superjidai

How do you see the future of Tibet?

 

Wang Lixiong:

I am not a religious believer, hence I cannot see the future from the point of view of predestination, nor can I hope for the intervention of some mysterious forces. Generally speaking my view of the future is pessimistic – for Tibet, China, and for humanity. This pessimism is based on the current reality, and its logical progression. Rationally speaking, it seems difficult to reach any other conclusion except that the existence of humanity is meaningless and absurd.

 

From a sociological perspective, it is unavoidable for an agnostic to harbor hopes that religion can change the tragic future of humanity, and to give one meaning in life. Although I’m not very confident of such a future, I do really hope that religion can be a means to halt the pessimistic progression of things. I have a heartfelt belief that if religion can have such an effect on the future, then Tibetan Buddhism will definitely be one of the major forces. Interestingly enough, the biggest group of people that Tibetan Buddhism will help are the Chinese people who have given the Tibetans the most pain and misery. Whenever I think about this I can feel the ocean-like compassion of the Buddha, and understand the bodhisattva spirit, which causes one to personally go down to hell to liberate the beings suffering there.

 

 

 

回答某西方佛教杂志的问题：

 

我不是一个宗教信徒，因此无法从命定的角度看待未来，也无法指望某种冥冥的力量。总体来说，我对未来是悲观的，对西藏是这样，对中国是这样，对人类也是这样。这悲观是基于理性的，从眼下现实沿着逻辑往下推，似乎很难有别样的结果，那种悲观结果对理性而言，显示的只有人类存在的无意义与荒诞。

 

这就使无神论者免不了要从社会学意义对宗教产生一些期盼，希望能靠宗教改变人类的悲惨未来，并给人以生存的意义。我虽对这样的前景信心不足，但也确实希望能够以此截断通向悲观的逻辑脉络。而且我个人十分相信，如果宗教真能在未来起到如此作用，西藏佛教一定是其中最为重要的一支力量。奇特的是，西藏佛教在未来会去拯救的一个最大人群，恰恰可能就是曾给藏民族造成最多苦难的中国人。我无法从宗教的体系对此进行解释，但即使作为一个俗人，每每想到这点，我就会感受到佛之浩瀚如海的慈悲，以及什么是以自身下地狱来普度众生的菩提道精神。

 

王力雄

 

2002-8-10 北京

 

 

July 2001, recorded in Lhasa

My Four Meetings with Dalai Lama

 

Wang lixiong

 

      More than thirty years ago, I was sixteen or seventeen, a youth "sent down" to the countryside of northeastern China to be reeducated.  One day I drove the carriage to the commune to get the food aid.  In the Food Control Office I found a bound collection of the newspaper "Can Kao Xiao Xi" (News Digest), and immediately grabbed it to read.  In those days "Can Kao Xiao Xi" was the only newspaper that had news from overseas.  Though its news was still ideological, it was at least different from the standard party newspapers of the day.  Among the news was an interview with Dalai by a foreign reporter.  I have forgotten the specific content of the article, but an image remained in my head – a young and lanky Dalai in his lonely exile, heatedly criticizing China in his broken English to his visitor.  This was the first time that I had a relatively specific impression of Dalai Lama.  Though I have heard of him before, in the usage of the communist party literature the word "Dalai" was just a synonym for the dark days of Tibet.  The reason I remember this article was not due to any grandiose concepts like the Tibet issue, but a rather trivial detail.  As I was reading the article, the employee at the Food Control Office came and took away the newspaper in my hands.  He told me self-importantly that it was an "inside publication" which only those "ranked highly enough" were permitted to read.  Neither he nor I could have guessed that one day, the boy that was me, with rope belted around the waist and a whip gripped in hand, who was sheepish because he wasn\’t "ranked highly enough", would embrace the Dalai from "Can Kao Xiao Xi".

 

1. Invitation from exiled Tibet

 

      In October, 2000, I traveled to Boston to take part in a Chinese multi-ethnic conference sponsored by the 21st Century China Foundation.  (Perhaps to make it easier to raise money, the conference had a rather exaggerated title: "Chinese Ethnic Group Young Leaders Camp").  Many different ethnic groups, including Han, Tibetan, Mongolian, Uigur, and people from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macao attended the conference.  Among the representatives, Tibetans were the largest group after the Hans.  None of them came from the Chinese mainland; all were exiles.  Dalai Lama personally wrote the conference a congratulatory letter.  Dharamsala also dispatched a delegation headed by a vice foreign minister in the exiled Tibetan government, as well as several staff members from the exiled government\’s office in America.  Altogether, the delegation had about seven or eight Tibetans.  Their attendance showed how much importance they attached to this conference.  Of course, they could not expect to reach any specific political goal from this type of unofficial meetings; their goal was probably only to understand the circumstances and to explore unofficial ways of bettering their situation.

 

      As I recall it, in that event the Tibetans were the best-behaved group.  Rational, restrained, serious, polite, they were outstanding among all the representatives at the conference.  Without a doubt, this was partly due to the fact that they were a governmental delegation.  Their words strictly conformed to the positions expressed by Dalai Lama in various occasions, never overstepping one bit.  During meetings they quietly sat together, and at parties they deliberately scattered into the crowd, publicizing their viewpoints mildly but explicitly.  Observing them often filled me with admiration.

 

      Among the Tibetan delegates was a "nongovernmental figure" named BQ.  He once was a reporter in India, and now was one of the directors of "International Tibetan Aid Organization."  It is actually a nongovernmental organization with mostly American members, which is why I never fully understood BQ\’s role there.  While he worked with this American organization, he was also quite involved in the affairs of the exiled Tibetan government.  The other nongovernmental delegate was a Harvard doctoral student ZX.  She was a very learned Tibetan woman, born in Canada.  She came to the conference because of personal interest.  ZX\’s Chinese pronunciation was accentless.  I thought she was fluent in Chinese at first, but a few sentences more and I realized that it wasn\’t so.  It turned out that she only recently started learning Chinese.  One could therefore see her talent for learning languages.  When mainland Tibetan author Zhaxidawa visited Boston, she had communicated with him in her recently-learned Chinese, since Zhaxidawa couldn\’t speak any Tibetan.  This peculiar phenomenon – that Tibetan scholars and writers could only converse in the language of the occupier- was one of the reasons that she was so interested  in the Tibetan political problem.

 

      As soon as I arrived at the meeting, a staff member at the conference told me that some Tibetan delegates had asked if and when I would come.  The first day of the conference, BQ came to me during break.  Since my English was very bad, I couldn\’t really talk to him.  I thought they were interested in contacting me because they knew that I had written books and articles about the Tibet issue.  Later I learned that my book "Sky Burial: The Fate of Tibet" had been translated into Tibetan and broadcasted in a series by Radio Free Asia.  My article published in the mainland, "Tibet: China\’s Weakness in the 21st Century", had also been translated into Tibetan and English.  Many Tibetans living overseas had read it.During the conference I often spent time with Tibetans.  They were all born overseas, and had never been back to Tibet.  But they spoke Tibetan amongst themselves, read Tibetan literature, wore Tibetan religious decorations on their chests and wrists, and played Tibetan music on their car stereo.  In contrast to them, my nephew in Seattle, who left China when he was seven or eight, cannot read any Chinese characters and speaks less and less Chinese everyday.  What\’s more, he does not at all want to be a Chinese.  When I thought of my nephew, I couldn\’t help wondering at the heritage of Tibetan culture abroad, and what cohesion it must have to be sustained to such a degree!  Though a political solution to the Tibet problem was nowhere in sight, the fact that Tibetan culture had been preserved so completely abroad, was itself a worthwhile achievement.  As I saw all this, my admiration for Dalai Lama increased more and more.

 

      One day BQ extended to me an invitation.  He hoped that I would travel to Washington D.C. and meet with the special representative of Dalai Lama, Mr. LD.  BQ said that if Mr. LD wasn\’t so busy, he would come to Boston to see me, but he was going to visit abroad soon, and therefore had to trouble me to make the trip.  They would pay for all expenses.I am by nature interested in new experiences, and naturally would not have refused.  BQ said that a very good Tibetan-Chinese interpreter would receive me in Washington.  By coincidence, the interpreter was the boyfriend of ZX.  His name was WA and he was the Tibetan editor of a major American media company.  The first time I talked to him on the phone, I had the feeling that I was speaking to a native Han.  He visited ZX in Boston on the weekend, and flew with me to Washington on Monday.  He suggested that I should stay at his place.  This way it would be 1) cheaper (one could sense that exiled Tibet must often be concerned with saving expenses); 2). He and I could conveniently meet and plan our schedules; and 3). He lived right in the center of Washington, which was close to many museums.  But my plane ticket turned out to be very expensive.  If the reservation had been early, a roundtrip plane ticket from Boston to Washington D.C. could be only one hundred dollars.  But my ticket was bought last minute, and we had to name the airline, so it cost more than six hundred dollars.

 

      WA was in his early forties.  Growing up in Lhasa, he stayed in Beijing to do research after graduating from the Central Ethnic Institute.  As the story went, in those days he could use Chinese to write novels.  One could thus imagine the level of his expertise in Chinese.  He traveled to India in the late eighties, and then decided to stay abroad and work for Dalai Lama.  At that time Dalai Lama encouraged him to study in the U.S.  Today he had already lived in America for more than ten years and just got his American citizenship, but he still participated in the work of exiled Tibet.  Since he was very familiar with technical political language, and in addition could accurately grasp the situation in China and the mentality there, a Tibetan-Chinese interpreter of his caliber (especially in the field of politics) was quite rare among the exiled Tibetans.

 

      The autumn in Washington displayed colorful leaves everywhere.  WA drove me to the home of LD.  He lived in a small house in the suburbs.  Apparently many exiled Tibetans lived nearby.  Though the building was western in style, inside LD decorated the rooms like many other Tibetans: Buddha figures, scripture banners, religious pictures, ghee lamps, and scripture books were all there.  LD was over fifty.  He was originally a living Buddha from Tang Borough Xinlong County.  In 1959 he went into exile in India, and once served as the Gelun in the Tibetan exiled government.  Now he lived permanently in the U.S.  Besides being Dalai Lama\’s special representative, he was responsible for communications with the Chinese government.  He was the most important figure to the exiled Tibetans in America.

 

      BQ had originally told me that this meeting would be only casual conversation, but I could guess that they mainly wanted to hear me talk.  After the first cup of tea and all the pleasantries, LD expressed interest in hearing my views on how to solve the Tibet problem.The main idea of my talk with him was this: the exiled Tibet has been successful in their efforts abroad.  It has been outstanding in matters such as striving for the support of international public opinion, dealing with the various international groups and organizations, cultivating public relations, winning the support of countries, and pressuring the Chinese government.  The issue of Tibet has successfully become internationalized, and the public in the West is almost unanimous in support of the exiled Tibetan government.  Though the various western regimes cannot publicly express their support for exiled Tibet, their actions usually contradict their words and they are all secretly sympathetic with exiled Tibet. 

 

      However, in the final analysis, to solve the Tibet problem is up to China and not governments or people from other countries.  No matter how much pressure the international community exerts, they cannot solve the Tibet problem directly.  Its significance exists only in the hope that this kind of pressure could work on China and force the Chinese government to react and concede.  Thus the standard for evaluating how much the Tibet problem has been solved should not rest on how successful one is in the international community, but rather how much headway one has made with China.

 

      If we used this criterion to evaluate the work of exiled Tibet, then we cannot say that it has been successful, because pressure from the international community on China has not been clearly effective, and sometimes even had negative effects.  China is a large country.  She would not find it unbearable just because the international community has exerted pressures.  Even the sanction of so many countries after June 4th did not really work against her.  To the contrary, in the profit-oriented economic age today, many countries in the world need China in many ways.  China\’s enormous market potential is something that no country would be willing to give up.  Faced with the possibility of disturbing the economic development, products export, employment rate, and other practical interests of one\’s own country, would these countries break with the Chinese government only because of its moral support for Tibet?  This is no doubt too much to ask.  The Chinese government knows this, and therefore does not care about pressure from the international community.

 

Of course, I did not mean that it is exiled Tibet\’s own fault that it has  been unsuccessful with China.  The Chinese government\’s refusal to open the  door of communication is without question the main problem.  Without  contact, there is nothing exiled Tibet could do.  Moreover, I am not saying  that the success that exiled Tibet has had in the international community is  meaningless.  Without international pressure, the Chinese government would  never believe that there is a need for change.  At least right now the  Tibetan regions of the country receive many concrete benefits, and this all  has something to do with the efforts of exiled Tibetans and international  pressures.  But only achieving this is not enough.  Working on China should  not be seen as a singular task.  It should not be seen as only a question of  how to communicate with the decision makers in Zhong Nan Hai and how to  influence or convince them.  No doubt this is important, but one should not  attach all hope to this, because history has proven that it is not easy  changing these people.  One should rather broaden one\’s perspective and see  that the so-called China consists not only of the few people in the central  government.  There are 1.3 billion people in China; there exist different  classes and many groups in its society; one should not treat them  simplistically as one entity.  In fact, there are a myriad of conflicts  within the Chinese society.  On many issues the public opposes the regime.   But on the Tibet question, the vast majority of the Han people accepts the  propaganda of the authorities without objection and stand together with the  government.   This signifies at least one thing: until now the work of  exiled Tibet has not been careful to separate the ordinary Chinese people  and the ruling communist regime.  Condemning China as a whole entity,  expressing the sufferings of Tibetans from a ethnic angle, and demanding  that the western community intervene based on the principle that human  rights are more important than national sovereignty- these tactics on the  one hand helped the success of exiled Tibet in the international community,  but at the same time also served to encourage the Han people to unite with  the Chinese government on the question of Tibet.

 

Even though the solution to the Tibet problem has to ultimately come from  the Chinese government, one should still not look only at the present  government, because governments are not immutable but always changing.   Today\’s China is filled with uncertain elements and the range of its  fluctuations is very large.  The changes can even become cataclysmic.  If  one considers the future this way, one should not try to expend efforts only  on the rulers of the moment, but broaden the effort to include the entire  elite class in China, since no matter how much China will change, and how  often the regimes will alternate, those who come into power will always come  from the elite class.  According to Pareto\’s definition, "elite" mostly  means the political elite.  Besides those who are already in power, the term  also includes the ones that could potentially come into power in the future.

 

  After the unavoidable political reforms in China, which will come sooner  or later, those in power at that time will use new methods and make new  choices about many issues.  Their attitude about the Tibet issue will in  some ways depend on how they are influenced today.  If they still have the  same views on the Tibet issue as the Beijing regime today, then the Tibet  problem will not be solved even then.  Even if democracy comes to other  areas of Chinese society, the new regime can still enforce tyrannical rule  in Tibet, just as Russia has done in Chechnya, or Serbia in Kosovo. Persuading the elite class should not mean only aiming at one particular  group within, since participation in the future Chinese government cannot be  decided by drawing lots.  The so-called elite is a numerous and varied  group; it includes those within the communist system, as well as the  dissidents who are against the system; it includes independent  intellectuals, as well as political figures with clear views.  To persuade  these people as a whole, one must employ the art of the golden mean; one  must extricate oneself from political propaganda, ideological dispute, or  racial warfare, give up emotional accusations and insistence on personal  goals.  One must employ an understanding and tolerant attitude to find the  path to a win-win situation.

 

When I say this, of course I don\’t mean that only Tibetans should act this  way but not the Han people.  I admit that as victims, Tibetans have more  right to demand that the Hans should take a lead in considering the Tibetan  perspective, to take the initiative in not doing onto others what one does  not want for oneself.  I myself have been acting exactly according to this  principle.  The reason I make this suggestions is because the exiled  Tibetans have their own government, and are thus able to behave with more  rationality and self-awareness; they are able to form a consensus and act in  a more united way through the unity of their government.  The current  government of the Hans is the Chinese communist regime, the creator of the  Tibet problem.  Naturally it would not encourage the Hans to understand the  Tibetans.  Therein lies the necessity to separate the Han people from the  communist regime.  As soon as one separates the two, exiled Tibet no longer  faces organized Hans but millions of individual Hans.  It is unrealistic to  demand that the individual Han, who has always listened to the communist  propaganda on Tibet, to repent the actions of their people and to understand  the Tibetans all on their own.  But if organized Tibetans could change  first, and take the initiative to understand the Hans and to influence them  in the right way, the latter would be much more likely to confront and to  understand the Tibet problem.

 

The discussion of that day concentrated in this area.  LD listened very  intently.   He spoke very little, but still made me feel like we  communicated a lot.  He was good at listening and encouraging criticisms.   In a few days he was going to accompany Dalai Lama to Eastern Europe.  He  said that he would repeat what I said to Dalai Lama.  At the same time, he  wanted me to think a bit more and to give them some ideas, especially in the  few aspects that I talked about, to give them some specific suggestions  about what they might do in the future.

 

For lunch LD invited me to a Southeast Asian restaurant near his home.   During the meal he revealed that Dalai Lama had recently written the Beijing  regime a letter.  Right now they were waiting for reactions from Beijing.   To create a friendlier atmosphere and to avoid angering Beijing, Dalai\’s  planned second visit to Taiwan had also been postponed.  He asked me what I  thought would happen.  I had no optimistic expectations.  I answered that  while one could not absolutely rule out the possibility for progress, that  progress required a miracle, and one should not expect a miracle to happen.  I said: at the moment it is not a problem that Beijing does not want to  respond in a new way, but that there are no more new responses to show.  The  hard-line response has already been done to the extreme in the Cultural  Revolution; and for gentle responses no one can exceed Hu Yaobang\’s "Six  Items", published in Tibet in 1980.  Neither solved the Tibet problem, and  instead gave the Beijing regime a heap of new problems.  Beijing can no  longer find any innovative ideas about Tibet, and the only feasible reaction  now is a one-size-fits-all response.  Since Tibet is under its control  anyhow, solving the Tibet problem is not that urgent.  Under these  circumstances, how can one expect it to respond to Dalai Lama\’s letter, or  to have a dialogue with Dalai?  A dialogue is not as easy as just meeting  and talking.  First one must know what to do after the dialogue, and what is  possible for one to do.  Before Beijing can find any ideas about what to do,  dialogues for its own sake would only make it losing its advantage.

 

As I spoke, I couldn\’t help recalling that Tibet, too, had once ignored  England\’s effort to communicate with it.  Since Lhasa had refused to accept  any letters from Great Britain, the British had even dispatched special  envoys to Tibetan border officials in order to read aloud their letter to  the government, in the hope that the border officials would repeat what they  heard to Lhasa.  At that moment, sensing LD\’s urgent desires to have a  dialogue with Beijing, I understood what "historical changes" mean.  Today\’s  exiled Tibet has completely opened up itself, but like a fated retribution,  it now faces an opponent who absolutely refuses to communicate.  When Tibet  refused to communicate, Great Britain could eventually send "military  envoys" and fight its way to Lhasa to force Tibet to talk.  But today, in  contrast to history, faced with a powerful Chinese government, there is  nothing the frustrated exiled Tibet can do.

 

After lunch we took a walk at the bank of a quiet lake with many wild birds.     I told LD a bit about my ideas on successive multi-level electoral  system.  Since there was not enough time and we needed interpreting, we  couldn\’t really have a discussion in detail.  But the one thing he said,  that "we are also considering whether we should implement a western  democratic system" gave me the feeling that he also felt that Tibet was not  suited for a completely western democratic system.  But since then, half a  year after we spoke, exiled Tibet had the first direct election of Geluns,  and established three branches of government.  This shows that exiled Tibet  still went down the road of western democracy.  Clearly, finding a new way  is not easy.

 

After that meeting, LD went to Eastern Europe, and I traveled to other  places in the U.S.  It was close to the U.S. presidential elections, and I  had already planned to travel around to observe the elections.  Right before  Election Day, I went back to Washington to see the final vote.  LD had come  back from Eastern Europe by then, and we met for the second time at a  downtown restaurant.  LD told me that he had passed on to Dalai Lama our  last conversation, and Dalai Lama had expressed agreement with my views.  At  this meeting, LD asked me if I could find time to meet Dalai Lama and to  speak with him personally.  He said that Dalai Lama really needed to know  the real opinions of a Han intellectual, and how the Han people as a whole  saw the Tibet issue.

 

Though Dalai Lama had already met some Han people from the mainland, they  were mostly exiled participants of the democratic movement.  In my  observations, the status and political situation of the exiled Han people  determines that their views would often be different from the populace in  the mainland.  There are some among them who support exiled Tibet, but this  kind of support is a little like the westerners and not so similar to the  Hans, and therefore not so persuasive to the Hans, either.  Instead, it is  often easy for the nationalists in the mainland to attack this position as  "playing the Tibet card" or "treason".  But most Hans overseas are still in  favor of unification just like those within China.  No matter how much they  disagree with the Communist Party in other areas, they are with the  Communist Party on the Tibet question.  According to LD, I was in the  middle, different from both the Beijing regime and the western society.  I  did not completely break away from the position of the Hans, but could also  understand and sympathize with the Tibetan, and therefore was suited to  build bridges between the Hans and the Tibetan, as well as objectively  describe and analyze problems.  This was perhaps the major reason why he  hoped that Dalai Lama and I meet.

 

At the same time, LD told me, Dalai Lama\’s middle-of-the-road position,  which states that Tibet not become independent but stay with China and  retain a high degree of self-governance, is absolutely not just rhetoric,  but instead a serious and sincere position.  He also said something that  impressed me deeply: "If we are only paying the \’middle-road\’ position lip  service, we would not have contacted you.  Because for the independence of  Tibet it\’s people like you who are the biggest threat.  It\’s the things done  by the Department of Military Unification that are most beneficial to  Tibetan independence."  I knew what he meant was that the doings of the  Department of Military Unification always aroused the resentment of the  Tibetans, and therefore pushed Tibet further and further away from China.   But what I did was to try to eliminate the antagonism between the two  ethnicities, and to bring them closer together.  This is of course harmful  for those who really want independence.

 

I answered LD that being able to meet Dalai Lama would be my honor.  I would  be willing to do it absolutely.  I have always believed that Dalai Lama is  the key element in solving the Tibet problem.  If I could tell him my views  personally, perhaps I could help him in his own thoughts about Tibet.  On  the other hand, my own curiosity and my research on Tibet both made meeting  Dalai Lama a rare opportunity for me.

 

In terms of specific plans, LD at first thought that I should go to India,  then changed the place to Southeast Asia where I could use the chance of  Dalai visiting there to meet.  After a few months, he told me that it has  been again changed to America.  Dalai Lama was going to visit America in  May, 2001.  If I could have had my wish, I would have wanted to meet in  India, because there Dalai has more time, and our meetings and conversations  could be more unhurried and thorough.  But if I met him while he was on a  visit, I could only see him between his already fully scheduled events.  It  would be very rushed.

