‘Thoroughly reforming them towards a healthy heart attitude’: China’s political re-education campaign in Xinjiang

ABSTRACT

Since spring 2017, the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China has witnessed the emergence of an unprecedented re-education campaign. According to media and informant reports, untold thousands of Uyghurs and other Muslims have been and are being detained in clandestine political re-education facilities, with major implications for society, local economies and ethnic relations. Considering that the Chinese state is currently denying the very existence of these facilities, this paper investigates publicly available evidence from official sources, including government websites, media reports and other Chinese internet sources. First, it briefly charts the history and present context of political re-education. Second, it looks at the recent evolution of re-education in Xinjiang in the context of ‘de-extremification’ work. Finally, it evaluates detailed empirical evidence pertaining to the present re-education drive. With Xinjiang as the ‘core hub’ of the Belt and Road Initiative, Beijing appears determined to pursue a definitive solution to the Uyghur question.     

The Wang Lixiong prophecy: ‘Palestinization’ in Xinjiang and the consequences of Chinese state securitization of religion

ABSTRACT

In Your Western Regions, My Turkestan (2007), Chinese dissident Wang Lixiong warned of the ‘Palestinization’ of the Xinjiang question, defined as reaching ‘a critical point in time’ where Uyghurs and Han Chinese enter an interminable ‘ethnic war’. Following the knife attack on Han civilians in Kunming (2014), seen by many as an act of Uyghur terror, Wang reminded us that he had foreseen this trajectory seven years earlier. This article outlines Wang’s six interpretations of ‘Palestinization’ in the Xinjiang context, then shows how tightened regulations on religion and intrusive religious policing was the main catalyst for local retaliatory violence in 2012–2015. I contend that state securitization of religion was counterproductive, heightening societal insecurity and promoting inter-ethnic conflict between Uyghur and Han communities. In Chen Quanguo’s era of ‘de-extremification’, the state’s purported attempt to ‘purify’ Islamic practice continues to be experienced on the ground as violation of pure, halal space.     

Domestic politics of Chinese foreign policy: where will Xi Jinping bring China?

ABSTRACT

Xi Jinping has concentrated his power since he acceded to the Chinese presidency. Where will Xi bring China? In this review essay I discuss four single-authored books – one in English and three in Japanese – to explore security implications of Xi’s reform and foreign policies. In her recent book, Elizabeth Economy is critical of Xi, arguing that he is turning away from Deng Xiaoping’s reform and internationalist policies. The three Japanese China specialists concur, and further highlight the interconnectedness of domestic politics and international relations. In sum, the four books show that Xi has struggled to commit to the state-owned enterprise reform and to cooperative foreign policy due to Chinese domestic politics, and as a result, has threatened regional security in the Asia-Pacific.     

Development for all? State schemes,security, and marginalization in Kashgar,Xinjiang

ABSTRACT

The past decade of development schemes has been experienced very differently by various groups within the city of Kashgar in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China. The recent exacerbation of social inequalities, stratification, and tensions in Kashgar is a structural consequence of two phases of government policies: an accelerated formalization of the economy and remodelling of the city-scape as part of modernistic development implemented before 2014, followed by a phase of strong securitization. Based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork between 2009 and 2017, this paper analyzes the situation, reactions, and strategies of different groups of Uyghur residents of Kashgar to cope with the changing socio-economic and political environment.     

Peak Oil as a stimulus for a green economy transition in South Africa: Alternative liquid fuel and transport options

Abstract

While the arguments in favour of a green economy often rest on the need to reduce environmental damage, mitigate climate change and create environmentally friendly jobs, this article argues that the inevitable and possibly imminent peak and decline in world oil production provides another strong rationale for green economy policies and investments in South Africa. The South African economy has a high degree of reliance on imported petroleum fuels and evidence suggests that oil price and supply shocks – resulting from diminishing world oil exports and a decline in the energy return on investment for oil globally – are likely to have a debilitating socioeconomic impact under business-as-usual policies and behaviour patterns. Two broad strategies for mitigating the impact of increasing world oil scarcity and oil price shocks are considered. The first evaluates the prospects for developing indigenous sources of liquid fuels, including coal-to-liquids, gas-to-liquids and biofuels, and finds that there are significant resource and environmental risks associated with these options. The second strategy involves short-term measures to reduce demand for liquid transport fuels together with a long-term shift toward electrified mass transport, supported by accelerated investments in renewable energy. The latter strategy is argued to be compatible with and necessary for a societal transition towards a green economy.     

