis of post-colonial governments but with limited capacity over wider social incorporation: the historical “state” and identity around which the modern nation would coalesce was excavated from the colonial past by the forces that brought independence. Much of the region’s cultural heritage is also predicated on this assertion, either overtly or implicitly, such that Angkor has become the redemptive inner core of Cambodia, while Pagan, the symbol of the Bamar kingdoms, has been redefined as militarized Myanmar. Disorder as the product of historical disruption and the aberration of colonial history is even marked in nationality law, as in Myanmar.

The difficulties created by this use of the past to explain the present are manifold, and they do a disservice to the nations in which they are produced. In particular, they deny many communities from finding meaningful ways of exploring their shared histories, on their own terms. History itself seems full of threat: it demonstrates the weakness of kingdoms or the vulnerability of nations in the present to both internal and external “foes.” It produces a civic culture that depends on demarcating divisions between people in order that their potential for disruption can be monitored and controlled.

The most extreme example of a nation in the region with a mature policy of multi-culturalism at its heart, is Singapore—paradoxically the one nation that did not want independence but was forced to accept it. Yet, multi-culturalism in Singapore, as is well-known, is based around a controlling set of categories into which all citizens must place themselves. The dilemma of how Singapore will manage an evolving policy of multi-culturalism to reflect the increasing numbers of migrant groups that are outside the official CMIO (Chinese, Malay, Indian, Others) categorization is one of its biggest social challenges. The “multi” of multi-culturalism in its most elaborate ideological modelling in the region, is not very “multi” at all.

Another danger is that lack of more incisive historical engagement of these representations by policy makers in the region tends to perpetuate a worrying lack of understanding of the historical and contemporary conditions of social incohesion that may lead to conflict. The most extreme example of this may well be in Myanmar, where I conduct most of my own research. There is a blindness to the limitations of the standard historical narratives that emanate around the privilege of the Burman interpretations of the past. The result is that there is a prevalence of the view that conflicts are inevitable in a country where there have long been endemic divisions between highland and lowland peoples, that these are innate divisions and which are therefore naturalized as “normal.”

These ungoverned spaces are then configured as inherently unruly, and perhaps ungovernable. Their political leaders fail to appreciate the complexities of modern governance and instead wish for impossibly naive political arrangements such as “federalism.” The whole historical narrative, from the unquestioning discourse of the rupture of colonialism through to the interpretation that the political demands of minority peoples are “unsophisticated,” has generated a set of historical assumptions that have influenced international policy. Yet, these policies have singularly failed to shift those conditions of conflict at all in recent years, even in an era of new and more democratic governance.

The narrative of history clearly needs to be changed. These narratives are simplistic in [14] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Sadan | History and the Making of Southeast Asia

that they normalize the idea that ethnically, racially, and religiously complex societies were perhaps inevitably bound to find themselves in conflict with each other. Not only does it deny the reality that many of these communities have complex and mutually inflecting histories with each other, but it also absolves the modern state from responsibility for exacerbating issues such as educational exclusions or failing to redistribute resources to improve the economic resilience of marginalized communities. Instead, conflicts are explained as an almost inevitable outcome of colonial interventions and political naiveté of non-national minority elites. While these issues are part of a matrix of issues that have produced very long term conflicts in some areas, they explain only part of the story and not its whole context.

Historians of Southeast Asia need to work on unpacking some of the complexity of these issues in tandem with other disciplines to incorporate useful methodologies for penetrating the histories of apparently impenetrable spaces. The histories of marginalized areas, especially borderlands, explored through key themes in global/imperial history such as flows and mobilities, global wars and militarization, and cultural interaction, also connect the local scale of ethnohistory and memory into the politics of ethnicization, race, and religion. Equally, in the long term, the national narratives of the region’s states need to develop the maturity of purpose to see beyond simply the justification and authentication of the modern state, but rather to explore how history can help to discover new kinds of relationships and shared pasts. These shared pasts may not be without conflict, and there may be contest over their meanings, but the voicing of these histories is vitally important to creating conditions of inclusion and social cohesion that presently have failed to secure stable and peaceful futures in many marginalized areas—and these perpetually disrupt the stability of the center. Yet the orientation of modern states is revealed very fully through the discourses that prevail on issues such as citizenship and indigeneity. Policy makers in the modern states have participated in the construction of national histories that project certain central narratives of the origins of the modern state and how certain groups come to predominate by historical right.

We are, as Southeast Asian specialists, perhaps asking the wrong questions. Does it really matter if there is an inner historical core to the identity Southeast Asia? Unless we want to write a pre-history of the emergence of ASEAN, I would suggest it does not (although some people clearly do!). Does it matter if we say that modern states reflect actual political and cultural identities? Perhaps we might question instead the outcome would be if we said that they did not—it is a question with no meaningful outcome. The questions that we need to ask are much more penetrating of the region’s past—both recent and distant—than this, and should provide the means to shape not only new histories but also new futures for modern nations and their citizens, as well as those who in the future might become their citizens by birth or migration.

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Mandy Sadan is Associate Dean of Research in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities at SOAS University of London as well as Reader in the History of Southeast Asia. She has published widely, particularly on issues relating to understanding ethnic and social conflict in Myanmar.

Her first research monograph was Being and Becoming Kachin: Histories Beyond the state in the Borderworlds of Burma (Oxford University Press, 2013), which won the 2015 EuroSEAS Nikkei Asian Review Prize for Best Book in the Humanities.

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Chowdhary | Kashmiri Identity Politics

The Shifting Nature of Kashmiri Identity Politics and the Need to Reinvent the Past Rekha Chowdhary Kashmiri identity politics has played an important role in defining the context of conflict in Jammu and Kashmir. This state has been in conflict ever since 1947, both externally and internally. While the external dimensions have been characterized by Pakistan’s contestation of the state’s accession with India and the resultant hostility between India and Pakistan, the internal dimension of conflict has been driven by the response of Kashmiris toward the Indian state. This response is defined by identity politics, the contours of which evolved in the pre-accession period. Kashmiri identity politics, however, has not remained static. It is quite dynamic and has shifted in nature depending on the context and situation in which Kashmiris have found themselves at different times.

The evolution of Kashmiri identity politics can be traced back to the 1930s and 1940s, when common Kashmiris were politicized in their struggle against feudal rule that had not merely rendered them economically oppressed but also politically disempowered. The period is significant for a number of reasons. In addition to the mobilization of the common masses comprised of peasants, artisans, and the working class, it saw the emergence of a mass-based political organization called the National Conference, whose outreach extended across the valley. It also witnessed the evolution of dynamic leadership in Kashmir. The charismatic Sheikh Abdullah and a number of other leaders of the National Conference rose to power in this period. Most importantly, however, it was during this period that the contours of Kashmiri identity politics evolved and its basic logic took a concrete form.

Inclusive Identity Politics and Reconstruction of Society and Economy Though initially a response of the emerging middle class to feudal rule, Kashmiri identity politics eventually took shape as a mass movement. In 1932, when a political response had started to emerge through the All Jammu and Kashmir Muslim Conference, it had limited goals linked with the class interests of the middle class Muslim intelligentsia—mostly related to educational and employment opportunities as well as those related to control over religious places. The Kashmiris’ religious sense of Spring 2017 [17]

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belonging formed the crux of identity politics. The Muslims of the state were seen as a part of the unified group of people struggling against the Hindu ruler and the Hindu state.

The movement, however, was gradually changing and shedding its religious character.

By 1939, it had sufficiently broadened itself to accommodate significant changes in the organizational structure of the Muslim Conference. Rechristened as the All Jammu and Kashmir National Conference, it opened up to non-Muslim communities and was reorganized on the basis of secular principles. Most importantly, it reimagined and redefined its political agenda to incorporate the interest of the most marginal and oppressed members of society. Since the feudal economic structure severely impacted the mass of impoverished Kashmiris, the new goals of the organization were directly aimed at attacking this structure and reconstructing the economy of the state.

Catering to the interests of peasants, artisans, and the working class, the National Conference soon assumed status as a mass movement. In 1944, it adopted the New Kashmir Manifesto, which not only provided an agenda for the future constitution of the state but also a vision of the socio-economic restructuring of the state. It called for complete reorganization of the agrarian structure, eliminating its parasitical and feudal components, and empowering the peasantry, artisans, and other working classes. It also advocated for compulsory work for all residents of the state, the right to unemployment, the right to rest, the right to education, and a minimum wage, among others. Elimination of economic inequalities and an adequate standard of living for all people were the major goals of the manifesto. Among the most important parts of the manifesto were a peasant’s charter, a worker’s charter, and a women’s charter.

On the political side, the National Conference adopted the goal of representative government and participation of the Kashmiri masses in it. The political goals followed the strong sentiment during this period that Kashmiris had lost their political dignity due to the continued alien control over Kashmir since the arrival of Mughals in the latter part of the sixteenth century. Though the Mughals were succeeded by Afghans and Sikhs, it was the transfer of power from Sikhs to Dogras that was particularly perceived as humiliating for Kashmiris. The Amritsar Treaty, under which Kashmir had come under the control of the Dogra rulers, was termed a “sale deed” since it had a provision for the transfer of the territory of Kashmir to Maharaja Gulab Singh and his heirs through a payment of seventy-five lakh rupees. Restoration of political control over Kashmir and in turn the dignity of Kashmiris was therefore the first major goal of the National Conference. This goal later evolved into the goal of political autonomy for Kashmir.

In pursuit of these twin goals—the reconstruction of the Kashmiri economy and political autonomy—the Kashmiri leaders did not place much importance on the question of accession to either of the two dominions of India and Pakistan. Rather, they insisted on the goal of freedom before accession and therefore rejected the supposed inevitability of joining Pakistan despite its status as a “Muslim Homeland.” Despite the fact that Kashmir was predominantly Muslim, Sheikh Abdullah and his colleagues felt [18] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Chowdhary | Kashmiri Identity Politics

that neither the political autonomy of Kashmir nor radical economic transformation would be possible in feudal Pakistan. Rather, there was a danger of Kashmiri identity being subsumed by the larger Muslim identity. Negotiation with India, in his opinion, was a better option, and therefore he and other leaders of the National Conference approved of accession to India. They negotiated an asymmetrical federal system with a special status guaranteed by Article 370 of Indian Constitution that provided a nearly perfect scenario for fulfilling the twin goals of autonomy and radically transformative economic policy.

The principles of autonomy, dignity, and negotiability governed the logic of Kashmiri identity politics. So long as this logic governed Kashmir’s relationship with India, there was a smooth relationship between Kashmiri and Indian nationalism. The Kashmiri leadership had enough freedom to pursue radical land reforms and empower the vast class of peasantry by acquiring surplus land from big land owners and redistributing it to cultivators.

Growing Difficulties between Kashmiri Leadership and India Problems started erupting with the state’s relationship with India as challenges to the logic of Kashmiri identity politics arose. The removal of Sheikh Abdullah from the political scene, his long incarceration, the intrusive politics of the center, as well as the stifling of the democratic space, changes in center-state relations, and the erosion of autonomy—all of these developments led to the crisis of Kashmiri identity and caused it to begin gradually changing its character. Unlike its original aim of the emancipation of the most marginalized people, it started to assume a more inward-looking, homogenous character, and continued to be contested.

In the first shift that took place in 1953 following the removal of Sheikh Abdullah from politics and his long incarceration, the social aspect of Kashmiri identity politics dissipated. Fixed on the political question of Kashmir’s relationship with India, and plebiscite being the primary demand, there was no way that the question of economic justice and the class interests of the marginalized could be articulated or raised. From 1953 to 1975, Kashmir saw the emergence of an affluent class who were beneficiaries of a development bonanza for the state by the central government in a bid to counter the political crisis; yet, a majority of Kashmiris remained at the subsistence level. However, the question of class contradictions was not raised at any point of time.

When Sheikh Abdullah returned to politics in 1975, the core issue underlying Kashmiri identity became autonomy. Rather than resistance against the Indian state, it was now a movement in the context of center-state relations that defined Kashmiri identity politics. The major demand of the mass mobilization was related to restoration of the pre-1953 constitutional status of the state. The issue of autonomy continued to inform Kashmiri identity politics even after the death of Sheikh Abdullah. Farooq Abdullah, his son and successor, aggressively tapped into identity politics to mobilize Kashmiri voters in the 1983 Assembly election. However, his failure to sustain this led to a political vacuum in which the Muslim United Front, a combination of the religious-oriented Spring 2017 [19]

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political organizations, emerged and brought religion to the center stage of Kashmir’s identity politics.

Despite the fact that the social aspect was missing from Kashmiri identity politics after 1953, it retained two important elements that evolved from the pre-1947 period—it completely shied away from religious and communal elements of Kashmiri identity, and its roots were firmly indigenous. These two elements had a major impact on the years following 1986.

Militancy and Externalization of Kashmiri Identity Politics While religion assumed centrality with the emergence of the Muslim United Front, Kashmiri identity politics became exposed to external factors with the onset of militancy in the post-1989 period. Though militancy was caused by purely internal factors and the first generation of militants were all local Kashmiri recruits, the fact that they sought Pakistan’s support for training and financing indicated a new external factor in Kashmiri identity politics. After training the first generation of militants, most of whom belonged to Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front ( JKLF), Pakistan started controlling militancy by launching parallel militant groups, such as Hizbul Mujahideen. In the process, Pakistan started putting pressure on JKLF and eliminating a large number of its cadres. By 1993, militancy had changed, not only because Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence controlled it in a major way, but also because of the large number of foreign militants and jihadis. The entry of jihadis introduced religion in Kashmiri politics, and the conflict—which was originally seen as indigenous—was now perceived as a part of global jihad. By the mid-1990s, the majority of the militants came from outside Kashmir. With the entry of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen and Jaish-e-Mohammed, the militancy acquired not only a very heavy foreign character, but also the element of religion.

The externalization of Kashmiri identity politics and its Islamization led to internal contradictions. While on one hand it brought Jamaat-e-Islami and various other Islamic separatist and militant organizations to the forefront, on the other hand, there was also an attempt to reclaim the indigenous and secular nature of Kashmiri identity.

This contradiction could not come out in the open for quite some time due to the prevalence of violence. However, by the late 1990s, Kashmiri society strongly indicated its uneasiness with both the centrality of religion in Kashmir’s movement politics as well as the role of jihadis in it. Women specifically played a very crucial role in de-legitimizing the role of various fundamentalist organizations that had insisted on imposing religious and moral codes on society and restricting freedom. Silently but forcefully, women defied various efforts at veiling them or restricting them to the confines of the four walls of their homes.

It was during the late 1990s that the debate around the question of religion in Kashmiri identity politics was brought to the public domain. Representing two different sides of the debate were the two stalwart leaders of the All Party Hurriyat Conference, the major separatist organization of Kashmir, Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Abdul Gani [20] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Chowdhary | Kashmiri Identity Politics

Lone. Geelani represented the view that religion was the core of the Kashmiri identity politics and that the movement was part of the global jihadi politics, with that being the reason for the presence of foreign militants in Kashmir. Lone, on the other hand, argued that the movement was purely political and had indigenous roots and had no connection whatsoever with the global jihad. He even argued that jihadi militants in Kashmir were irrelevant. He stated that “we are thankful to [the foreign militants]. But when it comes to the settlement of the dispute it will be the Kashmiris—their militants and their political leadership which will have to represent the people of Kashmir.”1 On the whole, he rejected the argument of the prevalence of religion in Kashmir’s identity politics. A religion-based argument, according to him, ignored the distinct nature of the movement and overlooked the diversities of Jammu and Kashmir, which had religious, cultural, and regional differences. Lone paid a heavy price for making this argument—he was assassinated soon after.

Crisis-Driven Identity in Post-Militancy Period Externalization of Kashmiri identity politics has been a major question for Kashmiris in more recent years. Though Pakistan has been perceived as a major supporter for Kashmiris in their struggle during the recent period of azadi politics—and at a symbolic level one can see extension of pro-Pakistan elements in Kashmir—there is an increasing assertion of the indigenous element of politics. This is more clearly reflected in the post-militancy stage of separatist politics.

Popular protests characterized the post-militancy stage of Kashmiri identity politics.

With the decline of militancy, separatist assertions have arisen through massive and prolonged demonstrations. The years of 2008 to 2010 was particularly noted for such mass assertions which took place for several months. More recently, in the summer of 2016, such assertions took place. During all these assertions, one point that is overtly emphasized is that the protest forms a part of the indigenous resistance politics and stems from local sentiments.

What is particular about these mass assertions is that they are driven by a sense of cynicism and anger among the youth rather than purposive politics. One can see a generational shift with younger men born and brought up during the peak of violence taking center stage. The protests of these stone-pelting youths have been mostly spontaneous, with the separatist leadership following their emotions on the streets instead of giving direction to the movement politics. The politics have been mostly nihilistic, with many youths losing their lives or becoming injured in the process.

Such cynicism represents the general mood in Kashmir that followed the failure of engagement politics that took place from 2000 to 2007. It was during this period that sufficient movement forward took place in the peace process. The Vajpayee government Rekha Chowdhary, “Lone’s Liberal Legacy,” Economic and Political Weekly 37, no. 25 (2002): 23982400.

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took the initiative of simultaneously engaging Pakistan as well as Kashmiri separatists in order to resolve the conflict. In the process, a hope that the conflict would be resolved and that Kashmiris would have an “honorable exit� was generated. However, with the internal disturbances in Pakistan since 2007, the peace process collapsed and hope gave way to cynicism.

The present phase of identity politics is peculiar in that the centrist space is shrinking.

Extremism, hardline positions, and rigidities have become the hallmark of Kashmiri identity politics, and a sense of religious belonging is overtaking centrist politics in a significant way.

The Need to Reinvent the Ethos of Kasmiri Identity Politics To conclude, one may say that Kashmiri identity politics has come a long way from the socially purposive politics of 1940s, during which it had taken a progressive turn in the direction of an inclusive politics and had redefined its purpose as the reconstruction of the economy, society, and politics of the state. At the present moment, however, it is much more of a crisis-driven identity which responds to emotive issues related to demography. There is a strong feeling that the Muslim-majority character of the state is under attack.

While one can attribute the reasons for this sense of crisis to the changing nature of Indian politics, particularly the Hindu rightist assertions, there are internal reasons for this crisis as well. Over the years, the leadership has lost the initiative and has been engaged in self-perpetuation. Because of this, the common Kashmiris find themselves in a difficult position.

There is, meanwhile, a lot of internal questioning. While there is ongoing criticism of the leadership, there is also a demand for rethinking the strategies of the movement.

Following one of the statements made by Syed Ali Shah Geelani in late 2015 that people have failed the leadership in Kashmir, there was a prolonged debate about the role of the leadership and the need to reimagine the direction of separatist politics. This kind of critique has emerged again after an extended agitation during the summer of 2016. This conflict saw the loss of young lives as well as numerous gun injuries. While the agitation reflected the general mood of desperation that has overtaken the youth since the collapse of the peace process and the sense of political marginalization due to disengagement of Kashmiris, the immediate reason for it was the killing of Burhan Wani, a young Kashmiri militant of Hizbul Mujahideen. Wani, who symbolized the renewed interest of Kashmiris in armed militancy, had attained an iconic stature among the youth in a very short time period. Widespread protests all over the valley followed his death.

While the conflict lasted throughout the summer, during which there was a complete shut down because of calendars issued by the joint separatist leadership of Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Mirwaiz Omar Farooq, and Yasin Malik, there has recently been a renewed questioning of the leadership. There is not only a scathing critique of the [22] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Chowdhary | Kashmiri Identity Politics

leaders, but also a demand for placing the responsibility on the government. There is also criticism of the separatist leaders regarding the huge loss of lives, livelihood, and education during the five months of government shut down. Once again, this is a call for reinventing the identity politics of Kashmir.

In this call for reimagining and reinventing the identity politics of Kashmir, one can refer to the past, especially the 1930s and 1940s when the foundations of this identity politics were laid and when this identity had acquired a broad, inclusive, and socially meaningful character. Can Kashmiri identity politics again include those past essential qualities?

On the whole, a study of the trajectory of Kashmiri identity politics clearly indicates that it is the urge for political dignity, autonomy, and control over political destiny that informs Kashmiri identity politics. This urge, as this analysis informs, is not contradictory to the goals of Indian nationalism. In fact, the journey of identity politics started with an emphasis on the kinship of ideas between Kashmir and India—particularly the ideas related to democracy, secularism, and federalism. It is during this period that a harmonious construction between Kashmiri and Indian nationalism evolved. It is in the similar construction of the relationship between Kashmiri identity politics and Indian nationalism that the possibility of conflict resolution can be explored. The key, therefore, lies in the strengthening of the democratic, secular, and federal ethos and in locating Kashmir’s relationship with India in this ethos. Only such an ethos will restore the internal strength of Kashmiri identity politics and reinvent the progressive tilt that is reflected in the New Kashmir Manifesto.

Rekha Chowdhary was educated in Universities of Kashmir, Jammu and Jawaharlal Nehru University. She was formerly Professor of Political Science, University of Jammu, and has authored Jammu and Kashmir: Politics of Identity and Separatism (Routledge India, 2015) and edited Identity and Politics of Jammu and Kashmir (Vitasta, 2010), among others. Dr. Chowdhary was a visiting fellow in Queen Elizabeth House in University of Oxford as SAVSP scholar in 1992-1993 and as a Commonwealth fellow in 1997-1998. She taught a course on Jammu and Kashmir at Johns Hopkins SAIS as a Fulbright scholar in 2005.

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Modern Mongolia and Chinggis Khan Morris Rossabi Mongolia and its renowned thirteenth-century ruler Chinggis Khan have become increasingly prominent in Northeast Asia. Its geographic location, however, has often not been advantageous, surrounded by the two “socialist powers,” China and Russia.

The Qing dynasty of China ruled and exploited the country from 1691 to 1911, and the Soviet Union played a pivotal, if not dominant, role from 1921 to 1990. Lacking independence for almost three centuries, Mongolians were, to a large extent, deprived of their own views of Mongolian cultural heritage. Their only world-renowned leader was Chinggis Khan. When the country abandoned socialism in 1990, Mongolians attempted to bolster their image by emphasizing their relationship to Chinggis.

This essay focuses on changes in the Mongolian perceptions of Chinggis since 1990 and the reasons for such transformations. The government, in particular, employed his image to deflect the people’s numerous problems as a result of the economic and political turmoil that engulfed the country. The elite, some of whom had profited enormously from the rapid and chaotic transition to a market economy, echoed the state’s pronouncements on Chinggis. In recent years, as corruption has become pervasive and as economic decline persists with ever-higher rates of poverty, the appeal of Chinggis appears to be receding.

History of the Image of Chinggis Khan Development of the Image Until 1921 After the collapse of the Mongolian Empire in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, most Mongolians, especially those who had occupied China, returned to their homeland. Unification eluded them, and they generally divided into Eastern and Western Mongolians, although separate groups developed within each of the two major divisions. The title of “Khan” was reserved for rulers directly descended from Chinggis.

In the 1570s, Altan Khan sought to use Tibetan Buddhism as a unifying force. Although most Mongolians adopted Buddhism, they remained disunited, a vulnerability which allowed Qing China to occupy Mongolia starting in 1691. The Buddhist monasteries—which the Qing favored—prospered, but the state and Chinese merchants [24] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Rossabi | Modern Mongolia and Chinggis Khan

exploited and manipulated much of the rest of the population, leading to extreme poverty and oppression. Yet, no major Mongolian rebellion against the Qing erupted.

Instead, Mongolians looked backward to the era of Chinggis Khan, which they perceived to be their most glorious heritage. Then “faced with threats to their lands and to their very existence, the Mongol[ians] repeatedly sought to identify with heroes of the past, an effort that was significant in inspiring bonds of identity.”1 The first Mongolian historical and literary works, which started to be compiled in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, evoked Chinggis as the country’s symbol. A Chinggis cult emerged in which the members sometimes depicted him as a great hero and at other times as a deity. Written sources provide few details about the cult, but it appears that the prayers and sacrifices offered to secure the blessings of the Mongol ruler incorporated shamanic and Buddhist elements. Four seasonal festivals and wedding feasts portrayed Chinggis as a deity and included such shamanic practices as the scattering of mare’s milk for good fortune and the performance of rituals on hills or mountains. Buddhism, which became prominent in the seventeenth century, often integrated Chinggis into its ceremonies. These developments contributed to the creation of a Mongolian identity to counter the threat posed by the Qing. Deification of Chinggis continued after the fall of the Qing in 1911 until the rise of socialism.

Socialist Era Depiction of Chinggis Mongolia’s transition to socialism under guidance from the Soviet Union in 1921 transformed Chinggis’ image and resulted in deliberate erasure of all positive mentions of him until 1990. The Soviet Union depicted Mongolian rule over Russia as the period of Tatar Yoke and portrayed Chinggis as a feudal conqueror who rampaged, killed, and destroyed. Dependent on Soviet aid, trade, and technical assistance, the Mongolians abided by the Soviet perception of Chinggis. Because the Soviets tried to disassociate Chinggis from Mongolian nationalism, the Mongolians complied and frequently omitted his name from books and school curricula. In 1962, concerned both about the denigration of the unifier of the Mongolians and about the overpowering influence of the Soviet Union, Mongolia’s second most important Politburo official, Daramyn Tömör-Ochir, together with historians and nationalists, planned to commemorate the eighth centenary of Chinggis’ birth. Severe Soviet condemnation led not only to cancellation of all the events but also a purge and imprisonment of Tömör-Ochir and other figures involved in the projected programs.2 Yumjaagiin Tsedenbal, the Prime Morris Rossabi, “The Development of Mongol Identity in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” in Leonard Blussé and Felipe Fernández-Armesto, eds. Shifting Communities and Identity in Formation in Early Modern Asia (Leiden: Research School of Asian, African, and Amerindian Studies, Universiteit Leiden, 2003), 45.

2 On these events, see Paul Hyer, “The Reevaluation of Chinggis Khan: Its Role in the Sino-Soviet Dispute,” Asian Survey (December 1966): 696-698 and J. Boldbaatar, “The Eight-hundredth Anniversary of Chinggis Khan: The Revival and Suppression of Mongolian National Consciousness,” in Stephen Kotkin and Bruce Elleman, eds., Mongolia in the Twentieth Century (Armonk: M.E. Sharpe, 1999), 237-246.

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Minister and Secretary of the Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party who instigated the purge had studied in the USSR, married a Russian woman, and was sympathetic to the Soviet viewpoint. During his more than three decades of governance, restrictions on the written and visual representations of Chinggis persisted.

Deification of Chinggis Khan Today The 1990 collapse of socialism in Mongolia ushered in a decades-long virtual deification—or at least glorification—of Chinggis Khan.3 Mongolian nationalists were surely relieved when the USSR collapsed, because they could resurrect the image of Chinggis Khan and talk and write openly about him. He was no longer banished from Mongolian history, and a more even-handed assessment of his role and career was permissible. However, a balanced representation proved to be impossible, especially as social and economic conditions deteriorated and the state looked to the country’s heritage to counteract the hardships of parlous times. The various administrations since 1990, as well as many of the country’s elite, fostered these perceptions. A large sculpture of Chinggis now dominates the entrance to the State Great Khural (which houses parliament). A private company constructed an even more colossal steel statue of the Great Khan riding a horse approximately one hundred miles from the capital city of Ulaanbaatar. The government overreached recently in renaming the central square, the equivalent of Red Square in Moscow or Tiananmen in Beijing, from Sükhbaatar Square to Chinggis Khan Square. Sükhbaatar, the first leader of the socialist movement, was associated with Ulaanbaatar, which did not exist at the time of Chinggis.

Protests by historians, nationalists, and the general public caused the government to reverse the change and to abandon its effort, but this change was the only reversal in the frenzy of renaming. Chinggis Khan’s purported image is found on paper money and on stamps, the government renamed the airport in Ulaanbaatar in his honor, and his portrait hangs in Mongolian embassies around the world.

Private groups have matched the government’s prodigious efforts to associate themselves with Chinggis. One group constructed a hotel in Ulaanbaatar in his honor, while others introduced a Chinggis Khan vodka, beer, restaurant, and pub. Reputed portraits of the Mongolian ruler hang in stores and in advertisements. A rock and roll band has coopted his title of Chinggis Khan, but none have adopted his birth name of Temüjin.4

Yuki Konagaya asserts that in the 1930s the Japanese, for their own political purposes, contributed to the revival of the deification of Chinggis, see: “Modern Origins of Chinggis Khan Worship: The Mongolian Response and Japanese Influences,” in Morris Rossabi, ed., How Mongolia Matters: War, Law, and Society (Brill, 2017).

4 For a more complete list of such renaming, see Nomin Lkhagvasuren, “Today’s Genghis Khan: From Hero to Outcast to Hero Again,” in William Fitzhugh, Morris Rossabi, and William Honeychurch, eds., Genghis Khan and the Mongol Empire (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2009), 285-286.

On the astonishing number of depictions of Chinggis in stone, textiles, and porcelain, see Isabelle Charleux, “Critères changeants d’authenticité. Sur quelques portraits anciens et modernes de Chinggis Khan dans le monde mongol,” in Denise Aigle, et. al., Miscellanea Asiatica: Mélanges en l’honneur de Festschrift in Honour of Françoise Aubin (Sankt Augustin: Institute Monumenta Serica, 2010).

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Rossabi | Modern Mongolia and Chinggis Khan

Strangely enough, there is a Chinggis Khan University, founded for a ruler responsible for considerable destruction of towns and sites and the killings of numerous individuals during his campaigns.

Idealization of Chinggis by Mongolians and credulous Westerners has contributed to the confusion and blurring of his image. Many portray him as an advocate of democracy, women’s rights, and international law on the basis of distorted and tortuous reading of the sources about him. One author titled his book Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World and implied that the Mongolian ruler and his descendants had an impact on the Renaissance, a totally ahistorical analysis.5 Others, Mongolians and Westerners alike, designated him a great military figure, although nomadic pastoral groups had developed the same weapons, strategy, and tactics, including the impressive and innovative use of cavalries, centuries before the Mongols. Chinggis’ greatest contributions, such as selection of leaders based on merit rather than social status and unification of the various groups in Mongolia, were actually administrative.

Explanations for the Revival of Chinggis Khan The Natural Revival of the Image Absent Socialism Adoption of a policy of “shock therapy” through immediate privatization of state assets, minimalist government, liberalization of trade and prices, and support for a pure market economy caused considerable disarray in Mongolian society. Unemployment, poverty, inequitable distribution of income, corruption, and attendant social problems plagued the country.6 Despite a temporary mining boom in the early twenty-first century, Mongolia currently faces a recession, if not a depression. Many herders abandoned pastoralism to move to the capital as the herding economy lost its state support. Ulaanbaatar is now home to 50 percent of Mongolians. A focus on better times during the economic recession has inspired the greater prominence of Chinggis. Yet, assessment of the Mongolian leader has gone to extremes in depicting him as a believer in democracy and international law.