 

I was right.

 

2. First meeting with Dalai Lama

 

      WA had worked on arranging my meeting with Dalai Lama.  In the spring of  2001, he sent me an invitation from "International Campaign for Tibet",  asking me to travel to America to discuss the Tibet problem.  After the  officer at the American consulate finished reading the letter, he looked at  me keenly, said "no problem", and gave me the visa.  I suspected that  perhaps I was the first person from the Chinese mainland in many years who  applied for a visa with this kind of invitational letter.

 

      WA had sent me the plane ticket beforehand.  When I arrived in Washington,  I still lived in his home.  Since I had stayed with him a few times, though  we only recently met, we already felt like friends.  The second day LD  visited WA, and together we ate some Tibetan, western, and Chinese styled  meals that WA cooked.

 

      According to the original plan, I was going to meet Dalai Lama sometime  between May 25th and May 27th in Los Angeles.  The exact time depended on  Dalai Lama\’s daily schedules.  LD told me this time that he divided my  meeting with Dalai Lama into two meetings.  The first time would be in  Washington.  The meeting would not be too long, and was mainly ceremonial,  so that we could meet each other.  I could start by asking a few questions.   The second meeting would be in Los Angeles, because Dalai Lama had  relatively more time there.  Our main conversation would take place there,  and the duration could be longer.  Also, our talks could be more satisfying  there because we would have already met and become friends, and would have  thought over the questions placed at the first meeting.

 

      I asked LD, could my meeting and conversation with Dalai Lama be made  public?  He answered that on their side there were no reservations, because  there was nothing secretive about it.  But they would not take the  initiative to publicize it, mainly for my safety.  What I wanted to do was  up to me.  I asked this question not out of a desire to interview or publish  anything, but out of safety concerns, too.  Once I returned to China, if the  government knew that I had this meeting and interrogated me, to tell the  truth should be the safest venue for me.  Trying to evade the questions  would appear the most suspicious.  I felt relieved that LD did not ask me to  keep the meeting secret.

 

Counting this meeting, I had only met LD three times, but I already admired  him greatly, and could understand why Dalai Lama relied so heavily upon him.    He had a clear, analytical mind and was also very personable.  He played a  large part in the success that exiled Tibet had in the international  community.  I heard that he had been the first Gelun in the exiled  government before he quitted his office to concentrate on being Dalai Lama\’s  personal representative.  He resided in the United States.  Dalai Lama\’s  many affairs, especially such important issues such as his interactions with  the U.S. government and the contact between exiled Tibet and the Chinese  government, were all arranged through him.  When Dalai Lama made  international visits, he almost always arranged the matter and accompanied  him.

 

After meeting LD, I went to New York and Boston.  In between I held a  seminar at Harvard University – WA and I each talked about our opinions on  the "Seventeen Agreements".  The year 2001 was the fiftieth anniversary of  the "peaceful liberation" treaty between Beijing and Lhasa (also known as  the "Seventeen Agreements") .  Beijing had celebrated elaborately, but  exiled Tibetans believed that it was an illegal treaty signed under the  threat of violence.  I said in the seminar, the "Seventeen Agreements" was  indeed signed under military threat, but based only on this fact we could  not conclude that it is illegal, since many important treaties in history  were also the result of war.  To determine whether the "Seventeen  Agreements" is legal, we must think about it from another angle – as an  agreement signed by both sides, the treaty needs to be completely  implemented, and not only partially implemented while ignoring other parts.   In the "Seventeen Agreements", the clauses which call for the preservation  of the Tibetan political system, the preservation of the role of Dalai Lama,  not forcing Tibet to undergo reformation, and protecting Tibetan religion  and so on, have not been implemented since March, 1959.  These changes were  not ratified by the other side of the treaty — the regional government of  Tibet and Dalai Lama.  Under these circumstances, the "Seventeen Agreements"  should be treated as already null and void.  The "Seventeen Agreements" is  the first legal document from the Tibetan side that admits that Tibet  belongs to China.  If it were null and void, then the promise that Tibet  belonges to China also becomes invalid.  This is the basis of the existence  of the "Tibet Problem".  Thus to solve the Tibet problem, the best way is no  other than for the Chinese government and Tibet to create a new agreement,  which would ensure that Tibet belongs to China.  At the moment, the only one  that most Tibetans listen to is Dalai Lama.  Besides him, there is no one  who can unify the severely divided Tibetan race.  In the international  community, Dalai Lama is seen as the representative of the Tibetans.  He has  enough authority, and at the same time, he has expressed many times that  Tibet can stay in China.  If one could create a legal document that Dalai  Lama would sign, which admits the sovereignty of China in Tibet, then  neither Tibetans nor the international community could challenge the fact  that Tibet belongs to China.  There would then be no basis for the struggle  for Tibetan independence.  Thus I believe that China should take the  opportunity and sign such an agreement while the 14th generation Dalai Lama  is still alive and well.  Once Dalai Lama passes away, this chance would be  lost forever, because on the question of whether Tibet belongs to China, no  one can convince the entire Tibetan race except for Dalai Lama.

 

After the seminar, a Tibetan woman came and said to me that she could accept  what I had said in this speech, but she thought the views on Tibet I had  expressed before inspired the Chinese Communist Party and helped the Party  to increase its control in Tibet.  Thus in effect I had been serving the  Chinese Communist Party and giving council to them.  Another Tibetan man  from Harvard Law School told me, they were organizing a workshop on the  Tibet issue and had planned to invite me to participate.  At the same time,  they had invited an official from the Department of Military Unification.   But the official from the MUD had said that if I came, then he wouldn\’t  come, so they had no choice but to invite me the next time.  I was amused  that my position irritated both sides.  I answered the Tibetan woman that  perhaps the communist side also thought that I was serving the exiled  Tibetan side.  But I was not a tactician from the Chun-Qiu Warlords period,  who served the side that gave him the most benefits.  My hope that all sides  win was not an unprincipled one.  Everything that I did was in the hope of  avoiding and ameliorating conflicts between the races and realizing the  common happiness of the different peoples.

 

On May 23rd, the 50th anniversary of the Seventeen Agreements, I arrived in  Washington again.  Dalai Lama was already in Washington.  On this day, he  met President Bush in the White House.

 

My meeting with Dalai Lama was arranged for the second day, on May 24th  2001.  The weather that day was very clear, with bright sunlight.  Our  meeting time was scheduled for ten o\’clock in the morning.  WA guided me  through the subway system to the Park Hyatt Hotel, where Dalai Lama was  staying.  Since we arrived very early, we had enough time to first have  breakfast nearby.  Park Hyatt Hotel looked quite high-class.  Approaching  the hotel, we could see small groups of Tibetans in traditional clothing,  many of whom looked families.  Before meeting me, Dalai Lama was meeting  Tibetan residents in Washington.  There were many other characters inside  and outside the hotel, and all seemed to be related in some way to Tibet or  Dalai Lama, or trying to have some kind of relationship.  For Americans,  Dalai Lama is not only a religious leader or a political figure, but also a  star.  Quite a few popular American movie stars and singers are his  followers, so he counts as a star among stars, and has of course many  admirers.

 

Meeting Dalai Lama was a very formal event, and one must consider how to  dress. (There was one thing that WA was dissatisfied with Wei Jingsheng,  because Wei had actually worn shorts when he met Dalai Lama).  I had never  worn suits, and could not even tie a tie.  This time I had brought from  China a blue traditional Chinese buttoned-down shirt especially for the  occasion of meeting Dalai Lama.  Chinese clothes do not have the same  complications as western clothes, but they are also suited for formal  occasions – they are traditional!  What\’s more, it is always easy to find  faults with western suits, but my Chinese traditional clothing, though it  only costs 30 dollars, cannot be criticized by anyone.  Just as I was  exulting over my own cleverness, WA realized that my clothes might be a  problem, because the people around the hotel noticed me especially – one  could tell at first glance that a Chinese came to the hotel of Dalai Lama.   If I had worn a suit, no matter how ill fitting, it would never have  attracted attention.  One would merely take me for an ordinary Asian who was  a bit sloppy.  But traditional Chinese clothing was very sensitive here,  since the Tibet problem was the conflict between Tibet and China.  Then what  was somebody in traditional Chinese clothing doing here?  Those who noticed  me must all have this question.  WA began to worry whether I was being  videotaped or photographed.  This was quite possible, since the intelligence  departments in China must have someone watching the activities of Dalai Lama  in the United States.  Perhaps they were right around us.  But we had  already walked into the hotel, and there was no point in thinking anymore  about this.

 

There was a lot of security in the hotel.  The protection of Dalai Lama was  provided by the American government.  There were already security on the  ground floor, and also bodyguards with dogs.  We took the elevator to the  floor where Dalai Lama was residing, and waited at first in an outside room.    There were some people working in that room, and one even brought  children, so the atmosphere did not seem tense.  The president of the  International Campaign for Tibet was also there.  I talked with him last  time I was in America.  He used to be a lawyer.  By coincidence, he  encountered the Lhasa "riots" when he vacationed in Lhasa in 1987.  He was  there and saw the whole thing, and this experience changed his life.  From  then on, he devoted himself to the international movement to aid Tibet.   This man gave me a very good impression: simple, good, idealistic, but not  extreme.  We got along very well.  WA also introduced to me a secretary of  Dalai Lama.  He was originally in charge of the security around Dalai Lama,  and just became his secretary.  Dressed in suits and leather shoes, he was  tall and handsome.

 

While we were talking, suddenly someone hurried in and motioned urgently for  us to go over.  We got up hastily and followed.  The place where Dalai Lama  lived was a closed quarters; perhaps it was the so-called presidential  suites.  There were a bunch of bodyguards in front of the door.  By the time  we walked over, the front door was already opened, and there was a lot of  people inside, too.  It seemed to me like a dense mass of people.  I saw  Dalai Lama among the crowd right away.  He was standing in the middle,  wearing a red cassock, slightly crouching, looking out of the door quite  attentively.  It was his typical pose.  Originally I expected to meet him in  something like a living room, and did not expect at all that he would be  waiting for me in the door.  Later I found out that he had just received the  Tibetans from Washington and came up in his personal elevator.  This  elevator was inside the presidential suite, close to the door and somewhat  distant from his room.  Therefore he did not go back to his room directly,  but waited in the door for me to come.  This was why his attendants hurried  us so much – it was already a bit excessive to let Dalai Lama wait, we could  not let him wait for too long.

 

I went up to Dalai Lama , put my palms together, and said in Tibetan "how do  you do".  Dalai Lama told me in Chinese: "Ni Hao."  His voice was loud and  clear.  Then we shook our hands, not the usual ceremonial handshakes, but  with both hands clasped together.  Dalai Lama held my hands and looked at me  carefully, saying: "I already know you.  I have read your articles.  I am  very happy to see you." He said this in Tibetan, which WA interpreted for  me.  I also uttered a few polite greetings.  Then Dalai Lama led me by the  hand and walked to his room.  This scene impressed me greatly.  It was a  very long hallway, brightly lit, with many rooms on both sides and more than  ten doors.  In front of every door there was a bodyguard from the American  government.  Every single one was dressed in dark suits, tall and large,  with short hair and earphones in the ear.  I don\’t know why they had to  stand in front of every door.  Was it to prevent assassins from suddenly  bursting out?  Dalai Lama led me by the hand through the long corridor.  It  was like a scene from a movie: a Lama in red cassocks and a Chinese in a  blue gown, behind us a whole silent crowd.  Dalai Lama\’s hands were warm and  full.

 

Walking into Dalai\’s drawing room, I presented Dalai Lama with a hada  according to Tibetan custom.  WA had prepared it for me the day before..   Dalai Lama took the hada and set it aside, then we sat down.  Dalai Lama  looked at me, and I looked at him, and he began to smile but said nothing.   Suddenly, he reached out and pulled me over.  I didn\’t know what he was  doing and thought that he wanted to say something in my ear.  I was trying  to guess what he might say, but I wouldn\’t have understood anyway if he  spoke in Tibetan.  But unexpectedly, he touched his head against my head.   Our heads touched for a long time, ten or twenty seconds.  Though I did not  feel any warm stream coming into me or anything like that, I knew that it  must have been a very good blessing.  From the Buddhist perspective  especially, it was the highest honor.  After our heads separated, I sensed  that Dalai Lama was a little emotional.  I could see it from his eyes, and  even felt that his eyes were moist.  I don\’t know whether it was really so  or merely my imaginations.  Maybe he took me for the representative of the  Han people who for generations lived in the land near the Tibetans.  Though  he had met a few Hans in the past, those people were mostly émigrés who no  longer had their roots in China, or else he met those Hans in public, and  they were not as vivid for him.

 

Aside from Dalai Lama and I, present at the scene were also WA, LD, and the  main secretary of Dalai Lama.  The main secretary looked about fifty,  bespectacled, and not very tall.  He was reputedly the descendent of an  eminent aristocratic Tibetan family.

 

Dalai Lama began to speak.  The content of his speech was to this effect:  whether or not the Chinese government acknowledges it, the Tibet problem  definitely exists and cannot be ignored.  The whole world knows that there  is a Tibet problem, and is interested in the solution of the Tibet problem.   Not solving the Tibet problem means suffering for the Tibetans, but it is  also not good for China.  Not only does the problem damage the image of  China in the international community, it worsens other problems for China,  for instance Taiwan, which has many doubts and reservations about China  because of the Tibet problem.  Thus, solving the Tibet problem is not only  advantageous for Tibet but also advantageous for the Chinese Communist  Party.

 

To show that he was not against the Chinese government, he told me in  Chinese: "I am not against communism!".  He explained that one could tell  from his work that he was in favor of many things in socialism and  communism.  He also told me an anecdote.  When he visited Taiwan, he also  told Lian Zhan the same thing in Chinese: "I am not against communism!"   Lian Zhan replied: "I am against communism!"  After recounting the story, he  laughed heartily.  His laughter was very contagious.

 

He went on to say: the Chinese government repeatedly said that Tibet is a  part of China, that it cannot become independent, as if they are chanting  scripture verses over and over again.  And he himself has already said on  various occasions that Tibet does not demand independence, also as if  chanting scripture verses.  Both sides chant and chant, but just by chanting  the problem won\’t be solved.  The first step is to communicate and to  discuss.  Yet right now the problem is that the Chinese government has  refused all along to communicate.  He jokingly said: perhaps more than half  of the brain power of the Chinese government is used for suspicions; it is  always imagining how others are plotting against them.  But if one has only  suspicions and fear, one cannot accomplish anything.  What\’s more, he said,  on the one hand he attaches much importance to communicating with the  Chinese government.  On the other hand, he also thinks that it is important  for the two peoples to communicate.  This is the significance of his meeting  with me.  Before, the mainland Hans he met were all exiled and could not  return to their country.  But the intellectuals who could both understand  the Tibet problem objectively, and observe and speak within China, are not  only able to help the Tibetan people and the solution of the Tibet problem,  but can also be especially useful in helping the Han people to understand  Tibet.

 

Dalai Lama was very eloquent.  He spoke on various occasions every day and  must have had a lot of practice already.  His talk was clear and logical;  the points were well-connected; and his diction was simple and precise.   People who knew him had already told me before that when Dalai Lama met Han  people in the past, they rarely had in-depth conversations.  Sometimes he  liked to look back in history and to talk about how Tibet was like in the  fifties and how he met Mao Zedong.  The interest of those Han people would  then be focused on those topics, and after a few rounds of questions and  answers, the time would already be nearly over.  As a result, this kind of  meeting were often more ceremonial than practical.  Thus, I did not plan on  asking him questions or interviewing him.  Since our conversation was so  limited by time, I could not really ask many questions anyway and would not  have gotten anything for an interview.  Better to use this time to say what  I really wanted to say to him.  The reason LD and WA spent so much effort to  arrange for our meeting was because they hoped that I could say something  that he could not hear from other people.

 

The arranged time for this meeting was only half an hour, and just  interpreting took half the time. Thus after Dalai Lama had spoken, I did not  have a long time to speak.  The main point of what I said to Dalai Lama was  this: if we view Tibet as a part of China, then I also see Dalai Lama as a  leader of the Chinese people, and not just the leader of the Tibetans.  The  Tibet problem is not an isolated problem; it is a part of the China problem.    Without having solved the China problem, one cannot solve the Tibet  problem by itself.  What I meant was: if the present political system in  China does not change, and if one can only deal with the single-party  Beijing regime, then there is no way that the Tibet problem can be  fundamentally solved.  Only when the totalitarian society in China changes  into a pluralistic and open society, can one really solve the Tibet problem.    Thus, I said, I hope that Dalai Lama not only uses his energy to solve the  Tibet problem, but also to solve the China problem.

 

In reaction to this, Dalai Lama jokingly said, right now I have been branded  a separatist for merely talking about the Tibet problem.  If I meddle in the  internal affairs of China, who knows what they will call me?  But jokes  aside, he did not seem to disagree with the basic analysis that only after  the China problem is solved can the Tibet problem really be solved.

 

During that meeting there was a strange interlude.  As soon as Dalai Lama  and I began talking, after only a few sentences, the fire alarm in the room  suddenly went off.  The bodyguards outside ran in to check, and I could hear  someone talking in the intercom, as if the central control office was also  checking.  The confusion was quite overwhelming.  Dalai Lama stopped talking  and asked what happened.  But those people could not find the problem, nor  could they make the alarm stop ringing.  So Dalai Lama talked with me while  the alarm was still ringing.  One of the bodyguards had to cover the alarm  with his hands so the sound would not disturb us too much.  More than ten  minutes later, the alarm was finally overcome and silenced.  Later I asked  WA about this, and joked that I didn\’t know what kind of omen this was.  WA  mumbled something and did not continue the topic.  According to the Tibetan  way of thinking, this should indeed mean something and therefore requires an  explanation.  I did not dare to ask further, since it might involve me – did  the alarm go off because my appearance could result in some bad things, or  was it predicting that my meeting with Dalai Lama could set some things "on  fire?"

 

Time was soon almost over.  LD and Dalai Lama\’s secretary began to look at  their watches frequently, and finally told us explicitly that we needed to  stop.  Before I said goodbye, I gave Dalai Lama a set of photographs taken  during the Cultural Revolution in Tibet.  A Tibetan who had passed away took  these photos.  I said to Dalai Lama: no doubt the experience of the Cultural  Revolution is a very painful memory for Tibet, but history is history and  one cannot and should not forget it.  Tibet has very few mementos left from  the Cultural Revolution.  Thus these photos are very valuable.  Dalai Lama  looked at each photo in good spirits.  He recognized in one of the photos a  man in a tall hat and painted in the face, being denounced.  It was an  aristocrat that he once knew very well.  Among the photos was one of the Red  Guards carrying a large propaganda picture and marching down Bolang Street.   In the propaganda picture, a "liberated serf" was sweeping two clown-like  persons away, one was Dalai, the other was Panchen.  Dalai Lama laughed  every now and then, but did not react when he saw the photo of a female Red  Guard with obvious Tibetan features smashing with an ax the golden roof of a  temple.  Tibetans smashing by themselves the temples in which they had  worshipped for centuries – this historical period has always been an  unexplained puzzle, even for Dalai Lama.

 

As soon as we left the drawing room, we met in the corridor the next group  coming to see Dalai Lama.  Those people were carrying all sorts of TV  equipments.  WA told me that the one in front was the most famous black  woman TV host in America.  We passed by them, and the time in between could  be measured in seconds.  It was clear to me how busy Dalai Lama\’s daily  schedule was.

 

LD came out as well and invited me to sit for a while in the bar downstairs.    He could not accompany Dalai Lama to Los Angeles, because Dalai Lama had  just met President Bush and there were many things that he must deal with in  Washington.  Thus he said goodbye to me there.  He said that after more than  half a year of effort, he was gratified to at last arrange the meeting  between Dalai Lama and me.  He further hoped that when I go to Los Angeles,  I could have a more in-depth conversation with Dalai Lama.  I gave him my  heartfelt thanks.

 

3. Listening to Dalai Lama\’s lecture in Washington

 

      That same afternoon Dalai Lama was going to speak at a commencement  ceremony.  It was a school devoted to training political and diplomatic  talents.  Its English name was quite long: Johns Hopkins University, School  of Advanced International Studies.  I heard that many high officials in the  American government graduated from there.  The school has an old tradition –  every year before graduation, the graduates vote on the celebrity they most  want to speak at the commencement ceremony.  This year after voting, Dalai  Lama was in first place.  The school then invited Dalai Lama to come to the  ceremony.  It happened that the date of the ceremony was the same as the  date of Dalai Lama\’s visit to Washington.  Exiled Tibet had always been good  at public relations, and especially valued this kind of school that  commanded the future powers of America.  Thus Dalai Lama accepted the  invitation to come.

 

      WA got two tickets for me.  He had a lot of work, and had already seen a  lot of this kind of events, so could not accompany me.  By chance I had a  friend who really wanted to go, so I made an appointment with her, and she  also acted as my interpreter.  Having already seen such tight security  measures this morning, I was worried that this time we also needed to pass a  security check.  There were a lot of people attending the commencement  ceremony, and it would take a long time for sure.  So we came half an hour  early, but the entrance was not restricted at all.  Perhaps it was because  at the commencement ceremony Dalai Lama was only a guest and not the main  program, thus they could not check each visitor out of security concerns for  him.  Looking at it from a security perspective, as long as there was an  event like this without security checks, the strict precautions this morning  became completely meaningless, since assassins would of course avoid the  situation this morning and choose a place like this one, in which it was  both convenient and easy to flee from.

 

      Before the commencement started, the graduates entered first.  One of the  graduates glued on her doctoral cap a white adhesive tape that read: "Free  Tibet", which was very conspicuous among the sea of black caps.  One could  witness this kind of scenes not only at events that Dalai Lama attended.   Last year when I went to the New England countryside to attend a holiday  festival with the people there, I also saw the snowy mountain and lions  Tibetan flag.  There were even a few people raising money for exiled Tibet.   It is hard for those of us who have lived in China for so long to imagine  the extent to which the Tibet issue impacts the western world.

 

      After the graduates came in, the guests followed.  Dalai Lama entered in  the front of the procession.  The audience cheered thunderously, mostly to  Dalai Lama.  The guests walked through the middle aisle to reach the stage.   My seat was the fourth seat from the aisle, and my friend\’s seat was the  third seat.  Dalai Lama stopped right beside us and kissed a child.  Later  my friend said with wistfulness that if she had sat at the aisle seat, she  would speak to Dalai Lama, and would introduce me to Dalai Lama and tell him  that I was a Chinese writer researching the Tibet problem.  I had not told  her that I had just met Dalai Lama.