Securitization,insecurity and conflict in contemporary Xinjiang: has PRC counter-terrorism evolved into state terror?

ABSTRACT

In the Introduction to this special issue, I first provide an overview of the programme of 'de-extremification' and mass internment in Xinjiang since early 2017. I then situate this development against the ‘ideological turn’ in Chinese Communist Party policy under President Xi Jinping, highlighting the new emphasis on stability maintenance and ideational governance. Next, I explore experiences of (in)security in Uyghur communities in- and outside of Xinjiang in the era of internment to consider how far PRC counter-terrorism initiatives have now evolved into state terror. In doing so, I apply Ruth Blakeley's (2012) definition of state terror as a deliberate act of violence against civilians, or threat of violence where a climate of fear is already established by earlier acts of violence; as perpetrated by actors on behalf of or in conjunction with the state; as intended to induce extreme fear in target observers who identify with the victim; and as forcing the target audience to consider changing its behaviour. Finally, I discuss the six contributions to the special issue.     

Huawei and ZTE in Malaysia: The Localisation of Chinese Transnational Enterprises

ABSTRACT

While much research has been undertaken on firms’ internationalisation, much less has been written on internationalisation’s other side, localisation. Yet with the rise of emerging economies, especially Chinese transnational corporations, localisation has become an increasingly significant. This article examines the localisation experience of two Chinese telecommunications enterprises – Huawei and ZTE – in Malaysia. By holding these factors constant (the ceteris paribus assumption), several dimensions of localisation are revealed. They are product, workforce, technology, organisation and management. Firm-specific factors matter both in accounting for inter-firm similarities and differences in the manner they localised. Enterprise ownership is also important in explaining firm performance and host countries’ perception of these firms. Leadership styles of these enterprises’ founders also matter. Together, these factors affect the differential pace of firms’ internationalisation and localisation.     

Sovereignty–Security Nexus,Domestic Constraints,and the Taiwan Independence Policy (1988–2010)

Abstract

This article explains the rise and fall of the so-called Taiwan independence policy during the period of 1988–2010. It defines the Taiwan independence policy as an internal political move by the Taiwanese government to establish Taiwan as a separate and sovereign political entity on the world stage. It reviews two existing prevailing theses – electoral politics and shifting identity – and points out their weaknesses, the former's being its indeterminacy and unfalsifiability, and the latter's being its inadequacy to explain policy change. A new explanation focusing on relative power shift (military balance, alliance strength, and diplomatic standing) and domestic constraints (resource and political constraints) is then proposed to explain the rise and fall of the Taiwan independence policy. A brief examination of the 1988–2010 cross-strait history lends strong support to the theory.     

Native rhythms in the city: embodied refusal among Uyghur male migrants in Ürümchi

Over the past two decades, state-directed Han settlement and capitalist development in the Uyghur homeland in Chinese Central Asia have uprooted thousands of Uyghurs, causing them to move to the city. In this article, I explore how low-income male Uyghur migrants and Uyghur culture producers build a durable existence despite these challenges. Based on analysis of migrant responses to the Uyghur-language urban fiction and indigenous music as well as ethnographic observations of Uyghur migrants from Southern Xinjiang, I argue that indigenous knowledge provides underemployed male Uyghurs a means to refuse the alienating effects of settler colonialism and economic development. By broadening the scope of what counts as ‘resistance’ to Chinese attempts to eliminate aspects of Uyghur society, I show that ‘refusal’ can be a generative way of embodying sovereignty, particularly when confronted by structural violence.     