One explanation for such deification is that the Mongolians had indeed fashioned a Chinggis Khan cult as early as the seventeenth century. The families descended from the Khan sacrificed to him as part of the practice of ancestor worship. His accomplishments were recited, and his descendants sought his support and protection. The larger Mongolian community also worshipped him and practiced rituals designed to secure Chinggis’ favor. The socialist government that took power in 1921 forbade and attempted to extirpate the Chinggis cult, but some limited evidence suggests that some Mongolians covertly engaged in the rituals associated with deification of the Mongolian

This error-filled book is by Jack Weatherford published in New York by Crown Publishers in 2004.

For an assessment of these developments, see Morris Rossabi, Modern Mongolia: From Khans to Commissars to Capitalists (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005).

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ruler.7 The downfall of socialism permitted the cult to reemerge, contributing to the post-1990 revival of Chinggis’ deification.

Deliberate Use of the Image of Chinggis Another explanation for the hagiography surrounding Chinggis derives from the previously detailed deteriorating economic conditions for much of the population, as the deification may be attributed to deliberate manipulation by the state and elites. In a time of gross inequality and government corruption, some perceived a drive toward national unity as an attempt to divert the attention of the less fortunate from social and economic disparities. Onlookers view the reverence toward Chinggis and repeated observances of events in his life as efforts to promote so-called Mongolian unity and to deflect antagonism toward the tiny group of wealthy Mongolians and the increasing corruption in government. The miniscule number of Mongolians able to afford items at Louis Vuitton and other luxury stores, to live in elaborate town houses with concealed swimming pools, to travel abroad in business and first-class seats, and to employ chauffeurs and servants benefit from such misdirection. Memories of their glorious heritage consoles ordinary Mongolians, and they might believe that they can overcome their current hardships and look forward to a bountiful future. Such reactions can distract from the considerable economic and social problems the majority of the population faces, ultimately contributing to “national unity.” Repeated and pervasive references to Chinggis’ greatness and his role as protector of the Mongolian people as a god-like figure has contributed further to the bonds allegedly uniting Mongolians.

The Power of Chinggis’ Image in Today’s Mongolia Recent events suggest that the Chinggis Khan phenomenon may not be as effective and promulgated as in the early post-socialist days. The earlier optimism, which had been bolstered by references to Chinggis, resulted in festivals and celebrations lauding the Mongolian ruler. His image was attached to public documents and artifacts, such as paper money, statues, and symbols associated with the Great Khan. This optimism, which was supported by appeals to the magnificent past and to the blessings of Chinggis, prevailed. The idealization of Chinggis was especially prevalent after the 1996 defeat of the Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party, which was the only legal political party in the socialist period. However, since 1996, because the government has not succeeded in dealing with corruption, inequality, and economic development, references to Chinggis have diminished and confidence in securing his god-like blessings has eroded.

The June 2016 Khural (parliamentary) elections attested to a growing disillusionment with the uplifting morale linked to the Mongolian conqueror. A poll taken before the election found that “over one-third reported that they did not trust any of the [political] parties to properly lead the country and 77 percent stated that none of the parties

[28] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Rossabi | Modern Mongolia and Chinggis Khan

accurately represented public opinion.”8 Quite a number of the members of the Khural are businessmen or businesswomen, and many Mongolians suspect that they have their own—rather than the country’s—economic interests at heart. Bribery, graft, and nepotism, which led to the imprisonment of one of the country’s presidents, have become pervasive. In 2015, Transparency International ranked Mongolia 72 out of 179 countries in its Corruption Perception Index.9 In 2012, Mongolia’s Judicial Index was at 122 of 142 countries, and as of 2016, reforms have not been successful.10 In addition, young sons and daughters of officials whose only work positions were in government were revealed to have substantial offshore accounts, raising even greater suspicions about Mongolia’s political leaders.

The lack of enthusiasm for any political party in the June 2016 elections revealed the public’s disillusionment with the political process. The Mongolian People’s Party won a resounding victory, but only because the Democratic Party, which dominated the previous Khural, was in such disrepute. Since then, interviews and polls indicate a lack of confidence in the Mongolian People’s Party and perhaps even in democracy. Under these circumstances, the deification of Chinggis Khan and the use of his image as a unifying force have faltered. The government and the elites, which championed the “revival” of Chinggis, have scarcely had a favorable rating. Mining, which politicians, elites, and foreign advisers have emphasized as critical to the economy as opposed to herding and light and a select group of heavy industries, has declined due to a lack of Chinese demand for copper, gold, and coal. A growing number of unemployed and poor Mongolians has become less concerned with Chinggis as they are with eking out a living. The appeal to Chinggis is not as effective as in the 1990s, and contemplation of the past does not help to resolve Mongolia’s current pressing problems, which include beginning to repay massive debts that the country incurred over the past twenty years.

Conclusion Politics has dictated the Mongolian image of Chinggis Khan, who, with his grandson Khubilai Khan,11 are the most recognizable Mongolian leaders. During the Mongolian Empire, Chinggis’ descendants ruled much of Asia and respected his legacy as the founder of their state, but he was not an outsized national symbol. When Qing China conquered Mongolia in the seventeenth century, Chinggis became an inspiring figure and was virtually deified during this abyss of Mongolian history. The victory of socialism in 1921 crushed the cult that had developed around him. The Mongolian socialist state, adopting the Soviet Union’s agenda and views, either excluded Chinggis from

Morris Rossabi, “Mongolia’s Mangled Politics,” Foreign Affairs, 30 May 2016, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/mongolias-mangled-politics (date accessed: 27 January 2017).

9 Transparency International, Corruption Perception Index 2015, https://www.transparency.org/ cpi2015 (date accessed: 21 January 2017).

10 Rossabi, “Mongolia’s Mangled Politics,” Foreign Affairs.

11 For Khubilai Khan, see Morris Rossabi, Khubilai Khan: His Life and Times (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988, rev. ed. 2009).

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discourse or denigrated him as a “feudal” barbarian who destroyed towns and massacred tens of thousands.

After 1990, in the initial stages of post-socialism, the government and the elites successfully revived and deified Chinggis during a chaotic time of transition to a market economy and the ensuing crises of unemployment, poverty, and social problems, including alcoholism, domestic abuse, and declines in education and medical care. Yet as negative trends increase, such as corruption, income inequality, disillusionment with politics and politicians, and economic dependence on China, the government’s and the elites’ glorification of Chinggis no longer reverberates with the population, and the future of Mongolia is uncertain. Use of Chinggis’ image to foster national unity and to conceal the population’s problems has become insufficient to cope with the magnitude of the economic, political, and social difficulties Mongolia faces.

Morris Rossabi is Distinguished Professor of History at the City University of New York and Adjunct Professor of Inner Asian History at Columbia University. Author or editor of twenty-two books, including Modern Mongolia: From Khans to Commissars to Capitalists (University of California Press, 2005) and Khubilai Khan: His Life and Times (University of California Press, 2009), he received an honorary doctorate from the National University of Mongolia. Awarded fellowships by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Smithsonian Institution, and the Smith Richardson Foundation, he has collaborated on exhibits at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Art and has served as Chair of the Arts and Culture Board of the Soros Foundation.

[30] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Jacobs | Indigenous Reconciliation? The Case of Taiwan

Indigenous Reconciliation?

The Case of Taiwan J. Bruce Jacobs1 As in Australia, the United States, and Canada, reconciliation in Taiwan between the minority indigenous populations and the overwhelming majority of the later-arriving communities has been difficult to achieve. The “immigrant” communities in Taiwan assumed a cultural and racial superiority over the indigenes, whom they regarded as “savages.” Due to the resulting systematic discrimination, Taiwan’s indigenous peoples— like those in Australia, the United States, and Canada—have below average income and educational levels. Despite some improvements over the years, this discrimination and disadvantage continues, leading to higher rates of alcoholism and despair among Taiwan’s indigenous communities.

When the Dutch—the first foreign power to rule Taiwan—arrived in 1624, they described Taiwan’s indigenous peoples as strong and healthy. Even though Chinese reported the Dutch to be considerably taller than themselves, the Dutch recounted that Taiwan’s aborigines were more than a head taller than the Dutch. In addition, the aborigines could run endlessly—one of their methods for hunting deer was literally to chase the creature down. The Dutch also reported that Taiwan’s indigenous peoples had relatively egalitarian societies in which no one could order anyone else around, a relatively humane system of laws and regulations, fine and substantial housing, and large villages. Archeological evidence demonstrates that Taiwan’s indigenous peoples have inhabited Taiwan for over six thousand years. Some twenty-six hundred years ago, they had substantial trade networks with Southeast Asia. Scholars today also believe that Taiwan is the source of all the Austronesian peoples who inhabit every Pacific Ocean island capable of sustaining life, large parts of Southeast Asia, and Madagascar across the Indian Ocean.2 Taiwan’s history neatly falls into three major periods. The first is the six thousand years The author wishes to thank many indigenous and non-indigenous friends in Taiwan for contributing to the ideas in this article.

2 J. Bruce Jacobs, “A History of Pre-Invasion Taiwan,” 台灣史研究 [Taiwan Historical Research] 23, no. 4 (December 2016): 1-38.

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prior to the arrival of the Dutch in 1624. During the second period, from 1624 until 1988, Taiwan underwent rule by six colonial regimes, which came in from the outside and ruled in their own interests. These regimes were (1) the Dutch (1624-1662), (2) the Spanish (1626-1642) who ruled northern Taiwan simultaneously with Dutch rule in southern Taiwan, (3) the Zheng family, which continued the rule of its founder, Zheng Chenggong, also known as Koxinga (1662-1683), (4) the Manchus (1683-1895), (5) the Japanese (1895-1945), and (6) the Chinese Nationalist Party (romanized variously as Kuomintang, KMT, or Guomindang) under Chiang Kai-shek and his son, Chiang Ching-kuo. Only with the death of Chiang Ching-kuo in January 1988, did the colonial period end and the third major period begin, the period of democratization.3 As Taiwan liberalized and then democratized, many social movements arose, including that of Taiwan’s indigenous peoples. This development has led to some improvements in the treatment of the indigenous population. Thus, Taiwan’s indigenous peoples, who were still called fān (savages) under the Manchu and Japanese colonial regimes, became shān bāo (mountain compatriots) under the Chinese Nationalists—though the then colonial government tried to force the indigenous peoples to become Chinese through such policies as requiring them to adopt Chinese names, which could not begin to express the sounds of their original indigenous names. Later, in 1994, as part of the constitutional revisions enhancing democracy, the “mountain compatriots” became Taiwan’s “indigenous people” or its yuán zhùmín (original inhabitants), a term much more in accord with international conventions.4 Even back under the authoritarian regime led by the Chinese Nationalist Party, Taiwan’s indigenous peoples had their own electoral constituencies for legislative and council seats, which at least ensured that some indigenous legislators and councilors would be elected. These separate electorates continued after democratization. In the close December 1995 legislative election, Taiwan’s indigenous legislators formed a critical minority. They used this power to gain concessions from the government, including the establishment of a de facto ministry for indigenous affairs, the Council of Indigenous Peoples.5 But, by and large, the Council of Indigenous Peoples has found it difficult to operate in Taiwan’s political system; gains for Taiwan’s indigenous peoples remain slow and incomplete. Factionalism and incompetence in the ministry and among Taiwan’s indigenous leaders have also slowed progress.

During her election campaign for the presidency in 2015-2016, Tsai Ing-wen declared that she would seek to improve the welfare of Taiwan’s indigenous population should she be elected president. Thus, Taiwan’s indigenous communities looked forward to seeing what she might achieve. During her inauguration ceremony on 20 May 2016,

For the issue of colonialism, see inter alia J. Bruce Jacobs, “Whither Taiwanization? The Colonization, Democratization and Taiwanization of Taiwan,” Japanese Journal of Political Science 14, no. 4 (December 2013): 567-586.

4 J. Bruce Jacobs, Democratizing Taiwan (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2012), 93-94.

5 Ibid., 102-105.

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Jacobs | Indigenous Reconciliation? The Case of Taiwan

indigenous children participated, though the announcer made comments that some indigenous peoples regarded as insulting, such as suggesting “the arrival of Western religion and influenced [sic] helped rid Aborigines of their ‘boorish and uncultivated’ characteristics.”6 A key event came on 1 August 2016, the twenty-second anniversary of the Constitutional revision, which made Taiwan’s indigenous peoples “original inhabitants” and which became the first Indigenous Peoples’ Day in Taiwan. On this day, President Tsai delivered a major speech apologizing to Taiwan’s indigenous peoples.7 Prior to the speech, she welcomed leaders of all of Taiwan’s indigenous peoples to the Presidential Office.

The speech was carefully crafted, and her speechwriters consulted similar speeches delivered in other countries, both for content and for rhythm. Thus, for example, Tsai’s speech had echoes of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s powerful apology to the “stolen generation” of Australia’s indigenous peoples, which he gave in Parliament on 13 February 2008.8 The rhythm in President Tsai’s speech came as she repeatedly stated: “For this, I apologize to the indigenous peoples on behalf of the government.”

President Tsai began by apologizing directly to the indigenous peoples for “the four centuries of pain and mistreatment you have endured.” She noted that with the arrival of the immigrants, the indigenous peoples “became displaced, foreign, non-mainstream, and marginalized.” She quoted the famous General History of Taiwan, written

by Lien Heng and published in 1920: “Taiwan had no history. The Dutch pioneered it, the Koxinga Kingdom built it, and the Qing Empire managed it.” President Tsai noted that Taiwan’s indigenous peoples had lived in Taiwan “for thousands of years, with rich culture and wisdom…” She stated, “For 400 years, every regime that has come to Taiwan has brutally violated the rights of indigenous peoples through armed invasion and land seizure.” Thus, “the fabric of traditional societies was torn apart, and the collective rights of people were not recognized.”9 President Tsai also raised issues of language loss and how “successive governments have been negligent in the protection of indigenous cultures.” She raised the issue of the government storing nuclear waste on Orchid Island, inhabited by Taiwan’s indigenous Tao people (though unfortunately her speech referred to the “Yami tribe,” an outmoded and politically incorrect Chinese term for the Tao people).

Loa Iok-sin, “Democracy focus of celebrations,” Taipei Times, 21 May 2016. The word “influenced” should be “influence.”

7 For the full text of an English translation, see: “Full text of President Tsai Ing-wen’s apology to indigenous people,” Focus Taiwan—CNA English News, 1 August 2016, http://focustaiwan.tw/news/ aipl/201608010026.aspx (date accessed: 6 February 2017).

8 For text and video of Prime Minister Rudd’s speech, see: Australian Government, “Apology to Australia’s Indigenous Peoples,” http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/our-country/our-people/ apology-to-australias-indigenous-peoples (date accessed: 6 February 2017).

9 “Full text of President Tsai Ing-wen’s apology to indigenous people,” Focus Taiwan—CNA English News, 1 August 2016, http://focustaiwan.tw/news/aipl/201608010026.aspx (date accessed: 6 February 2017).

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President Tsai also apologized for the various gaps between Taiwan’s indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in health, education, income, and political participation. She apologized for the failure of government agencies to give sufficient weight to the Indigenous Peoples Basic Law. For example, indigenous peoples have been indicted and even sentenced to prison for hunting when “the hunting was done in accordance with traditional customs, on traditional lands, and for non-transactional needs, and where the animals hunted were not protected by conservation laws.”

According to President Tsai, remedies for all of these injustices are to be sought through an Indigenous Historical Justice and Transitional Justice Commission as part of her Truth and Reconciliation Commission in the Presidential Office. To describe these processes, she even used the Atayal indigenous words, Balay and Sbalay, to assist in her description of Truth and Reconciliation. Despite these excellent sentiments, widespread skepticism remains among both Taiwan’s indigenous and non-indigenous communities about the possibility of achieving genuine Truth and Reconciliation. Let us look at some examples.

Truth and Reconciliation requires an investigation of past crimes, prosecution of offenders (with consideration of whether any apologies are genuine), and the possibility of compensation. This has not been done for the crimes of the Chinese Nationalist authoritarian government during the period of White Terror (1945-1988). It will be even more difficult in indigenous affairs where the timeframe goes back four hundred years. Even if the necessary documentation is at hand, will the government have the drive to conduct Truth and Reconciliation?

The storage of nuclear waste on Orchid Island has caused health issues for the Tao people. Yet, despite promises, nothing has been done to remove the waste, which was secretly deposited on Orchid Island without the knowledge of its people. President Tsai promised only to “direct relevant agencies to present an investigative report on the decision-making process of nuclear waste storage on Orchid Island.” This statement strikes this writer as falling far short of a pledge to remove the waste. President Tsai’s assurance of “appropriate compensation” is not helpful to those who have already died or will have their lives substantially shortened by radiation illnesses.

The sixteen recognized indigenous peoples in Taiwan are divided into two groups: the Highland and the Lowland. Excluded are a third group, the Plains indigenous or Pingpu peoples. These are the peoples who met the Dutch and later Chinese invasions, yet they do not have government recognition as indigenous peoples of Taiwan. President Tsai specifically apologized to the Plains indigenous peoples, but she made no promise to give them official recognition. Their history is different, though anthropological work indicates they maintained at least some of their indigenous ways despite intermarriage and language loss.10 The issue of formal government recognition of the Plains See, for example: Melissa Brown, Is Taiwan Chinese? The Impact of Culture, Power, and Migration on Changing Identities (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004).

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Jacobs | Indigenous Reconciliation? The Case of Taiwan

indigenous peoples remains a difficult one, and many of the Lowland and Highland indigenous peoples say that the Plains indigenous peoples were racist against other indigenous peoples in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, and also did not participate in the indigenous social movements of the late 1980s. So President Tsai’s promise is vague, and on this issue there is great division among Taiwan’s indigenous groups.

Another issue about which Taiwan’s indigenous peoples have doubts is hunting. The rules state that any gun used in “traditional” hunting must have a barrel shorter than ninety-three centimeters in length, that it must be homemade, and that it must be loaded from the end of the barrel. Unfortunately, several of these homemade guns have exploded, blinding their users. Furthermore, as President Tsai stated, people have been sentenced and imprisoned for such hunting—and even for gathering fallen trees—because various authorities in Taiwan charge the indigenous peoples under their general laws. Legal coordination among jurisdictions has yet to take place, and many indigenous peoples remain skeptical that such coordination will in fact occur.

Finally, anti-indigenous racism is still widespread, even in contemporary Taiwanese society. A notable example occurred on 16 November 2016 when a prominent legislator of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), Ms. Chiu Yi-ying, used a very racist Taiwanese term to refer to opposition legislators, including indigenous legislators. Her use of the Taiwanese word “huan-a,” meaning “savage,” is similar to such English-language racist terms as “n***er,” “coon,” or “slope.” Such words should never be used and most certainly should not be used in a twenty-first century legislature. Chiu apologized two days later in the legislature, but her apology did not seem genuine to the indigenous people. The question is: will she be punished by the legislature or by her party?

So far, neither the legislature nor the DPP has acted. Yet, such language by a leading DPP legislator raises questions about whether Taiwan society as a whole has sincerely matched the good will of President Tsai.

Such racism and lack of respect for President Tsai’s apology among Taiwan’s population appears widespread. The apology was broadcast on Taiwan’s Indigenous TV station, but no other station sent TV teams to broadcast her speech. The next day, even though there was no major domestic or international news, the Liberty Times, Taiwan’s largest circulating newspaper and a close supporter of the DPP government, did not carry news of the speech on its first page.

Thus, despite President Tsai’s attempt to improve relations between Taiwan’s indigenous communities and its populations descended from immigrants who make up the vast majority of Taiwan’s population, there is much work to be done before Taiwan’s indigenous peoples can live on their own island with both a good standard of living and without facing daily racism.

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J. Bruce Jacobs is Emeritus Professor of Asian Languages and Studies at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. He first visited Taiwan in 1965 and has been a frequent visitor since then, except when he was on the blacklist from 1980 to 1992. His recent books on Taiwan include Local Politics in Rural Taiwan under Dictatorship and Democracy (EastBridge, 2008), Democratizing Taiwan (Brill, 2012), and The Kaohsiung Incident in Taiwan and Memoirs of a Foreign Big Beard (Brill, 2016). He has also edited the four-volume Critical Readings on China-Taiwan Relations (Brill, 2014). His current project is A History of Taiwan.

[36] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Bandarage | The Enduring Impact of Tamil Separatism

The Enduring Impact of Tamil Separatism Asoka Bandarage In May 2009, the Sri Lankan military defeated the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a “most lethal and well-organized terrorist group in the world,” which had fought for nearly thirty years to establish a separate Tamil state in Sri Lanka.1 Since that decisive victory in what was considered the “longest-running conflict in Asia,” significant steps have been taken towards the reconciliation and integration of the Tamil minority into the country’s political system.2 Local government elections held in July 2011 brought the Tamil National Alliance into power in the Northern Province, which signified a return to democracy and normalcy in the north, as elections could not be conducted during the armed conflict.3 Despite possible dangers to national security, the current Sri Lankan government, which came into power in 2015, lifted the ban on Tamil separatist organizations, released imprisoned Tamil rebels charged with terrorist activities, and returned thousands of acres of land in the north and the east that the military confiscated during the thirty-year war.⁴ Members of the Tamil elite have taken important government positions, including Chief Justice and Governor of the Central Bank, notwithstanding ethical and legal controversies surrounding some of those appointments. A Tamil politician was appointed as the Leader of the Parliamentary Opposition, even though his Tamil National Alliance party won only sixteen seats as opposed to the fifty-one seats gained by the United People’s Freedom Alliance of the Sinhalese in the 2015 Parliamentary elections. In an effort to appease Tamil sentiments, Sri Lanka’s national anthem was sung in the minority Tamil language at the official Independence Day celebrations in 2016

Asoka Bandarage. The Separatist Conflict in Sri Lanka: Terrorism, Ethnicity, Political Economy (London: Routledge, 2009), 1.

2 Ibid.

3 Asoka Bandarage, “Towards Peace and Justice in Sri Lanka: An Alternative Perspective,” India Quarterly 68, no. 2 (2012): 103-118. ⁴ Shihar Aneez, “U.S. Lauds Sri Lanka Government on Post-War Tamil Reconciliation,” Reuters, 24 November 2015, http://in.reuters.com/article/sri-lanka-conflict-reconciliation (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

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for the first time since 1949.5 Regardless of such efforts, Tamil separatism has not been halted. Since the military defeat of the LTTE, a faction of the Tamil diaspora in the West has regrouped, forming new initiatives to carry on the separatist struggle through political means. In June 2009, a “Transnational Government of Tamil Eelam” was inaugurated with New York-based attorney Visuvanathan Rudrakumaran, the international legal advisor to the LTTE, as its first prime minister. The Global Tamil Forum, a “conglomerate” of pro-LTTE diaspora organizations, has renewed the call for the creation of an “Autonomous Tamil Region” in the northern and eastern provinces through a “rearrangement of Sri Lanka’s governance structures.”6 In Sri Lanka, the Northern Provincial Council, which is dominated by the Tamil National Alliance, has passed a resolution that the north and the east provinces should merge into one. A Northern Provincial Councilor (a relative of LTTE leader Velupillai Prabhakaran) has said that if constitutional reforms uphold the unitary state, “we will not be in a position to accept it…there will not be any room for reconciliation and the country will split into four or five parts.”7 Internationally backed constitutional changes that focus merely on Tamil separatist interests overlook the interests of the Sinhala majority and the Muslim minority. By ignoring the island’s historical, demographic, and geopolitical evolution, they could reignite violent conflict, leading to ethnically based balkanization. The international community tends to see the Sri Lankan civil conflict simply as a case of Sinhala Buddhist majoritarian aggression and Tamil minority oppression. The various peace initiatives built upon this narrow perspective, such as the Indo-Sri Lanka Treaty imposed by India in 1987 and the peace initiative facilitated by Norway in 2002, sought to create a separate region for Tamils in the north of Sri Lanka. Given the marginalization of all groups opposed to separatism, those initiatives led to the intensification of the conflict and violence rather than to peace and conflict resolution.8 It is important, then, to develop a balanced historical and pluralist perspective and to consider the wisdom of international support for Tamil separatism, which threatens multiculturalism, peace, and stability in Sri Lanka and the South Asian region.

Evolution of Tamil Separatism British colonial policies had differential impact on the diverse ethnic, religious, and caste groups. The colonial state’s grants-in-aid provided most of the Christian missionary schools to the Northern Province. As a result, the Vellala caste, dominant in the Jaffna Peninsula, gained disproportionate access to English language education, Global Tamil Forum, http://www.slguardian.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Submission-to-Public-Representations-Committee-on-Constitutional-Reforms-from-Global-Tamil-Forum-GTF-1.pdf (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

7 Mirudha Thambiah, “North and East merger non-negotiable—Sivajilingam,” Ceylon Today, 8 November 2016, http://www.ceylontoday.lk/print20161101CT20161231.php (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

8 Bandarage, The Separatist Conflict in Sri Lanka, 4.

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Bandarage | The Enduring Impact of Tamil Separatism

university science faculties, careers in the civil service, modern professions, and the trust of the colonial masters. The post-independence Sri Lankan government of the 1950s and 1960s introduced some language and university entrance policies to redress those ethnic, class, religious, and caste disparities established in the colonial era. The government has reversed those policies since then, and Tamil is now an official language, a status it does not have even in India where there is a much larger Tamil population.

When the shift towards electoral democracy beginning in 1921 first threatened the Vellala Tamil advantage, Ponnambalam Arunachalam, a Sri Lankan Tamil leader, turned to the idea of a pan-Tamilian state. At the inaugural meeting of the Ceylon Tamil League, he stated its objective: “to keep alive and propagate…throughout Ceylon, Southern India and the Tamil colonies…the union and solidarity of ‘Tamilakam,’ the Tamil Land.”9 In 1949, one year after the island became independent from the British, the Malaysia-born Tamil politician S.J.V. Chelvanayakam formed the Tamil Federal Party. In the Tamil language, it carries a distinctly separatist connotation as Illankai Tamil Arasa Katchu (the Tamil State Party). Chelvanayakam saw federalism as a stepping stone to eventual secession, the motto of his approach being “a little now, more later.”10 The traditional Tamil “homeland” that has been invoked since the 1950s constitutes the Northern and Eastern Provinces, which the British carved out largely from the Sinhala Kandyan kingdom for administrative convenience. The Sinhala origin of place names and extensive historical evidence reveal the existence of Sinhala Buddhist settlement and culture throughout the northern and eastern regions;11 it did not constitute a unified Tamil political entity that has existed from the “beginning of history.”12 The militant movement for the creation of a Dravidian state, Dravidasthan, in South India, encompassing Tamil Nadu, Mysore, Kerala, and Andhara, where Dravidian languages are spoken, goes back to the late British colonial period. Tamils in South India, however, were compelled to give up the formation of a nation-state in their own country when the Indian government adopted the draconian anti-secessionist constitutional amendment in 1963 following the Sino-Indian War.13 Then, in conjunction with policies introduced in Sri Lanka to redress grievances of the Sinhala majority, South Indian Tamil support for a “surrogate” Tamil state in Sri Lanka expanded. The confluence of local and regional factors resulted in the armed conflict between the Sri Lankan state and Tamil militant groups in the mid-1970s, leading to the anti-Tamil pogrom of 1983. Increased terrorism and state violence followed.

Bandarage, The Separatist Conflict in Sri Lanka, 35 and 216.

Ibid., 39-41.

11 Asoka Bandarage, “Ethno-Religious Evolution in Pre-Colonial Sri Lanka,” Ethnic Studies Report 11, no. 2 (July 2003).

12 K.M. De Silva, Separatist Ideology in Sri Lanka: A Historical Appraisal (Kandy: International Centre for Ethnic Studies, 1995).

13 Duncan B. Forrester, “The Madras Anti-Hindi Agitation, 1965: Political Protest and Its Effects on Language Policy in India,” Pacific Affairs 39 (1966), 23; Robert L. Hardgrave, “The DMK and the Politics of Tamil Nationalism,” Pacific Affairs 37 (1965).

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Tamil militant separatists would not have had the ability to emerge as a strong threat to the Sri Lankan government without the arms and military training given by India starting well before the riots of July 1983. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s covert support for Sri Lankan Tamil insurgent groups, including the LTTE, stemmed from concern over India’s regional security and the importance of the electoral support of the Tamil Nadu region. When the Sri Lankan army was just about to vanquish the LTTE in May 1987, India intervened militarily and stopped the Sri Lankan advance.

The Thirteenth Amendment and Indian Intervention The Thirteenth Amendment to the Sri Lankan Constitution emerged from the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord, signed in July 1987, and the arrival of the Indian Peace Keeping Forces (IPKF). The stated objective of this accord was “resolving the ethnic problem of Sri Lanka” by recognizing that “the Northern and Eastern Provinces have been areas of historical habitation of the Sri Lankan Tamil-speaking peoples.”14 In an attempt to create a Tamil-majority area, the accord resolved to join the Northern and Eastern Provinces to form one administrative unit with one elected provincial council. It also called for a referendum to determine if the people of the Eastern Province wished for their province to be joined to the Northern Province.

The hasty and confused process of adopting the Thirteenth Amendment violated the island’s democratic and legal traditions. The assertion of the existence of a unified “Tamil-speaking people” ignored the pluralism of the north and the east and the regional differences between the northern Jaffna Tamils and the eastern Batticoloa Tamils and marginalized the Muslims, who, though predominantly Tamil-speaking, do not identify themselves as Tamils.15 Given the failure to hold a referendum in the east and continued opposition to the Indian-imposed merger, the Northern and Eastern Provinces were de-merged by the Sri Lankan Supreme Court in 2006.

The Indian intervention gave rise to one of the bloodiest and most anarchic periods in the modern history of the island. Violent resistance by the Sinhala Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna ( JVP) against Indian intervention turned into a horrific reign of terror in the south. Struggle against the IPKF allowed the LTTE—one of several Sri Lankan Tamil militant groups originally funded and armed by India—to emerge as the “sole representative of Tamils.” Tamil separatist violence and ethnic cleansing of Muslims and Sinhalese intensified.16 In March 1990, the Indian Army finally withdrew from Sri Lanka, leaving behind a trail of death and destruction. In addition to the thousands of soldiers, rebels, and civilians killed by the IPKF and the LTTE in the north and the Bandarage, The Separatist Conflict in Sri Lanka, 133.

Neville Ladduwahetty, “Democracy: Direct vs Representative,” The Island, 15 November 2016, http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=155542 (date accessed: 29 January 2017); Pieris, Kamalika, “The 13th Amendment,” Lankaweb, 8 June 2016, http://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/2016/06/08/the-13th-amendment (date accessed: 29 January 2017); Bandarage, “Towards Peace and Justice,” 111.