 

      Before Dalai Lama spoke, the president of the university and a few other  people gave speeches.  Among them was a deputy secretary of the Department  of Defense, a graduate from the school.  As he explained what kind of  official the deputy secretary of the Department of Defense was, he joked  that whoever was interested in how many missiles China had pointed at the  United States, they could ask him.  From this kind of joke, one could see  that in the thoughts of the American military organizations, China was  taking the place of the collapsed Soviet Union.

 

      Dalai Lama\’s speech was scheduled for the last slot.  He spoke at first in  Tibetan, and a Tibetan stood beside him to translate.  But after the  beginning, he no longer needed the interpreter and began to speak English  himself.  He said that he could actually speak English.  Though his  pronunciation was not good, he could express the meanings clearly.  Then why  did he first speak in Tibetan?  Because there was an interpreter right  there.  If he did not speak any Tibetan, then wouldn\’t the interpreter be  out of his job?  His speech was very humorous, and the crowd erupted often  in laughter.  The central idea of his lecture was, human beings need to have  knowledge and skills, thus humans need to be educated.  You people came to  this school to study in order to acquire knowledge and skills.  But just  having knowledge and skills is not enough.  If at the same time you do not  have the compassion for humanity and the sense of responsibility for  society, then the effect of knowledge and skills becomes negative, becomes  destructive to others, and would ultimately be destructive to yourself.  The  more you have knowledge and skills, the more destructive you become.  Thus,  only when someone possesses the compassion and sense of responsibility for  society, can knowledge and skills have good impacts.  His speech would have  been right on target for the educational situation right now in China.  The  Chinese school now can produce large quantities of professionals.  They are  very clever and capable within their own professional fields, but they have  no compassion or sense of responsibility towards society and humanity.   These people often use their abilities to do bad things, and do them at a  quite efficient level.  This is not at all rare in China today.

 

      After the speech, Dalai Lama departed immediately.  The whole audience  cheered thunderously again, and the applause did not die down for a long  time.  Dalai Lama frequently turned back and acknowledged the audience.  We  were not interested in the rest of the ceremony and left as well.  Outside  his row of cars had already started to move.  People on both sides of the  road waved to his car warmly.  A female reporter was using her cell phone to  dispatch the news.  The president of the International Campaign for Tibet  was also outside.  He greeted me, then walked hurriedly away.

 

      Outside it was a sunny and breezy spring day.  I suddenly wondered how  Beijing on the other side of the earth would look at all of this.  Yesterday  was the 50th anniversary of the signing of "Seventeen Agreements".   President Bush had chosen to meet Dalai Lama on this particular day, and  even at the White House.  Beijing would no doubt believe that this  coincidence of time was a deliberately planned provocation.  In the morning  when I met Dalai Lama, he took care to tell me that this timing did not have  any special meaning but was completely coincidental.  If the schedule had  been completely planned by the Americans, then I believe that they would  have indeed not regarded the date as special.  But though the Americans had  not thought of it, the exiled Tibetan government should not have forgotten  it.  For Beijing, this kind of coincidence in time would no doubt constitute  a severe aggravation.  Recently the U.S. Congress had just passed a new bill  regarding the Tibet policy.  It granted more support for exiled Tibet.   During Dalai Lama\’s visit to America, Chen Shuibian was visiting America at  the same time.  He was received like an honored state guest in the same  league as Jiang Zemin and Chu Rongji.  His movement was also not as  restricted as the two occasions before.  He met many Congressmen, and had  many other events planned.  The mayor of New York City Giuliani would not  meet Jiang Zemin, Zhu Rongji, or Li Peng when they came to New York City,  and called them the representatives of totalitarianism and the executioners  of the June 4th massacre.  But when Chen Shuibian came to New York, he not  only met with him, but also gave him the golden key of an honorary New  Yorker.  All of these would not doubt be seen by the Beijing regime as  Bush\’s deliberate provocation toward China after his inauguration.  They  would further believe that various forces in favor of Tibet independence,  Taiwan independence, and other anti-China stances were coming together under  the manipulations of the United States.

 

      It happened that I also came to the U.S. around this time and even met  Dalai Lama secretly.  Would the Chinese regime see this as a part of the  conspiracy, too?

 

4. Second meeting with Dalai Lama

 

      That night I had dinner with WA, JM, and another Tibetan couple at a  Chinese restaurant near JM\’s house.  JM had just bought a new house.  It was  a town house.  He had lived in the U.S. for more than ten years, but had  always rented apartments.  What he spent on rent had long surpassed what he  would have paid for a house.  Now he finally bought a house.  This signified  that his plans had changed.  Before he would not buy a house because he had  always thought that he would not reside permanently in the U.S. and would  sooner or later return to Tibet.  Now he had finally begun to face  "reality".

 

      After dinner we parted, and I went with JM to his new house to talk.  JM  looked a bit wooden on the outside but was actually a deep thinker.  In the  eighties he visited India, and from there joined Dalai Lama.  At that time  his choice was completely based on his idealism.  Otherwise, if he had  stayed in China, with a high official as father he could have had anything  he wanted.  Later he came to America to study with the encouragement and  arrangement of Dalai Lama.  Now he was the chairman of the Tibetan  department in some radio station.  While I conversed with him, I smiled  often, but there was always a bit of sadness inside of me.  He did not tell  me what he thought of the future of Tibet, but I sensed that deep inside he  was no longer so confident and firm as before.  It was not so much that he  changed, but that more than ten years had passed, and his ideal not only did  not became closer, they seemed further away.  I think every Tibetan  dedicated to freedom and ideals would have been downcast in the face of  this, unless they deliberately try to avoid it in their hearts.  Only when  he talked about playing bridge with his father on the Internet did he smile  somewhat happily.  Recently his sister passed away.  He requested to return  to China to see her, but was not allowed.  His father was already ninety-two  years old.  Not allowing father and son to be reunited was really too cruel.

 

  I don\’t understand why the government in China is so petty in such  details.  Especially since his father helped the Communist Party  tremendously in the occupation of Tibet, they should not have been so  vengeful n the matter of his son.  It chills one to the hearts.

 

      That night I stayed with JM.  The house was not yet furnished; in my room  there was only a mattress on the rug.  The next day, on the morning of May  25th, JM took me to the airport before he went to work.  I flew to Los  Angeles from there.  I started to, but finally did not, tell him that I came  to the U.S. to see Dalai Lama.  It was not because I wanted to keep anything  secret, because JM was very trustworthy.  It was rather because I did not  know to what extent I should have told him.  Then it was better not to say  anything at all.  But I think he could have guessed from my schedule –  wherever Dalai Lama went I followed.  Many people noticed it.  If agencies  in China wanted to analyze my whereabouts, they could have of course guessed  the connection as well.

 

      WA flew from another airport on the same day, and reached Los Angeles more  than an hour later.  Dalai Lama\’s group had already arrived the day before.   WA reserved a room in Pasadena Hilton, the hotel where Dalai Lama was  staying.  I went there to meet him.  Dalai Lama\’s main objective in Los  Angeles was to host a three-day Buddhist scripture meeting for the Chinese  Buddhists there.  This was the second time that he came to Los Angeles to  teach the holy manuscripts.  Its purpose on the one hand was to spread  Buddhism.  On the other hand, it also showed that exiled Tibet was  concentrating more of their efforts on the Chinese people.  They could not  communicate with the Hans within China now, so they were trying to form a  united front with the Hans overseas.

 

      On May 26th, the second day of Dalai Lama\’s scripture teaching, WA and I  went to hear the lessons in the morning.  He was teaching the Ban Ruo Xin  Jing.  Before entering one must pass through a security check.  No bags were  allowed.  Everyone had to pass through a metal detector, and there were  policemen sweeping people with wands.  Dalai Lama\’s bodyguards followed him  from Washington.  I heard that their personal and equipment costs had long  exceeded the spending of Dalai Lama\’s own group, but of course, they were  spending the money of the U.S. government.  The people coming to hear the  lesson already seemed very numerous to me.  There were not only Chinese, but  also many Americans.  Among them were also Buddhist monks of every kind,  coming from many different countries.  But WA and his colleagues still  thought that the organization was not good enough and that not enough people  came.  Perhaps it was in comparison to the occasions they had seen before.

 

      My meeting with Dalai Lama was scheduled between the two lessons in the  morning and in the afternoon.  After hearing the lesson in the morning, I  had a picnic-styled lunch with WA and BQ outside of the hall.  We discussed  how to proceed with the conversation with Dalai Lama this time.  The time  scheduled for us was not as sufficient as we had expected.  In fact it was  not so much more than the first meeting, thus we must consider how to say as  much as possible in a short time, while also explaining clearly what we  wanted to say.  WA thought that it was really inauspicious that LD did not  come to Los Angeles.  Though others would also arrange time for us, they  would not put us in an important slot.  If LD had arranged it, he would not  have scheduled the meeting in such a tight space.

 

      Fortunately I had already printed my two articles in advance.  One was  titled "Successive multi-tier Electoral System and Representative Democracy:  A Comparison of Solutions to the Tibet Problem".  The other was: "The Most  Effective Non-Violent Method – Successive Multi-tier Electoral System".  My  thoughts about how to solve the Tibet problem were all in these two  articles.  I would give the articles to Dalai Lama.  If he wanted to read  them, he would have them translated into Tibetan.  This way we could save  many words.  Otherwise to go over these contents in detail would require a  few days.  If our meeting had been in India, as we had planned in the  beginning, it would all be different.  Neither of us would have needed to  hurry.  I could speak with him whenever he was free.  But during a foreign  visit, in which everything was measured in minutes and seconds, one could  not really develop a theoretical conversation.  I could only prepare in  advance and give him my articles, and then concentrate my talk on a few  important points.

 

      Our meeting time came.  We went in through the side door of the auditorium.    The side door served for the moment as the personal entrance for Dalai  Lama.  There were bodyguards both outside and inside.  We were led into the  resting room on the side of the auditorium.  It was not large, very simply  furnished, and did not have too much light.  It could not even come close to  the hotel in Washington where Dalai Lama had stayed.  Walking inside the  room, I saw Dalai Lama sitting in the lotus position on the couch.  Seeing  me, he stood up to greet me, and extended his bare feet to put on the  slippers under the couch.  It was a pair of cheap wedge slippers made of  rubber or some synthetic material.  In China only ordinary laborers would  wear them.  This time Dalai Lama shook my hands as if I were a friend, and  pulled me to the sofa to sit down.  I sat down directly, and Dalai Lama  stood and spoke with WA and his group.  Later I realized that no matter what  occasion it was, If Dalai Lama had not sat down, the other Tibetans would  never sit down first.  That day except for WA and BQ, there was also the  secretary of Dalai Lama, as well as the chairman of the New York office of  the exiled Tibetan government.  Last year I saw him at the conference in  Boston.  A cheerful, mild, and affable man, he graduated from Moscow  University.

 

      Since time was urgent, I started speaking before Dalai Lama had said very  much, because if he started to speak, then it would not be polite to  interrupt him, and he was usually very talkative and would not have left me  with too much time in the end.  I first gave him my two articles and told  him that my thoughts about how to solve the Tibet problem were all within,  and that I hoped it would be useful for him.  Dalai Lama gave the article to  BQ and said something.  I could not understand what he said.  I hope that he  was telling BQ to find someone to translate for him, and I hope that BQ  would really give the translated article to Dalai Lama.  But to tell the  truth, I don\’t know whether exiled Tibet works in the same way as the  "Self-Governing Region of Tibet", in which many things end up not getting  done.

 

      I had already discussed with WA in advance what I wanted to say.  We had  also decided that some things I would only bring up the beginning, and he  would continue on in Tibetan.   This way we could save a lot of time.  I  first talked about the situation and problems in current Tibet.  On the one  hand, its economy has indeed made a lot of progress.  On the other hand, the  Tibetan traditional culture is being destroyed at an unprecedented rate.  I  especially cited the example of "prostitute city", recently appearing in the  western part of Tibet.  It is a dirty and disorderly field, with hundreds of  pitched tents, which Tibetan prostitutes use as a place to entertain their  guests.  Most of the people who visit the prostitutes are also Tibetans.   Empty beer bottles are stacked into walls around the tents; the sounds of  mahjong and flirting reverberate everywhere… Although in theory, the Tibet  problem will be resolved one of those days, but if too much time elapses, it  will only be resolved in terms of politics.  Though Tibet will then receive  self-governance and political freedom, it will no longer be the Tibet that  Dalai Lama so yearns for, nor the Tibet that those who love Tibet hope to  see.  It will instead have become a nondescript Tibet, not so different from  the other regions of China.  Thus, one cannot comfort oneself by saying that  there will eventually come a day when the Tibet problem can be resolved.   The Tibet problem must be resolved while the Tibet is still the real Tibet,  still the Tibet that preserves its traditional culture; only then can the  resolution be a meaningful one.  This means that resolving the Tibet problem  is not an endless wait, but rather a fight for each minute and second.

 

      I then went on to speak about the dilemma Dalai Lama found himself in when  he wanted to use non-violent methods to solve the Tibet problem.   Non-violent methods require three conditions to be effective.  The first  condition is that the opponent must have a conscience.  Just as Martin  Luther King Jr. said: "Our ability to bear suffering will dry up your  hatred.  When we win our freedom, we will wake up your conscience and win  you over."  This way, the non-violent side can use its own suffering to make  the other side unable to bear the condemnation of its own conscience and to  concede in the end.  The second condition is that it requires the opponent  to have highly advanced rule of law.  When Gandhi fought against the English  colonists, one of his important methods was to use the English law to  constantly bring up lawsuits.  In the legal system of England, if one could  prove what was illegal about the opponent\’s actions, one could win through  the legal process even if the opponent was the government itself.  The third  condition is that there must be nongovernmental communities.  In other  words, aside from the regime, the society must have space for  nongovernmental organizations and the activities of various unofficial  groups, which can motivate and organize the society.  This way the  non-violent side is not in a state of disunity, but able to unify and  coordinate with each other.  Only then can the non-violent struggle be  effective on a large scale.  But these three conditions do not exist in  present day China.  In a one party rule, the current communist regime has  neither conscience nor a rule of law in any real sense.  At the same time,  it tries in every way to limit and destroy nongovernmental communities.   Thus for the three representatives of non-violent opposition in today\’s  world – Gandhi, King, and Dalai Lama, — only the former two could be  successful, and Dalai Lama cannot make any real progress.  In the word of a  Taiwanese proverb, Dalai Lama using the non-violent method against the  Chinese government is like "mosquitoes stinging a bull horn".

 

      I said, right now the methods of non-violent opposition are all passive.   Whether or not the goal can be realized depends entirely upon whether the  opposing side – namely, the Chinese government – would yield or not.  No  matter how much support you get internationally, how many congresses pass  resolutions regarding the Tibet problem, how many international  organizations condemn China, how many exiled Tibetans demonstrate, protest,  hunger strike, or set themselves on fire, none of this can have a direct  effect.  Though they create pressure on Beijing, they can only be called  useful if Beijing will yield under the pressure.  If Beijing does not care  and pays no attention to the pressure, then there is nothing anyone can do,  and the methods will not be effective at all.  In the situation in China  right now, we cannot yet see what kind of pressure would force the  government to yield on the Tibet problem, and thus there has been no  positive outlook on the non-violent opposition thus far.

 

     I told Dalai Lama, I am against all violence, and completely approve of his  non-violent principles.  But with the realities in China and in Tibet, we  must find a new method for non-violent opposition.  With the new method, the  effect would not have to be realized only when the opponent yields.  It  would be an activity dependent only upon oneself.  The more one does, the  more progress one makes and the more the goal comes true.  In the end,  whatever one accomplishes, he would win exactly the same amount of victory.   Only when one finds such a method, which is different from the non-violent  methods in the past, can one take the destiny into one\’s own hands, and no  longer depend on the favor that the powerful opponent may or may not grant.

 

      Later WA told me, he had interpreted for Dalai Lama many times before.   This time his expression was the most grave.  He had never seen Dalai Lama  with such a grave expression; it even made him afraid.

 

      I continued to say, successive multi-tier electoral system is such a new  method.  Specifically, take the election of a village: as soon as the  villagers there realize one thing – from then on, they would only recognize  the village head that they elected themselves, and would no longer obey the  person appointed by the authorities, whether it is a village head or a  secretary of the party, then advanced self-governance is realized in that  village.  When another village do the same, they have also realized advanced  self-governance.  When all or most villages in the township do so, they can  begin the election on the next level – all the village heads come together  to elect the leader of the township, and only recognize the township leader  that they elected themselves and no longer obey the leader appointed by the  authorities.  This township then would also have realized advanced  self-governance.  Thus step by step, from township to country, from county  to region, the advanced self-governance of whole Tibet can be gradually  realized through the individual changes of each of the societal units.  In  the past, the way to change society was from the top down.  In other words,  from the very beginning there must be total changes on the highest level.   The ruling authorities must first agree to the total change, or else one  must use violence to overthrow the ruling authorities.  But in the method of  the successive multi-tier electoral system, change occurs from the bottom  up, from the most basic societal organizations, controlled by the members of  the community themselves and not dependent on the concessions of those in  power.  This can thus break the impasse of the current Tibet problem.

 

      Of course, in the beginning stages, this process must go through certain  trials.  For instance, the authorities have imprisoned the township leader.   What should one do then?  No problem, elect another one.  It is convenient  for the village heads from the same township to elect a new township leader  together.  Then the village heads would still only recognize the township  leader they elected themselves.  Though the township leader appointed by the  authorities could use the office and the seal of the township, if the  village heads do not obey him, he would be nothing more than an empty title.    If the authorities arrested the second elected township leader, then one  can continue with the non-violent method and elect the third township  leader.  In short, the authorities can use violence and arrest constantly,  and we can constantly elect peacefully.  Can they arrest everybody?  If they  think that merely arresting the township leaders is not enough, and want to  further arrest the village heads who elected the township leader, then the  people in each village will then elect their new village head, and let the  new village heads elect a new township leader.  Unless they arrest  everybody, this kind of election could go on indefinitely.  Non-violent  movements have a slogan "to fill up the prisons".  One should try to act on  this slogan then, in order to advance wave upon wave and to never give up.   For those who are elected, the danger should not be too great for them,  since they were passively elected, and not the "bosses" who control from  behind the scene in traditional struggles.  For the real "bosses", the  authorities could try to arrest "the small few", but since successive  multi-tier electoral system is an election from the very bottom, it is the  act of the majority, arresting "a small few" would lose its effectiveness.   Of course, the reality would not be so simple, and the courage of man would  not always be so sufficient.  But as long as one perseveres, very soon the  oppression of the authorities cannot continue, because it does not have so  many prisons.  In the grand tide of freedom and democracy and under the  gazes of the whole world, it also could not apply the ultimate repression to  tens of thousands of people who only participated in an election.

 

      I said to Dalai Lama, there is another advantage to the successive  multi-tier electoral system.  It non-violently transforms the totalitarian  system from the bottom up, and does not need to directly challenge the  highest totalitarian authority from the very beginning.  Thus the  totalitarian powers would have relatively more tolerance for it.  In  contrast, those top-down methods for advanced self-governance must clash  with the totalitarian powers and enter the stage where one must eliminate  the other from the very beginning.  Therefore, it is hard for totalitarian  regimes to tolerate it.  In the successive multi-tier electoral system, only  in the final stages – when the chiefs from all the regions in Tibet come  together to elect the highest leader of the whole Tibet – would the system  completely replace the totalitarian powers in Tibet.  By that time, the  totalitarian regime will no longer have the power to repress.  The advanced  self-governance of Tibet could thus be accomplished completely without  violence.

 

      Of course, with this method the process will be quite long.  One must bear  all of the hardships oneself.  No doubt, obtaining permission for  self-governance directly from the Chinese government requires only a few  words from Beijing and would have been much easier.  But the problem is:  when is Beijing going to say those words?   If it never opens its mouth,  then must one wait forever, until Tibet is no longer Tibet, and Tibetans are  no longer Tibetans?  This kind of waiting, with one\’s destiny in someone  else\’s hands, has no hope and no end in sight.  Though it is not easy in a  successive multi-tier electoral system, at least one\’s destiny is in one\’s  own hands.  One requires only oneself for progress, and moreover, the more  one does, the closer one comes to the goal.  The only requirements are one\’s  own courage and patience.  As long as one keeps going, one would reach the  goal sooner or later.  Going down this road, the difficult part is only the  beginning.  When one jumps over the hurdles in the very start, it would  become increasingly simple in the end, and could even carry the situation  through with very little resistance.

 

      I said in the end, perhaps at the moment one does not yet have the  conditions to immediately implement the successive multi-tier electoral  system within Tibet, but the Tibetan communities overseas could at least  first experiment a little, research the method from theory to practice, and  accumulate some experience.  At the same time, they can wait for  opportunities to start the process in Tibet.  Tibetans have an exiled  community.  This on the one hand is their misfortune, but one the other hand  can be turned into a unique advantage.

 

      After hearing me speak, Dalai Lama opened his mouth.  But what he said  seemed rather irrelevant and far-fetched to me.  From his doctrine of the  "middle road", he went on to the question of who should rule the future  Tibet, to the fact that the Panchen Lama is to this day under house arrest,  and his own feelings of guilt.  For a while, I even thought that he did not  understand what I just said, or did not really listen.  But soon, he came  back to my topic.  Perhaps his meandering then was just to give himself more  time to decide on his reply.  He said, one can only attach the hope for a  solution to the Tibet problem to reforms within China itself.  It must also  depend on the people in Tibet now and the various Tibetan officials.  Right  now, he has been branded a separatist by Beijing though he has not yet  engaged in any activities aiming at the region within the Tibet borders.  If  he really starts to do something aimed at Tibet, he would no doubt be seen  as an even bigger enemy.  His implication was that to reach a solution of  the Tibet problem, he could only urge for change and wait quietly overseas,  but could not initiate any activities directed against Tibet itself.

 

      He only asked one substantial question.  He said that right now, Tibetans  were imprisoned for merely expressing different opinions, how could they  elect officials according to their own wishes?  What would happen then if  they did not obey the leaders appointed by the communist party?  Wouldn\’t  the situation be even worse then?