Building transregional and historical connections: Uyghur architecture in urban Xinjiang

Economic investment and the growing immigration of Han Chinese from other parts of China to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region over the last three decades have increased the presence of eastern Chinese architecture in the urban built environment. This paper refers to the making of, residing in and speaking about the materiality of urban architecture by Turkic-speaking Muslim Uyghur middle-class actors. Besides creating personal comfort through Uyghur elements they draw ethnic boundaries to the Han Chinese. In highlighting the materiality of architecture, the analysis expands beyond the individual house by investigating the ways in which urban architecture offers spaces of meaning for social and ethnic communities. Based on ethnographic data, this paper argues that due to the political context and the state-controlled urban development with Chinese characteristics, urban Uyghur architecture was relegated from the outside of houses to an emphasis on interior decoration.     

The Possibility of Liminal Colonial Subjecthood: Yayutz Bleyh and the Search for Subaltern Histories in the Japanese Empire

ABSTRACT

This article examines whether writing histories of colonial subjects is possible. Traditional colonial histories subsume the colonial subject's individual history under a larger narrative of subjugation, which often does not allow room for people to exist outside the dichotomized role of collaborator/resister. This approach has left a gap in the scholarship for histories of colonial subjects whose lives do not easily fit either category. This article addresses this gap by detailing the life of Yayutz Bleyh, an Atayal woman who became one of the most important participants in the Japanese colonial administration of Aboriginal Affairs in Taiwan. For over six years, the author gathered fragmented pieces of information regarding Yayutz from a multitude of sources – visuals, as well as oral and written materials from inside and outside the colonial archive – in order to sketch the contours of an extraordinary woman and her life. Through the process of filtering these disparate sources, it was the silences regarding certain issues and the discrepancies that emerged among sources that proved to be the most revealing about Yayutz as someone who straddled both the world of the colonizer and the colonized.     

Track 2 Security Dialogue in the Asia-Pacific: Reflections and Future Directions

Abstract

This article critically reviews the literature on Track 2 security dialogue in the Asia‐Pacific and suggests a number of possible avenues for further research. From almost a standing start, Track 2 security dialogue in this part of the world has burgeoned over the past decade and a half. As these institutions and activities have grown, so too has a body of scholarship grown around them which has striven to stay abreast of them and – at least in the case of some of the more prominent second track institutions and activities – to evaluate their influence and effectiveness. Just as viable second track processes must constantly adapt in response to changes in the regional and global security environment, however, this article contends that the scholarship on Track 2 security dialogue needs now to evolve beyond its heavy emphasis upon on the “success” of these institutions and activities. While this criterion remains vital, the article argues that greater analytical attention should also be given to differentiating between the many and varied Track 2 security processes that are currently active in the Asia-Pacific; to developing a closer understanding as to the operating modalities of these institutions and activities; and to better comprehending longitudinal trends in regional Track 2 security dialogue.     

Oil's Colonial Residues: Geopolitics,Identity, and Resistance in Venezuela

This article argues oil occupies a central role in the discursive universe of Venezuelan underdevelopment, producing anxieties of vulnerability and dependency. These anxieties are internalised and reproduced in what I describe as the coloniality of oil. Coloniality naturalises, hides, and rewrites maldevelopment – a process in which the developed world stymies growth elsewhere through the machinations of hard or soft power – as underdevelopment – a neutral category suggesting the developing world need only to catch up to the North Atlantic. Animated by the formation of new political subjectivities, the Bolivarian Revolution has attempted to break with this coloniality of oil.     