16 Bandarage, The Separatist Conflict, 153.

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east, anywhere from 40,000 to 60,000 deaths occurred in the JVP-Sri Lankan government war in the south.17 Although the LTTE was banned in India following its assassination of former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in Tamil Nadu in 1991, support for a separate Tamil state in Sri Lanka has persisted. It plays a major role in South Indian electoral politics; rival politicians and parties manipulate the issue for self-advancement. A pan-ethnic sense of relative deprivation has played a significant role in both regional and international Tamil support for the Tamil separatist struggle in Sri Lanka. Tamils—about eighty million people worldwide, with over sixty million in Tamil Nadu—consider themselves to be a “nation without a state” or a “trans-state nation.” LTTE leader Prabhakaran envisioned a “Greater Eelam,” going beyond just Sri Lanka.18 Post-LTTE Developments Since the defeat of the LTTE, Tamil diaspora groups have deflected international attention away from LTTE terrorism and its atrocities, including those toward Tamils.

Using ample funds, lobbying, and media connections, they have cultivated access to the British, United States, and other Western governments and international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and have succeeded in bringing war crime charges against the Sri Lankan government. These efforts have influenced the adoption of the UN Human Rights Council’s Resolution (co-sponsored by the current U.S.-backed Sri Lankan government) in Geneva in 2015 and the 2015 Report of the Office of the UN Human Rights Commissioner. They call for accountability and an international investigation into war crimes and human rights violations in the final stage of the armed conflict in Sri Lanka, as well as international monitoring of transitional justice and reconciliation. Clause 16 of the Geneva Resolution explicitly states that the Sri Lankan government must devolve power through constitutional means, namely the Thirteenth Amendment, which: Welcomes the commitment of the Government of Sri Lanka to a political settlement by taking the necessary constitutional measures, encourages the Government’s efforts to fulfil its commitments on the devolution of political authority, which is integral to reconciliation and the full enjoyment of human rights by all members of its population; and also encourages the Government to ensure that all Provincial Councils are able to operate effectively, in accordance with the thirteenth amendment to the Constitution of Sri Lanka.19 The legitimacy of the UN to continue to intervene in and monitor Sri Lanka, however, is questionable given its admitted “systematic failure” to carry out its duties and uphold Bandarage, The Separatist Conflict in Sri Lanka, 153.

Ibid., 141-152.

19 Ibid., 4, 20-22.

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humanitarian interests during the final phase of the Sri Lankan armed conflict.20 The former UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon himself has admitted this failure. The “Report on Secretary General’s Internal Review Panel on UN Actions in Sri Lanka,” concludes: …events in Sri Lanka mark a grave failure of the UN to adequately respond to early warnings and to the evolving situation during the final stages of the conflict and its aftermath, to the detriment of hundreds of thousands of civilians and in contradiction with the principles and responsibilities of the UN. The elements of what was a systemic failure can be distilled into…a UN system that lacked an adequate and shared sense of responsibility for human rights violations…an incoherent internal UN crisis-management structure which failed to conceive and execute a coherent strategy in response to early warnings and subsequent international human rights and humanitarian law violations against civilians.21 Although UN documents refer to human rights violations by “both parties,” calls for accountability are directed solely at the Sri Lankan government, as the LTTE no longer exists as such.22 An international investigation that focuses merely on one party—the Sri Lankan government—and on just the final phase of the war, absolves the LTTE, the Tamil Diaspora that funded the LTTE, the IPKF, and various other parties of human rights violations. Indeed, is the ultimate objective of international pressure, humanitarian justice, or coercion of the Sri Lankan government to concede Tamil regional autonomy?

Tamil Regional Autonomy Since the end of the armed conflict, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been pressing Sri Lanka to go beyond the Thirteenth Amendment and to devolve powers to provide for Tamil regional autonomy.23 The U.S. Ambassador in Sri Lanka, Atul Keshap, stated on record that the United States supports a federal structure as the means for reconciliation between the Sinhala majority and the Tamil minority.24 Erik Solheim,

Neville Ladduwahetty, “Who Monitors the Monitors?” The Island, 26 July 2016, http://www.island. lk/index.php?article-details&code_title=149274 (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

21 “Report of the Secretary General’s Internal Review Panel on United Nations Action in Sri Lanka,” 28-29 November 2012, http://www.un.org/News/dh/infocus/Sri_Lanka/The_Internal_Review_Panel_report_on_Sri_Lanka.pdf (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

22 Manjula Fernando, “Panel Report Fails to Recognize: Terrorists, Biggest Violators of HR,” Sunday Observer, 1 May 2011, http://archives.sundayobserver.lk/2011/05/01/fea04.asp.

23 “Modi in Jaffna: PM urges Sri Lanka to implement 13th Amendment, delegate power to provinces,” FirstPost, 14 March 2015, http://www.firstpost.com/world/modi-jaffna-pm-urges-sri-lanka- implement13th-amendment-delegate-power-provinces-2153845.html (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

24 Daya Gamage, “Power & Soros in Sri Lanka to press for Federal Constitution,” Asian Tribune, 20 December 2015, http://www.asiantribune.com/node/88205 (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

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who led the failed Norwegian intervention into the Sri Lankan conflict, and the financier George Soros are among those in the West calling for federalism in Sri Lanka.25 These calls ignore the complex demographic realities, multiculturalism, and mutual co-existence in Sri Lanka. The majority of Tamils in Sri Lanka are estimated to be living in the southern regions of the island outside the disputed “Tamil Homeland.”

The Eastern Province is the home to Tamils, Sinhalese, and Muslims, approximately one-third each. Even the overwhelmingly Tamil Northern Province had a significant Muslim population and a smaller Sinhalese population that was driven out by the LTTE during the course of the war. As U.S. geographer Robert Stoddard observed, the “distribution of ethnic populations in Sri Lanka cannot be regionalized to form a single, contiguous territory for each group. The final resolution to the ethnic conflict in the country will have to recognize this geographic reality.”26 A grant of regional autonomy to Sri Lankan Tamils could revive the call for a separate Muslim administrative unit in the east, as happened during the 2002 Norwegian-facilitated peace process which sought to establish LTTE control over the north and the east.

Similarly to developments elsewhere in the world, efforts to enforce regional autonomy along ethnic lines are leading to ethnic cleansing and new forms of conflict and violence in Sri Lanka. Recent examples of ethnic cleansing include the plight of Buddhist monks whom Tamil politicians have ordered to remove their historic temples from the Northern Province, attacks on Sinhala students at the University in Jaffna in July 2016, which compelled them to leave the campus after including a Sinhala dance form at a campus ceremony, and a Special Gazette notification on 21 August 2015 that transferred the only remaining Sinhala village in the Northern Province, Bogaswewa, to the North Central Province.27 Notwithstanding these disturbing ground realities, the Sri Lankan government is now forging ahead with proposals for constitutional reform in response to the Geneva Resolution’s demands for comprehensive judicial and non-judicial measures and political devolution. Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has stated that the constitutional reform process has “achieved significant momentum” and would provide “an opportunity to rectify structural deficiencies that contributed to past human rights violations, and reinforce guarantees of non-recurrence.”28 However, the recently released recommendations of the Sub-Committee on Center-Periphery Relations on constitutional reform are raising serious concerns over political destabilization “Prabhakaran's reluctance to embrace federalism and lack of bipartisan spirit of SLFP and UNP: Two difficulties encountered by Norway Erik Solheim,” Asian Tribune, September 2015, http://www. asiantribune.com/node/87848 (date accessed: 25 January 2017).

26 Robert Stoddard, “Regionalization and Regionalism in Sri Lanka” (Paper presented at the Annual Conference on South Asia, Wisconsin, 7 November 1986): 9-10.

27 Asoka Bandarage, “United Nations Special Rapporteur on Minority Issues: Statement on Sri Lanka,” Huffington Post, 26 October 2016, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/united-nations-special-rapporteur-on-minority-issues_us_58112250e4b096e870696133 (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

28 Statement by Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein.

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and renewed conflict in Sri Lanka and the region.29 Constitutional Reforms and Devolution The draft report of the Sub-Committee on Center-Periphery Relations refers to the present unitary character of the constitution as an “impediment” to devolution. It recommends going beyond the Thirteenth Amendment to transform the governance structures of the country by dismantling the powers of the central government and equipping and empowering each province to pursue full independence from the center and from each other.

Among the many recommendations of the draft report are: repeal of the center’s exclusive powers and giving the provinces power over land, finances (including the power to receive foreign direct investment), and police powers; abolition of the present Concurrent List (on subjects shared between the center and the provinces) and the reduction of the governor—the representative of the central government—to a nominal status; and limitation of the center’s powers to bring provincial administrations under direct judicial review.30 There is no provision in the draft proposals for retaining the center’s power to override provincial statutes with a two-thirds majority vote in parliament.

Without such a provision, each province would be constitutionally independent and have the freedom to secede from the federal union through a provincial referendum or other mechanism.

The proposed constitutional changes pose a threat to the sovereignty and unitary character, as well as the territorial integrity, identity, and national security of Sri Lanka.

Although only the northern region has been clamoring for separation, the proposed decentralized structure is likely to encourage political elites in other regions also to secede to augment their own powers. Such a situation could lead to multiple conflicts between the separated regions over boundaries, waterways, coastline, cultural heritage sites, etc. It would undermine the central government’s ability to respond to common threats to the environment and the security of the island as a whole.

The Sub-Committee on Center-Periphery Relations has not taken up the recommendations by Sinhala activists and organizations, such as the Global Sri Lankan Forum, to repeal the controversial Thirteenth Amendment and the failed Provincial Councils and establish district-based devolution.31 Rather, the current recommendations of the Sub-Committee would weaken existing district and village level authorities by bringing them firmly under the control of the vastly strengthened Provincial Councils.

Devolution on the basis of smaller district units may better accommodate the regional

Report of The Sub-Committee on Centre-Periphery Relations appointed by the Sri Lankan government, 2016 unpublished draft manuscript, 2; Sinhalanet, “Centre-Periphery Relations report Leading to Tamil eelam,” 9 November 2016, http://www.sinhalanet.net/centre-periphery-relations-report-leading-to-tamil-eelam (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

30 Ibid.

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ethnic, cultural, and social heterogeneity of the island. It may allow local people greater control over land, water, and other natural resources and preclude many communities from turning into minorities within larger multi-ethnic provincial units. However, devolution at the provincial level, which is the stepping-stone to separatism, prevails over economic and political rights of people at the district level.

Dangers Ahead The proposed political devolution in Sri Lanka could facilitate increased militarization and exploitation of national wealth, natural resources, and people by powerful countries. It could exacerbate fragmentation, destabilization, and conflict, requiring even greater foreign intervention by external actors, such as the UN. The enforcement of the Thirteenth Amendment and a grant of Tamil regional autonomy could result in a Tamil region in the north that is subservient to India. These concerns are aggravated by new projects planned by India, such as the sea bridge and tunnel to connect the southern tip of India with the north of Sri Lanka. While the proposed bridge could provide the basis for realizing the long-held Tamil separatist dream of “Greater Eelam” it could simultaneously threaten the stability and unity of India, as well as the environment.32 Proposed changes could also aggravate geopolitical competition in the region. India, China and the United States are all struggling for influence over Sri Lanka, which is strategically located in a major international trade route in the heart of the Indian Ocean. Sri Lanka is an active participant in China’s extensive network of ports and maritime facilities connecting the Pacific and Indian Oceans. There is a plan under way to cede the Hambantota deep-sea port and land for a massive economic zone in southern Sri Lanka to China.33 India is concerned about Chinese encirclement and is in turn expected to sign an accord to develop the Trincomalee Harbor in the east of Sri Lanka.34 In August 2016, the first joint operation between the United States and the Sri Lankan militaries took place in Jaffna with participation of Tamil National Alliance “Global Sri Lankans Forum Calls for Devolution of Limited Powers to Districts,” 20 March 2016, http://www.sinhalanet.net/global-sri-lankans-forum-calls-for-devolution-of-limited-power-todistricts (date accessed: 29 January 2017); Shenali Waduge, “Repealing the 13th Amendment and Listening to the Patriotic Nationalists,” Lankaweb, 8 June 2011, http://www.lankaweb.com/news/ items/2011/06/08/repealing-the-13th-amendment-listening-to-the-patriotic-nationalists (date accessed: 29 January 2017); Gomin Dayasiri, “Much blood spilt on the 13th Amendment but India still wants it?,” Daily Mirror, 7 June 2011, http://print.dailymirror.lk/opinion/46195.html (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

32 Asoka Bandarage, “The Transformation of Sri Lanka and the Indian Ocean,” Huffington Post, 27 September 2016, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/the-transformation-of-sri-lanka-and-the-indian-ocean_us_57ea9c0ce4b095bd8969ffdf (date accessed: 29 January 2017).

33 Wade Shepard, “Violent Protests Against Chinese 'Colony' In Sri Lanka Rage On,” Forbes, 7 January 2017, http://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2017/01/08/violent-protests-against-chinese-colony-in-hambantota-sri-lanka-rage-on/#79ec75b529ed (date accessed: 11 February 2017).

34 “India, Sri Lanka talks to develop Trincomalee port enters final stage,” Express News Service, 18 January 2017, http://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/2017/jan/18/india-sri-lanka-talks-to-developtrincomalee-port-enters-final-stage-1560979.html (date accessed: 11 February 2017).

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politicians at the launch.35 Political devolution could contribute to making the island a stage for the foremost geopolitical struggle of the twenty-first century.

Ordinary Sinhalese and Tamil youth have spilled much blood over the Thirteenth Amendment, devolution, and separatism in recent Sri Lankan history. The Sinhalese, Tamil, and Muslim elites in Sri Lanka and the Indian and western elite must not let that happen once again. Mass discontent and protests against unjust policies and external intervention are growing in Sri Lanka. The volatile situation requires balanced perspectives and policies which transcend narrow ethnic and separatist interests and protect all communities and the island’s natural environment.

Asoka Bandarage has taught at Brandeis, Georgetown, Mount Holyoke, and other colleges and universities. She is the author of Colonialism in Sri Lanka (Mouton De Gruyter, 1983), The Separatist Conflict in Sri Lanka (Routledge, 2009), and Sustainability and Well-Being: The Middle Path to Environment, Society, and the Economy (Palgrave MacMillan), and numerous other publications on South Asia, global political economy, ethnicity, gender, population, and ecology. She currently writes a column on global political and environmental issues in The Huffington Post.

“Editorial: ‘Independence,’” The Island, 3 February 2017, http://www.island.lk/index. php?page_ cat=news-section& page=news-section&code_title= 60 (date accessed: 11 February 2017).

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Inoue | On the Okinawan Multitude

On the Okinawan Multitude Toward a New Policy Paradigm for Reorganization-Reduction of the U.S. Bases in Okinawa Masamichi S. Inoue1 While accounting for only 0.6 percent of Japan’s total landmass, Okinawa shoulders more than 70 percent of facilities in Japan for the exclusive use of U.S. military forces.2 On top of this disproportionate burden, in 1996, the U.S. and Japanese governments proposed to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps’ Futenma Air Station by building a new facility within Okinawa. Protests in Okinawa over the past two decades have made it clear just how unfair and unreasonable this proposal is by blocking all plans to construct such a facility. Yet the protests have also been criticized as “opposition only” for their failure to present a policy alternative to the Futenma relocation proposal. As an anthropologist who has studied Okinawa’s U.S. base issues since 1997, I write this essay to respond to this criticism.

My argument develops in three steps, with the following question explored as its guiding thread: does the current global security order, underpinned by the might of the U.S. military, represent the general will—defined by Jean-Jacques Rousseau as “the unvarying will of all the members”3—of the global society? First, I situate local desire for reorganization-reduction of the U.S. bases in two foundational events of Okinawa’s modernity—the Battle of Okinawa (1945) and U.S. rule of Okinawa (1945-1972)— while tracing how this desire, as a foundation of the “unvarying will of all the members” of Okinawa to achieve peace, has been articulated and rearticulated by different social actors in postwar Okinawa. Second, I discuss what I call the “Okinawan multitude,” highlighting how they transform Okinawa’s general will under new historical Part of this essay was presented at the University of Kentucky’s Modern and Classical Languages, Literatures & Cultures Departmental Colloquium held on 14 February 2017. In finalizing this essay, I benefited enormously from the comments and questions of the participants.

2 In December 2016, more than half (or about 4,000 hectares) of the Northern Training Area was returned, reducing Okinawa’s burden of U.S. military exclusive-use facilities in Japan from 74.5 percent to 70.6 percent. Ishimatsu Wataru, “Okinawa no Hokubukunrenjō Henkan, Nichibei Seishikigōi, Hondofukkigo Saidai” [Return of Okinawa’s Northern Training Area, Japan and the United States Officially Agreed, the Largest Return Since the Okinawa Reversion], Asahi Shimbun, 22 December 2016.

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circumstances of globalization. Third, as an alternative policy paradigm to supersede the Futenma relocation proposal, I explore the idea of “a security alliance without permanent stationing of U.S. forces in Okinawa/Japan” in a manner that grafts the general will of Okinawa onto that of the global society.

This essay uses and elaborates on some of the analyses presented in my book, Okinawa and the U.S. Military: Identity Making in the Age of Globalization, and a subsequent preface to a forthcoming edition of that book.4 In so doing, however, it departs from the pacifist position—a belief that peace will arrive only when the military is abolished—which is often advocated in Okinawa’s anti-base struggles and implicitly assumed in my previous writings. Specifically, I posit that the measured use of force is acceptable, even necessary, under certain circumstances involving violence, insofar as it expresses the will of all the members—not the privileged few—of the global society to construct peace and prosperity for all.

Past as Present, or, How the Will for Peace Has Been Expressed by Different Social Actors in Postwar Okinawa In September 1995, a twelve-year-old Okinawan schoolgirl was gang-raped by three U.S. servicemen. In an attempt to placate Okinawa’s anger, the U.S. and Japanese governments announced in April 1996 that the land used for Futenma Air Station—a strategically vital U.S. Marine Corps facility of approximately five hundred hectares located in a congested residential area in central Okinawa—would be returned within five to seven years. This return, however, was contingent upon a number of provisions.

Chief among these was the construction of a Futenma replacement facility (hereafter FRF) within Okinawa. By December 1996, the U.S. and Japanese governments chose Henoko, a sparsely populated coastal community in northern Okinawa and home to U.S. Marine Corps Camp Schwab, as the site of the FRF.5 A basic conflict over the FRF construction emerged at this juncture. From the perspective of the U.S. and Japanese governments, the central question is how to reorganize and reduce U.S. military bases in Okinawa without sacrificing their functions as the linchpin of the U.S.-Japan security alliance. According to this view, bases in Okinawa are a deterrent, essential to the peace and prosperity of Japan and East Asia. From the Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Social Contract,” in Ideal Empires and Republics: Rousseau's Social Contract, More's Utopia, Bacon's New Atlantis, Campanella's City of the Sun (Washington, DC: M. Walter Dunne, 1901), 95-96.

4 Masamichi S. Inoue, Okinawa and the U.S. Military: Identity Making in the Age of Globalization (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007); Masamichi S. Inoue, Preface to Okinawa and the U.S. Military: Identity Making in the Age of Globalization, paperback ed. (forthcoming).

5 Special Action Committee on Okinawa, “The SACO Final Report on Futenma Air Station (an integral part of the SACO Final Report),” 2 December 1996, http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/n-america/us/ security/96saco2.html (date accessed: 13 December 2016). This document somewhat vaguely stated that the FRF “will be located off the east coast of the main island of Okinawa,” but it was understood by the parties involved that “the east coast of the main island of Okinawa” meant Henoko.

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Inoue | On the Okinawan Multitude

Okinawan perspective, however, the issue at stake is how to reorganize and reduce the U.S. bases to restore the well-being of Okinawans, which the bases have disrupted through earsplitting jet noise, land pollution, and accidents, as well as crimes committed by U.S. servicemen. The notion of U.S. bases in Okinawa as a deterrent no longer makes much sense in a new post–Cold War security environment, in which military capabilities must be decentralized in a network, rather than concentrated in one place such as Okinawa, in order to reduce vulnerability to outside attacks and to cope with diversified contingencies across the globe.6 If the U.S.-Japan alliance is important for the peace and prosperity of Japan and beyond, Okinawa adds, the burden of U.S. bases must be shared equally across the nation; constructing the FRF within Okinawa denies this elementary logic of fairness. Over the past two decades, the FRF issue has revolved around this tension over the meaning of “reorganization-reduction” of the bases in Okinawa.

Two foundational events of Okinawan modernity mark the intensity of local desire for base reorganization-reduction, upon which Okinawa’s general will for peace has been formed. The first is the Battle of Okinawa in 1945, during which Okinawans, the object of prolonged discrimination by the Japanese, were essentially sacrificed to protect the mainland of the then Japanese Empire. The death toll reached 150,000—a quarter of the prefectural population at the time. Most were killed under the barrage of American bombs and artillery fire, but some were killed by Japanese troops who, instead of protecting Okinawans, protected themselves by, for instance, driving them away from shelters. During this battle, the U.S. military enclosed a vast extent of Okinawan land for their bases, an act that prepared for U.S. military rule of Okinawa from 1945 to 1972, the second foundational event of Okinawa’s modernity. Tokyo sacrificed Okinawa once again, this time by allowing the U.S. military to turn it into the “Keystone of the Pacific” for the containment of communist threats, a process that facilitated the recovery and economic development of postwar Japan. Violation of basic human rights of Okinawans by the U.S. military was all too common, exemplified by additional seizures of Okinawan land for base construction and expansion in the 1950s. These two events of “sacrifice”—the war and U.S. military rule—have formed the basis of Okinawa’s general will for peace, articulated by different social actors in postwar Okinawa through their attempts to reorganize and reduce the U.S. bases.

In the 1950s and 1960s, a division had already existed between pro-base residents who reluctantly accepted and sometimes actively supported the presence of the U.S. bases for economic reasons and anti-base residents who opposed it in search of political self-autonomy.7 Both, however, lived on the same socioeconomic plane, constituing Akikazu Hashimoto and Mike Mochizuki, “Revise the Plan to Build the U.S. Marine Air Base in Henoko, Okinawa: Tokyo and Okinawa have a better option,” The Diplomat, 11 September 2015, http:// thediplomat.com/2015/09/revise-the-plan-to-build-the-u-s-marine-air-base-in-henoko-okinawa/ (date accessed: 14 January 2017); “Nye suggests rotating U.S. forces in Japan around SDF bases,” Japan Times, 25 December 2014.

7 Jun Toriyama, Okinawa Kichishakai no Kiten to Sōkoku—1945-1956 [The Origin and Conflict of Okinawa’s Base Society—1945-1956], (Tokyo: Keisōshobō, 2013).

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the poor and oppressed Okinawan minshū (people) who depended, directly or indirectly, on the U.S. bases for their livelihoods. United by shared experiences of the two events of sacrifice, the Okinawan “people,” the first postwar generation, collectively expressed Okinawa’s general will for peace by mobilizing island-wide actions such as the resistance to the U.S. military’s land seizures in the 1950s and the movement for the reversion of administrative rights over Okinawa from the United States to Japan in the 1960s and the early 1970s.

After the Okinawa reversion in 1972, Tokyo began injecting funds for infrastructure and economic development into Okinawa as political compensation for the continuing presence of the U.S. military there, helping Okinawa’s private sector economy grow to an extent that Okinawans were no longer as dependent on base-related revenue as before.8 As a result, the poorer working-class “people” who still depended economically on the U.S. bases were sharply confronted by an increasing number of educated, middle-class, anti-base “citizens” who made their living without depending on the bases.

It is these citizens, called shimin locally, who articulated the Okinawa’s general will in the 1980s and 1990s.

Okinawan shimin were the second postwar generation born during U.S. rule of Okinawa (1945-1972), the “post-generation” having not directly experienced the war.9 In the 1980s and 1990s, they increasingly defined forms of social discourses and practices vis-à-vis the first generation, which had known both war and alien rule and the third generation who had known neither. In 1990, indeed, the first generation (forty-five years old or older) became a minority, at approximately 30 percent of the population, while the second generation (eighteen to forty-five years old) accounted for 39 percent and the third generation (under eighteen years old) accounted for 31 percent.10 Against the background of this newly emerging intergenerational arrangement, the first generation’s direct experience of the war and U.S. rule was rearticulated as Okinawa’s collective memory by the subsequent generations. The second generation, who were in their prime in the 1990s, played a particularly important role in constructing this collective memory as a core element of Okinawan citizen identity. In the protests against the 1995 rape and the FRF construction in Henoko after 1997, specifically, the second generation powerfully embedded Okinawa’s collective memory in global citizenry discourses on the promotion of peace, the protection of the environment, and the empowerment of women, in a manner that asserted Okinawa’s general will for peace through a determined political demand for reorganization-reduction of the U.S. bases.

Moritake Tomikawa, “Okinawa’s Economic Future and Asia: Looking beyond the U.S. Military Presence,” 27-28 (A paper delivered at the Workshop on the Okinawa Collection, Gelman Library-George Washington University, 3 February 2017).

9 Marianne Hirsch, “The Generation of Postmemory,” Poetics Today 29, no.1 (2008), 103.

10 Sōmushō Tōkeikyoku, Heisei 2nen Kokusei Chōsa, Nenrei (Kakusai), Danjobetu Jinkō [National census 1990, population by age and sex], Okinawaken Kikakubu Tōkeika, http://www.pref.okinawa.jp/ toukeika/pc/pc_index.html (date accessed: 4 December 2016).

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Inoue | On the Okinawan Multitude

The Okinawan Multitude: A Transformative Social Agent in the Twenty-first Century Over the past decade, Okinawa’s general will has been expressed by yet another emerging social actor in a new socioeconomic context of uncertainty, inequality, and insecurity. The notion of the “precariat”11 provides a useful entry point into the status of this social actor. This concept sheds critical light on the global market economy’s impact on the living conditions of workers of all countries, whose wages have been relentlessly lowered through outsourcing, layoffs, deregulations, and other neoliberal measures.

Okinawan workers have also been impoverished, though for a slightly different reason.

The majority of Okinawan industries, increasingly protected by the government funds for infrastructure and economic development, shut down innovation, growth, and transformation in their business practices by refusing to raise Okinawan workers’ wages.12 Consequently, the number of non-full-time workers in Okinawa increased dramatically from 75,000 (17.1 percent of the employed labor force) in 1992 to 238,000 (43.0 percent) in 2012, highest among the nation’s prefectures.13 The poverty rate of children in Okinawa, an estimated 30 percent, is also the highest in the nation.14 In the process, the distinction between the middle-class (and typically anti-base) “citizens” and the working-class (and typically pro-base) “people” in the 1980s and 1990s has significantly attenuated, if not completely evaporated; both have disintegrated into an aggregate of precarious lives.

Though useful, the concept of the precariat tends to focus on the suffering—lack of jobs, securities, and hope—of the people as victims of globalization.15 I, for one, want to explore how those in the precariat transform themselves into creative social actors with agency and hope, by examining Okinawa’s struggles against the FRF construction as an example. Following Hardt and Negri’s notion of the multitude—a decentered and often unavowable network of singularities that act in common and thus rule themselves16—I call these creative social actors in Okinawa “the Okinawan multitude.” Their sensibilities are shaped not only by the first and second generations, but also increasingly by the third generation born after the Okinawa reversion. In 2015, the majority, or approximately 53 percent of the Okinawan population, indeed fell into the third generation (forty-three years old or younger), while approximately 34 percent fell into

Guy Standing, The Precariat: The New Dangerous Class (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2007).

Higuchi Kōtarō, “Okinawakara Kichi ga Nakunaranai Hontō no Riyū” [The true reason for why U.S. bases stay in Okinawa], Politas, 14 December 2014, http://politas.jp/features/3/article/327 (date accessed: 3 December 2016).

13 “Hiseiki Koyōsha, “30nende 2.7bai: Seikikyūjin, Izen Hikuku” [270 Percent Increase of Non-fulltime Workers Over 30 Years: Demand for Full-time Workers Remains Low], Ryukyu Shimpo, 1 November 2015.

14 “Shasetsu: Kodomono Hinkon—Sōryoku Ageta Torikumi Isoge” [Editorial: Poverty of Children— Hasten to Implement Measures by Joining Our Forces], Ryukyu Shimpo, 1 August 2015.

15 Standing, The Precariat, vii.

16 Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire (New York: Penguin Press, 2004), 100-102.

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the second generation (between forty-three and seventy years old) and 14 percent fell into the first generation (older than seventy).17 Emerging in this new intergenerational composition are two mechanisms that contribute to the production of the Okinawan multitude whose will, I suggest, constitutes part of “the unvarying will of all the members” of the global society.

First, internally, as the pro-base/anti-base divide has attenuated over the past decade, the Okinawan multitude has rearticulated this divide into a site of empowerment. The intensified governmental attempt to construct the FRF in Henoko since 2014, in particular, has enabled the rhetoric of sabetsu (discrimination)—i.e., Japanese discrimination against Okinawa ever since, or even before, the Battle of Okinawa—to develop, uniting Okinawans, either anti-base or pro-base, under a common Okinawan identity against Tokyo. On the one hand, in the eyes of those leaning toward the anti-base position, the FRF construction represents Tokyo’s discriminatory treatment against Okinawa, in that it tramples on a local pacifist view, informed by the two foundational historical events of “sacrifice,” that the military never protects local life and that peace will not arrive until the military is abolished.18 On the other hand, from Okinawa’s pro-base perspective, which acknowledges the importance of the U.S.-Japan security alliance (and thus the U.S. bases in Okinawa/Japan) to defend the “free world,” the FRF construction is discriminatory in that it reinforces the excessive burden of U.S. bases upon the shoulders of Okinawans. Takeshi Onaga, Okinawa’s governor since November 2014, has effectively constituted a rallying point for both anti-base and probase constituencies by adamantly opposing the FRF construction.19 Meanwhile, the rhetoric of sabetsu is intertwined with existing discourses on the promotion of peace, the protection of the environment, and the empowerment of women, now disseminated through explosive communication not only in physical space but also in the new cyberspace of the twenty-first century. In the process, cyberspace has become a platform—and the second, external mechanism—that expands the Okinawan multitude in the following manner.

Most of those who participate in protests in Henoko carry electronic devices, including smartphones. With these devices, they capture, for instance, the use of excessive force against protestors by the riot police in front of Camp Schwab and by the Japan Coast Guard officers on Henoko’s sea. The protestors share videos and pictures, in real time through blogs, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking tools. Those who live outside Okinawa but are concerned about the situation can access the information through the Internet and come to Okinawa to support the protestors. In the summer of 2016, for instance, I found that more than half the members of the canoe Okinawaken, Heisei 27nen Jyūmin Kihon Daichō Nenreibetsu Jinkō [Residents Register 2015, Population by Age and Sex], http://www.pref.okinawa.jp/site/kikaku/shichoson/2422.html (date accessed: 4 December 2016).