 

      I answered in this way: since in a successive multi-tier electoral system,  everyone participates from the bottom up, violent repression will not be  able to prevail against so many people, and thus will lose its effect.   Moreover, the units that participate in successive multi-tier electoral  system only govern themselves internally, but externally they still obey the  original system.  If the authorities tolerate it, then the old system can  still operate.  If they insist on repression, the old system would  malfunction or even break down.  Thus, if one continues with enough patience  and the courage to fill up the prisons, the authorities – especially the  authorities whose power is declining – would most likely concede.   Furthermore, China has issued and implemented "Villagers Self-Governance  Legislation".  There is now legal basis for elections and self-governance  within the village.  It would be perfectly justifiable to do so.  As long as  one can elect officials freely on the village level, one has already planted  the roots for successive multi-tier electoral system, and acquired the  foundation to ascend and expand.  Of course there will be risks.  The  totalitarian powers will not be reconciled to the fact that there are alien  elements within its own system.  But compared to the other methods of  reform, successive multi-tier electoral system should be the least risky and  the most likely to succeed.

 

      Dalai Lama thought that free elections based on the "Villagers Self-Governance Legislation" was a good idea.  But in the end, he still maintained that it should be accomplished by the people and officials within Tibetan borders.  Tibetans overseas could assist them, but one must attach all the hope for the future of Tibet to the people within the Tibetan borders.

 

      Later I said to WA, how could one attach all the hope to the people within Tibetan borders?  They are not organized and do not have sufficient information.  By themselves they cannot accomplish anything systematic.  The biggest hope to solve the Tibet problem is Dalai Lama.  If he let the matter drop, the unorganized Tibetan people would not have any direction.  But WA had another opinion- though in the beginning Dalai Lama\’s speech was rambling and meandering, in the end it returned to the central theme clearly, with very distinct internal logic and clear-cut ideas.  Though there were some diplomatic utterances, his answer did not veer from my central topic.  But he was definitely moved by my suggestion, otherwise his expression would not have been so grave.  I guess that perhaps Dalai Lama was not able to clearly express anything on my ideas, since after all, he did not know me well.  He could have taken me for a writer coming for an interview.  If I had published later that Dalai Lama would do this and that, this might harm him politically.  Thus he could only speak in a way that would not cause any trouble.

 

      But at the end of this meeting, Dalai Lama asked me to arrange a time to speak to me again, thus I believed that he really did want to further listen to me.  I advocated successive multi-tier electoral system to him, not only for the benefit of Tibet, but also because I hoped that solving the Tibet problem could be a beginning for the implementation of successive multi-tier electoral system everywhere.  For a new system to start, the hardest part is the beginning.  I believe that Tibet is the most appropriate place for this beginning.  First, there is an exiled community for experimentation, whereas within China there is no such possibility for experimentations.  Second, there is Dalai Lama.  His summons could give the Tibetan people courage to take extensive action, but in China there is no one who has enough strength for such mobilization.  Third is that Tibet has religious beliefs, and thus could easily generate the spirit of "filling the prisons", but it is harder for a Chinese to have such courage.  The decisive element here is of course  Dalai Lama, since he controls both the exiled Tibetan community and the  religious beliefs of Tibetans.  Thus as long as he accepts it, successive  multi-tier electoral system can then begin in Tibet and affect a  breakthrough.  And if Tibet can succeed, it could serve as an example for  reforms in Chinese society.  Thinking about it this way, Dalai, Tibet, and  successive multi-tier electoral system together can inaugurate a new era.

 

      Of course, these are only the thoughts in my head.  To influence Dalai  Lama, just thirty or forty minutes of conversation is not enough.  He has  already lived for several decades in the old ideological framework.  The  fact that his career relies heavily on the west also determines that he  cannot stray too far from the western mainstream paradigms and its value  system.  Right now, the construction of the political system in the exiled  Tibetan community is also imitating the congressional model in the west.   This kind of politics could perhaps be implemented in the exiled Tibetan  communities, but to copy it entirely in the vast Tibetan farms and fields  would certainly  be problematic.

 

      When we took our leave and came out, there was already a crowd of south  Asian looking people waiting outside the resting room.  In the front there  was a role of gorgeously dressed children.  Everybody had bright and  colorful flowers and hada in his hands.  Before the teaching of scripture in  the afternoon, Dalai Lama had to meet more people.

 

5. Listening to Dalai Lama speak in Los Angeles

 

      That night Dalai Lama gave a speech at the University of California at Los  Angeles.  It was still WA who got me the tickets.  I was like a real fan,  not missing any opportunity to see him.  I was indeed interested in this  Tibetan lama, and wanted to observe him in all occasions.  A friend in the  city drove and translated for me.  Coming out of the hotel, we saw Dalai  Lama just leaving the hotel.   The securities temporarily prohibited other  people from entering or leaving the main entrance, and cleared a way for him  to leave the lobby and get into his car.  When he was blessing the crowd on  the sides, he saw me.  We smiled at each other, and did not say anything  more.

 

      The site of the speech was at the gymnasium in the University.  The ticket  cost $6.  A Tibetan lama lingered in front of the ticket counter.  He  thought the ticket was too expensive.  Since WA did not come, we had one  extra ticket to give to the lama.  Sometimes I tried to guess how much  income Dalai Lama had from this type of events, and how did he use it?  With  his star power, if he had a good agent, he should have no problem earning  huge amounts.  Though he himself did not need money, exiled Tibet did.   Everyone would understand if he used commercial means and his star power to  generate income for exiled Tibet.  But I heard that he really disliked  associating his own movement with money, and often did things for free or  even paid himself.  The donation money that his disciples gave him was often  given in the next instant to someone else.  WA once told me that when he  visited Taiwan with Dalai Lama, Dalai Lama asked that all the money that  they received in Taiwan to remain in Taiwan.  The donation of the Taiwanese  was very generous.  People working for exiled Tibet must witness Dalai Lama  giving away large sums just received.  They were secretly distressed.  This  kind of money could accomplish so many things for exiled Tibet!

 

      The gymnasium was very big.  The seats within were mostly filled.  Many  chairs were also placed in the floor in the middle.  According to the news,  twenty thousand people were coming.  Before the speech began, the large  screen above the gym played a documentary about the reincarnated Panchen  Lama recognized by Dalai Lama – the documentary film called him the youngest  political prisoner in the world.  Many celebrities appeared in the film.   Among them, the Tutu Cardinal said something very wise: "Freedom is cheaper  than repression."  Indeed, I deeply agree with this point.  If China grants  Tibet advanced self-governance, it would spend much less money than now, but  obtain much better results.

 

      Before Dalai Lama appeared, the lights in the gym dimmed, while bright  lights illuminated the stage, as if a drama was about to begin.  When he  appeared on the stage, everyone gave him a standing ovation.  But he was  blinded by the light above and had to shield his eyes with his hands to look  at and to greet the people welcoming him.  His movements were natural and  completely without artifice.  At this age in which everything was a show, on  stage politicians only wanted to show off themselves.  But he was  charismatic precisely because he was not artificial (of course, one could  also say that he had the cleverest artifice, which expressed itself as  naturalness).  There was a single chair in the middle of the stage, brightly  illuminated by lights.  It was hard for anyone not to feel awkward, sitting  in that chair and knowing that in the darkness tens of thousands of eyes  were fixed upon him.  But he acted as if he was at home, sitting on the  chair and crossing his legs into a lotus position.  The audience laughed  sympathetically at this gesture.  Even with their own celebrities, they  could not see someone so free and easy.  I was already familiar with this  position.  Whether in the presidential suite in Washington, or in the small  resting room in the Los Angeles auditorium, he was always in this position.   He was always barefoot and wore only slippers, maybe so it was more  convenient to take his shoes off and cross his legs.  Tibetans, especially  Tibetan monks, found their most natural positions in sitting cross-legged.   Perhaps once he crossed his legs on stage, he felt as if he was already at  home.

 

      Dalai Lama\’s speech was in English.  His interpreter sat next to him and  only reminded him when he came across a word that he didn\’t know.  There  were four sides to the large screen above the gymnasium, which broadcasted  four giant close-ups of him at the same time.  His speech was on some topics  about life and wisdom.  I no longer remember the specific content.  I am  interested in the political problem in Tibet, but he seldom talks about  politics to the western audience, and instead speaks about life philosophies  and religion.  His popularity with the western public is due largely to the  fact that he has an image of a wise man and a religious leader, and not just  the representative of a repressed races\\.  The sympathy obtained purely from  a political angle is too limited.  There are so many repressed races in the  world, and so many people telling the suffering of their people and  advocating for his own race.  Why is the western public not interested in  them?  Because there are too many sufferings worthy of sympathy, and too  many injustices worthy of condemnation.  They all speak to the western  audience, but there is not enough time to listen to all.  Moreover, asking  them to give something every day, and soon they will be exhausted, and even  fed up.  But Dalai Lama is different.  He makes the western audience feel  that they are not asked to give, but that they are given, they receive, they  are the beneficiaries.  They receive from Dalai Lama advice on life,  exaltation with philosophy, and the fulfillment of religious feelings.   Therefore, they warmly welcome and love him.

 

       Dalai Lama is intelligent.  He himself does not talk about the political  problem in Tibet, but that does not mean that the Tibet problem is ignored  or overlooked.  Other people would talk about this topic for him.  Take this  speech for example: the documentary in the beginning had already embellished  the Tibet problem quite sentimentally.  The prologue given by the university  president was also about the Tibet problem.  This is the norm.  At every  occasion that Dalai Lama appear in, there are always celebrities,  congressmen, or stars from the west introducing him and talking about the  Tibet problem, expressing their condemnation for the Chinese government,  calling upon the western public to support the freedom movement of Tibet,  etc.  So when he begins to speak, he no longer mentions it.  Since there are  already people saying these things for him, what is the use of saying them  himself?  Isn\’t it smarter to let the others speak?

 

      That night I did not really listen to the content of Dalai Lama\’s speech,  but was mainly watching the reaction of the audience.  The Americans around  me almost all watched him with admiration.  They were completely transfixed,  sometimes nodding knowingly, sometimes bursting out with laughter.  Faced  with them, Dalai Lama was completely within his elements and directed the  thoughts and emotions of thousands in the gym with total ease.  Watching  such a scene, I was very moved.  All the more, I realized what a rare leader  he is.  Such a figure is so wanting in China, but future China desperately  needs such a leader.  Such a leader is worth more than a mountain of gold.   One of the most lacking elements in the political transformation of future  China is the leader.  The source of leaders of the Han people themselves has  almost been completely exhausted.  For so many years, I observed one figure  after another who appeared on the political arena, hoping to see one leader  who could possibly lead the future China out of the crisis.  I finally gave  up my hope.  My Han compatriots did not lack excellent talents in many  fields, but the person who possessed all qualifications never appeared.   This kind of figure is not a warlord who despotically rules a territory, not  an official good at schemes and tricks, nor a rebel who rises in revolt.  It  must be a leader who can balance all factors, unify all sides, who has  personal charms and spiritual authority, who is accepted and admired by the  whole world, who is able to lead China to complete the transformation to  freedom and democracy and create a new society, who, at the same time, does  not use power as a private property.  In short, it should be a leader like  Dalai Lama.

 

      If Dalai Lama were Han, no one but him would become the leader who controls  the future destiny of China.  But if he were really Han, could he have been  the Dalai Lama of today?  Then again, though he is not Han, why can he not  be Chinese?  Chinese is not necessarily Han.  He has often expressed the  belief that Tibet can stay in China, and thus in effect admitting that he  could be Chinese.  I have a friend who visited Dharamsala, and heard him  saying something like this: "If Mr. Jiang Zemin could solve the Tibet  problem, I am willing to nominate him as the second Chinese who wins the  Nobel Peace Prize."  Put this way, who is the first Chinese who has won the  Nobel Peace Prize?  Who could it be but him?  If he could be a Chinese, of  course he could be the leader of the Chinese!

 

      I did not come to this idea only that night.  In January 2000, in my first  article in the new millennium  "The Summary of a Fantasy Novel about Dalai  Lama and Excerpts from Another Novel", I wrote as a story my visions about  the two possible endings of the Tibet problem.  The two endings are one  negative and one positive (of course negative or positive for me).  The  negative one is that after the passing away of the 14th Dalai Lama, he  reincarnates his successor in America, and from then on realized the  independence of Tibet.  The positive ending is that Dalai Lama is elected as  the national leader of the Chinese, and becomes the stabilizing element  which ensures that China safely goes through the period of political  transformation.  A friend of mine who converted to Tibetan Buddhism told  these two stories to the Wuming Buddhist Institute in Kanquseda.  After he  came back to Beijing, he told me that, when he narrated the first story, the  monks all nodded in agreement.  But when he told the second story, the monks  all fell into silence with strange expressions.

 

      In any case, while I listened to Dalai Lama\’s speech in Los Angeles, I  began to think specifically about all this – what needs to be done to make  Dalai Lama the leader of future China.  For Dalai Lama, all the other  qualifications he already has: fame, influence, the recognition from  international society, the spiritual authority, and the ability to unite the  various ethnicities and peoples in China, all of this is already sufficient.    The only problem, and the biggest problem, is that right now he is not yet  understood and accepted by the Hans.  This is a fatal problem.  More than  ninety percent of the population in China is Han.  Without being known and  accepted by the Hans, it would not work no matter how good one is in other  areas.  But one can think about it from another perspective: ordinary  Chinese people do not necessarily need a leader that they know.   Circumstances make heroes.  In a certain historical juncture, the public  could readily accept a leader overnight.  Though Dalai Lama is not Han, he  has a high Buddhist position, and could transcend the differences of race  for the Han people with Buddhist cultures.  The important task now is to let  the elite class among the Han people understand and accept him, because a  leader cannot work without the recognition and cooperation of the elite  class.  And the acceptance of the elite class cannot happen at the last  moment – then it would be too late.  We need to let them understand and  accept Dalai Lama as soon as possible.

 

      It occurred to me that night that what I can do is to write a book, and to  introduce to my Han compatriots in detail what kind of person Dalai Lama is,  what is he about, what benefits he could bring to China, and how he could  help the transformation of the Chinese society.  There is no such book at  the moment, especially no book that is especially written for the Han  people.  Right now besides the propaganda of the Chinese government, the Han  people basically know nothing about Dalai Lama.  There are indeed many books  in the world about Dalai Lama, but books written by Tibetans or foreigners  are hard to accept by the Hans.  The Han people have lived in an environment  of deliberate propaganda for so many years, it is easy for them to dismiss  those books as propaganda material for an ideology, only that the position  is the opposite from the position of the Communist Party.  In this area,  books written by a Han would be better accepted by Han people.  This could  be seen from my book "Sky Burial".  Though before there were already many  books about the Tibet problem, but, in the words of He Qinglian, only "Sky  Burial" brought the Tibet problem into the field of vision of the Chinese  intelligentsia.    "Sky Burial" helped them to understand the basic concepts  of the Tibet problem, and to begin to ponder the problem in-depth.  Before  this, though the Tibet problem was a hot topic in the international  discussion, the Chinese intelligentsia had always considered it an  ideological topic, and believed that it was not worth being considered from  historical, political, and religious perspectives.  One of the reasons for  this attitude is that, all of the comments about Tibet before this, whether  from the Communist Party, exiled Tibetans, or the western world, have always  had a strong ideological flavor, and were thus rejected as propaganda from  their consideration.  But "Sky Burial" on the one hand broke away from  ideology, and used the thought methods and analytical perspectives of an  intellectual; on the other hand, since the author was a Han, they believed  at least that it was not separatist, and found it easier to read.  Although  reading does not necessarily mean acceptance, as long as they start to  confront, start to think, their first impressions and prejudices can be  broken and the result is much more productive and beneficial.  Looking from  this perspective, it is the same with books about Dalai Lama.  If I can  write it, Han intellectuals would be more willing to read it.  It will thus  encourage them to think more about Dalai Lama and interest them in  understanding Dalai Lama better.  This way their original ignorance and  rejection of Dalai Lama can be changed.

 

      However, I only considered this project, but did not yet know when I can  start doing it.  To start it requires a few conditions.  The first is to be  able to converse with Dalai Lama many times and in a thorough way, and to  observe him from close quarters.  I don\’t know whether this is possible, and  when I can have such an opportunity

 

6. Third meeting with Dalai Lama

 

     My third meeting with scheduled at 9:00 a.m. on May 27th.  Every day when  Dalai Lama got up, he first read some scripture and medicated, then  discussed work and breakfasted.  Before seeing me he had another meeting.   Then he would talk to me, and then go to the scripture lessons.  This time  our meeting would take place in his room in the hotel.  WA and I first  waited in BQ\’s room.  BQ\’s room and Dalai Lama\’s room were on the same  floor, not too far away from each other.

 

      While we waited, Dalai Lama asked his Tibetan-Chinese interpreter, a  20-something Taiwanese, to first come over and speak with us.  I don\’t know  why he arranged it in such a way.  The young interpreter and I had no  specific topics, and just randomly chatted for a while.  The interpreter had  been sent to the Sela Temple in India to study Tibetan and religion when he  was not yet ten.  He looked very innocent and not yet learned in the ways of  the world.  He mostly interpreted for Dalai Lama in matters of religion.   The past few days he had interpreted at the scripture meetings.  Yesterday,  when I listened to the lesson, I felt that he could translate the literal  meaning, but not the spirit of the words to the audiences.  For instance:  the American audiences at the lesson listened to a simultaneous translation  in English with earphones.  Often, the people listening to the earphones  laughed, but not the people listening to the Chinese translation.  This  interpreter was too young, and also born in Taiwan, and thus had no  knowledge of many events such as the Cultural Revolution or the movement  against Rightism in the mainland.  I could not imagine how he could be a  good interpreter between Dalai Lama and the mainland Han people.  It is  different with English translation.  There are many people good at English  among the exiled Tibetans.  I heard that Dalai Lama\’s English interpreter is  outstanding.  One can see that from the results of the simultaneous  interpretation at the scripture lessons.  But the people the Tibetans most  need to know and to communicate with are not westerners, but Hans, whether  or not they want to emotionally.  Thus discovering and using people talented  with Chinese are very important for exiled Tibet.  My feeling is that they  did not seem to have done enough in this area.

 

      Fortunately, WA interpreted for Dalai Lama and me.  With him, I could  hardly feel the language barrier.  Often I did not even need to finish what  I said, and he could already translate according to my intentions.  There  were many words about which even I could not be sure, but he could always  prompt me appropriately.  To ensure the quality of our talk, WA interrupted  his own work and flew across America to be our interpreter.  This showed, on  the one hand, how serious and important they thought this was, and on the  other hand, showed that Dalai Lama really lacked good Han speakers by his  side.

 

      Since Dalai Lama arranged this meeting himself, and we did not have to save  every seconds for speaking and to forget anything else, I, like many other  people who saw Dalai Lama, began to ponder how to get a little souvenir.   After all, seeing Dalai Lama was not easy.  Thus I brought a book written by  Dalai Lama.  It was a Taiwanese translation, titled "Living More Happily".   Originally, I had only wanted Dalai Lama to sign his name on the book.  Just  the words "Dalai Lama" would have been enough.  I planned to give the book  to the family member of the photographer who took those photos during the  Cultural Revolution, as a thank-you gift for the photos I gave to Dalai  Lama.  But holding the book and pen, Dalai Lama thought seriously for a  while before he wrote.  It was not just an autograph, but quite a lengthy  passage in Tibetan, addressed to me.  WA later translated it for me.  It  meant: "For scholar Mr. Wang Lixiong.  I pray that you may use your wisdom  to find the truth of things, in order to make a large and beneficial  contribution to yourself and to humanity."  The signature was "Dalai Lama  Tenzin Gyatso", dated "May 27th, 2001".  Of course, I would not give the  book to someone else now.  But since I was afraid that when I returned home  it would be confiscated at the custom, I had to give it to WA to keep for  me, and did not bring the book back to China.

 

      I began the conversation by speaking about the speech Dalai Lama gave at  the University of California, and went on to the success exiled Tibet has  had internationally.  I then spoke about my belief that he was first and  foremost a spiritual leader, and then a political leader.  I said, as a  political leader, he is only Tibetan.  But as a spiritual leader, he can  transcend races and ethnicities.  His influence among the western audience  is due to the fact that he is a spiritual leader.  But for the Han people,  he has not been successful in this respect.  I had said the same things to  LD.  The majority of Han people have the same opinion with Beijing on the  Tibet question.  For them, Dalai is only a political figure who wants  Tibetan independence politically and tries to separate it from China.  They  are ignorant about his religious function and his spiritual role.  Of course  this is partly due to the information block and the deliberate distortion by  the Communist Party, but it is also due to the fact that exiled Tibet spent  most of its energy on the West, and did not attach enough importance to  China and the Hans.  Moreover, the conversation with China is focused too  much on nationalism and ideology, and neither stresses the difference  between the government in Beijing and the Chinese people, nor consciously  tries to broaden the religious influence of Dalai Lama in the mainland or to  cultivate among the ordinary Han people the image of Dalai Lama as a  spiritual leader.  What\’s more, there is a further relationship that needs  to be adjusted.  The two events — exiled Tibet\’s success with the west and  failure with China – are indeed connected.  Their original tactics has  resulted in an inverse relationship: the more successful exiled Tibet is  with the west, the less successful it is with the Chinese mainland, since  the elements that enabled it to win over the hearts of the western audience  are also the elements that cause it to lose support among the Hans.  How to  position the two sides should be reconsidered.

 

      While listening to these opinions, Dalai Lama continually nodded. Furthermore, I said, even in terms of politics, there are also areas that  need to be improved.  For instance, there is the "middle road" advocated by  Dalai Lama, which does not demand independence but only self-governance.   Just him saying that is not enough, since without a detailed plan and  thoughtful research, as well as the specification of technicalities, it is  just an abstract concept, or could even be seen as just a slogan.  No doubt,  Dalai Lama himself cannot do this research.  But looking around him, other  people are not doing it either.

 

      I gave Dalai Lama some examples.  For instance, once Tibet has  self-governance, would it permit Han people to move in and out of Tibet  freely? If yes, then what are they going to do about the current Tibetan  complaint that the large quantity of people flowing into Tibet is causing  the destruction of Tibetan culture and environment?  If no, then how could  they control the flow?  The constitutions of all modern countries permit  their residents to move and travel freely within the country.  From this  angle, even if Tibet becomes self-governing, it is still the same country as  China.  If they try to control the Han people coming into Tibet, how would  they resolve the conflict with the constitution?  What would be the method  of control?  With residence registration?  Or with issuing passports and  visa?  Should there be border guards and toll gates between Tibetan regions  and Han regions?  Would the Tibetan region be able to finance and supply the  manpower for these toll gates itself, or would it rely on the Han region to  establish them for it?  … etc, etc.  I had asked these questions to the  officials of the exiled government at the Boston conference.  They had  discussed in Tibetan for a long time, but had never given me a clear answer.    Evidently, exiled Tibet did not think about these questions deeply, nor  did they have a mature plan.