Social Media and the Successful Anti-Mining Campaign in Bangka,Indonesia

ABSTRACT

This article elaborates on the functionalities of Facebook and WhatsApp, and the possibilities and limitations of their usage in the anti-mining campaign in Bangka, Indonesia, with special focus on the participation and offline–online intertwining of communication processes. The research reported in this article contributes to a deeper understanding of the relationship between social media and political protest in the context of discriminatory natural resource extraction in Indonesia. In 2017, the alliance against the mining activities of the Chinese company PT Mikgro Metal Perdana in Bangka, which consisted of villagers, activists, tourism operators and divers, succeeded in ousting PT MMP from Bangka. Social media enhanced mobilisation, communication, knowledge transfer, transparency, and solidarity in this anti-mining campaign. Through WhatsApp, the rapid transmission of information and communication was facilitated when urgent action was needed. The Facebook group Save Bangka Island not only provided general information but also enhanced solidarity, cohesion and the creation of an “imagined community.” However, it is also found that social media sites are stratified spaces where villagers – the primary affected group – are excluded because of their lack of Internet access.     

The Future of the Chinese Economy: Four Perspectives

ABSTRACT

This article studies the future prospect of the Chinese economy using four different perspectives: neo-classical, Marxian, world-system and climate stabilisation. While the neo-classical perspective suggests that China can maintain a relatively decent pace of economic growth for decades to come, the Marxian analysis finds that the Chinese economy will confront a major crisis in the coming years due to internal contradictions of capitalist accumulation. The world-system analysis suggests that there has been a “ceiling of development” that historically has limited the scope of development for the great majority of the world population and China will hit this “ceiling of development” within about a decade. Moreover, if China were to fulfil its climate stabilisation obligations, it may prove to be impossible for the current system to maintain economic and political stability.     

Climate change: Double-edged sword for African trade and development

Abstract

African governments face increasing pressure from major export destinations, primarily former colonial and slave-owning countries, to be climate change compliant. This will certainly be on display at the upcoming December 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, which will seek to strengthen climate change rules agreed on in Kyoto, Japan, in 1997, and adopt new protocols on global climate change regulation. Climate change is a double-edged sword: on one side it is hitting Africa's agricultural sector with increased droughts, floods, extreme frost and wildfires; and on the other, African governments are being forced to respond to stringent regulatory regimes imposed by international export destinations. Currently, the per capita greenhouse gas emissions from the highly industrialised nations – the North – is estimated to be four times that of Africa and the rest of the developing world. Twin research questions were investigated in this article: (1) to what extent does climate change impact on African trade and development, and (2) how can African governments stay on a path of sustained trade and development in this era of climate change? The article argues that Africa's survival in these times of climate change compliance rests on a shift to greater intra-African trade, as individual nations move towards cleaner and more organic technologies to become full-fledged partners in the international climate change regulatory regime.     

Surrejoinder

Abstract

Boardman now says that my critique of mainstream quantitative studies of Chinese foreign policy is “perfectly justified,” yet he continues to argue in the same old unjustifiable manner. He continues the quest for timeless, placeless truths which all can agree to, a quest which both Marx and Weber long ago pointed out was impossible in a world of conflictful social relations where perception cannot be divorced from social perspective. The data does not gather itself, pattern itself or explain itself.     

Displaying the Worldview of Japanese Fascism: The Tokyo Thought War Exhibition of 1938

ABSTRACT:

This essay explores an imperial state exhibition held in Tokyo in 1938 and explains how the exhibition displayed a fascist worldview of historical crisis and national regeneration that was taking shape in Japan in the late 1930s. The exhibition – entitled the Thought War Exhibition (Shisōsen tenrankai) – was curated by the Japanese state's newly formed Cabinet Information Division (Naikaku jōhōbu) and held in Takashimaya Department Store in downtown Tokyo. Comprised of materials related to the Communist International, the Spanish Civil War, the national liberation struggle in China, and the communist and anticolonial movements inside the Japanese Empire, the Exhibition portrayed Japan's invasion of the Chinese mainland in 1937 as an extension of a global thought war against communism, requiring all imperial subjects to purify themselves of foreign influences and mobilize for national thought defense. While on the surface this Exhibition was an example of prewar state propaganda, it also expressed a fascist worldview that was coalescing in the Japanese state in the late 1930s. This essay investigates how this fascist worldview was exhibited in a sequence of displays, including dioramas, panoramas, illuminated maps, and display cases, and how these displays revealed constitutive contradictions that underwrote the formation of fascism in Japan.