18 See, for instance, Shun Modoruma, Okinawa <Sengo> Zero-Nen [Zero Year "After the War" in Okinawa] (Tokyo: Nihon Hōsō Shuppan Kyōkai, 2005).

19 Takeshi Onaga, Tatakau Min’i [The Public Will That Fights] (Tokyo: Kadokawa Shoten, 2015).

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Inoue | On the Okinawan Multitude

team who rowed on Henoko’s sea to block the FRF construction belonged to the precariat of mainland Japan, including an underemployed woman in her twenties, a retired Korean-Japanese math teacher in his sixties, a part-time yoga instructor in her fifties, a part-time case worker in her thirties, a scientist in his fifties who does not belong to academia, and a Buddhist monk in his forties. Sympathetic foreigners also join protests. For instance, fifty members of Peace Boat (November 2014), fifteen members of Green Peace (November 2015), and eleven members of the Veterans for Peace (December 2015) came to Henoko to express solidarity with Okinawa.20 These outsiders also record, share, and disseminate their experiences through the Internet, helping the Okinawan multitude “occupy” not only the physical space around Camp Schwab but also the virtual space dominated by the mainstream media and others who trivialize Okinawa’s oppositional voices.21 In summary, over the past decade, in their shared efforts to block the FRF construction, those in the precariat class in Okinawa and beyond have constituted themselves as an open network of critical subjects to express Okinawa’s general will for peace.

Specifically, discrimination rhetoric, as intertwined with discourses of peace, the environment, gender, and related issues, has contributed to the production of the Okinawan multitude, who internally transform the pro-base/anti-base divide into a site of empowerment and externally embrace sympathetic non-Okinawans to confront the larger system of power.

Security Alliance without Permanent Stationing of U.S. Forces in Okinawa/Japan Despite these accomplishments, the Okinawan multitude’s protests have been criticized as “oppositions only” for their failure to present a policy alternative to the Futenma relocation proposal.22 I suggest that the Okinawan multitude respond to this criticism by marshaling Okinawa’s foundational historical experiences of sacrifice—the very basis of Okinawa’s general will and identity articulated by the minshū (people) in the 1950s and 1960s and by shimin (citizens) in the 1980s and 1990s—not only as “Pīsubōto no Minasanraihō” [Members of Peace Boat have come], No Base, 7 November 2014, http://blog-imgs-46-origin.fc2.com/h/e/n/henoko/1113b.jpg (date accessed: 13 December 2016); “Gurīnpīsu ‘Jugon Mamore’: Kaijōode Henokochūshi uttaeru.” [Green Peace demands “Save the Dugongs”: Calling for Cancellation of the Henoko plan], Okinawa Times, 9 November 2015, http://www. okinawatimes.co.jp/articles/-/20656 (date accessed: 13 December 2016); “Veterans for Peace Protest in Solidarity at Henoko: ‘No New Bases in Henoko or Takae,’” Ryukyu Shimpo, 10 December 2015, http://english.ryukyushimpo.jp/2015/12/16/24161 (date accessed: 13 December 2016).

21 “Others” include the netto-uyoku, internet right-wingers. They can be defined as impoverished and alienated members of the Japanese precariat who, attempting to displace their helplessness with pride and dignity as Japanese, spread hateful discourse against “traitors”—Okinawa’s protesters—whom they see as jeopardizing the strength and security of Japan. The origin, roles, and significance of netto-uyoku are beyond the scope of this essay and will be explored in a separate project.

22 Jun Okubo and Akira Shinohara, Okinawa no Futsugōna Shinjitsu [Okinawa’s Inconvenient Truth] (Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 2015); Robert D. Eldridge, Okinawaron: Zai-Okinawa Kaiheitai Motokanbu no Kokuhaku [An Essay on Okinawa: Confessions of an Executive Member of the U.S. Marine Corps in Okinawa] (Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 2016).

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a way to remember the past, but also as a policy principle for shaping the future. To assist Okinawa in accomplishing this task, I introduce the idea of jōji-chūryūnaki anpo (a security alliance without permanent stationing of U.S. forces [in Okinawa/Japan], hereafter SAWPS).

SAWPS originated partly in Kichi Henkan Akushon Puroguramu (Action Program for Returning U.S. Bases to Okinawa),23 an Okinawa prefectural government proposal that was announced in 1996 in response to the 1995 rape incident as a crystallization of Okinawa’s historically informed general will for peace. The Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) refined this proposal in the late 1990s as part of its platform.24 SAWPS critically rearticulates the Cold War security paradigm centering on confronting, containing, and/or annihilating the “enemy.” It does so by engaging in a post–Cold War security environment, where the “enemy” has transmuted into amorphous contingencies at the level of everyday social life, such as terrorist attacks, natural disasters, refugee crises, and other threats (like China’s maritime expansion and North Korea’s nuclear program) requiring high-intensity police actions or low-intensity warfare.25 Construing the United Nations as a model of a supranational institution, SAWPS invokes “the unvarying will of all the members” of the global society by intervening into this new security environment with the following three mechanisms.26 First, SAWPS is part of security operations of the supranational institution. This supranational institution integrates national militaries, including the U.S. military and Japan’s Self-Defense Forces (SDF), and reorganizes them into the East Asia security forces, of which a basic function is policing—creating order and maintaining peace—in contingencies of various kinds. Second, bilateral alliances like the U.S.-Japan security alliance, created during the Cold War to contain and intimidate the “enemy,” are restructured as a forum of multilateral security dialogues across East Asia. Third, a basic principle of the Japanese constitution—renunciation of war, as stipulated in Article 9—will be actualized as Japan, together with other states, actively participates in and contributes to peacekeeping operations on the one hand and security dialogues on the other, both of which are to be led by the supranational institution for peace and prosperity of East Asia and beyond. The more thoroughly these three mechanisms are implemented, the less U.S. bases in Okinawa/Japan, a symbol of the Cold War logic of containment and intimidation, will be necessary. As an increasing number of U.S. bases become inessential and are returned to Okinawa/Japan, the U.S. military presence will Okinawaken Sōmubu Chiji Kōshitu Kichi Taisakushitu, Okinawa no Beigunkichi Heisei 10nen 3gatsu [The U.S. Bases in Okinawa, March 1998] (Okinawa: Okinawaken Sōmubu Chiji Kōshitu Kichi Taisakushitu, 1998), 240-241.

24 Hajime Takano, Okinawani Kaiheitaiwa Iranai! [The Marine Corps Are Not Needed in Okinawa!]

(Tokyo: Ningenshuppan, 2012), 211-225.

25 Hardt and Negri, Multitude, 39.

26 Takano, Okinawani Kaiheitaiwa Iranai!, 226-262. Given a range of problems of the UN, including obliteration of the representational mechanisms through veto power in the Security Council, the description below uses the term “supranational institution” to designate one that exists as a possibility beneath the threshold of realization.

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Inoue | On the Okinawan Multitude

decline until no U.S. troops are permanently stationed in Okinawa/Japan. It follows that construction of the FRF is unnecessary. This is where Okinawa’s historically grounded general will for peace is materialized as a policy principle for shaping the future, in a manner not unlike the way Immanuel Kant conceptualized perpetual peace.27 When it came to power in 2009, the DPJ led by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama tried to implement foreign policies informed by SAWPS, including a controversial policy to construct the so-called “East Asia Community,” with an attempt to establish Japan’s diplomatic autonomy vis-à-vis the United States.28 The premature resignation of Hatoyama as prime minster in 2010 and the eventual breakdown of the DPJ administration in 2012 left SAWPS unrealized. Today’s rapidly transforming global security order, however, makes revisiting SAWPS worthwhile.

This transformation is exemplified, for instance, by the ways in which the United States has supplanted the position of the supranational institution as a coordinator of militaries around the world (e.g., “the coalition of the willing” created during the Iraq War). The U.S-Japan alliance is now part of a larger global security network to cope with amorphous threats and diversified contingencies not only in East Asia but also outside it. In the process, Washington and Tokyo have tried to implement and, in some instances, have successfully implemented projects, such as: (1) transferring nine thousand Marines (of approximately sixteen thousand in Okinawa, who constitute about 60 percent of U.S. forces there), to Guam (four thousand) and Hawaii (five thousand); (2) returning some of the U.S. military facilities in Okinawa located south of Kadena Air Base; and (3) expanding the U.S. Marine Corps’ Unit Deployment Program (established in 1977) to use Australia as a new site of rotational deployment.29 Notably, on the surface, these projects approximate Okinawa’s demand for reorganization-reduction of U.S. bases. Equally important, however, is the fact that these projects are anchored in an ongoing effort of the U.S. and Japanese governments to integrate the SDF thoroughly into U.S. military operations, perpetuating and reinforcing the Cold War security paradigm, now recycled to contain new “threats.” In light of the likelihood that the FRF will be used by not only the U.S. military but also eventually by the SDF,30 I suggest that the basic concerns of Washington and Tokyo remain how to redefine and reinforce functions of U.S. bases in Okinawa as a linchpin of the global Immanuel Kant, Project for a Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Essay Translated from the German (London: Printed by Stephen Couchman, for Vernor and Hood, 1796).

28 Yukio Hatoyama, “Watashi no Seijitetsugaku” [My Political Philosophy], Voice, 29 September 2009, 132-141.

29 Ministry of Defense, Zaioki Beikaiheitai no Guamu Iten no Keiigaiyō [History and Summary of Guam Transfer of the U.S. Marine Corps in Okinawa] (Tokyo: Ministry of Defense, 2016), http://www. mod.go.jp/j/approach/zaibeigun/saihen/iten_guam/pdf/gaiyo_160912.pdf (date accessed: 13 December 2016); Security Consultative Committee, U.S.-Japan Alliance: Transformation and Realignment for the Future (Tokyo: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2005), http://www.mofa.go.jp/region/n-america/us/ security/scc/doc0510.html (date accessed: 13 December 2016).

30 Takano, Okinawani Kaiheitaiwa Iranai!, 251.

27 “

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security order in the twenty-first century.31 I propose the idea of a security alliance without permanent stationing of U.S. forces in Okinawa/Japan as an alternative policy model to overcome the ossified Cold War security paradigm of containment. In so doing, however, I must depart from pacifism often advocated in Okinawa’s anti-base struggles. Instead, I postulate that the will of the Okinawan multitude is part of the general will of the global society seeking to construct peace and prosperity for all, with the capacity to use force if necessary. It is at this point of departure that I want to provide a tentative response to the question posed at the onset of this essay: does the current global security order, underpinned by the might of the U.S. military, represent the general will of the global society? The struggles against the FRF construction in Okinawa over the past twenty years, with an increasing number of Japanese participants, suggest a “no.” Broad opposition across “precarious Japan” in the summer of 2015 to security-related bills that allow the SDF to cooperate with the U.S. military in a wide range of situations in the name of “collective defense,” indicates a “no.”32 Continuing protests against the U.S. military and national or local governments that support their presence in Vieques (Puerto Rico), South Korea, the Philippines, Turkey, Diego Garcia, Guam, and Hawaii show additional “no’s.”33 Furthermore, my ongoing research with student veterans in Kentucky reveals still another “no.” Suffering from PTSD and other difficulties, these veterans often express unarticulated resentment at unfair situations in the United States in which they, being of the precariat and without jobs, joined the military under a system whose primary beneficiaries are exempt from service. These widespread “no’s” suggest that militarization is imposed on the politically vulnerable across the globe for the bureaucratic, diplomatic, and commercial interests of the privileged few, the so-called “establishment,” in the United States, Japan, and other places of the world.

Today, populism in Europe, the United States, and Asia (including Japan) profoundly shakes the foundations of the existing mechanisms of representation in its challenge to the “establishment” that benefits from globalization. But populism, with its xenophobic tendency, disavows transformative aspects of globalization, characterized by the possibility of grassroots collaboration and connection across regions, nations, and continents. The significance of ongoing protests in Okinawa lies precisely in this possibility.

I present the idea of a security alliance without permanent stationing of U.S. forces in Okinawa/Japan as a policy paradigm to materialize this possibility, a paradigm that Inauguration of Donald Trump as the new U.S. president does not seem to alter the basic framework in which bilateral security policies are formulated. See Inoue, Preface to Okinawa and the U.S. Military, paperback ed. for further discussion.

32 Anne Allison, Precarious Japan (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2013).

33 For instance, see Katherine T. McCaffrey, Military Power and Popular Protest: The U.S. Navy in Vieques, Puerto Rico (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2002); Andrew Yeo, “Anti-Base Movements in South Korea: Comparative Perspective on the Asia-Pacific,” The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus 8, no. 24 (14 June 2010), http://apjjf.org/-Andrew-Yeo/3373/article.html (date accessed: 13 January 2017); and Catherine Lutz, ed. The Bases of Empire: The Global Struggle against U.S. Military Posts (London: Pluto Press, 2009).

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Inoue | On the Okinawan Multitude

expresses â&#x20AC;&#x153;the unvarying will of all the membersâ&#x20AC;? of the global society to achieve peace and prosperity for all.

Masamichi Inoue is associate professor of Japan studies in the Department of Modern and Classical Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at the University of Kentucky. He has taught in the United States and Japan and has written extensively on the U.S. base problems in Okinawa. His publications include Okinawa and the U.S. Military: Identity Making in the Age of Globalization, with a New Preface (Columbia University Press, forthcoming in March 2017).

He received his Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Duke University.

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Controversies over Park Yu-ha's Book Another Twist in the Comfort Women Redress Movement Pyong Gap Min The most brutal crime committed by the Japanese military during the Pacific War (1932-1945) was the forced mobilization of a large number of Asian women (80,000200,000) to military brothels to sexually serve Japanese soldiers as “comfort women.”1 Koreans are believed to have been the largest group of comfort women victims, due mainly to the fact that the Japanese military was most effectively able to recruit women and girls from its own colonies.2 The majority of these women died of physical abuse, malnutrition, illness (including sexually transmitted diseases), bombings, or other tragic circumstances. Many others are presumed to have committed suicide or been killed

by Japanese soldiers. Most Korean survivors returned home after Japan was defeated in August 1945, while others remained trapped in sexual servitude.

Due to patriarchal norms stigmatizing sexual victims, Korean survivors kept silent about their brutal experiences in Japanese military brothels for almost half a century.

However, the active feminist movement in Korea helped them to come forward with their stories in the early 1990s. The Korean Council for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan (hereafter referred to as the Korean Council) has helped about 240 women to come forward with their stories since 1991. Moreover, in January 1992, Japanese historian Yoshimi Yoshiaki located documents in the Japanese Defense Agency’s archives that verified the Japanese military government’s planning, construction, and operation of “comfort stations.” Testimonies by the victims and the release of historical documents accelerated the activities of the redress movement. The movement has gained support in Japan, the United States, other Western countries, and in the The term “comfort women” is a euphemism typically used in Japanese and international discourses.

Many Korean scholars and the Korean Council put the term inside quotation marks because the term is not accepted as accurate or respectful to the victims. Throughout the rest of this article, typical American style is used, which excludes quotations marks, although I agree with Korean scholars that the term is a poor representation of the victims.

2 Yoshimi Yoshiaki, Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery in the Japanese Military, trans. Suzanne O’Brien (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 91-95.

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Min | The Comfort Women Redress Movement

United Nations.

Despite the global support for the redress movement, the Japanese government has not yet made a sincere apology, dealt compensation to victims, or taken other measures to resolve the comfort women issue satisfactorily. Thus, the redress movement for the comfort women victims that started in Korea in 1990 is ongoing. The twenty-seven-year movement has had many twists and turns; naturally, many people of Korean ancestry in Japan and the United States have been actively involved in the redress movement, partly due to “long-distance nationalism” and partly due to concerns for women’s human rights.3 Park Yu-ha’s 2013 Book Defaming Comfort Women In the midst of this progress, the comfort women’s redress movement has also experienced setbacks. In 2013, Park Yu-ha, a third-generation Korean-Japanese professor of Japanese literature at Sejong University, published a controversial critique of the Korean Council’s redress activities that defames many Korean surviving victims. Her book, entitled Chegug-ǔi Wianbu: Singminjijibae-wa Kiŏk-ǔi T'ujaeng (Comfort Women of the Empire: Colonialism and Struggles of Memory), was criticized in Korea yet received extremely positive reviews in Japan, adding another twist to the redress movement.4 The central theme of her book is that Korean comfort women and Japanese soldiers felt camaraderie and sympathy for each other because both groups were citizens of the Japanese Empire.5 She admits that Korean comfort women were victims of sexual abuse, but simultaneously claims that they were willingly working to enhance the morale of Japanese soldiers in order to help the Japanese empire. While allowing that Korean and other Asian women were “semi-involuntarily” sent to Japanese military brothels, she advanced the notion that Koreans were more responsible for the victimization of Korean comfort women by emphasizing the abuse of girls in poor Korean families and the participation of many Koreans as recruiters of comfort women.6 She further claimed that many Korean comfort women had romantic relationships with the Japanese soldiers they served.7 In addition, Park argued that anti-Japanese nationalism and the propaganda campaigns of the “left-leaning Korean Council” had become the main hurdle to resolving the comfort women issue between Japan and Korea.8 Park’s book has been severely criticized by advocacy organizations, scholars, and social Benedict R. Anderson, “Long-Distance Nationalism,” in The Spectre of Comparisons: Nationalism Southeast Asia, and the World (London: Verso), 58-74.

4 Park Yu-ha, Cheguk-ŭi Wianbu: Singminjijibae-wa Kiŏk-ŭi T'ujaeng [Comfort Women of the Empire: Colonialism and Struggles of Memory] (Seoul: Dosŏch’ulp’an Ppuri-wa Ip’ari, 2013).

5 Ibid., 60-61, 65, 75, 79, 137, and 205.

6 Ibid., 22-27, 40, 41, 52-53, and 112.

7 Ibid., 69-70, 72, and 77.

8 Ibid., 204-222.

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media users in Korea. On social media, she has been vilified as a “pro-Japanese traitor.” In addition to dozens of magazine and journal articles, two major books—one an edited volume featuring critical essays and the other a monograph—that criticized her various arguments were published in 2016.9 Moreover, in April 2014, the House of Sharing (a home for surviving comfort women victims in Korea), along with nine comfort women residents who lived there, submitted a civil suit against Park and the publisher and a criminal suit against Park for defaming the victims. The civil suit asked for a provisional injunction to force Park and the publisher to stop printing, publicizing, and selling the book. It also demanded compensation for each plaintiff for defamation. The Eastern Seoul Civil Court accepted the plaintiffs’ request for the provisional injunction in February 2015. In January 2016, the civil court rendered a judgment, asking Park to pay each of the nine survivors ten million won (about $9,000).10 Park rejected the verdict and appealed to the Supreme Court. Although most people in Korea expressed satisfaction with the courts’ decisions, nearly two hundred progressive politicians and intellectuals in Korea opposed the indictment of Park through a public announcement emphasizing freedom of expression. For the criminal suit, at the end of January 2016 the verdict from the judge was not guilty, indicating that the thirty paragraphs from Park’s book the plaintiffs claimed defamed them reflect the author’s personal opinions rather than factual information. The plaintiffs did not accept the verdict and announced that they would appeal to the Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, the attitude towards Park in Japan is very favorable. Fifty-four eminent Japanese politicians and intellectuals, including liberals, signed a public statement opposing Park’s indictment in Korea. In their view, Park’s book emphasized the diversity of Korean comfort women victims’ experiences, both in their mobilization to comfort stations and how they were treated there, yet her book did not exonerate the Japanese government from its responsibility. Japanese media presented Park as an innocent victim of Korean nationalism and harshly criticized the Korean attorney that indicted her. Park’s Japanese-language book became extremely popular in Japan, receiving widespread praise and several awards.

As Young Hwan Chung, the author of Reconciliation for Whom?, correctly pointed out in his critique of Park’s book, the unusually enthusiastic acceptance of the academically controversial book in Japan reflects the right-leaning nationalist movement of Japanese society over the last ten years or so, epitomized by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Japanese politicians and intellectuals seem to especially like Park’s claim that the“very The edited Korean-language book, Cheguk-ui Pyŏhoin Park Yuha-ege Mutda [We Ask the Empire’s Spokesperson, Park Yuha] includes nineteen critical essays by Korean literary critics, sociologists, historians, and legal scholars. Young Hwan Chung, a third-generation Japanese-Korean, wrote the monograph in Japanese. The Korean translation of the title is Nugu-rŭl Wihan “Hwahae”Inga?: Cheguk Wianbu-ŭi Banyŏksasŏng [Reconciliation for Whom?: Comfort Women of the Empire as Invented History], published by Blue History Publishing in Korea. In the book, Chung systematically criticized many of Park’s arguments and historical data.

10 Director Ahn of the Korean Council said that the attorney gave a three-year sentence at the end of 2016, and that the judge will render a sentence in January 2017.

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Min | The Comfort Women Redress Movement

nationalistic attitudes” of the redress movement leaders in Korea have become the major hurdle to the resolution of the comfort women issue between Japan and Korea.

They also welcome Park’s book because her claims that many Koreans engaged in the mobilization of Korean women support their image of the comfort women issue.11 The UN, the United States, and other Western institutions have pressured these nationalistic Japanese politicians to acknowledge the crimes of their predecessors and accept responsibility, but intellectuals like Park confirm their preferred views.

Critique of Park’s Book I have critical views of many of Park’s arguments, but in this piece I will critique just four of her major points. First, Park highlighted the Korean Council’s anti-Japanese “nationalistic and left-leaning propaganda” as a major hurdle to resolving the comfort women issue dividing Korea and Japan. I strongly disagree with both the claim about the nature of the Korean Council and the claim that it created a major stumbling block in the progress of resolving the issue. Staff members of the Korean Council have indeed used nationalistic narratives to lead the redress movement in Korea since the forced mobilization of so many young Korean girls to Japanese military brothels was inseparably linked to Japan’s colonization of Korea. However, to encourage Korean comfort women victims to come forward with their stories and join the redress movement, the Korean Council has also fought against Korean patriarchal norms that stigmatize sexual victims. The redress movement started in Korea, rather than in China or Japan, because the Korean women’s movement progressed earlier. Moreover, throughout the movement, the Korean Council greatly contributed to challenging norms by shifting the focus from stigmatizing victims to punishing perpetrators of sexual violence.

As already pointed out, it was the Japanese right-leaning nationalist movement and the emergence of historical revisionists in the late 1990s, rather than the “left-leaning” Korean Council, that has become the main hurdle to resolving the comfort women issue. In 1993, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Kono Yohei acknowledged the forced mobilization of comfort women and made a formal apology to the victims and the Korean government. As a result of the redress movement in Japan and abroad, the first references to the comfort women issue appeared in most Japanese middle-school history textbooks in 1997.12 These were positive responses to the undeniable facts, but today’s Japan is very different from the Japan of the early 1990s. However, since 2006, the Abe administration has consolidated the historical revisionist position of denying Japan’s responsibility for comfort women. Park’s book further empowers the position of Japanese nationalists who deny responsibility.

Park challenged the widely accepted view of the forced mobilization of Korean comfort women by emphasizing the active role of Koreans in the comfort women system.

Chung, Reconciliation for Whom?, 5.

Jordan Sand, “Introduction to Historians and Public Memory in Japan: The ‘Comfort Women’ Controversy,” History and Memory 2 (1999): 120.

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She argued that the subordinate position of women in Korea was as much responsible for their mobilization to military brothels as was the Japanese military. She indicated that Korean parents’ abuse and even sale of their daughters as well as the role of Koreans in recruiting women and managing comfort stations greatly contributed to the comfort women system. I can make two major points in response to these arguments.

First, the establishment of so many military brothels in such a short period of time was contingent upon the forced mobilization of large numbers of local women and Japanese colonial subjects. Moreover, testimonies of over 108 Korean comfort women victims taken by the Research Association for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan indicate that about one-third of them were mobilized to military brothels by coercive methods, while the other two-thirds were mobilized through false promises of meaningful jobs. The two types of recruitment are clearly forced, not voluntary. Park’s claim that only a few Korean victims were mobilized to Japanese military brothels by coercive techniques distorts these facts. Japanese nationalist historical revisionists do not recognize testimonies by comfort women as historical evidence; yet, dismissing eyewitnesses and participant accounts conflicts with the legal and academic investigations of historical events.

My response to Park’s argument about many Koreans’ participation in the recruitment of Korean comfort women and operation of military brothels is that we should focus on structural factors—rather than patriarchal customs—that led many Korean young women to leave their homes in pursuit of employment and many Korean adults to participate in the recruitment of Korean comfort women and the operation of comfort stations. The economic policy of the Japanese colonial government was to use Korea as a source of food and war materials for Japan, which resulted in extreme poverty in Korea.13 As a result, many poor Korean families tried to simultaneously reduce the number of dependents and increase family income by sending girls out of the home to work.

Poor Korean parents initially sent their daughters to other Korean families, restaurants, or drinking places for money, and subsequently some of the girls were mobilized to military brothels through coercion or deception. No Korean parents seem to have sold their daughters directly to Japanese military brothels. Two interrelated structural factors—Japan’s economic exploitation of Korea and Koreans’ extreme poverty—rather than Korean patriarchal traditions, affected Korean parents’ neglect and abuse of their daughters that ultimately exposed them to the Japanese military brothels.

Moreover, the Japanese Army seems to have preferred to use the Korea Army (the Japanese Army in Korea) or the ( Japanese) Government-General in Korea for the recruitment of comfort women and managers of comfort stations.14 The Korea Army located Japanese or Korean recruiters of Korean comfort women and managers of comfort stations with assistance from the Government-General in Korea. The Government-General may have arranged for the local Japanese police to support the Japanese and Korean Yun Myong-Suk, Chosonin Kunwianbu-wa Ilbongun Wiansochedo [Korean “Comfort Women” and Japanese Military “Comfort Women” System] (Seoul: Ihaksa, 2015), 303-365.

14 Yoshimi, Comfort Women: Sexual Slavery in the Japanese Military, 107-115.

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Min | The Comfort Women Redress Movement

procurers of comfort women in close coordination with the Japanese military police in rounding up comfort women. Testimonies by Korean victims often mentioned a Japanese or military police officer who supported Korean or Japanese recruiters. The Korea Army, at the request of the Japanese Army in China and in other Asian countries, also recruited Japanese or Korean managers of comfort stations. In fact, the diaries by a long-time anonymous Korean manager of a few comfort stations in China suggest that the Japanese Army systematically mobilized Koreans for the management of the stations, just as it mobilized the Korean work force for the war.15 The central theme of Park’s book is that Korean comfort women and the Japanese soldiers they served felt camaraderie with each other since both groups were citizens of Japan who undertook difficult services on behalf of the empire. The title of her book, Comfort Women of the Empire, reflects this theme well. She also pointed out that many Korean comfort women maintained affectionate relationships with the Japanese soldiers they served. Park’s claim that Korean comfort women felt comradeship with Japanese soldiers is similar to the claim made by some Japanese ultranationalists that colonization was helpful to Korea in its industrial development. Precisely because of their status as Japanese colonial subjects, more Korean women, especially girls, were selectively mobilized by force for Japanese military sexual slavery. It is highly unlikely that any Korean victim would have had positive feelings about forcibly providing sexual services.

A small number of Korean victims seem to have established affectionate relationships with Japanese soldiers. Of those women, most had loving relationships with officers because they were ordered to sexually serve the same officer individually for six months or so. However, they did so as a temporary survival mechanism because they were powerless within barbed-wire military brothels. Those few Korean women who established loving relationships with Japanese soldiers still endured beatings and other forms of brutal treatment by other soldiers and brothel staff members. Moreover, because of the stigma and medical problems related to their sexual slavery, they could not restore their normal family lives after returning to Korea.

Effect of Park’s Book on the Redress Movement Park’s misrepresentations and distortions of Korean victims’ experiences have helped the cause of Japanese nationalist revisionists who deny Japan’s responsibility for the comfort women issue. However, perhaps more significantly, the book has damaged the honor and dignity of the victims of Japanese military sexual slavery. I cannot say whether her research deserves criminal punishment or not. But I believe that it is morally wrong for her as a scholar to inflict harm with her book upon powerless victims.

No scholar should justify research activities that defame others, especially the powerless, in the name of freedom of expression.

Ilbongun Wianso Kwanliin- ŭi Ilgi [Diaries of Japanese Military Comfort Stations], ed. Byong-jik Ahn (Seoul: Isup, 2013).

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Park’s book, which puts much of the responsibility for the recruitment of comfort women and operation of comfort stations on Koreans and the responsibility for the stagnated resolution of the comfort women issue on the Korean Council, seems to have bolstered the position of the Japanese government and Japanese nationalists. The government’s position is well reflected in the resolutions between the Japanese and Korean governments from 28 December 2015. The resolutions included an ambiguous apology for the victims’ suffering without clearly indicating the source of the suffering. It also included a promise from the Japanese government to give one billion yen to the Korean government to compensate the forty-six surviving victims. However, Abe should have made a more specific apology and agreed to pay the compensation directly to the victims rather than through the Korean government. Moreover, the Korean government did not ask the Korean Council or the victims whether the resolutions were acceptable. The resolutions also did not include measures to educate Japanese citizens about this dark part of their history. Finally, the resolutions included a statement indicating that the resolutions are final and irreversible. The Japanese government has not only the legal but also the moral obligation to express a sincere apology for this grave crime against humanity.

For these reasons, Korean advocacy organizations and Korean survivors did not accept the resolutions.16 The Korean government established the Hwahae-Ch’iyu Chaedan (Reconciliation-Healing Foundation) with the money given by the Japanese government in July 2016. The Korean Council has rejected the compensation money and services from the Foundation. However, the Foundation persuaded—with much difficulty—thirty-one of forty-six surviving Korean victims to accept each 120 million won (about $100,000).17 It was difficult for the Korean victims to decide not to accept such a significant amount of the reparation money because many knew they would not live much longer, but were ultimately persuaded by their children.18 However, the fifteen victims who had actively participated in the redress movement rejected the money. The Korean National Assembly is likely to pass a bill to nullify the resolutions that the Park Geun-hye administration hastily agreed on without its permission.19

For additional explanation of the resolutions’ problems, see: The Research Association for the Women Drafted for Military Sexual Slavery by Japan, 2015 Wianbu Hapŭi Idaeronŭn Andenda [The 2015 Comfort Women Resolution Not Acceptable] (Seoul: Kyŏngin Munhawsa, 2016).

17 One Korean victim rejected the compensation money, but she found that the money was deposited in her bank account anyway because one of her younger relatives gave her bank account information to the official of the Foundation. This indicates how aggressively the Foundation moved to get the surviving victims to accept the compensation money.

18 I use the term of “a large amount of money” because the Korean victims have largely maintained poor and frugal lifestyles, so this amount of money is comparatively large given their living conditions. However, considering the life-long suffering caused by their experiences, the compensation money is not great.

19 The possibility that the National Assembly will nullify the resolutions is very high, especially because an opposition party leader is most likely to be elected president immediately following the possible confirmation of Park’s impeachment.