 

      Also, Dalai Lama has suggested that the future system in Tibet should be  neither socialism nor capitalism.  For myself, I admire this ideal.  But  what exactly would such a system be?  Just having ideals is not enough.  The  system must be realized in specific arrangements and detailed descriptions.   The exiled Tibetan government has publicized the political system of future  Tibet, but it never said what would the economic system be.  The difference  between a socialist system and a capitalist system is mostly economic.  If  one does not concretize this area, there will be many obstacles one cannot  cross.  Currently, Tibet has many so-called "liberated serfs".  One cannot  ignore their existence.  They are anxious about the kind of economic  policies the exiled government will have once it returns to Tibet.  Will it  require them to return their land to the former owners?  Though Dalai Lama  has always emphasized that Tibet would not return to the old system, as long  as he does not clarify what the new system is going to be, the "liberated  serfs" will not stop suspecting and worrying.,

 

      Also, there is the legacy that the Communist Party has left in Tibet.  A  few decades have produced a large number of Tibetan who share their sorrow  and joys with the Communist Party.  These people include officials in the  Party, employees of the state-owned businesses, retirees, and other  beneficiaries.  All sides of their lives, even their survival, are deeply  connected to the current communist regime.  If Tibet becomes self-governing  and the Communist Party leaves the Tibetan society, how will the lives of  these people change?  Could their lifestyles be guaranteed?  How would a  self-governing Tibet deal with the state-owned organizations left from the  communist era?  Can it assimilate more than one hundred thousand officials  and employees who are mostly concentrated in the cities?  How to assimilate  them?  Change them?  What is the plan?  What are the methods?  … All of  this requires systematic research and thorough arrangement, in order to  design a set of system that can balance all sides.  Only depending on the  general concepts is not nearly enough.  "Revolution is a grand holiday for  the people".  During the revolution, the people might exultantly celebrate.   But problems usually occur the second day that the revolution succeeds.   Once Tibet really becomes self-governing, there will no longer be anyone  else who takes care of these matters and bear the responsibilities.   Everything must depend on itself.  What it facex then would be the banal  details of everyday life, which cannot be lacking one bit.  But exiled Tibet  now not only has not prepared well for these things, it has not even thought  very much along these lines.

 

      My final conclusion was: one must avoid such a situation – within exiled  Tibet only Dalai Lama himself is waving the flag of "middle road".  The  other people do not contradict him in words, but do not think and consider  appropriate policies and plans, either.  Right now, Beijing criticizes  "middle road" as a deceptive measure to first achieve semi-independence, and  then to use that as a springboard towards full-independence.  To refute such  a criticism, the best method is to concretize the "middle road", and not  give the simple answer that some exiled Tibetans have given – Dalai Lama has  already made such a compromise, and you still don\’t accept!  We can only try  to win our independence!  Such rhetoric will serve as evidence that "middle  road" is only a negotiating ploy and a middle step.  But if one can  concretize "middle road", and present every detail, it will be easier to  prove to the Hans the sincerity of Dalai Lama\’s "middle road" principle, and  that he indeed treats "middle road" as an end and not a means.  The Han  people are prone to distrust, because they were so often deceived in  history.  They are thus used to being suspicious.  They are not like the  Tibetans, who treat the words of Dalai Lama as a sacred promise.  They find  it hard to believe verbal promises.  Only when they se real actions with  their own eyes can their suspicions be dispelled and their trust won.

 

      Here, Dalai Lama said that he agreed with me one hundred percent.  But I  knew better than to be too self-satisfied with his "one hundred percent",  because this was a pet phrase of his.  I heard several people describing  their conversations with Dalai Lama, which all received "one hundred  percent" agreement or approval from Dalai Lama.  After that, Dalai Lama  began to explain to me some specific contents of the "middle road" policy.   I felt that perhaps I was not clear.  I mentioned those problems, not to aim  at the problems themselves, but mainly to illustrate how the "middle road"  policy has not yet been concretized.  But he seemed to have thought that I  wanted specific answers for those questions, and thus changed the topic to  this.  He first talked about the relationship between Tibet and Hans once  self-governance is achieved.  He said that someone had once suggested such a  criterion: those who were born inside Tibet could become a resident of Tibet  and have the right to remain in Tibet permanently.  Those who were not born  inside of Tibet should return to the Han residence area.  I have seen this  view before.  But just saying this did not answer my question.  If only  those who were born inside Tibet have the right to permanently remain in  Tibet, the number of such people will be miniscule.  Even for those Han  people whose residence is registered in Tibet, who have lived in Tibet for  many decades, when they give birth, they usually go back to Han residence  areas, because they believe that the altitude of Tibet is not suited for Han  mother and babies.  Thus, their children are mostly not born in Tibet,  either.  Would it be reasonable to demand all of the people who were born  outside of Tibet to leave Tibet? Would it be practical?  The right for  permanent residence is not even the biggest problem.  More important is  whether the future Tibet would permit Han people to come in freely.  Will  Tibet turn into another Hong Kong, which can only be entered with a special  pass?  The policy has been easy to implement in tiny Hong Kong, since before  Chinese were permitted to go there anyway (but this still spurred the  resentment of Han people in the inland, who said that unification was not  like unification at all).  But Tibet\’s area is one fourth of the total area  of China.  Han people have traditionally been able to move freely there, but  suddenly one day they need to have a special pass to enter.  This seems both  unreasonable and impractical.

 

      Dalai Lama went on to talk about the economic system for future Tibet.  Why  is it neither socialism nor capitalism?  Because he has many discontents  with capitalism.  The materialism of the western societies has brought many  problems to humanity, but socialism also has many disadvantages and created  many problems, as well.  But exactly what kind of economic system would be  most suited for future Tibet, he said, is not a question he could answer.   It must be researched by scholars and professionals.

 

      There was an interlude in between.  In the first two meetings, I had not  taken a picture with Dalai Lama.  This time I gave BQ a digital camera in  advance and asked him to take a few pictures during the conversation.  It  was not necessary to take those kinds of pictures where the two of us stand  together.  The camera was new and never had a problem.  But during the  conversation, I saw BQ raising the camera and trying several times, but  couldn\’t press down on the shutter.  He looked really exasperated.  There  were many legends among the Chinese people about how one cannot take photos  of people with supernatural powers.  At the time, I wondered secretly, did  Dalai Lama really have this kind of supernatural powers, which made the  camera malfunction?  Dalai Lama had to leave for a short while during our  conversation.  Taking this opportunity, I checked the camera.  The shutter  button indeed could not be pushed down, and the other buttons also did not  react, either.  The screen and the various functions all did not work.  Only  when I took out the battery inside the camera and put it back in again did  the camera start working again.  BQ was afraid that the camera would  malfunction again, so as soon as Dalai Lama came back, he took two pictures  of us.

 

      Dalai Lama continued with the topic before.  According to the original time  arrangement, our meeting should have been already over.  He was supposed to  go to the scripture lesson at 9:30.  But the time of the scripture lesson  was flexible.  Normally, in the beginning they sang and prayed, and helped  the followers to get into the mood.  The duration of this could be extended  or shortened as needed, so it was all right even if he was a little late.   That day he extended his meeting time with me for at least twenty minutes.   Though I felt that his topic had departed a little from our main  conversation, I think he probably thought that I was a writer and must want  an interview, so he answered my questions.  Actually I had rather that he  did not say those things, because he answered me with views that he had  repeated on many occasions, most of which I had already read.

 

      A hada lay on the coffee table.  It was supposed to be given to me at the  end of the conversation, which would signify a final farewell.  But at the  end of this conversation, Dalai Lama said that he wanted to see me again at  noon, and asked BQ and his secretary to arrange it.  So he did not give the  hada to me.  After that, he put on a yellow aromatic bag and left to attend  the scripture meeting, and we stayed behind and waited until he was out of  the door to leave.  He was still wearing his slippers barefoot.  I saw that  as soon as he was out of the door, two Americans who were waiting there came  and shook his hands, and then walked on with him at his side.  They were  arranged to speak to him on the way to the scripture meeting.  It seems as  if every single moment of his life had already been fully scheduled.

 

      I really admire Dalai Lama\’s uncommon energy.  For an old man of sixty-six  years, the fact that he can endure such a strenuous schedule is enough to  prove that he is very healthy; otherwise he would have never been able to  bear it.  WA said that when he visited Taiwan with Dalai Lama, the  accompanying young men were all exhausted.  And they were only following  him, unlike Dalai Lama, who must meet, converse, meditate, and teach.  But  Dalai Lama never seemed tired.  I thought of the rumors from the Beijing  government, which said that Dalai Lama was very weak, and hoped for his  death.  It must have been either wrong information or wishful thinking.   Judging from his constant activities in America for over a month, it should  not be a problem for him to live for another ten or twenty years healthily.   It would probably be a mistake if the Communist Party tried to compete with  him in longevity, since it is questionable whether the Chinese Communist  Party itself could last another ten years.

 

      WA seemed very happy leaving the meeting.  He said that there were many  "firsts" at this meeting: He saw for the first time Dalai Lama writing down  so many things for an autograph for someone; he saw for the first time the  almost terrifyingly serious expression that Dalai Lama had when he was  translating; moreover, Dalai Lama had never seen someone four times in a row  during such a strenuous visiting schedule.  I was also happy.  WA did all  the specific arrangements for my meeting with Dalai Lama.  He put a lot of  painstaking effort into this, and to succeed was the best reward for him.   WA had worried that since LD did not come to Los Angeles, when others  arranged the schedule they would not have given us too much time.  But  unexpectedly, Dalai Lama had arranged the meetings himself, and added two  more meetings.  It became very satisfactory.  Unlike other Han people who  met Dalai Lama, I did not see the meetings as only ceremonial, and also did  not only want an interview.  I wanted to tell him my views on the Tibet  problem.  For that I prepared a lot in advance, and could therefore give him  views and ideas that he has not yet had before.  I guess this was the main  reason why he kept arranging further meetings with me.

 

7. Fourth meeting with Dalai Lama

 

      At noon I had a box lunch supplied by the scripture meeting with WA and BQ.    It was free, probably the alms given by some Chinese restaurant owner to  the scripture meeting.  A funny thing happened there.  BQ was a vegetarian,  and had especially asked for a vegetarian meal.  But when we found a place  to sit down and opened the box, there was a chicken leg in every box.  BQ  was astonished, and hurried to exchange his box.  The people told him that  the chicken leg was fake.  It was actually made from tofu.  But BQ was still  not reassured, since the chicken leg looked very genuine.  Not only could  one not tell by looking at it, after I carefully tasted it, I still could  not judge whether or not it was chicken meat.  Only when the wooden stick  "bone" appeared in the middle, could I tell that it was a fake, and  immediately assured BQ.  BQ asked me a question.  If one is vegetarian, then  why expend so much effort to make it exactly like meat?  What kind of  mentality do the Han people have?  I did not have an answer for this.

 

      My fourth meeting with Dalai Lama was just like the previous day.  It was  arranged at the resting time between the lessons.  After eating, we went to  the auditorium and first waited on stage next to the holy seat and holy  vessels.  Soon, Dalai Lama\’s accompanying officials led us inside.  It was  still the same small resting room as last time.  Dalai Lama was not yet  there, so we waited inside the room.  No one sat down.  This time I also  learned my lesson, and stood there politely.  In a while someone came and  said that Dalai Lama was here, then Dalai Lama appeared in the doorway.  He  first bowed to me slightly.  The scene is still clear before me even today,  but at that time I was surprised, and hurried to return the bow.  I found  that one of the reason for his charisma was the fact that he was modest and  unassuming.  He was not one of those people who were convinced of their own  importance.  These people consciously or unconsciously distance and exclude  others.  But whenever he met people, he always tried to pull them closer,  and make them feel very intimate with him.  They would not think that he  wasn\’t an important figure because of it.  He was still an important figure,  but at the same time so friendly with you.  One can imagine how he could win  over many people just because of this.

 

      We started talking again.  I tried to clarify what I said in the morning.   I said that exiled Tibet probably has its own reasons for not working on the  concretization of the "middle road" principle-since the Chinese government  completely rejects "middle road", why is it necessary to concretize it?   Since one can see no hope for self-governance, what is the point of  preparing for self-governance at all?  But one must look at this from all  sides.  Concretizing the "middle road" policy is not only useful after the  "middle road" policy comes true, but is necessary in the process of changing  it from idea to reality.  Only when the "middle road" policy is concretized,  can all sides understand what it is, and have pertinent considerations and  judgments.  This also involves a question of means: one must separate the  Beijing regime and the Chinese people.  Even if the Beijing regime is tough  until the end on the Tibet question, one still should – or even especially  should – work hard to win over the Chinese people.  With this kind of  premise, one will never be disheartened and give up what one should do just  because the Beijing regime does not react.  One must realize that any  specific work that exiled Tibet does for "middle road" will eventually be  known by the elite class in China, and will diffuse through them to the  Chinese people.  The Communist Party is not China\’s eternity.  As soon as  the Communist Party leaves, the seeds that were sown today can be harvested  then.  But if one does not make such an effort, one leaves the majority of  the Han people tied together with the Communist Party on the Tibet question,  and enabling the attitude of the Communist Party today to extend to the time  of post-communism.  In my opinion, this is the biggest danger.

 

      I then gave Dalai Lama a suggestion.  If it is inappropriate for exiled  Tibet to call for the implementation of successive multi-tier electoral  system since it would interfere in the internal affairs of Tibet, such a  problem does not exist for another matter, namely, establishing a magazine  devoted to the discussion of "middle road".  The main purpose of the  magazine would be to research the Tibet problem, which could also extend to  other problems of Chinese ethnicities.  It should be a completely  independent academic journal, which only discusses how to turn the "middle  road" policy into concrete plan, and does not argue over "-isms".  The  magazine itself should be like the topic it is discussing: it should stay in  the "middle\’.  Its standpoint should be completely neutral and objective,  and it should reject propaganda, extreme language, and ideology from either  side.  The so-called "middle road" is only a banner that Dalai Lama waves  right now.  People can see it, but cannot gather under it because there is  no space beneath.  This should be the other function of the magazine.  It  should provide a forum for people interested in "middle road" to gather  together in order to communicate and discuss and eventually become a  gradually stronger camp.

 

      I emphasized that the independence of the magazine does not mean it should  cast away all ties with exiled Tibet.  To the contrary, it should let the  world know that it is founded with the support of Dalai Lama, and therefore  could express even more Dalai Lama\’s sincerity and devotion to the policy of  "middle road".  "Independence" just means that exiled Tibet does not  interfere with the policy and the content of the magazine.  The magazine  should have a self-governing and representative editorial board that manages  it independently.

 

      Of course, right now the magazine can only be published overseas.  Though  the news block in China makes it hard for ordinary Chinese readers to see  it, in today\’s information age, there are always channels of communication,  especially through the Internet.  Sooner or later the Chinese intelligentsia  will know the content of the magazine.  The magazine can help them  understand "middle road", and attract them to join in the reflection and  discussion on "middle road".  At the same time, since the magazine rejects  ideological propaganda, it is not impossible that the Chinese government  will tolerate it to some extent.  At least the relevant departments in the  Chinese government would subscribe to it, and the magazine would accomplish  the function of communication.  At the same time it could establish a board  of trustees with prominent figures from the Tibetan and Han communities, and  invite people within the Communist Party who are relatively liberal on the  Tibet question to participate.  This way, Beijing could understand the  situation of the magazine, and avoid the suspicions that arise out of  ignorance.  It might even acquiesce to some space for the magazine within  China.  Through this a positive interaction could spring up.

 

      To this, Dalai Lama immediately said: "Good!  You people should do it!   It\’s very good!  If it can be successful, I support it."  He immediately  asked BQ and others to think about this idea.  Actually, I had already  discussed this suggestion last time with LD.  I thought of this idea when LD  asked me to make suggestions.  At first they were very serious about it, and  had discussed with me extensively.  I had already designed rather  meticulously the structure of the magazine.  But then there was no more word  on the magazine.  Now I mentioned the magazine again to Dalai Lama, because  I had remembered this matter all along.  Indeed, I still believe that  founding such a magazine would be effective for solving the Tibet problem.   With the influence of Dalai Lama, it should be no problem to promote the  founding of such a magazine.  Of course it depends on whether he also  believes it would be useful.

 

      This meeting was rather short, only about half an hour.  It was a pity that  I do not remember more of what Dalai Lama said.  All throughout the few  meetings, I focused on speaking to him.  My mind had been concentrated on  how best to speak, and therefore found it very hard to also take down what  he said.  Moreover, since I didn\’t know whether recording was appropriate, I  never asked to record him.  Now as I try to recall everything, there was  only a vague idea left to the content of Dalai Lama\’s talk.  Especially this  last meeting, I could hardly remember his words.  I only remember at the  moment when we said our last farewell.  He put the hada on me and gave me  his blessings.  I also used this last time to say to him that for me, he is  needed not only to save Tibet in the future, but also to save China.  When  he heard this, he smiled.  It was a smile of disbelief.  But these words  came from my heart.  They were absolutely not just insincere compliments.   Perhaps he does not want to add to his responsibilities the heavy load of  saving more than one billion people.  Just solving the Tibet problem is  enough for him to worry about.  Moreover, he only has a responsibility to  the Tibetan people, and the problems of the Hans are not his affair.  But I  already told him at our first meeting: the Tibet problem cannot be separated  from the China problem.  It is impossible to only solve the Tibet problem  without solving the China problem as well.  The "middle road" policy does  not have any practical solutions for many specific problems in Tibet, and  always finds itself in an insurmountable dilemma.  An important reason for  it is that it limits itself only to Tibet and does not consider Tibet as one  with China.  This also means that to really solve the Tibet problem, Dalai  Lama must put himself in the position of a Chinese leader.  As long as he is  not willing to give up Tibet, he must carry at the same time the load of  China.  There are no other choices.  To me, this is perhaps fate.  To tie  the Tibet problem and the China problem together, is to make it possible  that Dalai Lama one day becomes the leader of China.  When the tremendous  changes in China arrive, his influence would be unmatched and irreplaceable  by anyone.  Though other people would laugh off what I say right now as a  ridiculous notion, Dalai Lama should not.  If he could really understand  providence, he should be conscious of this mission in his heart.

 

      At the last moment, when we shook our hands and said good-bye, Dalai Lama  clasped my arms and pulled me to him, and touched my forehead with his  forehead.  I also held his shoulders.  Neither of us spoke.  We stood like  this for a while.  The time seemed very long, but also very brief.  That  same night he was flying back to India.  Who knew when and where we would  meet again?  I walked to the door, then turned around and put my palm  together to say goodbye again.  He stood in the same place and watched me  go.  For some reason, my heart was filled with melancholy.

 

8. Exasperation

 

      After leaving Dalai Lama, we returned to the restaurant.  Some Tibetans  living in Los Angeles came in succession.  After the scripture lessons Dalai  Lama would see them.  BQ led me to a hall that some Tibetans were arranging.    Inside there was a yellow religious seat, on its back hung the  snow-mountain and lions flag.  A row of Tibetan women waved their long  sleeves and sang Tibetans songs.  They were rehearsing their dances for  Dalai Lama.

 

      WA was rushing back to Washington that night.  He signed out of the room in  the morning.  We sat in the hotel lobby and said goodbye.  BQ and I  discussed the idea of publishing the magazine.  He said that the reason for  the silence last time after our first talk was mainly due to their worry  that the Han people and Tibetan people within China would be too scared to  participate.  If the magazine were only for people outside the country, then  it would not have the intended effect.  I could understand such a worry.  In  the highly repressive atmosphere in China today, everyone is indeed very  cautious and afraid of being involved in complications.  But I believe that  one should not do nothing because of that, because these days in China there  is nothing that does not require worrying, unless one does absolutely  nothing at all.  I thought a good way was to first start the magazine, and  try to solve the problems as they come.  Perhaps in the end it would  succeed.  Even if it doesn\’t, and some energy and money were wasted, it  would still not be a big sacrifice.  Many things that exiled Tibet has done  and is doing cannot count as successful, judging from their immediate  effect.  Compared to the cost of international activities, visits, or  foreign offices, the cost of publishing a magazine would probably be much  less, but the effect could be much greater.  What\’s more, one should not  immediately conclude that people within the Chinese border would all be too  scared to participate.  After coming back from America, by chance I had to  go to the Tibetan region to do a project on environmental education.  I  traveled through Tibet and the Tibetan regions in the four provinces.   During that trip I did a special investigation, and the reality is not so  bleak.  The Tibetan scholars, monks, officials, and social activists all  thought highly of such a magazine, and most of them would be willing to  write for it.  Of course there were security concerns, but they can be  solved by using pseudonyms and so on.  However, after that conversation, I  have not received news from BQ for a long time.  I guess the project had  been set aside once again.

 

       On the trip across the Pacific Ocean back to China, facing the gate of the  country that I was about to enter, I began to think about the troubles I  could encounter, and how to resolve them.  Though the meetings with Dalai  Lama in America were secret, and before my departure no one in the mainland  knew the reasons for my trip, right now I no longer dared to say that no one  knew about it.  After the fourth meeting with Dalai Lama, we ran into a  Canadian Hong-Kongese outside the door, waiting to speak to me.  Though I  did not speak to him, it still meant that my whereabouts were known.  Then  wouldn\’t the relevant departments in China know as well?  What kind of  action would they take, and what should I do?  Around me other travelers  were deep asleep.  I thought for a long time under the dim light of the  cabin, but still could not decide.  If they really knew what I said to Dalai Lama, they probably would convict me of treason – giving counsel to Dalai Lama, what could it be if not treason?  It really felt a little ridiculous.  LD, who did not know me at all, could see across the Pacific that I had a "Chinese heart", but the Chinese regime, who kept me under surveillance every minute, thought that I was a "traitor".

 

      Actually, while seeing Dalai Lama, there was something that I almost said, but did not.  If one uses successive multi-tier electoral system, one can achieve even the independence of Tibet.  That would only required one condition- that the vast majority of Tibetans all insist on independence.  I did not say this because it would really feel a bit "treasonous".  But in all fairness, everything I said to Dalai Lama was aimed at keeping Tibet in China, and not promoting Tibetan independence.  All the council that I gave to Dalai Lama had the principle "Tibet stays in China" as our common basis.  Only I believe that what will make Tibet stay in China is not repression, but granting it freedom and democracy – "freedom is cheaper than repression".  At the same time I also believe this: if China would of its own accord permit Tibet to practice successive multi-tier electoral system, then the condition for Tibetan independence would no longer exist.  Since Tibet with successive multi-tier electoral system is already self-governing, the vast majority of Tibetans will no longer demand independence.  Moreover, the leaders elected in the successive multi-tier electoral system are highly rational.  They would understand more than anyone else that the price for independence would be unbearable for Tibet.  The argumentation for this can be found in my article "Successive multi-tier electoral system and representative democracy: A comparison of solutions for the Tibet problem".