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Min | The Comfort Women Redress Movement

A final part of the comfort women agreement also invigorated the redress movement: the comfort women statues. Park had previously criticized the Korean Council for installing a Korean comfort girl statue in front of the Japanese Embassy in 2010, and Japanese officials unsuccessfully requested that the statue be relocated to another place in the resolution negotiations. In response, a young Korean group installed another Korean comfort girl statue in December 2016, this time in front of the Japanese Consulate General in Busan. Upset by the installation of the second comfort girl statue in front of the Japanese Consulate General, Abe recalled the Japanese consul general to Japan in early January 2017, and the Korean government did the same with their representative in Japan. Thus, the Japan-Korean relationship turned sour again. Neither the Korean government nor the Japanese government has thus far taken any initiative in mending the damaged relationship caused by the installation of the second comfort woman statue.

Park emphasized that she wrote her book to facilitate the reconciliation between Japan and Korea. On the contrary, her book has resulted in a deterioration of the relationship between the two countries. On the one hand, her book has ignited Koreans’ submerged nationalistic sentiment by blaming Koreans for the inability to resolve the comfort women issue and by defaming the victims; one must remember that the modern form of Korean nationalism was developed in the process of Korean resistance to Japanese colonization. On the other hand, her book has encouraged Japanese nationalists to continue their untenable position by providing them with the comfort women stories they want to hear. Thus, Park’s book and the passage of the unacceptable resolutions between the two governments have reinvigorated the redress movement for the victims of Japanese military sexual slavery.

Park claimed that the installment of the comfort girl monument not only irritated rightist Japanese citizens, but also made pro-Korean citizens turn against Korea. However, it was Korean citizens who had the comfort girl statues installed in front of Japanese diplomatic buildings to remind Japanese officials of the tragic events that occurred seventy years ago. The Japanese government wants to eliminate the physical reminders of Japanese military sexual slavery embodied by the statues, but the government cannot simply erase this history. Another comfort woman monument, the tenth in the United States, will be installed in San Francisco in the fall of 2017. The comfort women Justice Coalition consisting of the Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Jewish organizations selected the following inscription to be included in the monument: “Our worst fear is that our painful history during World War II will be forgotten.”

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Pyong Gap Min is Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Queens College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He also serves as Director of the Research Center for Korean Community at Queens College. The areas of his specializations are immigration, ethnicity, immigrant businesses, immigrantsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; religious practices, and family/gender, with a special focus on Korean and Asian Americans. He is the author of five books, the editor or a co-editor of 13 books, and the author or co-author of 115 articles and book chapters. In 2012, he received the Distinguished Career Award from the International Migration Section of the American Sociological Association. He is currently completing a book, tentatively titled The Redress Movement for the Victims of Japanese Military Slavery: Global Responses.

[66] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Ruoff | The Future of the Japanese Imperial House

The Abdication Issue and the Future of the Japanese Imperial House Ken Ruoff In October 2016, it was made public on national television that the emperor of Japan was actively considering abdication. The choice by the eighty-two-year-old tennō (emperor), to step down has created a succession crisis for the rule-bound imperial family, raising questions about the need to revise the Imperial House Law because it does not permit abdication. The Imperial House Law also outlines succession to the throne and, according to Articles 1 and 2, solely allows for male heirs.1 In spite of the emperor’s constitutional position as a symbolic rather than political figure, most everything related to the tennō nonetheless can have political overtones. I would suggest, however, that the abdication issue in isolation is about as close to a non-political issue as possible; it is more in the realm of common sense and basic human rights. At the emperor’s urging, the Diet will likely pass either a narrow revision of the Imperial House Law or a onetime legal provision for Emperor Akihito’s abdication. Subsequently, the Abe administration could continue to push for further reform of the emperor’s status, reestablishing him as Japan’s legal head of state. However, without strong public pressure, the Diet is unlikely to pursue further proactive revisions of imperial inheritance laws.

The Imperial House Law The fact that Emperor Akihito himself has had to provoke action on this front speaks more to decades of stagnation by lawmakers to address an obvious abdication defect in the Imperial House Law than to any desire by the present emperor to involve himself in the political process. There is something undeniably moving about an elderly emperor, with the empress by his side, resolutely carrying out his official duties on behalf of the nation. It is a poignant reminder that whatever privileges the imperial couple enjoys, the life of an emperor and empress is one of fulfilling the role of national symbol through the performance of seemingly endless public duties.

Due to the emperor’s increasing age, there are multiple scenarios whereby the tennō could still be alive but in no shape to perform any public duties, not to mention carry The Imperial Household Agency, The Imperial House Law, http://www.kunaicho.go.jp/e-kunaicho/ hourei-01.html (date accessed: 18 January 2017).

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out a demanding public schedule. Establishing a regency to address this problem seems to be a weak solution, especially if the situation drags on at length. Frankly, this succession defect in the Imperial House Law should have already been fixed. But democracies are no better—and sometimes worse—than other forms of governments at proactively fixing flawed laws before a remedy becomes necessary. The situation now appears to be urgent, at least if the wishes of Emperor Akihito are to be respected.

Strictly speaking, revising the Imperial House Law in this area should be a straightforward matter, and hopefully the law will be revised to provide for abdication. However, I doubt the matter will be that simple. We are told that a government committee is secretly studying the issue and that the next step will include the establishment of a panel of experts to examine options. However, the Diet will have to address the issue openly at some point if the law is to be revised. That is how democracies work. One can easily imagine additional scenarios playing out once revision of the Imperial House Law is open for discussion, including allowing for a female heir or reestablishing the emperor as the official head of state.

The Legacy of Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko Whatever comes of this abdication issue, the legacy of the present Emperor and of Empress Michiko is secure in several areas: The imperial couple has acted as a source of hope for the Japanese people and as a diplomatic liaison abroad. The emperor and empress have worked diligently to bring attention to the struggles, and to improve the lives of some of the most marginalized people in Japan, such as the tsunami victims in 2011. They have endeavored to bring closure to the postwar era. Finally, Empress Michiko has embraced a dynamic public role, including a solo trip abroad. Her efforts have arguably laid the groundwork for a woman to serve as the national symbol someday in the future.

Commentators argued that because the emperor has had to force the issue of revising the Imperial House Law, he has already overstepped his constitutional position as a symbol that exists outside of politics. There may be a tiny element of truth to this claim, although Emperor Akihito spoke extremely carefully in his address to the nation to avoid trespassing beyond his constitutional position. He framed his concerns around his own life and desires, stating, “While, being in the position of the emperor, I must refrain from making any specific comments on the existing imperial system, I would like to tell you what I, as an individual, have been thinking about.” Exhibiting the traits of a true “people’s emperor,” the emperor talked in very specific detail about his desire to minimize the inconvenience caused by his aging and eventual death to everyone around him.

“Japan Emperor Visits Port Devastated by Tsunami,” BBC News, 27 April 2011, http://www.bbc.com/ news/world-asia-pacific-13207107 (date accessed: 7 February 2017).

3 Emperor Akihito, “Message from His Majesty the Emperor,” 8 August 2016, http://www.kunaicho. go.jp/page/okotoba/detailEn/12 (date accessed: 7 February 2017).

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Ruoff | The Future of the Japanese Imperial House

The Future of the Imperial Family At present, the future of the imperial line is far more tenuous than is typically acknowledged in Japanese society, making an amendment to the Imperial House Law necessary in order to secure the sustainability of the imperial family. The current structure of the Japanese imperial family includes Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko, their sons Crown Prince Naruhito and Prince Akishino, Crown Prince Naruhito’s daughter Princess Aiko, and Prince Fumihito’s son Prince Hisahito.4 The fact that the imperial line will likely eventually pass from Crown Prince Naruhito to his nephew, Prince Hisahito, highlights the awkwardness of Naruhito having to tutor his brother’s son Hisahito in the art of becoming the tennō even though Naruhito has his own child, Princess Aiko.

Also of note is that Aiko will lose her imperial status if she marries. The awkwardness of this situation will become a daily reminder that women are not permitted to serve as the national symbol. This succession issue, more than the perceived flaws of Crown Prince Naruhito, lies behind the surprisingly blunt public criticism of the crown prince and suggestions that his younger brother, Prince Akishino, might make a more suitable emperor. Of course, the far right’s dislike of Crown Princess Masako and of Crown Prince Naruhito’s resolute support for her is no secret, and this also lies behind the “replace Naruhito with Akishino” rhetoric. But there are more pressing issues related to the fact that there is only one boy among the current generation of imperial children, and below is where I write with unrestrained frankness.

Down the road it will fall solely to Prince Hisahito to provide a male heir. What if Prince Hisahito should die in an accident, or by some disease, before he produces an heir? What if Prince Hisahito is not inclined to marry a woman? What if Prince Hisahito does marry a woman but they are not able to have children, or not a boy in any case? The situation is more precarious than most Japanese will discuss publicly due to societal constraints regarding commentary on the Imperial Family, but maybe open discussion of the reality would provoke action on the part of lawmakers. Besides, even if Prince Hisahito produces an heir, this again only postpones the day of reckoning when sooner or later there will not be a male heir. So why not fix the situation now?

One might assume that in the twenty-first century the simple argument that a society dedicated to gender equality should also allow for women to serve as the national symbol would be enough lead to a change in the Imperial House Law to allow for a female tennō. However, even putting aside lofty justifications along those lines, the fact is that Japan’s imperial system as presently structured is a ticking time bomb: sooner or later there will not be a requisite male heir. Intense far right opposition to any change in this area—an opposition that is shared by some in the ruling coalition—prevents a solution to the imminent succession crisis.

The Imperial Household Agency, which handles matters related to the imperial family, further details the imperial family’s structure and members on their website: http://www.kunaicho.go.jp/e-about/ genealogy/koseizu.html.

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Female Emperor While the political right in Japan generally objects to the possibility of a female tennō, some scholars find it outdated that the Imperial House Law does not stipulate that the first-born child, whether a boy or a girl, would be designated the heir. Other scholars think that at the very least there should be a provision to permit a female emperor if no eligible male heirs were available. This change seems necessary for the continuation of the imperial line considering that Japan lacks both of the mechanisms necessary to continue an all-male line over time, namely a concubine system and a large pool of collateral families eligible to provide an imperial heir. There is a next-to-zero chance that the concubine system will be reestablished, and increasing the number of collateral families eligible to provide an heir seems a tricky task indeed in a society enamored with equality, so sooner or later the imperial house will likely find itself without an heir unless the law is changed.

One of the leading initiatives of the Abe administration is to create “a society in which women can shine (subete no josei ga kagayaku shakai zukuri).” But does this broad policy extend to revising the Imperial House Law to allow women to serve as the national symbol, as female tennō? Furthermore, does this extend to allowing a woman to serve not just as a caretaker emperor, as Japan has had in the past, but as a female emperor whose children would continue the imperial line? This change would break the supposedly unbroken imperial bloodline (bansei ikkei) that nationalists glorify but scholars refute.5 If there are times to honor traditions, manipulated though they might be, there are also times to put to rest contrived traditions.

There is not enough space here for me to examine each and every pertinent issue related to the imperial house, but I want to stress that one must be very careful when analyzing the concept of popular support. I personally do not agree with Japan’s far right on issues ranging from how one should interpret national history to whether or not Japan should permit female emperors. Nonetheless, one must recognize that at times the far right does rally popular opinion behind its proposals. Thus, when the government takes action regarding these proposals, the situation is not one of the ruling coalition ramming policies down the throats of the people whether they like them or not. The above is sometimes the case in matters relating to the imperial house. Often when one examines the fine details of laws that were passed by the government in comparison to what the far right really wanted, one learns that the far right got less than it hoped for. Popular support for various proposals have overlapped with the far right but did not rubber-stamp them, something that the ruling coalition calibrated carefully before writing details into measures. But we shall simply have to wait and see how the many agents and constituencies that comprise Japanese society line up in this particular political contest, and also pay close attention to how public opinion evolves on this and other issues.

Kenneth James Ruoff, Imperial Japan at Its Zenith: The Wartime Celebration of the Empire’s 2,600th Anniversary (New York: Cornell University Press, 2010), 188.

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Ruoff | The Future of the Japanese Imperial House

Looking Forward Once the issue of reforming the Imperial House Law to provide for abdication is opened for discussion in the Diet, I suspect that additional topics broached will go beyond that of allowing a female tennō. Presumably there will be questions—although this is a constitutional issue rather than one related to the Imperial House Law—about the LDP’s puzzling proposal to revise the emperor’s constitutional position to that of the official head of state (genshu), a needlessly provocative move. Every foreign country interprets the tennō as Japan’s head of state—albeit as a symbolic head of state. So why is this change necessary, especially when one considers how much historical baggage “genshu,” the term employed in the Meiji Constitution to designate the sovereign and constitutionally all-powerful emperor, carries? It only leads to suspicion about exactly what the Abe administration has in mind in reference to the emperor’s position and to other areas of the constitution. However, as much as the very notion of constitutional revision is loathsome to some in Japan, it is also true that reasonable people can argue that the 1947 Constitution is in need of updating to better address the social and political conditions of the early twenty-first century.

Ken Ruoff is a professor in the modern history of East Asia and director of the Center for Japanese Studies at Portland State University. He is considered one of the foremost experts on Japan’s monarchy in the world. The Japanese translation of his The People’s Emperor: Democracy and the Japanese Monarchy, 1945-1995 (Harvard University Asia Center, 2003) was awarded Japan’s equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize, and remains in print on both sides of the Pacific. His more recent Imperial Japan at Its Zenith: The Wartime Celebration of the Empire’s 2600th Anniversary (Cornell University Press, 2010) has also appeared in Japanese translation.

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Chinese Nationalism and U.S.-China Relations An Interview with Jessica Chen Weiss

Fueled by education and state propaganda, nationalism plays a dual role as both a tool and a liability in Chinese foreign policy. In this interview, Dr. Jessica Chen Weiss, Associate Professor of Government at Cornell University, discusses the dynamic role of nationalism in Chinaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s foreign policy as well as its potential impact on U.S.-China relations during the first term of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Journal: As you point out in your book Powerful Patriots: Nationalist Protest in China's Foreign Relations, in the past China has selectively cracked down on nationalist protests depending on the circumstances, exhibiting a pendulum dynamic between repression and tolerance. Could you please explain to our readers when and under what circumstances these select protests are generally allowed to emerge?

Weiss: The Chinese government tends to allow protests when it wants to demonstrate to foreign observers that it is quite serious about standing firm on a particular issue, and often tries to use the voice of the public to convey its resolve. In contrast, when the government wants to maintain diplomatic flexibility or reassure foreign audiences that China might be willing to compromise, they are more likely to tamp down nationalist demonstrations that might put pressure on them to act tough.

Journal: Is there a point at which fanning nationalist sentiment online risks spillover into uncontrollable protests in the streets?

Weiss: This is more of a latent risk than one that the government has allowed to materialize. We have often seen the initial signs of protests beginning to get out of control, such as in the 2012 demonstrations against Japan over the dispute in the East China Sea. In one case, protesters gathered outside the Communist Party headquarters in the [72] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Weiss | Chinese Nationalism and U.S.-China Relations

southern city of Shenzhen. Rather than getting angry at Japan, they turned their anger against the Chinese government. In other cases, initially peaceful protests or marches became violent, overturning private cars (primarily Japanese brands such as Honda and Toyota) and damaging businesses that appeared to be Japanese even if they were Chinese-owned and run. These kinds of escalating protests have never gotten totally out of control. The government, in most cases, was successful in putting the genie back in the bottle, often with somewhat costly measures that came with accusations by the people that the government was being hypocritical by suppressing patriotic protests and not acting tough enough on Japan. I think the real danger is that these protests could provide an opportunity for a larger challenge to the Communist Party to emerge, one that Chinese leaders feel they might not be able to rein in.

Journal: Do you predict that this dynamic will continue as China becomes increasingly assertive in territorial disputes, particularly in the South China Sea? Weiss: It is very difficult to predict the future, especially as the Chinese leadershipâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s objectives evolve. We have not yet seen any nationalist protests under the leadership of Xi Jinping, and that may reflect worries about what happened the last time protests were allowed against Japan. It could also reflect changing views of the appropriate role that public opinion plays in Chinese foreign policy. I should note that during crises with Vietnam and the Philippines over disputes in the South China Sea, the Chinese government went to some length to prevent demonstrations from breaking out. Recently, Party officials have stressed the importance of anticipating and controlling any further demonstrations as the South China Sea disputes may heat up.

Journal: China has been notably measured in response to Trumpâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s consistent lambasting via Twitter, including his reference to military installations in the South China Sea. Does such bluster on the part of Trump have the potential to spur the Chinese government to whip up nationalist sentiment, or will the Chinese government take a wait-and-see approach until words are met with action?

Weiss: By and large, the Chinese government has taken a wait-and-see approach toward new leaders who have been somewhat inconsistent in their previous statements, as Beijing tries to determine what direction the new administration will take with its China policy. If Trump continues to say very radical things about the way he might challenge the status quo, including the extension of more diplomatic recognition to Taiwan, I do not think that the Chinese government will have to whip up nationalism.

That kind of response will take place organically. Chinese netizens increasingly do not need and are not waiting for the governmentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s encouragement. Many of them are on Twitter, jumping the Great Firewall to find out what is going on. So the question is how the Chinese government will respond.

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Weiss: So far Chinese state media has downplayed the remarks by Trump and some of his appointees as they wait to see what follows his inauguration. But the Chinese government may lose patience quite quickly if the signs of looming confrontation over issues that are core to China’s interests keep piling up. I think we can expect a harsh response if Trump seeks to test China's resolve on some of these issues that are very important to Chinese nationalists, such as sovereignty over Taiwan and the South China Sea. Actions tend to matter more than words, but with a lot of these issues, words matter in signaling potential changes in U.S. policy. It is not like domestic policy, which is often made through laws and executive orders. A lot of foreign policy does depend on what the president says the United States will do. So words can take on real significance.

Journal: How important will the role of nationalism be in Chinese foreign policy visà-vis the new U.S. administration? Given indications that Trump’s administration may exhibit a break from longstanding U.S. policy on Taiwan, will nationalism in China play a role in fueling tensions between the two nations on this issue?

Weiss: I do not think that nationalism will be driving Chinese foreign policy. I think that the Chinese leadership is likely to keep its strategic priorities in mind as they determine how to deal with the new administration. But nationalism does make it really difficult for the Chinese government to compromise on certain issues, including Taiwan and the principle of “One China.” So I do not think that it will necessarily play an independent role in fueling tensions. Given this delicate time in China's own political transition, however, the Chinese government is unlikely to show any signs of weakness on these critical issues.

Journal: Do you have any opinion on Trump's recent statements that the One-China policy is up for negotiation? Could he approach such a negotiation in a reasonable way, or would any attempt to renegotiate the One-China policy necessarily lead to a deterioration in U.S.-China relations?

Weiss: What is radical here is the idea that the United States would link “One China” to progress on other issues like trade and currency. How we uphold the One-China policy has always varied slightly, and there have been shifts around the margins. But when a president-elect or soon-to-be president states that the whole policy is up for negotiation, that indicates that there is a real potential for dramatically altering the status quo in ways that increase uncertainty about the future of the relationship. That agreement was the basis of U.S.-China diplomatic normalization back in the seventies.

So if everything is up in the air, things could go downhill very quickly.

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Weiss | Chinese Nationalism and U.S.-China Relations

Jessica Chen Weiss is Associate Professor of Government at Cornell University. She is the author of Powerful Patriots: Nationalist Protest in Chinaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Foreign Relations (Oxford University Press, 2014). The dissertation on which the book is based won the 2009 American Political Science Association Award for best dissertation in international relations, law, and politics.

Her work appears in International Organization, China Quarterly, the Journal of Conflict Resolution, and Security Studies. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego in 2008. Before joining the Cornell faculty, she was an assistant professor at Yale University. Dr. Weiss is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

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CALL FOR PAPERS The Journal welcomes original social science research papers written on issues relevant to politics, security, economy, culture, and society of contemporary Asia, including Pakistan and Afghanistan. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Contemporaryâ&#x20AC;? is understood broadly as recent, but not necessarily as current. We are pleased to consider articles with historical background sections so long as such analyses are crucial for advancing core arguments.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES Submissions should be emailed to guasiajournal@gmail.com as MS Word documents. Please do not submit in PDF format. Authors should include a short bio in the email text, but must avoid any self-identification in the manuscript as we send our articles out for anonymous review.

Document: Manuscripts must be typewritten and double-spaced in Microsoft Word, with 1-inch/2.5-centimeter margins on all sides.

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Citations: All citations must be formatted as footnotes. Please also include a full bibliography at the end.

Abstract: Authors must include an abstract (100-200 words) that effectively and concisely summarizes his/her study. *Submissions must not be plagiarized, copyrighted, or under review elsewhere.

Yang | China's Public Security Intelligence

research China’s Public Security Intelligence Progress, Challenges, and Prospects Zi Yang

The goal of this paper is to explain why China’s public security intelligence apparatus continues to suffer from intelligence errors and failures despite the institution of major reform measures in the past two decades. As one component of China’s domestic intelligence body, public security intelligence plays an indispensable role in fighting crime and terminating subversive activities. However, high-profile setbacks in recent years have raised questions about the real capability of public security intelligence. Although two rounds of comprehensive police reforms have been completed, additional reforms await leaders of public security intelligence. This paper argues that further institutional and ideological changes are necessary to maximize public security intelligence potential.

All was quiet in Chongqing during the wee hours of 14 August 2012. The mountain city’s residents were sound asleep after another long, bustling day. Little did they know, Zhou Kehua, China’s most wanted killer, was back in town. For eight years, Zhou, nicknamed “head-buster” for his precise aim, went on a cross-country rampage of robbery and murder that resulted in the death of ten people and the injury of five.1 The police however, had a hard time tracking down the elusive silhouette that lurked among China’s thick concrete jungles.

At six a.m., two police officers patrolling around the postal savings bank of Qinjiagang Town received a phone call alerting them to the possible presence of Zhou in the immediate proximity. Forty-five minutes later, a suspicious man with dark sunglasses “周克华首先掏枪射击警察 ‘爆头哥’被近距离击毙” [Zhou Kehua Shot First at the Police, ‘Head-Buster’ Shot and Killed in Close Quarters], Xinhua News, 14 August 2012, http://news.xinhuanet.com/legal/2012-08/14/c_123581834.htm (date accessed: 20 February 2017).

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slipped past the patrol partners. Noticing the odd figure, the officers tried to pursue him but were met with surprise when the man pulled out a handgun and fired toward their direction. The officers returned fire, sending the man crumbling to the ground— dead.2 Upon close examination, the pair realized they hit the jackpot. China’s most wanted, Zhou Kehua, the pistol-toting outlaw who embarrassed the police for eight straight years, was no more. It was a celebratory moment, not only for the Chongqing Public Security Bureau, but also for the entire country.

Years later, when reflecting on this case, a frequently asked question remains—why did it take so long for the police to track down Zhou? In 2014, an article in the Journal of Beijing Police College found a direct link between intelligence errors committed by agents of the Chinese Public Security Intelligence (gong’an qingbao; PSI) with the police’s inability to apprehend Zhou.3 Yet Zhou’s case is not an exception. In recent years, a chain of failures to forewarn of terrorist attacks,4 prevent ethnic killings,5 and detect high-profile criminals6 demonstrated the intelligence hurdles facing the Chinese police. PSI agents—who assist the Public Security Police in their public and state security duties through domestic intelligence work—are partially responsible for this trend.

Although intelligence error/failure is far from a Chinese phenomenon, it is worth asking: why, despite reform initiatives in the past decades, is the PSI still encountering obstacles that lead to intelligence error/failure and sap its overall efficiency? This paper, besides serving as an introduction to the PSI, contends that an ill-designed incentive structure, limited analytical capabilities, inefficient quality control, and unchanging ways of policing based on obsolete ideas are the main hindrances to improving the

Xiaohua Huang and Zhijian Yu, “由‘8·14’击毙周克华案探析现代警用手枪技战特征及训练的发 展趋势” [Investigating the Future Development of Modern Police Pistol Tactics and Training from the August 14 Shooting of Zhou Kehua], 公安教育 [Police Education], no. 11 (November 2012): 40–41.

3 Xiruo Liu, “公安情报工作的失误与对策研究—基于周克华案件的反思” [The Study of Mistakes and Countermeasure in Public Security Intelligence Work in the Case of Zhou Ke-Hua], 北京警察学 院学报 [Journal of Beijing Police College], no. 6 (November 2014): 67–68.

4 The Chinese police failed to forewarn a spate of terrorist attacks in 2013 and 2014, with one car attack, orchestrated by the East Turkestan Islamic Movement striking Tiananmen Square, the most celebrated symbol of Chinese state power.

5 You Ji, “China’s National Security Commission: Theory, Evolution and Operations,” Journal of Contemporary China 25, no. 98 (3 March 2016): 189–190; Harold M. Tanner, “The People’s Liberation Army and China’s Internal Security Challenges,” The PLA at Home and Abroad: Assessing the Operational Capabilities of China’s Military, ed. Roy Kamphausen et al. (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2010), 265.

6 Police intelligence personnel have allowed numerous high-profile murderers to slip under the radar in the past several decades, the latest example being Gao Chengyong. Accused of raping and killing eleven female victims, Gao avoided police detection for more than thirty years until his arrest in August 2016. See: Jing Li, “End to Grisly Three-Decade Mystery? Chinese Police Arrest Suspected Serial Killer Accused of Murder and Rape of 11 Women and Girls,” South China Morning Post, 28 August 2016. For a list of Chinese serial killers that dodged police detection for extended periods of time, see: Eva Li, “China’s Worst Serial Killers: A Litany of Evil through History,” South China Morning Post, 30 August 2016.

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PSI. In addition, institutional and ideological changes are needed for the PSI to reach its greatest potential.

Literature Review and Methodology The value of this research lies in its distinctive contribution to the field of China studies. The development of China’s intelligence agencies is an area of research that remains largely untouched; the pool of existing English literature on Chinese intelligence is very limited, and the focus is almost entirely on China’s foreign intelligence or intelligence history. To date, there is no English-language academic writing dedicated specifically to the current state of China’s domestic intelligence apparatus, let alone the PSI specifically. My intention is to fill this void.

Nicholas Eftimiades’s 1994 classic Chinese Intelligence Operations is a prime example of the abovementioned tendency.7 The book dedicates most of its attention to China’s Ministry of State Security and military intelligence with solely one chapter on domestic surveillance. Despite revealing important facts about Chinese domestic security institutions, recent works on China’s security state have not treated the present state of Chinese domestic intelligence with the attention it deserves. Michael Schoenhals’s Spying for the People studies the secret agents and informants of the Mao Zedong era from 1949 to 1967.8 The analysis of China’s intelligence body in China’s Security State is detailed in its historical account but ends at the beginning of the Deng Xiaoping era in the 1980s.9 Likewise, Michael Dutton’s Policing Chinese Politics advances important theories regarding the Chinese police but concludes with its analysis of the Chinese police in the 1990s.10 Information in the above readings about the PSI is scant. Although there have been more recent publications on the Chinese police, notably by Kam Wong, the quality of his Chinese Policing11 and Police Reform in China12 are barely up to academic methodological standards and say very little about police intelligence.

Since there is a lack of English-language sources on Chinese domestic intelligence, this paper rests its foundation upon secondary sources of mostly Chinese journal articles and monographs. The secretive nature of Chinese intelligence organizations poses a great challenge to researchers. Thus, the heavy use of journal articles is my way of offsetting this disadvantage. Chinese police and intelligence journals constitute a valuable pool of information because their intended consumers are professionals within the domestic security industry. However, due to the need to preserve state secrecy, very few Nicholas Eftimiades, Chinese Intelligence Operations (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1994).

Michael Schoenhals, Spying for the People: Mao’s Secret Agents, 1949-1967 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013).

9 Xuezhi Guo, China’s Security State: Philosophy, Evolution, and Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012).

10 Michael Robert Dutton, Policing Chinese Politics: A History (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005).

11 Kam C. Wong, Chinese Policing: History and Reform (New York: Peter Lang, 2009).

12 Kam C. Wong, Police Reform in China (Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2011).

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statistics regarding the PSI have been made publically available. Although Chinese journal articles and monographs provide useful insights into the inner workings of the PSI, the inadequacy of statistics places a limit on the quantitative richness of this research, which I consider to be an unfortunate flaw.

I employ knowledge gained from reviewing theoretical works by American and European police, intelligence, and security professionals in distilling the best information from Chinese research papers.13 Since this paper will focus on the current state of the PSI, articles reviewed in this research are mostly published within the last five to six years. In addition, I have obtained access to a number of Chinese monographs on policing and intelligence that are marked “neibu faxing” (internal distribution only). These are excellent sources of information intended for an audience in sensitive government ministries.

The bulk of my paper is based on secondary sources. Online sources include legal and news sources. In reviewing online legal documents pertaining to China, the first item I search for is the website’s affiliation with the state. In this case, state affiliation gives a stamp of approval to the content, especially if translation is involved. Nonetheless, when quoting from official online law sources, I always verify the translated version with the original document to minimize inaccuracy. I prefer independent news outlets whenever possible given the degree of critical thinking involved and because government’s political agenda usually taints official media reporting.

When analyzing the content of Chinese journal articles, I look at the following four points specifically: 1) The nature of the journal. Is it professionally-oriented for police, security, and intelligence professionals? 2) The background of authors. Is he or she an industry insider or academic? What is the author’s institutional affiliation? 3) Is he or she well-published on the subject? 4) The author’s methodology and cited sources. I used a number of textbooks, written for Chinese law enforcement professionals, to substantiate claims in this paper. In addition to the author’s personal profile and institutional affiliation, I take note of the publisher of each book. In China, many I consulted the following works on criminal and domestic intelligence by American and European authors: Abram N. Shulsky, Silent Warfare: Understanding the World of Intelligence (Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books, 2002); John Buckley, Managing Intelligence: A Guide for Law Enforcement Professionals (Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2013); Peter Gill, Stephen Marrin, and Mark Phythian, Intelligence Theory: Key Questions and Debates (Studies in Intelligence) (New York: Routledge, 2008); Peter Gill, Policing Politics: Security Intelligence and the Liberal Democratic State (Studies in Intelligence) (New York: Frank Cass, 1994); Jennifer E. Sims and Burton L. Gerber, eds., Transforming U.S. Intelligence (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2005); Jonathan Randall White, Defending the Homeland: Domestic Intelligence, Law Enforcement, and Security (Contemporary Issues in Crime and Justice Series) (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Cengage Learning, 2003); David L. Carter, Law Enforcement Intelligence: A Guide for State, Local, and Tribal Law Enforcement Agencies (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, 2012); Jerry Ratcliffe, Intelligence-Led Policing (Cullompton, Devon: Willan, 2008); Darren E. Tromblay, The U.S. Domestic Intelligence Enterprise: History, Development, and Operations (Boca Raton: Taylor & Francis, 2016); Loch K. Johnson, National Security Intelligence: Secret Operations in Defense of the Democracies (Cambridge; Malden, MA: Polity, 2012).

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government and party organs have their own publishing house. For example, the Masses Publishing House (qunzhong chubanshe), a subsidiary of the Ministry of Public Security, published most of the textbooks cited, including two that are marked for “internal distribution only.” Accordingly, Masses Publishing House’s publications allow us to better understand the Chinese police state’s inner workings. In addition, books marked for “internal distribution only” provide greater insight into the more sensitive areas of Chinese policing with information that cannot be found on publicly available platforms—for example, detailed diagrams on security projects.

Defining the PSI in Context The PSI is one branch of China’s domestic intelligence apparatus along with the intelligence wings of the Domestic Security Guard (guonei anquan baowei) that deals with subversive elements without foreign connections, while the State Security Police (guojia anquan jingcha) handles subversive elements with foreign connections.14 State Security Police is an umbrella term for intelligence organs under the Ministry of State Security (guoan bu).15 Both PSI and the Domestic Security Guard are part of the Ministry of Public Security’s (gong’an bu) hierarchy. The State Council (guowu yuan) is responsible for both ministries on paper. Yet, characteristic of Chinese politics, state control serves as a front to mask the party’s role as the puppet master. In this case, the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission (zhonggong zhongyang zhengfa weiyuanhui) is the true body governing the public and state security systems.16 The newly formed Central National Security Commission (zhonggong zhongyang guojia anquan weiyuanhui), chaired by the Chinese Communist Party’s General Secretary Xi Jinping, has a role in coordinating the two ministries.17 Unlike the Domestic Security Guard that is an independent bureau within the Ministry of Public Security18 trained Hongyun Wan and Yongqing Li, eds., 警察法学 [Police Law Studies] (Beijing: 法律出版社, 2015), 41.

15 Ibid., 41.

16 Chang Wang and Nathan Madson, Inside China’s Legal System (Philadelphia, PA: Chandos Publishing, 2013), 71–72; Jinyan Zhong, “中共政法委制度的历史考察” [A Historical Investigation of the CPC’s Political and Law Committee System], 中共党史研究 [CPC History Studies], no. 4 (April 2014): 116.

17 The Central National Security Commission, established in November 2013, is a powerful party organ chaired by Xi Jinping that oversees work in “foreign affairs, national defense, intelligence, Taiwan affairs, public and state security, Internet and information control, anti-terrorism, non-traditional security affairs (disaster relief and rescue), and economic/human security matters (energy, resources, environment and public health).” Regarding the internal security sphere, the Commission, under Xi’s direct control, curbs the power of the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission, which had grown substantially during Zhou Yongkang’s tenure (2007–2012), for example by counterbalancing its control over the police and domestic intelligence. See: Ji, “China’s National Security Commission: Theory, Evolution and Operations,” 194.

18 The Domestic Security Guard Bureau (guonei anquan baowei ju) is ranked first (diyi ju) among the Ministry of Public Security’s twenty-seven bureaus, which signifies its importance. See: Chi-hou Chang, “中共公安部的序列號職能局” [The Study of Mainland China’s MPS Organization], 展望與 探索 [Prospect & Exploration] 9, no. 3 (March 2011): 111.

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specifically to suppress internal dissent,19 PSI agents have a greater role as members of the Public Security Police (gong’an jingcha; hereafter “police” for simplicity)—the most common type of order and political police in China.

In order to clearly define the duties of the PSI agents, one must first examine the official expectations of the police. The Public Security Police constitutes the bulk of China’s national police force.20 A top-down organization with presence in all administrative divisions, the police have three official roles: as an instrument for consolidating the People’s Democratic Dictatorship (a concept to be discussed later in this section), an administrative institution, and a criminal justice institution.21 The police’s power is rooted in Article Twenty-Eight of the Chinese Constitution: “The State maintains public order and suppresses treasonable and other criminal activities that endanger State security; it penalizes criminal activities that endanger public security and disrupt the socialist economy as well as other criminal activities; and it punishes and reforms criminals.”22 The Chinese police, in addition to its primary crime control duties, have a secondary but significant political mission in safeguarding state security (weihu guojia anquan).

The Chinese define public security (gonggong anquan) as the task to “maintain public order, protect citizens’ personal safety and freedom and their legal property, protect public property, and prevent, stop, and punish illegal and criminal activities.”23 State security (guojia anquan), however, can be more straightforward (i.e. protecting the Chinese state against subversives). In fact, it can be argued that state security is prioritized over public security. Article Two of the “People’s Police Law” clearly assigns the safeguarding of state security as the foremost duty of the police.24 Consequently, the Public Security Police does not fall strictly into either the order or political police category.

Rather, it is a state repressive apparatus of a dual nature; it simultaneously fights common and political crimes.25 Who is considered a criminal endangering public safety? What is considered a subversive act that threatens state security? The answer to the first question may be found in

Qun Zheng and Chuncheng Wang, eds., 国内安全保卫 [Domestic Security Guard] (Beijing: 群众 出版社, 2009), 12–15.

20 China has six types of police forces: 1) public security police, 2) state security police, 3) prison administration police, 4) forced isolation drug treatment police, 5) judicial police, and 6) the People’s Armed Police.

21 Wan and Li, 警察法学 [Police Law Studies], 35–36.

22 “Constitution of the People’s Republic of China,” http://www.npc.gov.cn/englishnpc/Constitution/ node_2825.htm (date accessed: 9 May 2016).

23 “People’s Police Law of the People’s Republic of China,” http://www.npc.gov.cn/englishnpc/ Law/2007-12/12/content_1383708.htm (date accessed: 9 May 2016).

24 Ibid.

25 The Chinese Public Security Police is comparable to the Militsiya, the regular Soviet police that also combatted political crime. See: Louise I. Shelley, Policing Soviet Society: The Evolution of State Control (New York: Routledge, 1996), 25–30.

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China’s criminal law books. But one will frequently encounter nebulous legal generalizations when trying to answer the second question; understanding it requires a broader review of a series of legal documents.

Figure 1. China's Domestic Intelligence Apparatus

Source: by author. * The hammer and sickle sign indicates party organizations. ** Solid lines show the State Council’s de jure control. *** Dotted lines show the party's de facto control. **** Broken lines denote the Central National Security Commission's coordinating role.

The textbook definition of a subversive act is the crime of “inciting subversion of state power” (shandong dianfu guojia zhengquan zui). Defined openly as “anyone who uses rumor, slander or other means to encourage subversion of the political power of the State or to overthrow the socialist system,”26 the basis for this code is established in the founding documents of the People’s Republic.

Article One of the Constitution states that “the People’s Republic of China is a socialist state under the people’s democratic dictatorship led by the working class and based on the alliance of workers and peasants. The socialist system is the basic system of the People’s Republic of China. Disruption of the socialist system by any organization or Wei Luo, ed., The 1997 Criminal Code of the People’s Republic of China (Buffalo, N.Y.: W.S. Hein & Co, 1998), 73.

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individual is prohibited [emphasis added].”27 Although acts considered “disruptive” are not clearly defined, the ambiguity allows the state to have the final say in what exactly constitutes a disorderly act. Recent crackdowns on human rights lawyers and activists28 show a citizen can be deemed an enemy of the state even if he or she is exercising rights guaranteed by the Constitution.29 While the state security apparatuses in liberal Western democracies remain wary of violating constitutional rights,30 the Chinese Constitution gives the state an essential carte blanche in clamping down on whatever acts it considers “disruptive.”

In addition to the socialist system, the other half of the Chinese political system is the People’s Democratic Dictatorship (renmin minzhu zhuanzheng). Mao Zedong, in a 1949 essay, defined the People’s Democratic Dictatorship as a “democracy for the people and dictatorship over the reactionaries.”31 In a People’s Democratic Dictatorship, “the state apparatus, including the army, the police and the courts, is the instrument by which one class oppresses another. It is an instrument for the oppression of antagonistic classes.”32 Magnanimity is an afterthought since the state does “not apply a policy of benevolence to the reactionaries and towards the reactionary activities of the reactionary classes.”33 State violence against individuals or groups is necessary and will be applied accordingly. The People’s Democratic Dictatorship forbids the “reactionaries” to “speak or act in an unruly way,” and they “will be promptly stopped and punished” if they dare to behave otherwise.34 The Chinese Communist Party has the final say in defining friends and enemies of the state. The composition of “the people,” similar to that of “antagonistic classes,” is subjected to the state’s shifting political needs.35 Only one matter is constant: the state’s willingness to employ violence against any individual or group behavior that it might perceive as a threat.

Article Fifteen of the “National Security Law” (guojia anquan fa), passed in 2015, “Constitution of the People’s Republic of China.”

“China: Latest Information on Crackdown against Lawyers and Activists,” Amnesty International, 6 January 2017, https://www.amnesty.org/en/press-releases/2015/08/china-list-of-lawyers-and-activists-targeted/ (date accessed: 20 February 2017).

29 Michael Forsythe, “China Is Said to Arrest 4 Human Rights Advocates,” New York Times, 12 January 2016.

30 Darren E. Tromblay, The U.S. Domestic Intelligence Enterprise: History, Development, and Operations (Boca Raton: Taylor & Francis, 2016), 36-37.

31 Mao Zedong, Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1961), 4: 418.

32 Ibid., 418.

33 Ibid., 418.

34 Ibid., 418.

35 The current composition of “the people” includes “all socialist workers, builders of socialism, patriots that support socialism and who support the reunification of the motherland.” The “antagonistic classes” encompass “a small number of hostile forces and elements at home and abroad belligerent to and seeks to undermine our socialist system.” See: Shengguo Zhang and Xiaoli Qi, eds., 宪法学 [Constitutional Studies] (Beijing: 中国人民公安大学出版社, 2009), 74.

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contains the most recent criteria on the state’s definition of a hostile act: The State guards against, stops, and lawfully punishes acts of treason, division of the nation, incitement of rebellion, subversion or instigation of subversion of the people’s democratic dictatorship regime; guards against, stops, and lawfully punishes the theft or leaking of state secrets and other conduct endangering national security; and guards against, stops, and lawfully punishes acts of infiltration, destruction, subversion or separatism by foreign influences.36 The Chinese police, built to protect the country’s ruling class headed by the Chinese Communist Party, are the main tool in preventing disorder and delivering punishments.37 Simply put, the PSI is a branch of China’s domestic intelligence body that assists the police in fulfilling its public and state security duties. The PSI agents are members of the Public Security Police. Present at public security bureaus of all administrative divisions, teams of the PSI agents are comparable to intelligence units at U.S. police departments. PSI agents operate according to a philosophy modeled on crime intelligence theories, their main task being the gathering of information through overt and clandestine channels. PSI analysts screen, analyze, and process raw data to produce intelligence that may assist the police in solving criminal cases, terminating subversive activities, and maintaining the upper hand in general police work.

The PSI in Action The Chinese state has kept a sizable domestic intelligence apparatus since 1949.38 However, the PSI was created only recently. Official discussions on the PSI started in the late 1990s and early 2000s. In 2005, the Ministry of Education designated PSI as a field of study, available for police cadets at a few selected universities.39 Currently, 1.4 percent (28,000)40 of China’s two million police personnel41 engage in PSI-related work. The PSI is a product of China’s plan to modernize its police force. Although the institutional structure of the Chinese police remains top-down and based on the

“National Security Law,” China Law Translate, 1 July 2015, http://chinalawtranslate.com/2015nsl (date accessed: 21 February 2017).

37 Wan and Li, 警察法学 [Police Law Studies], 35.

38 Schoenhals, Spying for the People, 18.

39 Dehui Ma, “中国公安情报学的兴起和发展” [The Rise and Development of Public Security Intelligence Studies in China], 情报杂志 [Journal of Intelligence], no. 11 (November 2015): 10-11.

40 This is a surprisingly low estimate of the total number of PSI agents, although this is the only publically available statistic. See: Xuemei Lü, “公安综合情报部门的发展困境与战略转向” [The Difficult Position and Strategic Transformation of Integrated Police Intelligence Department], 情报杂志 [Journal of Intelligence], no. 6 (June 2015): 16.

41 Wang and Madson, Inside China’s Legal System, 95.

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traditional model of “combining the vertical and horizontal” (tiaokuai jiehe),42 China has demonstrated commitment in reforming its police according to Western ideas.

One of the most important changes in the making is the adaptation of intelligence-led policing (ILP), one of five models of policing.43 Jerry Ratcliffe identifies six key characteristics of ILP as: [A] management philosophy/business model [that] aims to achieve crime reduction and prevention and to disrupt offender activity; employs a top-down management approach; combines crime analysis and criminal intelligence into crime intelligence; uses crime intelligence to objectively direct police resource decisions; [and] focuses enforcement activities on prolific and serious offenders.44 In essence, ILP is top-down, proactive and precise—three features that appeal to Chinese leaders. The traditional Chinese policing model is reactive. By adopting ILP, a model that compliments the top-down national police structure, China aims to make its police more efficient and professional.

The core of ILP is crime intelligence. In China, the definition is expanded to anticipate, monitor and prevent not only common crime but also subversive activities. The PSI’s intelligence cycle45 is similar to that of its Western counterparts.46 The demand for intelligence comes from the superior of each intelligence echelon after planning sessions that assess current intelligence needs and feedback on previous intelligence products.

Information is then gathered, evaluated, compiled, and analyzed before distribution to appropriate agencies.47 There are two main methods of PSI information gathering—overt and clandestine—that employ a combination of open-source (OSINT) and human (HUMINT) gathering.48 Tiaokuai jiehe is a leadership system where the police “would be led by local governments and local Party committees at the same administrative level as the police units concerned (this was called horizontal leadership, or kuai). For professional leadership, however, they would look to higher-level public security organs (vertical leadership, or tiao).” See: Dutton, Policing Chinese Politics: A History, 279.

43 The other four models are: standard policing, community policing, problem-oriented policing, and CompStat (computer statistics).

44 Jerry Ratcliffe, Intelligence-Led Policing (Cullompton, Devon: Willan, 2008), 87.

45 For an official diagram of the PSI intelligence cycle, see: 公安部政治部 [Ministry of Public Security Political Department], 犯罪情报学教程 [Crime Intelligence Tutorial] (Beijing: 群众出版社, 2007): 140.

46 Loch K. Johnson, National Security Intelligence: Secret Operations in Defense of the Democracies (Cambridge; Malden, MA: Polity, 2012), 38.

47 Chunxia Zhang, “公安情报工作的两个基本环节: ‘收集’与‘搜集’” [Two Basic Links: “Gathering” and “Collection” in Public Security Intelligence Work], 辽宁警专学报 [Journal of Liaoning Police Academy], no. 3 (May 2014): 38.

48 Zhihui Peng, “论公安情报收集渠道” [On Channels of Public Security Intelligence Gathering], 河北公安警察职业学院学报 [Journal of Hebei Vocational College of Public Security Police], no. 1 (March 2010): 5.

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OSINT is probably the most economical and effective way of intelligence gathering when compared to other methods. As George Kennan once pointed out, around 95 percent of the U.S.’s knowledge about foreign countries could be “obtained by the careful and competent study of perfectly legitimate sources of information open and available to us in the rich library and archival holdings of this country.”49 China’s PSI appreciates OSINT just as much. Books, newspaper, magazines, journals, radio, television, and the Internet are all sources of information scrutinized for intelligence value.50 According to Peng Zhihui, professor at the PSI department of Chinese People’s Public Security University, “large quantities of ” police intelligence come from OSINT.51 But this is not the only method. HUMINT, although more expensive and time-consuming, can provide information unobtainable through open sources. Three types of agents provide HUMINT. The first is the patrol officer that engages the community on a regular basis or an officer that is assigned to monitor specific criminal suspects.52 The second type of HUMINT agent—undercover agents—or “secret forces” (mimi liliang), penetrate places and groups that might pose a security threat, including crime syndicates, underground religious circles, nighttime entertainment establishments, and labor markets.53 Civilian informers (zhi’an ermu) constitute the third variety. They have the numerical advantage but can be unreliable due to unprofessionalism; nevertheless, the Chinese police have a history of relying on informers.54 Information gathered is divided into three categories: police work information (gong’an yewu xinxi), social information (shehui xinxi), and special subject intelligence information (zhuanti qingbao xinxi). Police work information is gathered from everyday professional engagement with the community, including information gathered from a household registration drive or during a criminal investigation.55 Social information includes anything that helps raise the police’s ability to prevent crime, serve the community, and maintain order. Examples are phone records and hotel guest information.56 Special subject information is divided into three subcategories: enemy intelligence information (diqinglei qingbao xinxi), stability maintenance intelligence information Thomas E. Copeland, ed., The Information Revolution and National Security (Carlisle, PA: U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute, 2000), 33.

50 Yufeng Shan, “对公开情报收集相关问题的研究” [Study on Questions Related to Open Source Intelligence Gathering], 科技信息 [Science & Technology Information], no. 20 (July 2012): 70; 犯罪情 报学教程 [Crime Intelligence Tutorial], 23-24.

51 Peng, “论公安情报收集渠道” [On Channels of Public Security Intelligence Gathering], 6.

52 Ibid., 6.

53 Jinpeng Di and Hui Zhao, “我国运用秘密力量侦查法律程序之构想” [Thoughts on Our Country’s Legal Process in Employing Secret Forces Investigation], 江西警察学院学报 [Journal of Jiangxi Police Institute], no. 3 (May 2011): 26.

54 Peng, “论公安情报收集渠道” [On Channels of Public Security Intelligence Gathering], 7.

55 Zhihui Peng, “论公安情报的收集内容与方式” [On Methods and Contents of Public Security Intelligence Gathering], 公安学刊 (浙江警察学院学报) [Public Security Science Journal (Journal of Zhejiang Police College)], no. 2 (April 2012): 42.

56 Ibid., 43-44.

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(weiwenlei qingbao xinxi), and public opinion intelligence information (yuqinglei qingbao xinxi). The first subcategory focuses on terrorist organizations, separatist groups, religious extremists, black society crime syndicates, and cults that altogether oppose stability (wending). “Secret forces” are usually employed to investigate, trail, monitor, and infiltrate these groups. The second subcategory, “stability maintenance intelligence,” includes information about factors that can lead to mass protests, strikes, unlawful gatherings, communal melees, and arson. Lastly, to obtain public opinion information, agents monitor views of the citizenry on the country’s sociopolitical state of affairs.

The average citizen’s thoughts on the Communist Party, the state, local government, the police, existing policies, and elite politics are all within the bounds of gathering.57 Trained and knowledgeable intelligence analysts under a strict quality control regime must cautiously parse raw data in order for information to be transformed into intelligence. Although on paper China’s PSI information collection process is relatively sophisticated, its intelligence analysis and quality control lacks efficiency. But before we delve into these weaknesses, let us first review past efforts to modernize the PSI. PSI Modernization The Cultural Revolution was a man-made political catastrophe with a scale of destruction unseen elsewhere in human history. Almost all government agencies ceased functioning during the violent phase of the Cultural Revolution. Chaos was the zeitgeist, embodied in the slogan: “smash public security bureaus, the procuratorate, and the court system to a pulp” (zalan gongjianfa).58 Red Guards, high on revolutionary spirit, attacked institutions of public order and plunged the country into total mayhem.

The Cultural Revolution devastated China’s law and order agencies. According to one estimate, 34,481 public security officials were persecuted, 1,257 died by suicide or beating, and 3,624 were injured or disabled.59 Public security organs were shut down for years. Red guard-led revolutionary committees (geming weiyuanhui) and the army’s military control commissions (junshi guanzhi weiyuanhui) usurped law enforcement power and dictated local security affairs with draconian measures.

With the dawning of reform and opening-up, the need for a professional modern police force to combat the rise of crime became ever more urgent. With assistance from Yugoslavia, China’s police modernization kicked off in the early 1980s with the introduction of a national police computer network.60 Since that time, police modernization Ibid., 45.

Xinyuan Xu, “我国公安机关和人民警察组织机构历史延革” [Historical Organizational Changes in Our Country’s Public Security Organs and People’s Police], 公安研究 [Policing Studies] no. 3 (June 1999): 92–93.

59 Min Cui, ed., 刑讯考论—历史, 现状, 未来 [Torture Interrogation—History, Status Quo and Future] (Beijing: 中国人民公安大学出版社, 2011), 159.

60 Yiping Xie, ed., 公安信息化建设基础教程 [Tutorial on the Fundamentals of Police Informatization Construction] (Beijing: 群众出版社, 2009), 1.

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efforts have been driven by the need to adopt state of the art crime fighting technology.

In 1993, China unveiled the China Crime Information Center, a computerized database of criminal justice information based on the FBI’s National Crime Information Center.61 In 1998, the most ambitious informatization project was announced. Codenamed the Golden Shield Project (jindun gongcheng; GSP),62 it aimed to substantially upgrade police information technology.63 Phase One of the GSP (GSP-1) lasted from 2003 to 2006 and received a total investment of 3.71 billion RMB.64 GSP-1 had six goals: First, upgrade police information networks that would connect all police agencies at the prefectural city level and above to the police private network (intranet).65 Furthermore, fifty percent of county level police agencies, as well as ten percent of all grassroots (community-based) police organization would be connected to the intranet.66 Second, upgrade computer operating systems, build secure databases67 and internal communications network, and establish a centralized system of Internet surveillance—a task delegated to the Ministry of Public Security’s Eleventh Bureau, with the objectives of combating hackers, viruses, and protecting data.68 Third, the China Crime Information Center would be further enhanced as a national database that provides quick and accurate information to police agencies.69 Fourth, standardize the use of technology for better information sharing.

Standardization included 1,272 items, for example, the standardization of terminology, project quality, and electromagnetic compatibility.70 Fifth, a system of information security that assists in troubleshooting, information recovery, network security, user authentication, and intranet resource protection.71 Lastly, a professional system of operational management that establishes regulations, personnel training, and an efficient management model to ensure smooth daily operations of the police information Ibid., 2.

For an official diagram of the GSP’s structure published by the Ministry of Public Security, see: 公 安部政治部 [Ministry of Public Security Political Department], 犯罪情报学教程 [Crime Intelligence Tutorial], 130.

63 Xie, 公安信息化建设基础教程 [Tutorial on the Fundamentals of Police Informatization Construction], 2.

64 Yanji Wang, ed., 中国公安科技发展简史 [Brief History on the Technological Advancement of China’s Police] (Beijing: 中国人民大学出版社, 2009), 210.

65 Ibid., 191.

66 Ibid., 191.

67 We know that GSP-1 founded at least twenty-one national and regional databases covering the following areas: 1) criminal; 2) fugitive; 3) stolen vehicle; 4) major criminal cases; 5) fingerprint; 6) economic crime; 7) narcotics; 8) public security petition; 9) firearms; 10) explosives; 11) DNA; 12) traffic; 13) missing person and unidentified body; 14) public security internal affairs; 15) stability maintenance; 16) Interpol’s China National Central Bureau; 17) bodyguards; 18) counterterrorism; 19) hotels; 20) secondhand cellphone sales; 21) high risk groups. See: Xie, 公安信息化建设基础教程 [Tutorial on the Fundamentals of Police Informatization Construction], 10-11.

68 Wang, 中国公安科技发展简史 [Brief History on the Technological Advancement of China’s Police], 191.

69 Ibid., 191-192.

70 Ibid., 191-193.

71 Ibid., 195.

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technology network.72 GSP-1 laid the technological groundwork for modernizing the PSI. By 2004, a nationwide police intranet73 was completed covering thirty-two provincial-level public security departments, 478 city bureaus, 3,361 county sub-bureaus, and more than 70,000 dispatch stations. The connection speed was raised, and about 98.2 percent of China’s public security organs were connected to the Internet. Public security organs received a total of 1.3 million computers that average to 89 per 100 police officers. Similar success manifested itself in database construction as well. The profiles of 1.38 billion citizens were managed using computerized methods with 41,000 public security dispatch stations handling household registration and establishing computerized population management systems. Criminal and noncriminal databases as well as information-sharing platforms were also up and running.74 Overall, judging from official reports, GSP-1 seems like a success that equipped China’s police with the technological tools for better policing. Yet it must be said that statistics reflect the typical official Chinese attitude that values quantitative over qualitative gains.

Leaders of the Ministry of Public Security considered GSP-1 a success in streamlining the police’s centralized command, and enhancing rapid reaction and joint operations capabilities. In September 2008, planning began for GSP-2, and goals for the project were announced a year later in 2009. One of GSP-2’s purposes was to serve as a carrier to position ILP as the leading management philosophy for China’s police force.75 In accomplishing this shift, the Ministry of Public Security believes that China’s police will become more proactive and better aligned with international professional standards. An emphasis was also placed on “big intelligence” (da qingbao),76 or using big data mining methods for intelligence work that is then stored and shared through information exchange platforms. Besides ideological changes, GSP-2 would continue police technological upgrades to fit the policing demands of the twenty-first century.77 Yet changing police philosophy is more difficult than technological reform in that it requires more than rhetoric and financial investment. GSP-2 was completed in 2014, but the project’s success on transforming police ideology is debatable. Unreformed ideological and institutional factors have negatively influenced the analysis and distribution stages of the PSI cycle.

Wang, 中国公安科技发展简史 [Brief History on the Technological Advancement of China’s Police], 193.

73 For an official diagram of the Chinese police intranet published by the Ministry of Public Security, see: 犯罪情报学教程 [Crime Intelligence Tutorial], 120.

74 Xie, 公安信息化建设基础教程 [Tutorial on the Fundamentals of Police Informatization Construction], 9.

75 Ke Wang, “我国情报信息主导警务的推进方法及实践状况” [Current Status and the Means to Impel Intelligence-Led Policing in Our Country], 湖北警官学院学报 [Journal of Hubei University of Police], no. 7 (July 2015): 25.

76 Xie, 公安信息化建设基础教程 [Tutorial on the Fundamentals of Police Informatization Construction], 33.

77 Ibid., 29-31.

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Identifying Shortcomings The Chinese government has a propensity to value quantitative growth over qualitative improvements. Although on paper the Chinese police have received substantial upgrades in technological infrastructure, the degree of usage is rarely reported in official summaries. In reality, the police, despite the GSP’s achievements, still face problems in fully reaping the benefits of the modernization project. We may group these challenges into three parts: clogged intelligence sharing, limited analytical and quality control capabilities, and old ways of policing based on obsolete ideas.

Clogged intelligence sharing between public security bureaus is a major problem concerning PSI. However, it is not an entirely Chinese phenomenon. More recently, European intelligence agencies have also been found guilty of intelligence sharing failures amid the war against terrorism.78 We have witnessed similar situations in China.

Whether it was the eight-year long failure to capture Zhou Kehua or the inability to forewarn the string of terrorist attacks in 2013 and 2014,79 researchers have identified a lack of intelligence sharing as the key impediment to successful police work in an era where criminals are becoming increasingly mobile and sophisticated.80 Nonetheless, the motivation to share intelligence is low. In fact, there have been instances where agencies intentionally created barriers to prevent intelligence collaboration. Although some have identified the lack of intelligence cooperation as a result of security concerns or the absence of a streamlined intelligence-sharing platform, a recent study by Wu Shaozhong of the Chinese People’s Public Security University shows an ill designed incentive system is the chief culprit in obstructing intelligence sharing.81 To be promoted in the public security system, one must have “achievements” (chengji); similar to the cadre evaluation system, police organs receive points for professional achievements.82 Cracking criminal cases earns them a considerable number of points.

All police organs have imbalances in terms of intelligence.83 Sharing intelligence thereBrunsden Jim and Chassany Anne-Sylvaine, “Europe’s Failure to Share Intelligence Hampers Terror Fight,” Financial Times, 4 April 2016.

79 Dehui Ma, “论公安情报分析的案例研究与教学” [On Case Study Method in the Research and Teaching of Public Security Intelligence Analysis], 情报杂志 [Journal of Intelligence], no. 5 (May 2014): 5.

80 Xiaoyan Bao, “京津冀协同发展战略视野下公安情报交流与协作问题研究” [Research on the Police Intelligence Sharing and Collaboration—From the Perspective of the Coordinated Development of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Region], 北京警察学院学报 [Journal of Beijing Police College], no. 6 (November 2015): 53–54.

81 Shaozhong Wu, “公安情报整合共享中的利益格局及破解之道” [How to Break Interest Barriers in Compiling and Sharing Public Security Intelligence], 北京警察学院学报 [Journal of Beijing Police College], no. 4 (July 2015): 67.

82 Yuhua Wang and Carl Minzner, “The Rise of the Chinese Security State,” The China Quarterly 222 (June 2015): 8–9.

83 Wu, “公安情报整合共享中的利益格局及破解之道” [How to Break Interest Barriers in Compiling and Sharing Public Security Intelligence], 66.

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fore is important to iron out the differences that will make cracking cases easier for all parties. However, the current police evaluation system only awards the agency that cracked the case, without taking into account any other organs that participated in the process.84 This causes strong resentment between agencies that should be working closely together. Moreover, it amplifies a “crab basket mentality” and creates an environment where agencies are indifferent about helping their colleagues create success— because there are no rewards for doing so.

Similarly, the current evaluation system overlooks the “foot soldiers” of intelligence, i.e. the information gatherers. Awards often fail to acknowledge them at all.85 Such official neglect is bound to negatively influence their enthusiasm and the quality of information they submit to intelligence departments. Without changing the incentive structure, it is hard to break the vicious cycle of sluggish intelligence sharing. Chinese police organs, as one researcher sees it, will continue to face unaided battles.86 Beyond incentive structures, to be a generalist or specialist is the perennial question confronting government bureaucracies, and the PSI is also confronted with this problem. Not all PSI officers received specialized training, and the pro-generalist position seems to be winning the debate over how to train and staff China’s 28,000 PSI personnel.87 Thus it is not surprising to see a shortage of intelligence specialists.88 Currently, the dominant idea in intelligence gathering and analysis is the “human wave tactic,”89 or as the Chinese would call it, “one officer with multiple talents” (yijing duoneng).90 This problem is especially pronounced in certain provinces. Officers have to work a main job and pick up intelligence tasks on the side. There is no professional training or work stability.91 Combined with a poor quality control mechanism, this regime

Wu, “公安情报整合共享中的利益格局及破解之道” [How to Break Interest Barriers in Compiling and Sharing Public Security Intelligence], 67.

85 Ibid., 67.

86 Wenli Bao, “吉林省信息情报工作新体系构建的相关问题研究” [Study on Questions Related to the New Structure of Jilin Province’s Information Intelligence Work], 吉林公安高等专科学校学报 [Journal of Jilin Public Security Academy], no. 1 (February 2010): 26.

87 Lü, “公安综合情报部门的发展困境与战略转向” [The Difficult Position and Strategic Transformation of Integrated Police Intelligence Department], 16.