 

      While thinking about this, a thought seriously crossed my mind.  After returning to the country, if I go of my own accord and "report" the circumstances of my meetings with Dalai, could it attract the attention of those in high places, and communicate to them the idea of using successive multi-tier electoral system to solve the Tibet problem? Could it influence them and help solving the Tibet problem, as well as help to start the successive multi-tier electoral system?  But I immediately rejected the idea.  For a regime that wants to control even elections on a village level, it is unimaginable that it would try a political system that is completely foreign to it.  To tell them the ideas of successive multi-tier electoral system is asking them to act against their own interest.  Nonetheless, having spoken so much with Dalai Lama was rare either for official or nonofficial persons.  I should be able to find something to communicate and see whether it could be useful.  I always hope to find "usefulness" in things.  Since I could not talk about successive multi-tier electoral system with the authorities, could I settle for less and talk about something else?   I summed it up.  There were three different points I could talk about.  First was Dalai Lama\’s sincerity about going the "middle road".  I could explain it with my own close observations and refute the view that described the "middle road" as a conspiracy.  Second was Dalai Lama\’s health.  I wanted to tell those who believed that Dalai Lama was weak and declining, and who strove to drag the Tibet problem beyond his death, to rethink their schedules.  Third was the prestige of Dalai Lama in the western community.  To antagonize such a person is to put oneself in the opposition camp of the western audience.  In all three of these points, explaining Dalai Lama was the key.  Only when one solves the Tibet problem together with Dalai Lama could the efforts be fruitful.  If I said it like that, could it influence the relevant decision-makers a little?

 

      But as I began to consider how to express these things, and to think about  specific details, problems arose.  First, who should I talk to?  Of course not the security departments.  I neither wanted to "report" to those places, nor did I want to foolishly look for trouble.  Then there was only one other place that took care of these things: Department of Military Unification.  But the Department of Military Unification is very exasperating.  For many years, it has been nothing but an obstacle to the solution of the Tibet problem, and has never had a good effect.  More than a year ago at a conference at Beijing University I had debated with the official responsible for Tibetan affairs from the Department of Military Unification.  I well knew that these people would never accept any views that accepted Dalai Lama and his influence.  The saying "China\’s attitude towards Tibet" actually means the attitude of the seven permanent members of the Politburo (or even just the general secretary himself) towards Tibet.  Those few people control such a vast China, their minds rarely entertain the Tibet problem, nor do they ever think about it deeply.  Thus their thoughts on the Tibet problem are led internationally by the Department of Military Unification, and domestically by the regional Tibetan government.  The Department of Military Unification was most influential in devising the policy of treating Dalai Lama as an enemy.  If it changes, would it not be rejecting what it has always said and done before?  Under the communist regime, this kind of change is unimaginable.  Thus to go to Department of Military Unification to talk about this kind of topic was asking for trouble.

 

      If I could not talk about big and general problems, could I settle for less again and only talk about the "middle road" magazine as a specific problem?  Indeed, as BQ said, if the magazine could win the acquiescence of China and receive the space to survive in China, or at least, if China would not forbid people within China to write for it, then the magazine could have the assurance of having influence and effect.  Then could I try to council the Chinese government and to argue for the benefit of such a magazine?  Acquiescence does not require someone being responsible for it, but it can open a window.  It could be useful even just for the purpose of acquiring information.  In communicating with Dalai\’s side, it is not enough to only rely on representatives and middlemen.  Those methods are the roots of much wrong interpretations and misunderstandings.  If such a magazine exists, every article would be written with careful thought and clearly explained.  It would clearly be very beneficial to accurately understanding the real views of every side.  Moreover, this window would not be only one-sided.  China will also be able use it to clarify its own opinions.  The academic aspect and the non-ideological principle of the magazine determine that it can be better than other propaganda methods to help the international society to understand and accept China\’s view.

 

      But, even if one shrank it to such a specific problem, one still could not talk to the Department of Military Unification.  This kind of bureaucratic organization could do much more harm than good.  Entering into its system is like falling into a black hole; one cannot not hope to see the light again.  After thinking for a long time, the only way I could think of is Mr. PJ.  He is familiar with the Chinese regime, has connections to high places, and also wants to urge the solving of the Tibet problem.  To directly communicate this idea to the high leaders of Chinese Communist Party is a shortcut for this kind of extraordinary matter.  If the top says a word, the people below would give it green lights all the way.  The problem was whether he was willing to communicate it?  Moreover, I had imagined that he and another liberal party member YF could join the council of the magazine.  Without the acquiescence of the CCP, they would not dare to accept.  Thus this also required him to communicate with the high officials in the  Communist Party in advance.

 

      After coming back to Beijing, I began contacting Mr. PJ, but could not meet him for a long time.  Either he was not there, or I had to travel.  I finally saw him after a few months.  When I told him what I had in mind, he did not answer directly, and only told me a small story with smiles.  Once he mentioned to YF that some Tibetan would like the latter to participate in an event related to Tibet.  YF\’s reaction was immediately shaking his hand and saying quickly: don\’t you get me involved in Tibet!  Tibet was already seen as a forbidden zone for the Chinese officials, why would anyone want to participate in an oversea Tibetan magazine?

 

      Coming out of PJ\’s home, I once again felt the powerlessness.  Walking on the crowded street of Beijing, my last sight of Dalai Lama appeared again before my eyes.  His silent silhouette in the crimson cassock was so unforgettable to me, because it reminded me of a scene in a documentary that deeply moved me.  It was an old lama who was already spent many decades in exile.  Standing alone on the mountain top along the border of Nepal, he looked from a distance at the vast Tibetan plateau, and uncontrollably wept …

 

July 2001, recorded in Lhasa

 

November 2001, arranged in Beijing

 

December 2001,  revised in Beijing

 

 

This article was translated from the Chinese by Princeton University Prof. Perry Link.

WSJ: The Cry of Tibet

By WANG LIXIONG

March 31, 2008

 

The recent troubles in Tibet are a replay of events that happened two decades ago. On Oct. 1, 1987, Buddhist monks were demonstrating peacefully at the Barkor — the famous market street around the central cathedral in Lhasa — when police began beating and arresting them. To ordinary Tibetans, who view monks as "treasures," the sight was intolerable — not only in itself, but because it stimulated unpleasant memories that Tibetan Buddhists had been harboring for years.

 

A few angry young men then began throwing stones at the Barkor police station. More and more joined, and then they set fires, overturned cars and began shouting "Independence for Tibet!" This is almost exactly what we saw in Lhasa two weeks ago.

 

The fundamental cause of these recurrent events is a painful dilemma that lives inside the minds of Tibetan monks. When the Chinese government demands that they denounce their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, monks are forced to choose between obeying, which violates their deepest spiritual convictions, and resisting, which can lead to loss of government registry and physical expulsion from monasteries.

 

From time to time monks have used peaceful demonstrations to express their anguish. When they have done this, an insecure Chinese government, bent on "annihilating unstable elements" in the "emergent stage," has reacted with violent repression. This, in turn, triggers violence from Tibetans.

 

In recent decades, the Chinese government\’s policy for pacifying Tibet has been to combine the allure of economic development on the one hand with the threat of force on the other. Experience has shown that this approach does not work.

 

The most efficient route to peace in Tibet is through the Dalai Lama, whose return to Tibet would immediately alleviate a number of problems. Much of the current ill will, after all, is a direct result of the Chinese government\’s verbal attacks on the Dalai Lama, who, for Tibetan monks, has an incomparably lofty status. To demand that monks denounce him is about as practical as asking that they vilify their own parents.

 

It should be no surprise that beatings of monks and closings of monasteries naturally stimulate civil unrest, or that civil unrest, spawned in this way, can turn violent.

 

Why aren\’t these simple truths more obvious? Phuntsog Wanggyal, a Tibetan now retired in Beijing who for years was a leading Communist official in Tibet, has observed that a doctrine of "anti-splittism" has taken root among Chinese government officials who deal with religion and minority affairs, both in central offices in Beijing and in Tibet. Having invested their careers in anti-splittism, these people cannot admit that the idea is mistaken without losing face and, they fear, losing their own power and position as well.

 

Their ready-made tag for everything that goes wrong is "hostile foreign forces" — an enemy that justifies any kind of harsh or unreasoning repression. When repeated endlessly, anti-splittism, although originally vacuous, does take on a kind of solidity. Careers are made in it, and challenging it becomes impossible.

 

I am a supporter of the Dalai Lama\’s "middle way," meaning autonomy for Tibet in all matters except foreign affairs and national defense. This arrangement eventually would have to mean that Tibetan people select their own leaders — and that would be a major change from the way things are now. Tibet is called an "autonomous region," but in fact its officials are all named by Beijing, and are all tightly focused on their own personal interests and the interests of the Communist Party. Tibetans can clearly see the difference between this kind of government and self-rule, and there is no way that they will support bogus autonomy.

 

It follows — even if this is a tall order — that the ultimate solution to the Tibet problem must be democratization of the Chinese political system itself. True autonomy cannot come any other way.

 

It is time for the Chinese government to take stock of why its long-term strategy in Tibet has not worked, and to try something else. The old problems remain, and they are sure to continue, perhaps in places like the "Uighur Autonomous Region" of Xinjiang, if a more sensible approach is not attempted.

 

Mr. Wang, a Beijing-based writer, was the organizer of the recent 12-point statement on Tibet by 30 Chinese intellectuals. This article was translated from the Chinese by Princeton University Prof. Perry Link.

 

 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120693039906976163.html#

 

I don’t know whether we can succeed or not, but what we can do is try our best.

‘, ‘

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      Disintegration and Doom of Chinese Cultural Structure

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                                     Wang Lixiong 

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   China is now undergoing a change that attracts worldwide attention. Generally speaking, most of current observation, analyses, comments and prediction tend to focus on the economic, political and social development and change in China, placing its culture in a secondary position. Economy, politics and society are tangible entities that can be grasped with statistics whereas culture is intangible and it is hard to tell what function it can perform in the social transformations of China. Therefore, intentionally or unintentionally, culture is put into a subordinate position, and it is believed that it will undoubtedly evolve as the tangible politics and economy develop ( similar to the Marxist belief that “the economic basis determines the superstructure”) and will not have decisive influence upon social development.

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   However, some others hold that culture can exert a positive impact on economic development and they give as an example the economic takeoff in the Confucian cultural region of East Asia. Deducing from this belief, one can say that China, being the birthplace of the Confucian culture, will also enjoy a bright future and even assume the central role in the “Grand Chinese Cultural Region” that will dominate the future world so long as it carries forward its tradition. Today, on the surface, Chinese traditional culture seems to have moved from the blockade and suffocation of the Mao’s era into a complete “restoration”. With the cream of the cultural heritage being revered again, its dross and dregs are also easily found everywhere. But does it follow that Chinese traditional culture has been truly restored?

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   Some more optimistic people argue that the present Chinese culture is not a simple return to the tradition. In their opinion, it has mingled and fused with Western culture and is going through a positive, substantial transformation, thus repossessing a higher vitality and quite possibly showing a new way out to the mankind that has on the whole come to a dead end.

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   I am not that optimistic. On the contrary, just because I attach great importance to the decisive role culture plays in a society, I am very pessimistic. I certainly agree that Chinese culture has undergone and is undergoing tremendous changes, but changes are transformation and the whole thing may fall apart again. If the culture of a nation is seen as a structure, I think Chinese culture is at this moment showing clear signs of an irrecoverable disintegration.

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   Aesthetic activities, entertainment, creation of wisdom, dissemination of knowledge and many other utilitarian functions of culture are no doubt key components of culture, but in my opinion, the most important function of culture is to integrate a society, that is, to regulate and adjust on the most extensive level the relationship among its social members. This integrative function can only come from the whole structure of culture. Without this structure, even with more Peking operas, qigong, joss stick burning before Buddha, calligraphy and paintings or large roofs with upturned eaves, China cannot be said to have restored its culture and tradition. All it has is no more than a variety show of shadows.

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   Disintegration of cultural structure is not a problem contemporary China is faced with alone. But this time, China, which has been lagging behind the mainstream of the world in the modern history, is in the forefront of this problem. And what makes China unique in this regard is that the disintegration of Chinese cultural structure is not caused entirely by oppressions from outside, but instead is to a large degree a result of “a conscious revolution”.  

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   After the May Fourth Movement and the first cry of “Down with Confucius and sons!”, in groping the way to make China a powerful nation, to choose Marxism or to choose capitalism both meant in nature a kind of conscious or unconscious sublation of Chinese culture. The core of Chinese culture lies in the “family” which extends from the family to the clan and then to the country. “Loyalty”, “filial piety”, “benevolence” and “uprighteousness” are four pillars which surround the “family” core and build up Chinese cultural structure, and most of meanings, values, ethics and moral systems in Chinese culture derive from these four pillars. “Loyalty”, “filial piety”, “benevolence” and “uprighteousness” used to support one another in all directions and form an organic framework that could not be broken up, but the Chinese government established in 1949 regarded family and clan as a threat and began to destroy the last three pillars in an uprooting manner, leaving there only “loyalty” pushed to the extreme. The entire nation was brought into the only “big family” and loyal to the only “patriarch”. The destruction was quite a total one: “Filial piety” gave way to “class consciousness”, “benevolence” was hypocritical and “uprighteousness” was bad. All actions against family were considered exemplary. Father and son became enemies; husband and wife fell out; relatives turned each other in and made a clean break with one another; nongovernmental societies were eradicated and all social cells were brought into the state system.

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   The experiences of those years manifest from the opposite side the integrative power of Chinese traditional culture: “loyalty”, the only thing left, could still make Marxism based on it in China an equal to the most fanatic religion in the world, the Party superior to all deities and Mao Tse-tung supreme to all kings and emperors. China was integrated into something like an iron bucket, and even grannies with bound feet held “little red books” in hand and danced “loyalty dances”. However, without the clan culture as its supporting base, “loyalty” in the extreme would lose balance and go to the opposite. It was bound to lead to an increasingly strict demand on loyalty to the “Central Authority” and the supreme leader, and no other “loyalties”, even within its own system, could be tolerated. The Cultural Revolution was in fact a general offensive based on “rebel is right” against all the authorities outside the “Central Authority”. Except the supreme “Great Leader” and the “Central Authority” in his command, the state powers and cadres at all levels were “pulled off the horse”, and even the President was forced to wear a tall paper hat and paraded through the street, denounced as demon.

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  With the death of Mao Tse-tung was gone only the authority that belonged solely to him, which he did not share with others in his life and therefore could not pass to anyone after it. But the reform launched by Deng Xiaoping who had been persecuted several times by Mao, in order to reach the pragmatic goal of economic takeoff as soon as possible, started to cut off the “loyalty” to the “Central Authority”. While a marked economic achievement has been made, the central authority also dissolves sociopsychologically and the “loyalty” already on its clay feet is at last hacked down.

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   The framework that used to support the cultural structure now totally collapses, and the social ethics that clang to it cannot exist on a void. The rampant materialism comes as a further blow and the “single child” policy makes the structure of Chinese traditional family culture crumb into piece from its foundation. Today, the integrated system of human relationship that was built up in the past by ancestry, generation, marriage, relatives, friends, hereditary house and neighbours has virtually ceased to exist or has been distorted. And because of the disintegration of the family cultural structure, the Chinese families, though the number of which ranks first in the world, have only an animalistic meaning of mating and breeding and become like scattering sands in structure.

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   By saying all these I do not mean that the cultural structure should only remain fixed and need no transformation. The traditional Chinese culture indeed contains quite a lot of unhealthy things and finds it especially hard to adjust itself to the modern world and international society. It should not remain unchanged and nor can it remain unchanged. But the problem is that if the old structure is destroyed and at the same time a new structure has not yet come into being to replace it, the society will be faced with a crisis for want of a cultural integration.

\r\n

   Law, system, organization and powerful institution are all the means to integrate a society but to integrate the scattered individuals born with animal instinct into an orderly, cooperative, human society on a large scale with everyone in his proper place, the most effective force can only come from the inner heart of every social member. Only when there is a “conscious judge” sitting in the inner heart of every social member can social balance and stability be secured and a good economic and social development be possible. This is where culture performs its decisive function in human society.

\r\n

   The crisis brought about by the disintegration of cultural structure can be described figuratively as “brittling”. The relationship of social “molecules”, or in other words the interpersonal relationship, has lost its adhesive quality; random collisions between these “molecules” build up into a general tension(“brittling”). Though law and police can keep the society in order for a short while, they are actually like iron chains tied upon glass containers. Once there is a tremor such as from a falling, they will, instead of preventing those containers from being broken, help break them.  

\r\n

   Authority was an important mechanism of social integration in the traditional China. It differed from power in that it was considered sacred in the heart of people and respected by them. But today there is almost nothing sacred in the heart of Chinese people; they believe nothing and they fear nothing. They make no distinction between the superior and the inferior, see no difference between the old and the young, follow no rules and regulations, and defy all laws human and divine. There is no right and wrong; there is only gain and loss. Believing nothing, one can do anything: here lies the reason why crime and corruption spread at such a surprising speed in today’s China. There have already been symptoms of nationwide corruption and crime has become an increasingly serious problem. Although the police force and budget have doubled, the ability to deal with crime is increasingly weak. Police is forever the few; if the many fail to obey the law and need to be watched by police, it will only result in a situation where the few always find themselves unable to guard against the many. What’s more, one criminal usually takes ten or even a hundred policemen to catch. With such a high cost of security and with an even higher crime rate, the day will come when things reach an unbearable degree and the society is trapped in a real predicament of absurdity. At present, I am working on an allegoric novel about future China, which is entitled The Death of Heart and unfolds its story in this perspective.

\r\n

   Up till now, all social structures of mankind are three dimensional, in which exist hierarchy, stratum and division of labour. For such societies, cultural integration is indispensable. Only law and hatchet men cannot keep the hierarchical structure stable. In the old China, people at the lower social strata assumed a “resign yourself to fate” attitude when faced with the gap between them and people at the upper social strata; they saw the wealth of the few as another world which had nothing to do with their own life. They did not feel discontented about it and nor did they strive to climb up. The gap between classes then was much larger than it is today, but the society could still maintain its stability and cooperativeness. The socialist revolution in China started by its efforts to eliminate social hierarchy. Even though hierarchy still exists in reality, egalitarian awareness is already deeply rooted in the mind of most Chinese, especially the idea of being economically equal. Against such a sociopsychological background, the widening gap, which has been the motivation of reform in China, is bound to become the source of social conflicts. And to complicate matters, the popularization of TV sets helps expose the gap inside and out–even exaggerate it–to everyone, and it stimulates the conflicts more extensively and more directly. In this respect, the discontent of Chinese peasants with their status and their eagerness to improve it will certainly become an important factor that influences the future society of China. The hostility of the country toward the city, the large horde of migrants formed by the jobless rural population, and the increasing crime rate of peasants have already become big headaches in China today. The accumulative effect of any trend of this social group of more than eight or nine hundred million people will be astonishing. Besides, countryside is where the state control is the weakest. Once it is out of control, to send soldiers and police there even by millions will be like trying to quench a big fire with a glass of water. Observations of the Chinese history show that the so called uncultured countryside has in fact always been the place which depends most on the rule of the traditional culture instead of on that of the state and law. Without tradition and culture, the realization of the integration of this enormous community would be beyond imagination, and China today is actually faced with such a reality.

\r\n

   The passenger train that travels the longest distance in China is   between Shanghai and Urumqi. Last year there were as many as over 800 violent incidents resulting directly from the sudden breakdown of some  mentally diseased of its passengers. Those who have never traveled by an ordinary train in china would found it very hard to imagine the reasons for this, but I have had a lot of experiences of it. Most trains in China are packed and passengers are like canned sardines and have no place to sit down; a few are even standing in the one square metered toilet. The stench on the train is suffocating, water is a luxury, and there is nowhere to excrete. People brush against each other and can hardly move about. Everyone is striving for space, nervous and angry, so there is a high probability of conflicts. And the fact that there is no leeway can only aggravate and escalate the conflicts. The train between Shanghai and Urumqi travels three days and four nights on end. Suffering in such a narrow space, under such a terrible condition and for such a long time, some passengers who show no sign of mental illness under a normal condition often break down suddenly. They start to attack innocent people around them, or damage facilities on the train, or break the window to jump out, or torture themselves and even commit suicide.

\r\n

   To me, China is such a train.

\r\n

  The disintegration of the cultural structure has removed the “doorkeeper” of the inner heart of every individual, and thus unprecedented human lust and greed gush out. Timed by 1.2 billion population, this kind of greed can be the strongest and most terrible one in the world today. If China had enough natural resources for its population, there could be a leeway and its people could explore them to satisfy their material desires. Even from the viewpoint of his self interest, one knows that cooperation can make better use of natural resources than rivalry. Unfortunately, the per capita natural resources are scarce in China. This September the World Bank published a new method of calculating the wealth of a country. With the calculation of natural resources included, the per capita wealth of China ranks 162 in the world, just 1/126 of that of Australia(ranking first) and 1/13 of the world average. And in it the capital of nature only holds 3% (it is 71% in Australia). How scarce the per capita natural resources are in China is very obvious. Not to mention that greed can never be satisfied, even to reach the living standard of American people today as many Chinese have stated, to realize the American dream of 1.2 billion Chinese, the total consumption of resources in China, according to some calculation, has to increase at least by 60 times. This is an impossibility and as a result people can only take to another way to satisfy their desires, that is, to scramble for material gains. Certainly, not all the scramble is law breaking and crime in broad daylight. It may be in the form of availing oneself of the loopholes in the law, or passing poor quality goods off as good ones in business, or forcing his employees to work overtime, or keeping a wallet he finds in the street… Treated separately, these are all minor problems, and only able to cause small,local clashes and conflicts. But the thing is, if all social “molecules” are involved in this kind of selfish scramble, calculation and estrangement, after accumulation, conglomeration and transmission in echelon, the result will be that the society becomes more “brittle”, breeding political and economic storms on the whole and finally even leading to the disintegration of the society.

\r\n

   For these reasons, I think the most realistic prospect and the most serious crisis of future China are less relevant to its politics and economy than to the disintegration of the cultural structure. Mere politics and economy are at shallow layers of the society and their crisis, if any, is not difficult to pass, but the spiritual chaos caused by the disintegration of the cultural structure can bring fundamental destruction upon the society. Into this argument I have also brought the factor of time. Political structure and economic structure can be readjusted and even rebuilt within a few years or a few decades, but the formation of a cultural structure must take several centuries or even a thousand years(not one great civilization in the human history has been an exception in its formation), and furthermore the culture structure cannot be artificially designed and constructed. Once it disintegrates, there will be nothing to support the society. The futility of the current “construction of spiritual civilization” carried out by Chinese government has already reflected this state of helplessness.