88 Wang, “我国情报信息主导警务的推进方法及实践状况” [Current Status and the Means to Impel Intelligence-Led Policing in Our Country], 28.

89 Gan Nie and Jing Huo, “情报导向警务背景下技术侦查的创新与运用—以武汉市‘12.1’爆炸案 为例” [Application and Innovation of Technology Investigation under Intelligence-Led Policing—a Case Study of Wuhan “December 1” Explosion], 法制博览(中旬刊) [Legality Vision], no. 2 (February 2012): 116.

90 Qifei Shi, “浅议公安机关中央事权与地方事权划分、警种、部门设置” [A Probe on the Division of Central Power and Local Governance in Public Security Organs, Police Classification and Department Setting], 政法学刊 [Journal of Political Science and Law], no. 6 (December 2015): 110.

91 Bao, “吉林省信息情报工作新体系构建的相关问题研究” [Study on Questions Related to the New Structure of Jilin Province’s Information Intelligence Work], 27.

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regime routinely produces substandard intelligence.92 We do not know whether a lack of funding or misconceptions of intelligence work were reasons behind a pro-generalist system. Nonetheless, placing additional intelligence gathering duties on ordinary officers, who are already poorly paid,93 undermines the motivation to obtain quality information. As a result, Chinese officers fabricate information to fill quotas. In one instance, a drive for fingerprint collection turned slapstick when toe-prints were submitted to meet the set target.94 Technology also poses a challenge to the generalist system. It is hard for a generalist officer, whose main job is not intelligence, to work with a computerized intelligence system designed for specialists. According to a 2011 study, some officers with limited computer skills find the data entry system, built during the GSP reforms, very difficult to operate.95 Besides old ways of policing mentioned previously—quantity over quality, quotas, human wave intelligence—another debate that has influenced the effectiveness of PSI is the classification of PSI as a field of study. Quality education and training makes a quality workforce. However, for the past six years, there was confusion on where exactly to place PSI studies. Although PSI studies was created in 2005, its position in relation to other disciplines was hazy until 2011 when it was classified under public security studies, a sub-field of law studies.96 But debates linger on. One position argues that PSI studies should be classified as part of information science, or “the collection, classification, storage, retrieval, and dissemination of recorded knowledge treated both as a pure and as an applied science.”97 The other position argues that PSI studies should remained part of public security studies that is “a field that studies questions of social and public safety.”98 Without a clear direction, it is hard for an enterprise to go anywhere. The result of this debate has, directly or indirectly, stunted the growth of PSI studies as a field. Currently,

Shuhua Li and Yue Li, “公安情报产品评价研究” [Study on Public Security Intelligence Product Evaluation], 中国人民公安大学学报 (社会科学版) [Journal of Chinese People’s Public Security University (Social Sciences Edition)], no. 3 (June 2012): 26.

93 Ibid., 26.

94 Bao, “吉林省信息情报工作新体系构建的相关问题研究” [Study on Questions Related to the New Structure of Jilin Province’s Information Intelligence Work], 26.

95 Jing Chen and Juncheng Shao, “论公安情报人才培养” [On the Training of Public Security Intelligence Personnel], 湖北警官学院学报 [Journal of Hubei University of Police], no. 4 (July 2011): 53.

96 Ma, “中国公安情报学的兴起和发展” [The Rise and Development of Public Security Intelligence Studies in China], 10.

97 “Information Science,” Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/information%20science (date accessed: 9 May 2016).

98 Ming Zhu, “公安情报分析的理论模式与创新” [Theoretical Model and Innovation of Public Security Intelligence Analysis], 图书馆学研究 [Research on Library Science], no. 3 (February 2015): 5.

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there has been no theoretical breakthrough in PSI studies.99 Given China’s specific sociopolitical conditions, PSI research is partially reliant upon theories developed by Western scholars that operated on a different set of variables. PSI studies, at present, remain confined to police colleges. As of 2016, eleven years after it became a state approved field of study, there are only five schools in China teaching PSI, another possible explanation for the intelligence specialist shortage.100 Prospects for Reform Despite pockets of democratic experimentation—i.e. village elections—a review of China’s legal statutes shows that the People’s Republic is no more than a one-party authoritarian state. Self-referred to as a People’s Democratic Dictatorship, a Chinese adaptation of the Marxist-Leninist Dictatorship of the Proletariat,101 the Chinese Communist Party uses its coercive powers to assert dominance upon all remnants of a liberal democracy in China—the constrained personal liberty of its citizens, the rubber stamp parliament, the heavily censored press, government-controlled trade unions, and the non-independent judiciary.

The PSI, along with other branches of China’s domestic intelligence body, is a tool of the authoritarian state that pursues the goal of social order and political stability. According to Brian Chapman’s model, China has all the traits of a “modern police state.”

[T]he police services are centralized under effective national command…the political police service is built up into a national service with its own powers and chain of command…the political police service is amalgamated with the criminal police service, with the political police in command; the uniformed police services are then subordinated to the needs and special operational requirements of the unified political/criminal police service; and, finally, the uniformed police service is strengthened as an armed reserve force by the creation of a para-military force with its own weapons, intelligence and logistic support, under the command of, and loyal to, the central police command. The policies laid down by the central police command make the police apparat as a whole into an offensive weapon of the state rather than protective force for society.102 Police reform in an authoritarian modern police state follows the decisions of political elites, in other words, the leaders of the Chinese Communist Party. In contrast to a totalitarian police state where the police reign supreme above all state institutions, the Ma, “论公安情报分析的案例研究与教学” [On Case Study Method in the Research and Teaching of Public Security Intelligence Analysis], 5.

100 Ma, “中国公安情报学的兴起和发展” [The Rise and Development of Public Security Intelligence Studies in China], 10-11.

101 Zhang and Qi, 宪法学 [Constitutional Studies], 72-73.

102 Brian Chapman, Police State (London: Pall Mall Press, 1976), 78-79.

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power of the Chinese police is limited by state and party superstructures.103 Mao Zedong was a strong proponent of a single source of power—a view widely shared by successive paramount leaders. Despite its esteemed status, the police suffered rounds of punishments in the recent political turbulence; agents of the Ministry of Public Security, regardless of their position within the hierarchy, were arrested under the pretext of anti-corruption.104 The decision to clean house in the Ministry of Public Security, once a bastion of Xi Jinping’s archrival Zhou Yongkang, is the new party leader’s way of showing that he is the sole source of power.105 Yet given the authoritarian state’s need for an efficient police force, reform is a priority.

In fact, police reform, following the Xi party line of “comprehensive deepening reform” (quanmian shenhua gaige) has been ongoing since early 2015. Intelligence-led policing, with the PSI as the spearhead, is an area that will receive special attention.106 Although the authoritarian state might hinder reform in the political and economic sectors, as it might corrode the foundation of the state’s power and legitimacy, bettering the police is an investment with guaranteed returns. Critical to the Public Security Police’s ability to defend the state, the PSI has thus far enjoyed official blessing. Information imparted to the press tells an ambitious program with more than one hundred specific measures grouped into seven main missions, the first being, predictably, the improvement of “working mechanism for safeguarding state security.”107 At this point in time, it is still too early to tell whether the reform will fully address issues impeding the PSI’s performance, but it is likely that by the reform’s conclusion in 2020, the Chinese police state will emerge with greater capability in controlling an increasingly complicated society.

Conclusion Ultimately, intelligence is all about helping one gain the upper hand before the showBrian Chapman, Police State (London: Pall Mall Press, 1976), 114. “公安部一次性立案审查22名现役干部 2人被双开” [One Stroke, the Ministry of Public Security Investigates 22 Active Service Cadres and Expelled 2 from the Party and Public Office], QQ News, 3 November 2015, http://news.qq.com/a/20151103/019766.htm (date accessed: 20 February 2017).

105 Zhou Yongkang was the Minister of Public Security from 2002 to 2007. He then served as the Secretary of the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission of the Chinese Communist Party from 2007 to 2012. A prominent factional rival of Xi Jinping, Zhou was sentenced to life imprisonment in June 2015. See: Jun Mai, “What NOT to Learn from Zhou Yongkang and Ling Jihua: Fall of China’s Corrupt Party ‘gangs’ a Lesson for Its Cadres,” South China Morning Post, 16 February 2016.

106 “《关于全面深化公安改革若干重大问题的框架意见》及相关改革方案已经中央审议通过 [‘Opinions on Several Major Issues in Deepening the Reform of Public Security’ and Relevant Reform Proposals Have Been Deliberated and Adopted by the Center],” Ministry of Public Security, 15 February 2015, http://www.mps.gov.cn/n2255079/n4876594/n4974590/n4974591/c4976144/content. html (date accessed: 20 February 2017).

107 “公安部负责人就全面深化公安改革有关情况答记者问” [Ministry of Public Security Spokesperson Answers Reporters’ Questions Regarding the Deepening Reform of Public Security], Xinhua News, 15 February 2015.

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down even begins. As Sun Tzu famously intoned: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.”108 For an authoritarian modern police state like China that faces constant internal challengers to the existing order, having the aid of a sophisticated domestic intelligence apparatus is crucial to the maintenance of power. This paper, focusing on one branch of China’s domestic intelligence, shows why the PSI still encounters intelligence setbacks despite reforms. Technological advancement is not enough to modernize the PSI; forward thinking ideas, the right incentive structure and professionalization are just a few essential ingredients required to create an efficient intelligence organization.

As a youthful branch of China’s domestic intelligence, the PSI is set to expand in size and capability as China places greater emphasis on the internal facets of national security. The attention given to intelligence amid the current police reform is a sign that changes are already underway. Whether the reform program will bring long-term positive results for the PSI is yet to be seen. But as observers, we at least have an idea about the state’s commitment to better and more efficient police intelligence. The coming years will show whether the state has adopted the belief that changing technological “hardware” can only bring an intermediate modernization, but changes to the institutional and ideological “software” will be the catalyst needed to propel the PSI into modernity.

Zi Yang is an independent researcher and consultant on China affairs. His research centers on Chinese internal security issues. He is a frequent contributor to Jamestown Foundation’s China Brief. His current projects include an analysis of political indoctrination in Chinese colleges and an investigation into the mental well-being of People’s Liberation Army servicemen. He holds an M.A. in Asian Studies from Georgetown University and a B.A. in Global Affairs and History from George Mason University.

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Sun Tzu, The Art of War, trans. Lionel Giles (Mineola, NY: Dover), 5.

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Gady, Feaver, Ross, and Goldstein | Trump's Strategy for Asia

interviews President Trump’s Strategy for Asia Expert Perspectives Interviews with Franz-Stefan Gady, Peter Feaver, Robert Ross, and Avery Goldstein

President Trump’s advisors have claimed that his foreign policy toward Asia will be guided by a “peace through strength” principle, a model employed by many leaders throughout history—most recently by fellow political outsider Ronald Reagan. Despite discernable differences in leadership style and a changed political and economic climate, will President Trump’s Asia strategy resemble Reagan’s? How will his approach be perceived in Asia? Is it possible that President Trump could use his much-vaunted negotiating skills to reach a “grand bargain” with China?

To garner a breadth of insight into these questions, four experts have provided their perspectives on Trump’s Asia strategy and what we can expect from his administration over the next four years. The following features interviews with Franz-Stefan Gady, Peter Feaver, Robert Ross, and Avery Goldstein, which have been edited for clarity and length.

Franz-Stefan Gady: President Donald Trump’s foreign policy in Asia will not resemble Ronald Reagan’s “peace through strength” doctrine of the 1980s for two main reasons. First, the forty-fifth president of the United States has repeatedly questioned the value of American allies and alliances—one of the lynchpins of Reagan’s “peace through strength” doctrine—throughout his presidential campaign and his first days of office. Trump’s criticism of allies, based on a firm belief that they take advantage of the United States by not paying their fair share for American protection, goes back all the way to the 1980s. Indeed, in 1987 Trump placed a full-page advertisement in three major newspapers criticizing President Ronald Reagan’s foreign defense policy, urging the U.S. government to “stop paying to defend countries that can afford to defend Spring 2017 [103]

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themselves.”

Trump appears to neither recognize the importance of worldwide alliances for American security, nor consider the consequences of Washington reducing its diplomatic and military footprint in the world. For one thing, should he follow through with his campaign pledge and embrace a more isolationist foreign policy, the U.S.-led “hub and spoke” system in Asia, based on U.S. security guarantees to allies, will be in tatters and with it the entire post-World War II security architecture in the Asia-Pacific region.

The result will be growing regional instability and a power vacuum likely filled by the People’s Republic of China.

Second, Trump harbors distinct mercantilist economic views underlined by a belief that the global economy is a zero-sum competition that is rigged against the United States. In that spirit, he withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a twelve-member free trade agreement whose members comprise about 40 percent of global GDP, in January 2017. Instead, Trump has pledged to negotiate bilateral trade agreements, a difficult task given that the president has also been threatening to impose tariffs on countries he deems to have an unfair trade advantage, which likely will be reciprocated by potential trade partners.

This stands in stark contrast to Ronald Reagan’s economic policies. While he imposed import quotas for steel and Japanese cars as well as a tariff on motorcycles during his presidency, Reagan nevertheless helped shape the global free trade system as we know it today. He facilitated the establishment of the World Trade Organization and laid the groundwork for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). In 1986, President Reagan stated: “Our trade policy rests firmly on the foundation of free and open markets. I recognize…the inescapable conclusion that all of history has taught: the freer the flow of world trade, the stronger the tides of human progress and peace among nations.” No comparable doctrine can be attributed to President Donald Trump and, given past statements, he is unlikely to reverse course and embrace a free trade agenda anytime soon.

This still leaves the question: Which prior president’s strategy will Trump’s Asia security strategy resemble? It is difficult to predict Trump’s likely course of action in the Asia-Pacific region. While he pledged to rebuild the U.S. military, he appears to have no intention of combining the military buildup with the additional forward deployment of U.S. military assets. Indeed, he more than once questioned the value of American military bases abroad. Given Trump’s reluctance to permanently base U.S. troops abroad, what could emerge at the outset of his administration is a twenty-first century, Trumpian version of Teddy Roosevelt’s so-called “gunboat diplomacy” in which the United States will try to maintain its preeminent position in the Asia-Pacific primarily through naval power and the threat of military force—perhaps reinforced by the threat of economic warfare. Perhaps we will also see a form of offshore balancing in which the United States, underwritten by a strengthened U.S. Navy, will focus on strengthening security forces—in particular the navies—of regional allies and partners while reducing the number of overall American troops stationed in the region. Such a strategy, [104] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Gady, Feaver, Ross, and Goldstein | Trump's Strategy for Asia

combined with a pledge by allies and partner nations to increase their financial contributions to U.S. efforts, would appeal to Trump’s isolationist tendencies and his transactional nature while containing China and checking North Korean aggression. However, the effectiveness of a larger U.S. naval presence maintaining the status quo in the Asia-Pacific while simultaneously reducing the U.S. military footprint in the region is uncertain at best.

Furthermore, in the long run, neither gunboat diplomacy nor offshore balancing will be a substitute for more comprehensive engagements with allies and the strengthening of existing security arrangements as well as the forging of closer economic ties between allies and like-minded Asia-Pacific countries for a number of reasons. For one thing, Roosevelt-like gunboat diplomacy does not address transnational threats, including terrorism, and offers no tangible benefits for U.S. military forces currently fighting in Afghanistan. In addition, Roosevelt’s “speak softly and carry a big stick” approach might appeal to the bullish nature of the forty-fifth president. However, it promises to be an unmitigated diplomatic disaster in the long run and would unnecessarily militarize state-to-state relations in the region.

There is still the possibility that the United States will maintain its existing system of alliances with little or no changes. However, with a president who takes pride in his own unpredictability, it should be clear to everyone that no options are off the table.

While a twenty-first century reiteration of Teddy Roosevelt’s policy might seem farfetched, Trump’s promise to increase the size of the navy could make this a viable policy option. Nevertheless, should the United States under Donald Trump wish to continue to play a proactive role in shaping political and economic events in the Asia-Pacific region, it will inevitably have to abandon its isolationist stance and continue to comprehensively engage allies in order to reinforce its position as the security guarantor of the existing regional order.

Franz-Stefan Gady is an editor with The Diplomat where he covers regional conflict and military strategy in the Asia-Pacific region. He is also a Senior Fellow with the EastWest Institute where he edits the Policy Innovation Blog. His interests include naval strategy, civil-military relations, revolution in military affairs, and cyber diplomacy.

Peter Feaver: It is simply too early to tell what President Trump's Asia strategy will be and how it will integrate into his larger grand strategy. We know the label he intends to give his grand strategy: “America First.” We know that he has a long-standing view that the rise of China is the biggest long-term geostrategic challenge facing the United States (whereas the biggest near-term threat he has identified is terrorism inspired by Spring 2017 [105]

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militant Islamist ideology), and we know that he believes the current geopolitical realities call for a more confrontational policy vis-à-vis China. But beyond that, there is still too much unspecified to make strong predictions about how it will all play out. None of his major national security appointments thus far would be considered “Asia hands,” and he has yet to flesh out the sub-cabinet appointments, particularly those responsible for Asian policy. Personnel is policy, so once those positions get filled, it will be possible to make more confident predictions.

Even then, we should be wary of making straight-line projections. President Trump clearly sees himself as an unconventional president, one whose success has come in part because he surprises. This is most evident in his strategic communications: his tweets, his statements in interviews, and his dominance of the news cycle. Our allies, partners, and rivals in Asia will have to get used to a very different style. They undoubtedly recognize this already and are likely to take a cautious wait-and-see approach, with the possible exception of North Korea, which may be tempted to conduct its own pernicious variant of surprise diplomacy.

Peter Feaver is a Professor of Political Science and Public Policy at Duke University. He is Director of the Triangle Institute for Security Studies and Director of the Duke Program in American Grand Strategy. He has published widely on American foreign policy, civil-military relations, and public opinion. From June 2005 to July 2007, Feaver served as Special Advisor for Strategic Planning and Institutional Reform on the National Security Council Staff at the White House. In 1993-94, Feaver served as Director for Defense Policy and Arms Control on the National Security Council. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Harvard University in 1990.

Robert Ross: President Reagan’s strategy in Asia was premised on competing with the Soviet Union with a major defense build-up. Ultimately, that was a successful effort insofar as it contributed, in part, to the demise of the Soviet Union. [With President Trump], it will be a very different experience. President Reagan benefitted from the great strength of the American economy that was still growing at a rapid rate, as well as from the strong industrialization and technological development of the United States.

In a similar way, he benefitted from the ultimate economic catastrophe of the Soviet Union and its failed economic model.

In the contemporary era, we have a very different situation. In many ways we face an unprecedented situation in American diplomatic history in that for the first time we face a country—namely China—that can pose a threat to American maritime supremacy, which has been a cornerstone of American security for the last seventy-five [106] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Gady, Feaver, Ross, and Goldstein | Trump's Strategy for Asia

years or more. President Trump faces this challenge with a very different economic situation in the United States than President Reagan faced when he assumed office in 1981. The United States economy is growing at a much slower rate and our budget is severely constrained by extensive social welfare benefits, limiting our ability to spend on defense. In addition, the already significant deficits in the American economy make it difficult for the United States to continue deficit spending to fund a defense buildup.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon, after nearly twenty or thirty years of blank-check defense spending, has developed an overly costly and inefficient weapons acquisition program.

The high cost of benefits, including salaries and benefits for our soldiers, makes it very difficult for us to have an extensive weapons acquisition program.

In contrast, China is not the Soviet Union. The Chinese economy is still growing at six or seven percent a year and might continue to do so for the next decade. It is an economy that is growing three times faster than the United States, with a lean national budget, a lean military, and the ability to spend more, particularly on defense. It also has a considerable ability to increase defense spending faster than the United States can. Thus, President Trump assumes office with a very ambitious agenda, and in short, without the resources to carry it out.

In regards to [how Trump’s strategy will be perceived in Asia], I think there are multiple aspects to that. One aspect is that the region would welcome an America that can strengthen its defense presence in the region in order to maintain a long-term balance of power with a rising China. At the same time, the region doubts America’s ability to carry through on that objective. We can see the region beginning to improve relations with China in the expectation that the relative shift in power over the next ten years will continue to benefit China. We see that most obviously with relations between Malaysia and China and with the Philippines and China, but we see it elsewhere in the region as well. So the region, on the one hand, would welcome it, but they doubt that the Americans and resources will follow through.

Second, much of the region is just unsure about how Trump views the security of other nations in the region and whether he takes their interests seriously. Will he simply focus on relations with China, without consideration for the regional consequences? Will he focus on relations with China at the expense of other countries’ security interests?

This could happen in two ways—first, excessive U.S.-China conflict that puts pressure on these countries to take sides, or second, in the case of Taiwan in particular, the question is whether Trump simply views these countries as bargaining chips, in which he is prepared to sacrifice their interests in order to reach a U.S.-China bargain that benefits the United States.

The idea that there could be a grand bargain in which the United States maintains the status quo in its relationship with Taiwan in exchange for Chinese concessions on, say, North Korea or economic relations is, simply put, absurd. There is nothing China values more than security in domestic politics and, in its foreign policy agenda, its relationship with Taiwan and its commitment to “One China.” There is no trade off that could feasibly require China to make sacrifices on its Taiwan policy in exchange for Spring 2017 [107]

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something else. In this regard, should the United States decide to change the status quo with its own policy toward Taiwan—that could be very destabilizing. We need to recall that in 1996 there was a significant maritime confrontation between the United States and the Chinese over President Bill Clinton’s policy toward Taiwan. Today, China is much more capable and confident than it was in 1996, so one would expect that the repercussions of a changed U.S. policy toward Taiwan, of a reconsideration of the U.S. commitment to its “One China” policy, would be far more serious than they were over twenty years ago.

President Trump seems to think that the threat of a trade war with China will compel China to make compromises in its economic policies. This too, I think, is a reach. China has significant leverage over the United States, and the United States has significant leverage over China. It is not clear which country would be best able to incur the cost of a trade war, and who would be hurt the most from a trade war. We have already seen China signal its intention to retaliate against sensitive American industries, including the American automobile industry in China. Beijing can also quietly put pressure on other American products in China, including Apple, soybeans, or aircraft, all of which have significant implications for the health of the American economy and the rate of American employment. China has signaled its resolve to engage in that kind of tit-for-tat economic conflict. It is not at all clear how President Trump can reshape the U.S.-China relationship and also avoid significant costs to the U.S. security and economic interests or to regional stability that would surpass the benefits.

Robert Ross is Professor of Political Science at Boston College, and Associate Professor at the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. Since 2009, he has been Adjunct Professor at the Institute for Defense Studies in Norwegian Defense University College. He is a member of the Academic Advisory Group—U.S.-China Working Group for the United States Congress, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the National Committee for U.S.-China Relations. His recent publications include Chinese Security Policy: Structure, Power, and Politics (Routledge, 2009) and China in the Era of Xi Jinping: Domestic and Foreign Policy Challenges (Georgetown University Press, 2016). His books and articles have been translated in China, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, and various European countries.

Avery Goldstein: These are complicated questions because, of course, we are only guessing how Trump will actually approach his Asia strategy once he moves beyond the general principles he laid out during the campaign. I would expect that President Trump’s approach to Asia policy will differ significantly from the Reagan approach of “peace through strength” in dealing with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. I think it’s pretty clear that President Trump has a fairly idiosyncratic governing style.

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Gady, Feaver, Ross, and Goldstein | Trump's Strategy for Asia

It’s a lot more public, it’s a lot less formal, and it seems as though he engages in less deliberation with his advisors before making public policy statements.

He definitely does believe that a strong American military presence around the world can ensure American interests, so that is a very general similarity to Reagan’s approach.

But I think it still remains to be seen exactly how that translates into his Asia policy, because there were some signals that he sent during the campaign that he was going to be more demanding of American allies, especially the Japanese, in terms of burden sharing. The important questions are, to what extent is he going to insist on these allies making changes, and of course, are these countries willing to go along with his proposals on alliance policy?

There’s also the possibility that his economic policy and his military security policy in Asia could work at cross-purposes. He has decided to withdraw from the TPP, which was a major step, but it’s also a question of whether there will be trade friction, not just with China, but also with American allies in the region. That certainly was not something that really troubled relations between the United States and its European allies when President Reagan was using a strategy of “peace through strength” against the Soviet Union.

Beyond that is the question of whether a strategy of “peace through strength” is one that will effectively deal with the Chinese in the same way that Reagan dealt with the Soviet Union. I think these are fundamentally different challenges for the United States. If President Trump does try to replay the Reagan approach with the Chinese, I find it implausible that it will be very successful. There are too many overlapping interests between the U.S. and China beyond their disagreements that are going to be compromised, and those kinds of considerations were not in play between the United States and the Soviet Union.

My take on President Trump’s approach so far is that, because of his style of policymaking and making announcements about policy, it’s like no other president’s approach.

There are some people who would draw a parallel with President Nixon’s attempts to appear unpredictable. But clearly, President Nixon went through periods when he was engaged in very serious deliberations with his advisors, who were very experienced in government and foreign policy, whereas many of the people on the Trump team at this point are people with rather limited experience in foreign policy.

[As far as the likelihood of a grand bargain with China], it depends. A grand bargain is probably not in the cards because there are some fundamental disagreements between the U.S. and China that neither side is going to be willing to bargain over. There’s not going to be a grand bargain over Taiwan because, for the Chinese, the bottom line is that Taiwan is something they are not willing to bargain about. It will be impossible forthem to appear to be making concessions on Taiwan to get a better deal, for instance, on trade or the South China Sea/East China Sea disputes. Taiwan is not just a bargaining chip. It is a political entity that has support beyond Taiwan, especially in Washington. There would be resistance in the United States, especially from some in Spring 2017 [109]

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Congress, if it looks like the U.S. is trying to strike a bargain with the Chinese that compromises the interests of the people in Taiwan.

I think that the idea of a grand bargain sounds like it fits with the president’s style, and perhaps appeals to President Trump because it fits into his “brand” as a businessman who knows how to negotiate, but there are big differences between negotiating business deals and negotiating with other countries. The biggest difference is probably that the issues of nationalism and domestic politics on the part of your negotiating counterpart—in this case, the Chinese—come into play in ways that may lead them to do things believed to be against their own interest. The costs at home in terms of domestic political support, or even just support from elements within the political elite in the Communist Party and the military, may make it impossible for the Chinese to bargain over certain things.

During the election it was pretty clear that, no matter who won, the new president would be determined to draw a contrast between their approach to dealing with China, especially in the South China Sea. Both Clinton and Trump saw the approach of the Obama administration as too accommodating to the Chinese. President Trump’s inclination at this point is to try to take a firmer stand. The Chinese understood, even before the election happened, that they were going to face that issue with any new administration. However, there have been some more worrisome developments for the Chinese that they most likely had not anticipated. First were indications that the Trump administration would rethink America’s “One China” policy, and second was now-Secretary of State Tillerson’s testimony about using American military action in the South China Sea to prevent the Chinese from accessing some of the land formations they already occupy. That has been very alarming. The Chinese reaction has been very strong, even indicating that the United States has to think about whether it is willing to risk a military confrontation. The Chinese aren’t hinting about it; they are saying it pretty explicitly.

[In closing,] these are early days in the administration, and we are all extrapolating based on what we think the Trump administration is going to do. One of the possibilities we should keep in mind is that President Trump will change his approach if his style of relying on tweeting in the middle of the night results in resistance and problems that he could have avoided. I do not think it’s likely; I think this is the way he is going to continue to behave. But it is possible that he would change his approach and abandon his Twitter account. Events have a way of forcing administrations to modify their approach. In fact, with every recent administration that has come to power, their Asia policy has changed over the course of the first couple of years. The first year is often rocky. That was true for President Clinton, it was true for President George W. Bush, and I think it’s probably going to be true for President Trump. And even though U.S.-China relations during President Obama’s first year in office went smoothly, shortly thereafter his administration also encountered serious difficulties. Thus, it is likely that whatever China policy the Trump administration ultimately embraces, his team will have to go through what is often a painful learning process about what it takes to manage this key bilateral relationship.

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Gady, Feaver, Ross, and Goldstein | Trump's Strategy for Asia

Avery Goldstein is David M. Knott Professor of Global Politics and International Relations, Director of Center for the Study of Contemporary China, and Associate Director of the Christopher H. Browne Center for International Politics at the University of Pennsylvania. Goldstein’s research focuses on international relations, security studies, and Chinese politics. His books include Rising to the Challenge: China’s Grand Strategy and International Security (Stanford University Press, 2005) and China’s Global Engagement: Cooperation, Competition, and Influence in the 21st Century (Brookings Institution Press, 2017), ed., with Jacques deLisle. His articles have appeared in International Security, Foreign Affairs, International Organization, the Journal of Strategic Studies, China Quarterly, Asian Survey, Comparative Politics, Orbis, Security Studies, and other journals.

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Perception vs. Reality The State of Politics in China An Interview with Andrew J. Nathan

Scheduled to take place later this year, China's Nineteenth Party Congress will attract much attention as party leaders maneuver to determine the country's future leadership and direction. In this wide-ranging interview, Andrew J. Nathan, Class of 1919 Professor of Political Science at Columbia University, examines varying perceptions of China by offering his thoughts on President Xi Jinping, Chinese public opinion, questions of national unity, and the future of China's foreign policy.

Journal: In your 2003 essay titled â&#x20AC;&#x153;Authoritarian Resilience,â&#x20AC;? you stated that the institutionalization of orderly succession processes, meritocratic promotions, and channels of mass participation explained the resilience of the post-1949 Chinese political apparatus. Has your evaluation of the Chinese authority changed in the past ten years? Do you think the government has become more or less resilient?

Nathan: The concept of resilience that I was talking about in 2003 was more retrospective than prospective. It wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t a prediction or forecast that the leadership would survive. But it was an analysis of how it had managed to survive after the setback of 1989, and some of those things that helped the Chinese government survive after 1989 are changing. Things are always changing in politics. One of the things that seems to be changing is the institutionalization of succession, which was really the main point of my 2003 article. I said that this kind of governing structure (the Leninist party-state) is normally characterized by power struggles at the top. There is a lack of institutionalized succession procedures, so the leaders are subject to power struggle over succession.

However, the Chinese had managed to make these informal rules about the top leaders serving two five-year terms and retiring at a certain age, along with how the outgoing leadership should make a collective choice regarding the incoming leadership and how [112] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Nathan | The State of Politics in China

that incoming leadership should be chosen from among people who have served a series of posts in the government over the course of some decades and proved themselves in their careers. So it seems to me that, at this point, the Chinese government still has the meritocratic ladder for careers in the party and a system of orderly succession. But now it looks as though the two five-year term rule may go away. We don’t know for sure. As Xi Jinping is consolidating more and more power and seems to be damaging the former type of collective leadership, many people speculate he is preparing the ground to serve more than two terms. If that happens, then I think the rules of succession will be uncertain, and it opens the way for a power struggle.

Another feature that I pointed to in the 2003 article was the safety-valve institutions such as village elections and appeal methods (shangfang). It seems that, with the authorities cracking down more than before on civil society, this is also becoming a source of possible challenge to Beijing, because the Chinese people won’t feel they have a way of articulating their sense of injustice and grievance. So in that sense, I feel that the leadership is changing in ways that may make it more vulnerable to internal splits or to challenges from civil society. So I would say the Chinese government is less resilient, but I don’t mean it as a prediction, because I think there are so many complicated factors that are hard to predict.

Journal: Let’s talk about President Xi and the changing leadership structure for a moment. In the Sixth Plenum of the 18th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), held in October 2016, Xi was referred to as the “core” of the leadership, a description that had not been applied to his predecessor Hu Jintao. Does this designation suggest a possible breakaway from the post-Mao era tradition of collective rule in the Chinese central leadership?

Nathan: Xi Jinping has come to power at a time when Beijing faces some very sharp challenges that it has to deal with, including economic adjustments. Chinese stateowned enterprises (SOEs) have been under a continuous process of reform since 1979, and that process of reform has reached a place where there are a bunch of very large SOEs that are not operating as efficiently as private enterprises do. Many other problems remain unsolved. For one, the corruption problem has gotten worse in recent years. The military has to take another step upwards in becoming a contemporary military that is smaller, more high-tech, and able to do combined operations. The middle class is growing and the government needs to continue to make itself acceptable to the middle class. Xi Jinping faces a number of really huge challenges that are difficult to overcome because China is a huge country and the organizations that he needs to confront and reform are gigantic, including the SOEs, the military, and the party-state administrative apparatus. So I think he has consolidated power so that he can force reforms down the throats of these large bureaucracies. I don’t think the bureaucracies are opposed to the idea of reform in general. But when they are confronted with the need to make big changes, they resist because they have their own interests, and they worry about disruptions. So Xi needs a lot of power. And that may work if he can make all these reforms happen, but it also bears a huge risk. I think the risk has several aspects.

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keeping control of all these complicated domains. Another risk is the resentment that is engendered by consolidating so much power—resentment among other leaders who themselves are important and powerful people who are being sidelined. So I think there is a risk of a power struggle breaking out because Xi Jinping is rolling back collective leadership.

Journal: In your article “Who is Xi?” you wrote that “Xi’s government behaves as if it faces an existential threat,” but meanwhile, a number of public opinion polls and surveys have shown that Chinese people's level of trust in the government is significantly higher than the world average. If the Chinese government enjoys such high level of support from the population, why does it need to exert tighter control on civil society?

Is there a perceptual disparity between the level of threat Beijing perceives and the level of threat these public opinion polls suggest? Do these opinion polls accurately reflect the reality of the CCP’s legitimacy when universal suffrage on the national level is absent?

Nathan: This is such a puzzling question. You may know I wrote an article called “The Puzzle of the Chinese Middle Class”1 which in part addresses this puzzle with respect to the middle class in particular. We don’t know the answer. Survey research consistently shows a high level of trust especially in central government institutions.

However, survey research by nature, especially when you have a questionnaire and you ask people would you agree or disagree on some questions, doesn’t have the capability to probe into the complicated layers that any person’s attitude consists of. So I don’t know the answer. But I speculate that when you ask a person how the government is doing, especially about the central government instead of the local government, people tend to think they are better off because they think that the economy is growing—“my life is better now than it was five years ago, I am making more money, I bought a car, I bought an apartment, or I sent my child to work at a factory and she is sending money home.” Also, the person being surveyed may think, “I read in the newspapers that China is standing up to foreign enemies and I am proud to be Chinese.” So then they say they endorse the government.

However, this attitude is somewhat fragile and the relationship is provisional. When something bad happens, for example when the economy slows down, the person loses a job, encounters some bad consumer products, or the person’s baby gets sick from pollution, or something bad happens in foreign policy such as some clashes in the South China Sea or the East China Sea and the Chinese military doesn’t do well, then there is another layer of attitudes that comes out, as it did in 1989 when people were thinking that life in China was very hard. My point is that people have other attitudes that are critical, and the survey research may not capture these when it asks questions about how the central government is doing. That can easily come out if something goes wrong. This is how I speculate that we can understand this paradox.

Andrew J. Nathan, “The Puzzle of the Chinese Middle Class,” Journal of Democracy (April 2016): 5-19.

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Nathan | The State of Politics in China

I think Xi Jinping perhaps sees it in that way—that the people support the government only provisionally as long as the government is delivering and performing. Xi may not think his people support his government in any deep way, and if the government were to take the lid off and just let every lawyer sue those that they want to sue, let everybody run for office, and let every journalist report critical things about government policies, there could be a quick deflation of the government’s prestige. So the government may feel the need to keep a lid on. Chinese leaders don’t want to show any weakness, because they feel that people will take advantage of that. As I mentioned before, Xi Jinping is trying at the same time to control the SOEs, the military, the party-state apparatus, and the corrupt bureaucrats. I think he has the feeling that these corrupt bureaucrats are all opportunists. Xi may feel that they joined the party because the party was in power but are not really committed to what the party stands for. They just took the easy road. As soon as they perceive the party as weak, they will take advantage. So I think that Xi Jinping wants to crack down on civil society in general because of that fragility or contingency of public support and that fear that if he were to take the lid off, the people and the bureaucrats would defect. There is that belief that the Chinese government does not enjoy a robust or deeply rooted form of public support.

Journal: In your book China's Search for Security, which you co-authored with Andrew Scobell, you categorized China's foreign policy environment into “four rings” with the first ring being China’s interior regions that experience the “problem of stateness.”

Since the publication of this book, what has changed in Beijing's policy toward its “First Ring,” especially in light of the growing anti-Chinese sentiment amid both Taiwan's 2016 election and Hong Kong's 2014 pro-democracy Occupy Central Movement? Why do we see the surge of anti-Chinese sentiment in both regions?

Nathan: Both of these populations developed distinctive identities throughout history.

In the Hong Kong case, I guess I would characterize the identity in 1997 as an identity that said, “Yes, we are Chinese. We are willing to be part of China, and we are culturally Chinese, and we feel pretty okay about being part of a rising China, but at the same time, we have a distinctive local identity that prioritizes things like rule of law, freedom of speech, and cosmopolitan exposure to Western culture.” So there was an optimism in 1997 by most people, although there were some pessimists. I think as time has gone by, Beijing has not given enough respect to that independent identity of the Hong Kong people. But I can understand why, because there are pan-democrats in Hong Kong who want to press forward with democratization of elections. The authorities in Beijing feel that if they are going to democratize the election of the Legislative Council and the Chief Executive, then things are going to potentially get out of control. So Beijing decided to be risk-averse, as they generally do. Beijing basically did not trust the Hong Kong people with the democratic reforms that had been promised in principle in the Basic Law, at least in the way that they were understood by the Hong Kong people. So the simple answer is that Beijing decided not to take the risk of trusting the Hong Kongers, and the Hong Kong people felt like this showed a lack of respect for their identity and that it represented a threatening future where Hong Kong would be treated the same as other parts of China with less rule of law and less freedom than Hong Kong was used to. This has caused the situation to get worse and to polarize.

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Not everybody in Hong Kong feels this way, but apparently more and more people feel this way, especially among the young people. So it is going in the wrong direction.

The same logic applies to Taiwan. It basically comes down to a lack of respect by Beijing for local identity, given the reality that the people in Taiwan feel they have their own identity. A lot of people used to feel that they were both Chinese and Taiwanese and that the Taiwanese part of that identity was their globalized identity and part of their global outlook, partly due to the fact that they created the first Chinese democracy. Again, policymakers in Beijing felt that they couldn’t trust the Taiwanese people, and again I understand why that is, because the Taiwanese mostly did not want to unify with the PRC. Therefore, Beijing has tried to use all kinds of quasi-coercive methods—not military force, but diplomatic isolation, economic pressure, and the threat of military force—to keep Taiwan from, as they would see it, going off the rails. This computes for people in Taiwan as an insult to them, and it has polarized the situation for probably a majority of Taiwan’s population.

Based on this analysis, I believe Beijing has mishandled these two situations. But I understand why they handled it the way they did, otherwise it would have been really risky for Beijing. So, in that sense, you cannot really blame Beijing but rather view the situation as a tragic circumstance from the point of view of everyone involved. And it is not only China. This is a problem that you have all around the world right now. Right now in the United States we’re having this problem of voter suppression. In the United States, the Republican Party is afraid to trust the African-American and Hispanic voters and are trying to keep them from turning out in large numbers to cast votes, and that polarizes relations with those populations. It is very hard to find that point of mutual trust among diverse identity groups in any political system.

Journal: Why do Taiwanese, such as the protestors of the Sunflower Movement, see trade with the mainland as disrespectful to their independent identity?

Nathan: You raise a good question: if Beijing is allowing the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), which benefits the Taiwanese economy, why is that disrespectful? I think the Sunflower Movement occurred because a section of the young people in Taiwan felt that Ma Ying-jeou was using the ECFA process to put the Taiwanese economy too much under the control of the mainland. They saw this as political rather than economic, that Beijing and Ma together were cooperating to create more and more integration between the two economies that would restrict the freedom of Taiwan to follow its own path because they would become hostages. I think that was the underlying issue. Of course they viewed the economic relationship within a wider framework of Beijing saying that Taiwan cannot have a choice of independence, Beijing saying that we have a military option, Beijing saying that Taiwan cannot join the World Health Organization as a member—so [the protestors] would put that in the context of all of those actions. If you speak to mainland China experts on Taiwan, they would say look, we are fine with Taiwan choosing any option as long as it is part of China, and we are very open-minded about it. But in Taiwan, it is not perceived in that way. It is perceived as the need to recognize the 1992 consensus. I call it a tragic [116] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Nathan | The State of Politics in China

circumstance because from the mainland point of view, Beijing is trying to articulate a policy that is as flexible as it can possibly be. But from the Taiwanese point of view, it seems as if the mainland will not allow Taiwan to determine its own fate.

Journal: As you have pointed out in the past, mainland Chinese identity also plays a part as well in these issues. In China's Search for Security, you identified Chinese nationalism as a key driver in Beijing's foreign policy. Do you think the Chinese people’s nationalism is fueled by the CCP’s official narrative of the “century of humiliation” in the Chinese education system, or has it naturally developed in the context of China’s growing economic and military might? Can we compare Chinese nationalism with “American exceptionalism?”

Nathan: I think it is fueled by both the century of humiliation and [China’s] growing might. Both of these things are disseminated by the Chinese propaganda institutions, but they are sort of opposite sides of the same coin—that is, being proud of the economic and military might because it represents such a change from the century of humiliation. I think that if there were no propaganda about the century of humiliation, that if the government stopped emphasizing it, and if textbooks just told history as it was, it would still be there because it was indeed a century of humiliation. So I think both of these things are there. But I think the more powerful of the two elements is the sense of economic and military might. I think for those seeing Xi Jinping host the G20 conference, or having the Olympics in Beijing, or for a Chinese middle class person to go to New York and to go sight-seeing and buy things on Fifth Avenue, it is great. And I think people are very proud of that, and I agree with them. It is a great thing.

Nationalism is a word that covers a lot of different things. So the kind of pride that I was just describing is a nationalism which does not threaten anyone else; it is pride in your own country that is very justified. And then you have the other kind of nationalism that appears on some websites in China that call for an immediate attack on Taiwan or a military battle with the United States, which is a kind of xenophobic, anti-foreign, militaristic nationalism that is much more threatening. So there are different types of nationalism, and all of them exist. I mentioned two, but I think you could slice it up even more and identify many different streams of nationalist thinking that are popular among different parts of the population. And they are all there, and I think they all draw strength from these different factors that you mentioned.

Now, can you compare that to American exceptionalism? On one level, I think every country is exceptional. There is French exceptionalism and Russian exceptionalism in the sense that each of these countries has a national narrative, national identity, an idea of the superiority of its culture, and a sense of its contribution to global culture. In terms of the content of American exceptionalism, there exists this idea that we are the best economic and political model for all of humanity. We tell other people what to do, and nobody tells us what to do because we have the answer. We are the cutting edge of civilization. If this “city on a hill” idea is your definition of American exceptionalism, then I think that the mainstream of China does not yet have this idea.

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There are some people in China who have that kind of idea—that the Chinese model is a model for others. There is also the view, which has deep historical roots, that China is the most civilized place in the whole world, and that other peoples will benefit from learning from them, especially these ideas about correct human ethics and human relationships and so on. And, now that the Western model is having some economic and political trouble, there are some people saying that the Chinese economic and political model—a kind of authoritarian capitalism—maybe is the answer, or is the better system.

But I am not sure that there are many people in China who think that every country in the world should adopt the Chinese system, from Saudi Arabia to Venezuela. At this point, the official concept stated by the Chinese government is that there are many different civilizational traditions in the world that are equally respectable, and that theirs is one. I do not know of any serious Chinese thinker who says that all countries should have a big bureaucracy, meritocracy, state-owned enterprises, a ruling communist party, and all of the other things that China has. Whereas in the United States, there is the idea that all of these different countries should have a two-party system, separation of powers, capitalism, and the free market. So in that sense, I do not think that China has reached the point where they believe that other countries should model themselves on the Chinese system, and in that way it is very different from the view that many Americans hold.

Journal: Turning away from nationalism and towards geopolitical issues, has China become more assertive in protecting its enunciated core national interest of territorial integrity since Xi's ascendancy to the top leadership role? What is the overarching Chinese grand strategy in the South and East China Seas?

Nathan: I think the Chinese strategy is the following: having a dominant or very strong naval presence and reducing the American presence in the “near seas” is crucial for Chinese security. And as you know, the United States has a very large naval and air presence all around the maritime periphery of China. We have a lot of ships, a lot of planes, and a lot of personnel in Japan and South Korea. We sell weapons to Taiwan. We have forces in the Philippines. We have military cooperation with Singapore, Vietnam, and so forth. Our ships are operating in the South and East China Seas all the time. So, the Chinese feel that there is too much of an American presence in these areas, and that they must reduce that presence and increase their own.

And then they look at the strategic balance, where their economy has been growing very fast, and they have been modernizing their navy very quickly. Meanwhile, the American economy has been recovering slowly from a crisis, and our naval forces are actually reducing in size on a global level. They feel that we have a weak president [referring to President Obama], and that we have a weak political system with a divided administration versus Congress [under the Obama administration]. We have these chaotic presidential elections. So they think that this is a moment in history where the American system is weak, and where their own system, their own resources and military, are increasing. So it is a good time to try to take steps to change the balance of [118] Georgetown Journal of Asian Affairs

Nathan | The State of Politics in China

power in the near seas. Not to start a war. Not to get the Americans completely out.

Not to necessarily pick a fight with Vietnam, the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, or any other countries, but to change the relative balance of power in the region. They try to weaken the U.S.-Japan alliance as well. That is the overarching strategy.

I think the way that they seek to do that is on a careful step-by-step basis. They have built up seven sand islands on rocks that they already controlled. Nobody can do anything about it because they are not driving some other country off of those rocks and making a war out of it. The United States is not a claimant to those rocks and does not have a valid legal reason to use military force to prevent China from doing it. They are just building up what they already have. And in the Senkaku/Diaoyu area, where they feel that they have a valid territorial claim, they have increased their presence with more ships, more planes, more fishing boats, and more coastguard ships without triggering a war because it has not come to the point of a war-type crisis. And I think that is their strategy: to gradually increase their deployments in the near seas without creating or triggering a war, and to keep up the pressure on the other side, on the U.S. in particular, with the belief that sooner or later the U.S. will quietly reduce their presence. In their view, the tide of history suggests that the U.S. is far away and short on money, and that it will reduce its presence. I think that is the strategy.

Journal: While China may be taking a careful approach to its strategy with the U.S., historically speaking, when a rising power confronts a ruling power, more often than not the two powers come into conflict, a phenomenon known as the Thucydides Trap.

In your opinion, will the United States and China fall into the Thucydides Trap?

Nathan: I do not think that there will be a war between the United States and China.

I think that, first of all, there are so many common interests between the two countries.

Secondly, a war between two such large countries with nuclear weapons would be really unwise and against the interests of both countries. Third, the conflicts of interest that are very real and important between the two countries are certainly there, but they are not existential. The United States is not planning to invade China, and China is not planning to invade the United States. I think the Chinese leadership believes that the United States would like to overthrow the Communist Party, and I think that the United States would prefer if the Chinese Communist Party would reform itself into something that we could recognize as a type of democracy. But the United States is not undertaking any effective measures to overthrow the Chinese regime. I do not think there is an existential threat that would make it necessary for either side to go to war.

There are some serious frictions of the type I was describing beforeâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;for example, the United States military presence in the South China Sea and East China Seaâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;that cause tension and stress. There are economic issues. There are human rights issues.

There are all of these big issues. But I think that they will be managed by a process of partly negotiation and trust-building, partly testing, some sort of posturing and friction, and maybe accidents or military incidents. But if an incident occurs, for example if two ships were to collide in the South China Sea, or a Japanese and Chinese ship were to fire at one another in the Senkaku/Diaoyu area, I would expect both sides to Spring 2017 [119]

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be keen to de-escalate such a conflict. So I am optimistic that there will not be a war in the foreseeable future.

Does the United States welcome China’s peaceful rise? In my opinion, it really does welcome it in the hope that China will be stable and prosperous, contributing to the stability of the region and to economic prosperity in the U.S. and worldwide. But that does not mean that the issues that I mentioned will go away. The United States has big problems with China. It has problems especially with the fact that foreign enterprises are not able to compete on an equal basis in the Chinese market. And we have issues with China’s attempts to export its thought control to the West through influence over Hollywood movies, efforts to control Western journalism, and so on.

So there are some things that we do not welcome that are going to be issues. But not to the level of warfare.

Andrew J. Nathan is Class of 1919 Professor of Political Science at Columbia University. He studies the politics and foreign policy of China, political participation and political culture in Asia, and the international human rights regime. Nathan’s books include China’s Search for Security (Columbia University Press, 2012), and Will China Democratize? (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013). He has served at Columbia as director of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute and as chair of the Political Science Department. He is currently chair of the Morningside Institutional Review Board (IRB). Off campus, he is a member of the boards of the National Endowment for Democracy and Human Rights in China. He is the regular Asia and Pacific book reviewer for Foreign Affairs.

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Ling | Internationalizing International Relations

Internationalizing International Relations Developments in Asia An Interview with L.H.M. Ling

The study of International Relations (IR) is almost by definition concerned with relations among nation-states. In the past two or three decades, debates have abounded that the discipline of IR does not represent nations or states globally and is predominantly influenced by Western philosophies and histories. As one of the world’s most densely-populated regions containing the fastest-growing economies, Asia is a good starting point in the effort to internationalize the study of IR. The Journal has invited L.H.M. Ling, Professor of International Affairs at The New School, to broaden the intellectual discussion on international affairs.

Journal: What prompted your inquiry into alternative theories of international relations?

Ling: During my graduate studies, I often thought of this grocer who owned a small shop around the corner from our house in Bangkok. He probably had no more than an elementary school education. Nonetheless, he spoke several languages fluently: Thai, Burmese, Laotian, Mandarin, Minnan Chaozhouhua, and a smattering of other local dialects. He used all these languages daily to buy and sell goods. He also needed them to get along with neighbors.

My circumstances differed from his quite a bit, but I still felt our lifeworlds matched.

I, too, needed multiple languages to survive in multiple worlds. When my family lived in Saigon, for example, we spoke Mandarin and Cantonese at home while honoring Confucian rites like kowtowing to our parents on the Lunar New Year. At school, we spoke French and prayed “au nom du père, du fils, et du saint esprit…” (in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit) every morning before class. The same applied Spring 2017 [121]

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whether we lived in Bangkok or Tokyo, New York or Ottawa.

Later on, I realized that multiplicity characterized the world at large. Over the millennia, people have moved and mixed. Even in imperial Beijing, the supposed center of the Center, several linguistic communities jostled for attention in daily life. Manchus rubbed shoulders with Mongolians, Koreans with Japanese, Arabs with Persians. It was only when colonialism and imperialism became state policy from the sixteenth to early twentieth centuries that singularity became the standard of the day, creating the conditions of what Gramsci called hegemony.

IR theory reflected such hegemony. None of the hallowed IR theorists I read had grown up outside the country of their birth, worked overseas, or knew a second language fluently. This posed a serious problem for me. Languages were not just an instrument of communication—they revealed worlds. Simple forms of address like “uncle” or “aunt” for one’s elders, even when unrelated, convey a social ontology radically different from that where everyone, even strangers, is called by a first name. Not knowing that we live in a world-of-worlds, yet pontificating with certainty about it, especially in perilous terms such as war and peace, made these IR theorists terrifying to me. In world politics, ignorance reinforced by arrogance invariably leads to death and destruction.

I soon came upon a crossroads. Either I would deny my upbringing and accept the hegemony of IR theory or I would embrace my upbringing and forge another path. I chose the latter.

Journal: Why is theory important to IR students, especially in our society today?

Ling: Everything comes from theory. It may have developed in conjunction with practice but a theoretical framework emerges nonetheless. Even those who claim to be “pragmatists” or “realists” and who deal with the “real world” are only working from a theory of pragmatism, realism, and the real world. You cannot have one without the other. Otherwise, we wade in chaos.

Journal: Why should the policy and political science communities consider the concept of “the Other” in the 21st century?

Ling: Just read the news. You’ll find that lots of people around the globe are “mad as hell and won’t take it anymore.” It’s not simply a matter of needing a job or having a stable government. They’ve been robbed, bombed, and debased for centuries and over generations—typically by the same groups who exploited them yesterday but, today, want to keep out Others because “they will take away our jobs.” History affirms that suppression and eradication won’t work. There is no brutality that can compare with the genocides of the conquistadores in the New World or the Belgians in the Congo.

Yet, as the Andean activist Humberto Cholango declared in a letter to Pope Benedict XVI in 2007: “We are still here.” The world—and IR—needs to take note.

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have justified “taming” and “harnessing” Nature supposedly to benefit “mankind” but, really, for their own pockets and profiles. To preserve our planet, not just the lives on it, we must find a way to not just “consider the concept of the Other” but also get out of the Self versus Other binary altogether.1 Journal: In 1977, Stanley Hoffman published a famous essay entitled “An American Social Science: International Relations.” In your opinion, is IR still an American social science? What has changed in the last three decades or so, with regards to IR theory?

Ling: In a sense, IR is still an American social science. The U.S. intellectual establishment dominates IR in terms of methods and queries, not to mention funding and other kinds of institutional support. And English remains the lingua franca of contemporary social science. But I don’t see the issue in narrow, nationalistic terms like Hoffman did.

I see it more as a global infrastructure of thinking and doing, being and relating that comes from what I call Hypermasculine Eurocentric Whiteness or HEW. It normalizes what the West considers the “standard of civilization” (hypermasculinity, Eurocentrism, and whiteness) against everything and everybody else. Only by recognizing HEW as ideology, and not biology only, can we hold comprador states, organizations, and individuals to account. By comprador, I mean those entities or persons that may not qualify as male, European, or white but that still uphold the norms, practices, and interests of HEW. Still, IR has changed. To learn how, I suggest a recent chapter.2 Journal: Your research has looked at how “Eurocentric” IR theorists have historically constructed a hypermasculinized West and a hyperfeminized East. Could you talk a bit more about how this might apply today to how Western actors frame their engagement with Asian countries? Building on this question, how do you think academics or even policymakers can better come to terms with that history?

Ling: Let me address the second question first. As many postcolonial scholars have shown, Eurocentric theorizing in IR comes from internal sources. Ashis Nandy’s work, especially The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self under Colonialism (2010), shows how the British hypermasculinized (his term) the Self to justify conquering people they didn’t know and claiming resources they didn’t own. Domestic policies previewed this kind of consumption of the Other to benefit the Self. Note, for example, how the English historically treated the Irish, the Welsh, and the Scots. Even today, local populations still harbor desires to break away from the “United Kingdom.” Accordingly, academics and policymakers need to renew their understanding of relations between See, for example, L.H.M. Ling, “After Binaries: Multiplicity and Difference in IR Theorizing,” paper delivered at an International Workshop on “Theorising China’s Rise In and Beyond International Relations,” Deakin University, Melbourne, 31 March-1 April 2016.

2 L.H.M. Ling, “Don’t Flatter Yourself: World Politics As We Know It Is Changing and So Must Disciplinary IR,” in Synne L. Dyvik, Jan Selby, and Rorden Wilkinson (eds.), What Is the Point of IR?, (London: Routledge, 2017), 135-146.

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Self and Other at home before they can apply any insights from such to places and people elsewhere. For IR theorists in the United States, this means paying closer attention to historical relations between the U.S. government and the peoples of the First Nations, those who were enslaved from Africa, and immigrants as a whole before they start theorizing about “the world.”

As for your first question, one can find assumptions of a hypermasculinized West versus a hyperfeminized East in various venues and modalities. These range from economic development to foreign policy to domestic policy to…you name it. For example, economic development’s surface rhetoric might proclaim: “Man up with our policies and strategies so you can be more like us!” However, a second message underlies the first: “You can never catch up because you don’t have the balls to do so.” This second message rang most loudly during the Asian financial crisis (1997-1998). Clearly, the liberal press intoned, “crony capitalism” rotted these economies because “they can’t really be like us (wink wink).”3 If states like North Korea refuse to abide by rules set down by the “international community,” then they are conveniently coded as hysterical, unruly females. They are “backward,” “rogue,” or “failed” states that require manly supervision. “See,” the West shrugs, “we have no choice but to intervene.” If a state like China does catch up and according to all the criteria set by HEW, then a third rhetoric emerges. “China is not civilized (manly) like us—just look at its (perverse) human rights record—so we need to stay in charge.”4 Let’s abandon this rhetorical game. It’s no good for either Self or Other, as the nineteenth and twentieth centuries have amply demonstrated. Let’s stop digging the same holes.

Journal: One of your works is entitled Asia in International Relations (2017). How well is Asia represented in traditional (as versus critical) IR theories? What different perspectives can Asian IR theories offer to world politics?

Ling: In this edited volume, we had gathered several authors from Asia and elsewhere to discuss what it means to take Asia seriously in IR—and that begins with contesting how “Asia” has been defined. In so doing, and here I cite from the book’s blurb, we “refram[e] old problems in new ways with the possibility of transforming them, rather than recycling the same old approaches with the same old ‘intractable’ outcomes.”

Again, I urge your readers to look into the book to find out what difference this approach makes.

For more on this, see: L.H.M. Ling, “Cultural Chauvinism and the Liberal International Order: ‘West versus Rest’ in Asia’s Financial Crisis,” in Geeta Chowdhary and Sheila Nair, eds., Power, Postcolonialism, and International Relations: Reading Race, Gender, Class (London: Routledge, 2002), 115-141.

4 See: L.H.M. Ling, “Worlds Beyond Westphalia: Daoist Dialectics and the ‘China Threat,’” Review of International Studies 39, no.3 (July 2013): 549-568.

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Ling | Internationalizing International Relations

Journal: In the past decade, much has happened in Asia that has repercussions worldwide. In your view, what have been the landmark developments in Asia that have shaped its landscape in the past decade? Looking into the future, with the surge of nationalism, protectionism and populism particularly in Europe and the Americas, how would you foresee the development of Asia in the next ten years?

Ling: First of all, no one can “predict” the future. Secondly, to think that one could, comes from the hubris of colonial management. It rationalizes social science into speculations of “prediction” so as to “control” the natives. To me, this method of dealing with the world, let alone oneself, is neither possible nor desirable.

Journal: The rejection of globalization you predicted in Postcolonial International Relations Conquest and Desire between Asia and the West (2002) seems particularly prescient in the wake of President Trump’s recently enacted ban on immigrants from seven predominantly Muslim countries. However, the ban seems to originate from a fear of physical danger in the form of terrorism, not an economic dependence due to globalized trade. Is this an unexpected development?

Ling: Let’s not be fooled by the ban’s rhetoric. The fear of terrorism comes from a sense of economic dependence due to globalized trade. To put it bluntly, it’s no longer the heyday of Western colonialism and imperialism when the white man always wins.

Today, the formerly colonized are actors in their own right, making headway under the banner of Neoliberal Capitalism. That’s the scary part for former colonizers. Otherwise, why Brexit?

Journal: You argue that the rejection of globalization signaled by the election of Trump and Brexit are rooted in the history of colonialism and neoliberal capitalism. Can you elaborate more on how this transpired? How can scholars and policymakers envision an integrated world that avoids alienation and exploitation of the past?

Ling: Some on the Left claim that Trump and Brexit merely represent extensions of the past. That is, the Westphalian-capitalist state welcomed immigrants only in so much as they could provide cheap labor for booming economies. Once the economy stops booming then the national attitude of hospitality towards Others also ends.

This argument, however, doesn’t get to the heart of the matter: that is, why is there no learning by the state? We all know, for example, that the United States started out by treating African slaves as three-fifths of a human being. Would a return to that mean the United States is simply continuing its historical trajectory? Bill Clinton as President of the United States apologized to Japanese-Americans for the state’s internment of their elders during World War II. Why does this not serve as a reminder, if not precedent, for current policies?

To simply say that self-interested, exploitative policies have happened before may be intellectually satisfying to certain elites. But it risks normalizing what is happening.

What’s more important, to my mind, is to examine why the present is not held to Sprin 2017 [125]

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account for the hard-won victories of the past.

L.H.M. Ling (凌焕銘) is Professor of International Affairs at The New School in New York City. She is the author of four books: Postcolonial International Relations: Conquest and Desire between Asia and the West (Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), Transforming World Politics: From Empire to Multiple Worlds (co-authored with A.M. Agathangelou, Routledge, 2009); The Dao of World Politics: Towards a Post-Westphalian, Worldist International Relations (Routledge, 2014); and Imagining World Politics: Sihar & Shenya, A Fable for Our Times (Routledge, 2014). Two books are forthcoming: A Worldly World Order: Epistemic Compassion for International Relations (Oxford University Press) and Between India and China: An Ancient Dialectic for Contemporary World Politics (co-authored with Payal Banerjee, Rowman & Littlefield). Professor Ling’s articles have appeared in International Feminist Journal of Politics, International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, International Studies Quarterly, and Globalizations, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, among others.

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Front cover photo: A visitor looks at portraits of late former â&#x20AC;&#x153;comfort womenâ&#x20AC;? at the House of Sharing, a nursing home and museum in Toechon, South Korea (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon).

ALSO IN THIS ISSUE China’s Public Security Intelligence: Progress, Challenges, and Prospects Zi Yang

INTERVIEWS WITH Franz-Stefan Gady, Peter Feaver, Robert Ross & Avery Goldstein on President Trump’s Strategy for Asia Andrew J. Nathan on The State of Politics in China L.H.M. Ling on International Relations and Developments in Asia

Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service Asian Studies Program http://asianstudies.georgetown.edu

ISSN 2376-8002