\r\n

   Of course, the disintegration of the cultural structure will not lead immediately to the disintegration of the society. Lives of several generations are just a blink in the long river of history and one perhaps may not feel doomed in his everyday life. Put a frog into the boiling water and it will at once jump out, but heat the cold water up slowly and the frog will drift in the water, fall to sleep comfortably and finally die unawares. So many splendid great civilizations have declined and fallen in the human history and it is not without reason to believe this will happen again.

\r\n

   All this is sad enough, but in fact crisis does not exist only in China and countries differ only in degree. All over the world, east or west, the spiritual mansion is crumbling and collapsing. Men and women have been helplessly trapped in a spiritual confusion and psychological diseases spread at an unprecedented speed; people regard each other as enemies and become indifferent and cruel; religious belief shrinks, spiritual ideals are shattered, the truth and faith are contaminated by relativism and the meaning of life becomes more and more nihilistic; human understandings of the physical world have never been more comprehensive and profound, yet its inner world has become increasingly vague and alien; and the social apathy, conflict or unbalance brought about by these problems has become critical issues worldwide.

\r\n

   So I think, in order to escape this doom, we should again look for inspiration in the ancient wisdom, but we must also always bear this in mind: we have gone too far and behind us has already appeared a huge, impassable gap. Even if we have by now realized again the value of conservation, there is really not much left for us to conserve. Perhaps we have to start from scratch, and only by moving forward can we find the way out of the ruins.

\r\n

   I don’t know whether we can succeed or not, but what we can do is try our best.                       

\r\n

 

\r\n

1995

\r\n

 

I don’t know whether we can succeed or not, but what we can do is try our best.

 

      Disintegration and Doom of Chinese Cultural Structure

 

                                     Wang Lixiong 

 

   China is now undergoing a change that attracts worldwide attention. Generally speaking, most of current observation, analyses, comments and prediction tend to focus on the economic, political and social development and change in China, placing its culture in a secondary position. Economy, politics and society are tangible entities that can be grasped with statistics whereas culture is intangible and it is hard to tell what function it can perform in the social transformations of China. Therefore, intentionally or unintentionally, culture is put into a subordinate position, and it is believed that it will undoubtedly evolve as the tangible politics and economy develop ( similar to the Marxist belief that “the economic basis determines the superstructure”) and will not have decisive influence upon social development.

   However, some others hold that culture can exert a positive impact on economic development and they give as an example the economic takeoff in the Confucian cultural region of East Asia. Deducing from this belief, one can say that China, being the birthplace of the Confucian culture, will also enjoy a bright future and even assume the central role in the “Grand Chinese Cultural Region” that will dominate the future world so long as it carries forward its tradition. Today, on the surface, Chinese traditional culture seems to have moved from the blockade and suffocation of the Mao’s era into a complete “restoration”. With the cream of the cultural heritage being revered again, its dross and dregs are also easily found everywhere. But does it follow that Chinese traditional culture has been truly restored?

   Some more optimistic people argue that the present Chinese culture is not a simple return to the tradition. In their opinion, it has mingled and fused with Western culture and is going through a positive, substantial transformation, thus repossessing a higher vitality and quite possibly showing a new way out to the mankind that has on the whole come to a dead end.

   I am not that optimistic. On the contrary, just because I attach great importance to the decisive role culture plays in a society, I am very pessimistic. I certainly agree that Chinese culture has undergone and is undergoing tremendous changes, but changes are transformation and the whole thing may fall apart again. If the culture of a nation is seen as a structure, I think Chinese culture is at this moment showing clear signs of an irrecoverable disintegration.

   Aesthetic activities, entertainment, creation of wisdom, dissemination of knowledge and many other utilitarian functions of culture are no doubt key components of culture, but in my opinion, the most important function of culture is to integrate a society, that is, to regulate and adjust on the most extensive level the relationship among its social members. This integrative function can only come from the whole structure of culture. Without this structure, even with more Peking operas, qigong, joss stick burning before Buddha, calligraphy and paintings or large roofs with upturned eaves, China cannot be said to have restored its culture and tradition. All it has is no more than a variety show of shadows.

   Disintegration of cultural structure is not a problem contemporary China is faced with alone. But this time, China, which has been lagging behind the mainstream of the world in the modern history, is in the forefront of this problem. And what makes China unique in this regard is that the disintegration of Chinese cultural structure is not caused entirely by oppressions from outside, but instead is to a large degree a result of “a conscious revolution”.  

   After the May Fourth Movement and the first cry of “Down with Confucius and sons!”, in groping the way to make China a powerful nation, to choose Marxism or to choose capitalism both meant in nature a kind of conscious or unconscious sublation of Chinese culture. The core of Chinese culture lies in the “family” which extends from the family to the clan and then to the country. “Loyalty”, “filial piety”, “benevolence” and “uprighteousness” are four pillars which surround the “family” core and build up Chinese cultural structure, and most of meanings, values, ethics and moral systems in Chinese culture derive from these four pillars. “Loyalty”, “filial piety”, “benevolence” and “uprighteousness” used to support one another in all directions and form an organic framework that could not be broken up, but the Chinese government established in 1949 regarded family and clan as a threat and began to destroy the last three pillars in an uprooting manner, leaving there only “loyalty” pushed to the extreme. The entire nation was brought into the only “big family” and loyal to the only “patriarch”. The destruction was quite a total one: “Filial piety” gave way to “class consciousness”, “benevolence” was hypocritical and “uprighteousness” was bad. All actions against family were considered exemplary. Father and son became enemies; husband and wife fell out; relatives turned each other in and made a clean break with one another; nongovernmental societies were eradicated and all social cells were brought into the state system.

   The experiences of those years manifest from the opposite side the integrative power of Chinese traditional culture: “loyalty”, the only thing left, could still make Marxism based on it in China an equal to the most fanatic religion in the world, the Party superior to all deities and Mao Tse-tung supreme to all kings and emperors. China was integrated into something like an iron bucket, and even grannies with bound feet held “little red books” in hand and danced “loyalty dances”. However, without the clan culture as its supporting base, “loyalty” in the extreme would lose balance and go to the opposite. It was bound to lead to an increasingly strict demand on loyalty to the “Central Authority” and the supreme leader, and no other “loyalties”, even within its own system, could be tolerated. The Cultural Revolution was in fact a general offensive based on “rebel is right” against all the authorities outside the “Central Authority”. Except the supreme “Great Leader” and the “Central Authority” in his command, the state powers and cadres at all levels were “pulled off the horse”, and even the President was forced to wear a tall paper hat and paraded through the street, denounced as demon.

  With the death of Mao Tse-tung was gone only the authority that belonged solely to him, which he did not share with others in his life and therefore could not pass to anyone after it. But the reform launched by Deng Xiaoping who had been persecuted several times by Mao, in order to reach the pragmatic goal of economic takeoff as soon as possible, started to cut off the “loyalty” to the “Central Authority”. While a marked economic achievement has been made, the central authority also dissolves sociopsychologically and the “loyalty” already on its clay feet is at last hacked down.

   The framework that used to support the cultural structure now totally collapses, and the social ethics that clang to it cannot exist on a void. The rampant materialism comes as a further blow and the “single child” policy makes the structure of Chinese traditional family culture crumb into piece from its foundation. Today, the integrated system of human relationship that was built up in the past by ancestry, generation, marriage, relatives, friends, hereditary house and neighbours has virtually ceased to exist or has been distorted. And because of the disintegration of the family cultural structure, the Chinese families, though the number of which ranks first in the world, have only an animalistic meaning of mating and breeding and become like scattering sands in structure.

   By saying all these I do not mean that the cultural structure should only remain fixed and need no transformation. The traditional Chinese culture indeed contains quite a lot of unhealthy things and finds it especially hard to adjust itself to the modern world and international society. It should not remain unchanged and nor can it remain unchanged. But the problem is that if the old structure is destroyed and at the same time a new structure has not yet come into being to replace it, the society will be faced with a crisis for want of a cultural integration.

   Law, system, organization and powerful institution are all the means to integrate a society but to integrate the scattered individuals born with animal instinct into an orderly, cooperative, human society on a large scale with everyone in his proper place, the most effective force can only come from the inner heart of every social member. Only when there is a “conscious judge” sitting in the inner heart of every social member can social balance and stability be secured and a good economic and social development be possible. This is where culture performs its decisive function in human society.

   The crisis brought about by the disintegration of cultural structure can be described figuratively as “brittling”. The relationship of social “molecules”, or in other words the interpersonal relationship, has lost its adhesive quality; random collisions between these “molecules” build up into a general tension(“brittling”). Though law and police can keep the society in order for a short while, they are actually like iron chains tied upon glass containers. Once there is a tremor such as from a falling, they will, instead of preventing those containers from being broken, help break them.  

   Authority was an important mechanism of social integration in the traditional China. It differed from power in that it was considered sacred in the heart of people and respected by them. But today there is almost nothing sacred in the heart of Chinese people; they believe nothing and they fear nothing. They make no distinction between the superior and the inferior, see no difference between the old and the young, follow no rules and regulations, and defy all laws human and divine. There is no right and wrong; there is only gain and loss. Believing nothing, one can do anything: here lies the reason why crime and corruption spread at such a surprising speed in today’s China. There have already been symptoms of nationwide corruption and crime has become an increasingly serious problem. Although the police force and budget have doubled, the ability to deal with crime is increasingly weak. Police is forever the few; if the many fail to obey the law and need to be watched by police, it will only result in a situation where the few always find themselves unable to guard against the many. What’s more, one criminal usually takes ten or even a hundred policemen to catch. With such a high cost of security and with an even higher crime rate, the day will come when things reach an unbearable degree and the society is trapped in a real predicament of absurdity. At present, I am working on an allegoric novel about future China, which is entitled The Death of Heart and unfolds its story in this perspective.

   Up till now, all social structures of mankind are three dimensional, in which exist hierarchy, stratum and division of labour. For such societies, cultural integration is indispensable. Only law and hatchet men cannot keep the hierarchical structure stable. In the old China, people at the lower social strata assumed a “resign yourself to fate” attitude when faced with the gap between them and people at the upper social strata; they saw the wealth of the few as another world which had nothing to do with their own life. They did not feel discontented about it and nor did they strive to climb up. The gap between classes then was much larger than it is today, but the society could still maintain its stability and cooperativeness. The socialist revolution in China started by its efforts to eliminate social hierarchy. Even though hierarchy still exists in reality, egalitarian awareness is already deeply rooted in the mind of most Chinese, especially the idea of being economically equal. Against such a sociopsychological background, the widening gap, which has been the motivation of reform in China, is bound to become the source of social conflicts. And to complicate matters, the popularization of TV sets helps expose the gap inside and out–even exaggerate it–to everyone, and it stimulates the conflicts more extensively and more directly. In this respect, the discontent of Chinese peasants with their status and their eagerness to improve it will certainly become an important factor that influences the future society of China. The hostility of the country toward the city, the large horde of migrants formed by the jobless rural population, and the increasing crime rate of peasants have already become big headaches in China today. The accumulative effect of any trend of this social group of more than eight or nine hundred million people will be astonishing. Besides, countryside is where the state control is the weakest. Once it is out of control, to send soldiers and police there even by millions will be like trying to quench a big fire with a glass of water. Observations of the Chinese history show that the so called uncultured countryside has in fact always been the place which depends most on the rule of the traditional culture instead of on that of the state and law. Without tradition and culture, the realization of the integration of this enormous community would be beyond imagination, and China today is actually faced with such a reality.

   The passenger train that travels the longest distance in China is   between Shanghai and Urumqi. Last year there were as many as over 800 violent incidents resulting directly from the sudden breakdown of some  mentally diseased of its passengers. Those who have never traveled by an ordinary train in china would found it very hard to imagine the reasons for this, but I have had a lot of experiences of it. Most trains in China are packed and passengers are like canned sardines and have no place to sit down; a few are even standing in the one square metered toilet. The stench on the train is suffocating, water is a luxury, and there is nowhere to excrete. People brush against each other and can hardly move about. Everyone is striving for space, nervous and angry, so there is a high probability of conflicts. And the fact that there is no leeway can only aggravate and escalate the conflicts. The train between Shanghai and Urumqi travels three days and four nights on end. Suffering in such a narrow space, under such a terrible condition and for such a long time, some passengers who show no sign of mental illness under a normal condition often break down suddenly. They start to attack innocent people around them, or damage facilities on the train, or break the window to jump out, or torture themselves and even commit suicide.

   To me, China is such a train.

  The disintegration of the cultural structure has removed the “doorkeeper” of the inner heart of every individual, and thus unprecedented human lust and greed gush out. Timed by 1.2 billion population, this kind of greed can be the strongest and most terrible one in the world today. If China had enough natural resources for its population, there could be a leeway and its people could explore them to satisfy their material desires. Even from the viewpoint of his self interest, one knows that cooperation can make better use of natural resources than rivalry. Unfortunately, the per capita natural resources are scarce in China. This September the World Bank published a new method of calculating the wealth of a country. With the calculation of natural resources included, the per capita wealth of China ranks 162 in the world, just 1/126 of that of Australia(ranking first) and 1/13 of the world average. And in it the capital of nature only holds 3% (it is 71% in Australia). How scarce the per capita natural resources are in China is very obvious. Not to mention that greed can never be satisfied, even to reach the living standard of American people today as many Chinese have stated, to realize the American dream of 1.2 billion Chinese, the total consumption of resources in China, according to some calculation, has to increase at least by 60 times. This is an impossibility and as a result people can only take to another way to satisfy their desires, that is, to scramble for material gains. Certainly, not all the scramble is law breaking and crime in broad daylight. It may be in the form of availing oneself of the loopholes in the law, or passing poor quality goods off as good ones in business, or forcing his employees to work overtime, or keeping a wallet he finds in the street… Treated separately, these are all minor problems, and only able to cause small,local clashes and conflicts. But the thing is, if all social “molecules” are involved in this kind of selfish scramble, calculation and estrangement, after accumulation, conglomeration and transmission in echelon, the result will be that the society becomes more “brittle”, breeding political and economic storms on the whole and finally even leading to the disintegration of the society.

   For these reasons, I think the most realistic prospect and the most serious crisis of future China are less relevant to its politics and economy than to the disintegration of the cultural structure. Mere politics and economy are at shallow layers of the society and their crisis, if any, is not difficult to pass, but the spiritual chaos caused by the disintegration of the cultural structure can bring fundamental destruction upon the society. Into this argument I have also brought the factor of time. Political structure and economic structure can be readjusted and even rebuilt within a few years or a few decades, but the formation of a cultural structure must take several centuries or even a thousand years(not one great civilization in the human history has been an exception in its formation), and furthermore the culture structure cannot be artificially designed and constructed. Once it disintegrates, there will be nothing to support the society. The futility of the current “construction of spiritual civilization” carried out by Chinese government has already reflected this state of helplessness.

   Of course, the disintegration of the cultural structure will not lead immediately to the disintegration of the society. Lives of several generations are just a blink in the long river of history and one perhaps may not feel doomed in his everyday life. Put a frog into the boiling water and it will at once jump out, but heat the cold water up slowly and the frog will drift in the water, fall to sleep comfortably and finally die unawares. So many splendid great civilizations have declined and fallen in the human history and it is not without reason to believe this will happen again.

   All this is sad enough, but in fact crisis does not exist only in China and countries differ only in degree. All over the world, east or west, the spiritual mansion is crumbling and collapsing. Men and women have been helplessly trapped in a spiritual confusion and psychological diseases spread at an unprecedented speed; people regard each other as enemies and become indifferent and cruel; religious belief shrinks, spiritual ideals are shattered, the truth and faith are contaminated by relativism and the meaning of life becomes more and more nihilistic; human understandings of the physical world have never been more comprehensive and profound, yet its inner world has become increasingly vague and alien; and the social apathy, conflict or unbalance brought about by these problems has become critical issues worldwide.

   So I think, in order to escape this doom, we should again look for inspiration in the ancient wisdom, but we must also always bear this in mind: we have gone too far and behind us has already appeared a huge, impassable gap. Even if we have by now realized again the value of conservation, there is really not much left for us to conserve. Perhaps we have to start from scratch, and only by moving forward can we find the way out of the ruins.

   I don’t know whether we can succeed or not, but what we can do is try our best.                       

 

1995

 

An Electoral System of Consecutive Levels,

Section I: Power is a Form of Alienation / SECTION 2：THE DISSOLUTION OF POWER

An Electoral System of Consecutive Levels

Wang Lixiong

Section I: Power is a Form of Alienation

For thousands of years human society has continued in a state of dichotomy, with centralization of power as one component and deprivation of power as the other. Societies at separate stages, regardless of their various differences, have all been alike in that they were split into two categories—the rulers and the ruled. Power is an independently existing “entity”; whoever seizes it becomes the master of society. This separation between the power-holder and society at large has come to be regarded as an unalterable principle, a normal state of affairs. Seldom does anyone consider whether or not this should be changed to say nothing of whether or not such a change would even be possible.

As I see it, this split is a form of alienation.

I. The Source of Power—The Structure of Communication

1. Indirect Communication

Some people say power derives from force, yet ordinarily when people obey power, the resort to force is not involved, while most often, they obey as a matter of “natural rightfulness”. In maintaining control, power mostly uses procedural means and not force. The reason why people endure the restrictions imposed by power is explained by the fact that outside of restrictions, power also provides a function which is indispensable to society, otherwise people could simply go off to live in distant mountain forests or desert islands. It is only out of people’s need for this function that power can assume an aura of the unalterable principle.

What is this function? Power exists only if there is a society, which is mankind’s form of cooperation, while the premise of cooperation is communication. Obviously power and communication are inseparable. Therefore this study of power takes communication as its starting-point.

In a small group, people can achieve adequate rapport in the course of direct contacts. When a group exceeds a certain size, direct contacts may meet with obstructions or chaos. As the numbers keep increasing, the inadequacy of direct communication grows only more severe. Therefore, with the exception of small tribes, fairly large societies must depend on indirect communication.

Indirect communication as such, simply means dividing a group of people more numerous than can communicate directly among themselves, into separate units such that the number of persons in each one is kept within the scope of direct communication. In each such unit a “communication center” is set up –that is to say, a person is specially appointed to engage in communication between his unit and other ones.

This kind of indirect communication can be used regardless of the number of people involved. If it exceeds the basic limit of those who can communicate directly, then the persons are re-divided into another unit (the second-level unit), a new communication center (the second level communication center) is formed, and in a similar way, it is possible to expand and develop what may be called a “framework for indirect communication”.

 

2. Functions of the Communication Framework

To sum up, the indirect communication framework has several functions:

A.    To merge the channels of communication

In communicating, members of different units need only go through their own respective “communication center”. No matter how much the scope of communication needs enlarging, the unit members need not enlarge the communication framework. This is the basic function of the “indirect communication framework”.

B.     Concentrate handling of information

A considerable part of the information needed by people living close by or working in the same place is of a similar nature and can be handled in a unified way through the “communication center”. This can reduce the overall cost and eliminate repetitious labor.

C.    Realize cooperation within society

In a society based on division of labor, it is only necessary to engage in consultations between “communication centers” and separately direct the members of a unit, in order to harmonize division of labor and achieve cooperation.

D. Unify Policy

Each person making policy on his own may lead to thorny conflicts. One of the functions of the “communication center” is to provide public information to diminish the impact of differences, the other is to prevent insoluble conflicts by giving unified policy precedence over individually—conceived policy.

E.     Program Management

A communication framework necessarily calls for a communication program alongside it, each in turn giving rise to a system and an organization.

 

3. Power and Communication

In the above account of the functions of a communication framework, one can readily catch a glimpse of power. The fore-mentioned “framework of indirect communication” also bears a close resemblance to the structure of power – both are individual units with levels of gradation; therefore it is reasonable to consider them an integral whole.

The nature of power requires that people obey. Once the scale of society expands to the extent that its members are mutually unacquainted ,when they are required to act in a unified way, to coordinate closely, there is no alternative except to submit to the control of the “indirect communication framework”. In this situation the framework reveals the same characteristic of requiring that people obey.

Thus it can be said that the source of power lies in the dependence of people on communication. It follows that people obey power primarily because it appears “naturally right” and not because of force, the reason being that people living in some form of society cannot dissociate themselves from communication.

The primary concern of large-scale indirect communication is the setting up of rules and regulations. This is where the function of  “passing laws” is to be found in the concept of power. Law provides society with a publicly-recognized structure and unified standards. This is to say, law encompasses the most widespread communications of the whole society and emerges as the basis on which other communication must be carried out. Only if one follows procedures in accordance with, the control center can one manage to communicate. Nevertheless communication according to procedures thrown into disorder cannot possibly connect or may even become confused or stalemated.

Force guarantees power. Its main use is to suppress any undermining of the power structure and not to provide a source of strength for the everyday exercise of authority.

Force in the last analysis consists of organized people who have weapons, and, their organization being in fact communication, also exercises control over communication through its monopoly over weapons.

II. Power Is a Form of Alienation-Its Communication System Does Not Tolerate Communication

To say that power is a form of alienation is not to say that power has undergone a process of alienation. This is because I do not believe that such a thing as “power” really exists. Power and the structure of communication are in fact one and the same. Nevertheless, the communication system basically is a tool of society-at-large, therefore, above all, it should encompass the communication of society. But as the structure of communication became alienated, it did not allow for communication by society, and it became split off from society, forming a duality and emerging as power.

——Power is a structure of communication that deprives society of communication within itself.

 

1、The Increasing Complexity of the Structure of Communication

The indirect communication framework at first came into being for the purpose of dealing with complexities that had arisen; but with the continuous expansion of society, the framework itself grew more complex. It was this growing complexity which created a possibility for the structure of communication to become alienated.

In tribal society all group affairs came within the scrutiny of its members. Each one, with the assurance of his own experience, could express his ideas and wishes to the leaders, supervise their activities and consult with other members to restrict them. The leaders themselves, operating within such a simple, transparent structure and with no place to hide, were obliged to comply with this kind of give-and-take.

As the administrative layers of indirect communication kept increasing in number, entirely separate layers of indirect communication also kept increasing in number, while entirely separate layers not based on shared experience appeared as well. When the tribal chieftain took along only his son to meetings of a tribal alliance; any communication at the alliance level extended beyond the range of the members’ supervision, with the result that they could hear only whatever the chief reported on his return. This afforded the chief an opportunity to deceive or to manipulate the tribe. As society expanded, and the separate layers of communication multiplied, the members of society began losing confidence. At length they not only fell out of touch with common experience, but could no longer even entertain the idea of keeping up contact.

Today the complicated nature of the communication structure has reached an extreme difficult to imagine. One of the sources of this situation consists in vertical communication interlayer. Also within the structure of communications there are specially built-in horizontal layers—innumerable legal regulations, needless overlapping commissions, repetitious procedures, vast reams of documents, deep-rooted, stultifying relationships, and so on. The vertical administrative layers, already extremely complicated, have been further intercepted  by innumerable horizontal barriers, so that, with the exception of the qualified officials long ensconced within concerned people can only end up feeling helpless and frustrated, with society deprived of all means whatever to continue further communication with them.

 

2. The Privatization of Power

The above-mentioned “communication center” is a theoretical concept, while in fact there is a real living flesh-and-blood individual occupying it. A private person in charge can only be self-centered and highly focused on personal gains. When society is cut off from communication, it cannot function properly. Likewise, in the case of persons who would not hesitate to fight a war over oil, is it conceivable that they would not seize upon communication to use as their own private resource?

When deer meat is to be allotted within a tribe, the tiniest injustice falls within the scrutiny of the members; but when distribution is handled through lines with innumerable links in a monetary system, through banking institutions, legal ramifications and international trade, it is exceptionally difficult for ordinary people to discover embezzlement and corruption. Nevertheless, the essence of the privatization of power does not, in the main, consist in day-to-day self-serving practices but in the splitting off of the communication framework from society. Once communication by society is not tolerated, the whole structure turns into the private realm of the power holders. Once this happens, the structure no longer serves the needs of society but operates according to the wishes of those in power. They can pursue their own interests, while forbidding any and all disadvantageous communication. Thus the structure of communication turns into power monopolized by private persons.

 

3. Restricting Communication—Dictatorship’s Basic Measure

The reason why dictatorship emerges as such, apart from cutting off society’s communication with power vertically, is that it must necessarily also restrict communication horizontally between the inside of society and the inner precinct of power. We are only too familiar with such restrictions as forbidding contacts between units, banning organizations not sanctioned by law, controlling the media, press censorship, and prohibition of electioneering; all are limitations on horizontal communication.

On the one hand, keeping people ignorant, undiscerning, mutually estranged and hard to organize is but an age-old scheme to prevent them from rebelling; on the other hand, it is also necessary to be on guard inside the precincts of power by frequent transfer of high-ranking military officers to offset any enhancement of their own personal influence, and to maintain restrictions against officials holding positions in their own native place. All these are measures designed to cut off communication. As for the political trickery well known as “divide and rule”, the decisive move is to cut off any possibility of united action from below in advance by first instigating strife; only then can a would-be dictatorship reach its aim to “rule”.

Another form of restricting communication is secrecy under the guise of security. When news is blocked for reasons of “security”, people are prevented from understanding the whole situation. It serves as a threat by autocratic power-holders, warning people not to resist but to simply obey orders.

It is relatively easy to restrict communication in a large society such as China’s. Opposition groups find it difficult to exchange ideas. This is one of the reasons why autocratic power can maintain stability over a long period. Nevertheless once things get out of hand, redress is difficult because of unwieldy communication over such an extensive territory.

 

4. Difficulty of Communication—Democracy’s Limitation

Modern western systems of democracy have given society various channels enabling it to communicate with those in power in an attempt to solve problems arising from the split-off between society and power. The main forms are the following:

·General Elections

This form of communication, “from below to above” is by no means an everyday practice, but nevertheless it is a beginning.

·Voting and Electioneering

Voting enables the members of society to communicate with those in power. It is an improvement over the system of putting persons in office or ending their tenure from above, and gives citizens the decision to put in power or replace certain sections of office-holders. An election campaign gives voters a channel of communication for understanding the candidates.

·Freedom of Speech and the Press

These channels extend the flow of news and ideas horizontally and can to a certain extent penetrate into the shady deals and secrecy of the power-holders as well as present citizens the possibility of vertical communication for supervising those in power, while at the same time they can serve the function of coalescing public opinion through horizontal communication and use it as a form of pressure from below to place restraints on power.

·The System of Political Parties (Special Interest Groups)

The system of democracy allows for the existence of independent political parties outside the power structure, as well as for special interest groups and people’s organizations—that is, independent communication structures outside the precincts of power. This affords members of society new channels for expressing individual opinions and the possibility of forming alliances.

·The Principle of Checks and Balances

Western democratic societies operate according to “separation of powers”. This not only provides for mutual checks and balances among the several divisions, but also increases the channels for communication among the organs of power.

Other aspects of the western system of democracy such as rule by law and the guarantee of human rights also require the above-mentioned forms of communication assurance in order to be effective. Modern forms of autocratic power are purported to rule by law and to respect human rights, but words alone, “lip service” alone, can have no effect in the absence of the above-mentioned communication guarantees.

 

Theoretically, in democratic elections, there are no restrictions as to who may run for office; nevertheless, for a candidate to be elected, he must ensure that a large majority of voters understand his proposals. In reality, this condition restricts the number of possible candidates to a very small number. In a situation where direct communication is possible, each person can be known to the others and can speak to them face-to-face. It is a different matter in respect to a large-scale society. In order to become known to the general public and to promote his views, a candidate must make use of the media. Although this is not a political monopoly in western democratic society, still its services must be paid for in money. Therefore only persons who have financial means of their own, or who have such support from other sources, can run for office.

Democratic elections pose another problem—the difficulty in finding the must suitable person to take over leadership. This is because in a large-scale society, to let an ordinary person with only partial understanding of his own immediate surroundings make a judgment represents in itself a serious split in communication. At the same time, the only access voters have for understanding candidates is through television, newspapers and street-corner meetings, but what they manage to see are fictionalized images improvised by the media.

An advantageous aspect of the democratic electoral system is its use as a process for dismissing an incompetent official. Nevertheless, because of the split in communication, ordinary people have no way of discovering his mistakes but must wait until his crimes are exposed before repudiating him. By then a crisis may be on the rise. If an election is not at hand, ordinarily it is difficult to stop the harm from spreading. Therefore, western democratic society may be advanced, but the problem of power is over-riding,, and breaking free of predicaments is far from a simple question of choosing between a present-day system of democracy and a system of dictatorship.

III. The Evil of Power—The Power Will Dissociates Itself From the Social Will

1.      The Social Will

In the last analysis, social development consists of the sum total of the activities of all its members—activities which follow the will of each person. Thus it is possible to sum up the individual will of every member under a concept analogous with that of “social development”—i.e., the social will.

The social will is a vector combining the individual will of all the members of society.

A vector, in addition to magnitude, has direction. In the abstract, the will of each person can be considered a separate vector, equal in magnitude but differing in direction.

The sum of two vectors makes up the diagonal line of a parallelogram. The sum of any number of vectors is also a vector. In combining many vectors, it is possible to begin by finding the combined vector of two vectors, then using it to add a third vector, after that, adding a fourth vector to the sum of three vectors, and so on until the last vector forms the last parallelogram, of which the diagonal equals the total of all the vectors.

The concept of the social will does not belong in the realm of metaphysics. Historical accounts abound in ideas of the “popular will” which, similarly, cannot be touched or seen, but nevertheless must be recognized as existing. When the large majority of individual wills throughout society approach consensus and only a small number of those differing remains, the direction and magnitude of the social will can be considered the common will of the overwhelming majority of people—that is to say, the “popular will”.

Still, what reflects the essence of the social will more accurately is not its close proximity to “the great majority”, but the capacity of any small minority—even down to the will of one single person—to have an influence in the social will. While the combined vectors of all the individual wills make up the social will, each individual person’s will participating in the combination must be taken into account and is certain to have a relevant impact.

The social will encompasses all individual wills. It is not divided into “progressive”, “reactionary”, “left” or “right” wing, “oppressor” or “oppressed”, but includes one and all without exception, puts them together, considers each individual will as having equal power and conscientiously includes each one in the final result. Attaining the sum of vectors follows a standard procedure: the result is always to be sought in the difference between two vectors, and is arrived at by accommodating both sides and reaching a compromise. If one side holds a predominant position, it cannot achieve complete preference but in all events must be able to bring over his counterpart by allowing for a proportionate share in the final outcome.

Of course, up until now, this extent of agreement has never been realized. In the course of social development, individual wills of diverse tendencies have very rarely been accorded consideration simultaneously. The extent to which the social will can be realized is influenced by many factors, particularly that of the social structure. And up until the present, no form of social structure has been able to commit itself to the goal of seeking the sum of the vectors of all the individual wills throughout society. For this reason, the social will persists as deformed and crippled, so that even if it does succeed in finding expression it can be for only a short time.

2.      The Social Will is “Correct”

What is the standard for judging the state of affairs of a society?

“Judging”, itself is a kind of will. Society is a form of assembly for each individual. Therefore, the standard for judging the situation of a society is the social will. If the social will is satisfied, the situation is good; if not, the social situation is not good. In the last analysis, a society exists for the purpose of satisfying the social will. The direction toward which society develops, therefore, should be the direction that the social will desires.

As a matter of fact this is exactly what happens. Even though expression of the social will often encounters obstruction, nevertheless in the long run it can be realized. This kind of law is expressed in such familiar sayings as “the will of the people decides the rise and fall of kingdoms”, and “those who submit shall prosper, those who resist shall perish.”

The social will is “correct” as regards the development of society. The importance of this conclusion is incalculable. Once established, it can lead to the following one—that is to say, the best social situation is the full realization of the social will, while the best social system is one in which realization of the social will is not obstructed.

3.      The Will of Power

⊙ “Numerically-Based Structure for Seeking Consensus”

In a small-scale society, the members can communicate fully in a direct way and reach a compromise through persuasion and mutual understanding. This may be called a vector-style of reaching agreement. On the other hand, in a highly populated society, how can the individual wills—in figures astronomical, and subject to a myriad of changes in the twinkling of an eye—seek accommodation in such a style?

As a matter of fact, society itself is a kind of “agreement”; it is the result of people congregating the result of not only people, but of their material things, and necessarily, of individual wills congregating. But in the past this way of coming together has all along been distinguished by numbers, that is, it has been a kind of “numerically determined structure for agreement” and not one really seeking the social will through a “vector-type structure for finding consensus”.

There are two kinds of the “numerically-based structure for agreement” which divide according to how consensus is arrived at.

The first kind takes as its standard the will of the rulers, unifies the will of the people from the top down, compels the will of each individual to obey the “centralized leadership”, then allocates them according to a conceived number into a state, nation, class, political party, mass movement and the like.

The second kind of numerical determination—from bottom to top—consists of decision by a majority or by an election. This way of seeking consensus extends to each citizen the right to say “no”, but nevertheless confines the individual will, which is generically rich and varied in scope, within two choices—“for” or “against”. The search for agreement ends in a split represented by numbers, between “yes” and “no”, “for” or “against”.

This second kind, in reality, plays a very minor role by comparison. This is because even in the most democratic society, it is impossible to declare a general election over separate issues that keep rising. By and large the great number of day-to-day decisions are made from the top down by those in power and all the people are expected to agree with one accord.

⊙ Obstacles to Reaching a Vector-Accord

The ideal of the founders of western democracy was to allow all members of society to live independently, participate in social development, and influence it. This appears to be similar to harmonizing individual wills by vector-accord. Nevertheless, confronted by the real difficulties involved in expediting such a process, there appeared to be no alternative except to adopt a simplified method of casting votes. Two types of simplification include: (1) drawing up a plan in advance, and presenting it to the public for their opinion; (2) confining the choice to “yes” or “no”. The first type twists the orientation of thousands upon thousands of individual wills into a homogeneous mass. The second type of simplification consists in toting up election results and deciding the outcome according to the principle of majority rule.

With simplification carried to this extreme, all obstacles in running an election are overcome, its expenditures are reduced to the lowest; yet needless to say, the real nature of the result is a far cry from that to be reached through “vector accord”, and turns out to be nothing but accord by number.

⊙ The Will of Power

The first type of simplification mentioned above—proposing a plan in advance, obviously requires another factor, namely the source of the plan. This is determined by two conditions: (1) not every person can bring up his own plan; (2) to be acceptable to all members of society, a plan cannot be “a tiny one” proposed by any one member of society alone, and must be an “overall programme” to suit the whole of society. Most ordinary people lack the ability to propose any such “overall programme”. For this reason it can only be proposed by a small minority of special members of society.

If one maintains that voting is a form of accord from bottom to top, nevertheless the programme to be decided on is drawn up in advance by a small number of special persons; therefore, this in fact makes it from the very beginning an accord from top to bottom reached numerically. Over and above this, there are many day by day issues which cannot be voted on one by one but must be decided on by a small number of members of society—those in power– the rulers.

They exercise the will of power—“power will”—giving rise to the source of  “seeking accord by number”, and is even more blatant in an autocratic society which does not permit citizens to vote at all.

4.      Social Will and Power Will within the “Structure for Seeking Agreement by Number”

A.    “The Structure for Seeking agreement by number” can only be a dual structure

Power will, as one part, proposes a plan and makes decisions from above. The social will down below, passively accepts and follows orders. This sort of division is necessarily part and parcel of the “structure for seeking agreement by number”. To seek numerical agreement, division into “above” and “below” is indispensable for running the operation, for only then is it possible to transform an individual will from its vector, which is boundlessly rich in variety, into a stark number.

“The structure of the vector method for seeking consensus” consists mainly of the social will, while “the structure for finding agreement according to number” consists of the power will. The former seeks consensus through communication from bottom to top, while the latter finds agreement through control from top to bottom. “The structure for finding agreement by number” is the basic method of communication with society used by the power component of the dual structure, while the “structure of the vector-method for seeking consensus” can emerge only after elimination of the condition of duality, when society and power are integrated.

“Power will” is the core and soul of the “structure for seeking numerical agreement”. This structure, in essence, took shape in association with power will and is its offspring. Only with the aid of this structure can power will fulfill its function of making strategic decisions.

B.     The “Judgment” of the Social Will is Capable of Spontaneous Formation and Fulfillment Within the “Structure for Seeking Numerical Agreement”

Will is made up of three qualities-judgment, purpose and decisiveness. As to judgment, this can be treated simply as a general question of being satisfied or not. It is relatively convenient to seek consensus vector-style in case of a general question, and to a large degree is similar to seeking agreement according to number. Then there need only be a social network for setting up contacts among the members of society. Regardless of what the set function of the network happens to be, the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of every member can through its channels, be brought together,  regardless of whether the economy, politics, friends or relatives are involved. The members can freely seek common ground among themselves to form the judgment of the social will.

The social will’s judgment is not only capable of spontaneous formation, but of automatic manifestation. In the same way, it is not necessary to rely on any special structure, but only to take advantage of the web used throughout society in daily communication for reaching judgments through gossip, discussion, expressions of  popular sentiment and so on. Judgment is an especially important characteristic of the social will, and determines its power of initiative.

C.    The “Goal” Of the Social Will Can Exist Only Recessively in the “Structure for Seeking Agreement Numerically”. Whether or not it Can be Realized Depends upon Whether or not the Power Will Happens to “Touch” it.

Persons differ as to their own particular aim in everyday life, therefore fail to exhibit any general tendency in this respect. Within the “structure for seeking agreement numerically”, there is no way of finding their “vector-consensus”. This causes the aim of the social will to exist only partially recessive state within that structure. A social goal cannot be realized without a clear-cut program and relevant laws. Thus, in the absence of a “structure for vector-method consensus” a program and laws can only be formulated by the existing power will. Therefore, in a dual society, whether or not the goal of the social will can be realized depends upon whether or not the power will happens to “touch” upon it by some sort of coincidence.

“Touch” in this sense includes two kinds—“identification” and “coincidence”.

As a form of “identification” the rulers may choose to go along with some particular aspect of the social will in an effort to deal with it more or less correctly and may intentionally assume the role of spokesman and promoter on its behalf. “Coincidence” does not allow for such initiative; a muddle-headed monarch might even occasionally come up with some measure consistent with the social will. However no matter whether as identification or coincidence, there nevertheless exists some degree of “touch”. Sometimes the two wills “touch”, sometimes not; therefore to rely on this eventuality can at best  enable the goal of the social will to materialize only very briefly now and then, on and off.

D. Since “decision” by the social will can not be made in the “structure for seeking agreement numerically”, the development of society can only be determined by the power will.

Decision and aim are not the same. Aim can exist subliminally, but not decision. “The structure for seeking numerical agreement does not allow for the possibility of the social will to make decisions at its own discretion. Thus, decisions concerning society as a whole can only be made by the power will.

Decision is the basic function of the power will. Once it holds the power of decision, it determines the development of society. This is where the power will holds sway with all its might..

Without the structure of the vector-method for finding consensus, the aim of the social will cannot become dominant nor can it make decisions. Nevertheless, a society cannot but have an aim, nor can decision-making be avoided. Consequently, it is necessary and inevitable that the power will should occupy any gaps that may exist.

5.      Warping of the Social Will

A.    Warping of the Social Will

The “juncture” at which the power will and the social will interact occurs in the realm of decision-making. If the aspects of judgment and aim in the will of each side were not involved in decision-making, they could exist separately, independent of each other, in isolation and without mutual interference. In the “numerical-type structure for seeking agreement”, the social will can only follow decisions of the power will. If and when a decision compels the social will to subvert its own aim, its nonconformity will become evident and its judgment will be one of dissatisfaction.

The power will controls the procedure of communication and monopolizes force; it can use compulsion to confront the members of society with no alternative but to convert their “free will” into “un-free will”. This distortion of the will of every individual in the whole of society, through seeking consensus vector-style, is a warping of the social will.

In a society of binary structure, splitting-off of the power will from the social will assumes an aspect of inevitability. Unification can only be fortuitous; therefore society can benefit while at the same time one much it must sustain out-and-out harm—this is the basic problem in a society of binary structure.

B.     “Big Vector” Agreement

In fact a society has different groups, each one of which has its own will which by analogy could be called the “group will”, and is a kind of “big vector”. These big vectors themselves are also binary, while their direction usually is the same as that of the power will, or even the same as that of a dictator’s personal will. The fact that a group can become a big vector is because it itself is the result of seeking agreement by number. That is to say, either by threat or “brain-washing”, the vector-nature of an individual will is destroyed and forced to become a number within a “unified will”, and through similar additions it becomes a state, nation, class, political party, mass movement or exclusive faction.

Different large vectors strive among themselves to incorporate more members into their own orbit through such means as subjugation, annexation, amnesty and deceit; or else in reverse, try to weaken an adversary by cutting down its numbers through stark ethnic strife, class struggle, religious holy wars, ideological harassment, widespread purges and so on. Only when there is no single big vector which can gain overwhelming preponderance over its adversaries or which can annihilate them, a big vector cannot but engage in some degree of seeking agreement vector-style such as compromise, balance-of-power tactics, befriending those distant while attacking those nearby, or forming alliances both vertically and horizontally. Clearly through vector-style  relationships of this sort, agreement according to number is basic; if the numbers are insufficient, a vector cannot become a big one and also cannot become part of its ？？？, and once it has failed to accumulate enough strength to join in with a big vector to seek agreement, it can only serve as a cast-off or as an addition. This sort of mechanism impels the “big vector” to strengthen its own “structure for seeking agreement through number”.

C.    The “Big Vector” of Western Democratic Societies

Pressure groups have commonly arisen throughout modern Western democratic societies and are gradually on an ever-widening scale breaking up the few existing tough big vectors into smaller vectors of a somewhat narrower orientation. This provides a great many more channels for the expression of individual will. The relationship between the different factional groups is no longer one of mutual extermination; compromise tends to supervene over rivalry; their boundaries have become much less distinct, while exclusiveness has given way to overlapping. Within the faction, seeking agreement and setting aside differences has replaced “big unification”, compulsive co-opting has given way to free choice by the individual will. The usefulness of this relatively flexible structure for seeking agreement is gradually gaining in strength and the power policies of the Western democratic societies are increasingly concerned about maintaining equilibrium among all forces.

But of course this still cannot really solve the problem. Regardless of how wide a variety of persons the pressure group can assimilate, it is still a highly simplified  big vector as compared with individual will. The pressure group’s aim is to gain influence, therefore its inclination is to enlarge itself numerically, and strive to unify itself internally; therefore it cannot cast off its innate characteristic as a “structure for seeking agreement through number”.

 

IV. The Stagnation of Power—Renewal, Reorganization and Disaster

Can the social will simply allow itself to be controlled by the power will? On the surface, the whole world seems to be held in the palm of those in power. For the social will to surface depends likewise on if the power will happens to “touch” it. Nevertheless the power wills if it in fact wields absolute dominance as such, will unavoidably undergo a scissors-like split of ever-widening span with the social will. In the face of reality how can it still actually go on “touching” with the social will again and again? A restraining force must necessarily exist which can continually turn the power will back from its course, bringing it into “touch” with the social will.

1.      “Counter-Warping” a Function of the Social Will

The individual will is subject to warping, while a person’s instinct may at the same time give rise to a kind of  “counter-warping” to offset it. The social will is also imbued with this kind of counter-warping, representing the vector sum of counter-warping exerted by all the individual wills in society.

The warping sustained by different individual wills may well differ in countless ways, but the counter-warping is homogeneous. Things of the same nature can achieve consensus within the “structure for reaching agreement by number”. Counter-warping reveals itself as slow-down at work, undermining others, deliberate trouble-making, “policy from above circumvented from below”, and so on. Rulers, confronted by the social will’s counter-warping, may recognize that their control is ineffective and at odds with society.

The greater the warping imposed on the social will, the greater the corresponding counter-warping. When it reaches an extreme, the power will cannot deal with it. Finding no alternative except to let up on its warping of the social will, it must finally “touch” with the social will. This is the gist of the matter.

2.      Power Readjusts Its Pressure

Society’s capacity to oppose distortion by the power will takes two forms—one: pressure, the other: force. Counter-warping as it builds up “internally” ready to act, appears as pressure in a “static state”, or “externally” as release in a “dynamic” form, and can transform into violence. Force or violence, is always the result of pressure applied beyond its limits, and is a special state of affairs, while pressure is a situation of every-day prevalence.

Pressure expresses dissatisfaction on the part of the people, whose active participation in “legal” activities diminishes. The orders issued through the echelons of power turn ineffective, public protest runs rife, acts of destruction increase and so on. In a word, all forms of society’s opposition to power surface. The situation if allowed to continue, will shake the rule of the power clique. At the same time, the strength of the social will to counter warping weakens the vitality of society, while losses caused by internal strife increase. All this is detrimental to economic progress social order, and facility of movement to the extent of harming the interests of the power clique itself. Therefore when under pressure it may almost always make adjustments to alleviate the mounting opposition it faces.

Moreover, the “touch” of the power will with the social will always affects the struggles within the power will. In striving for power, the various factions like to pose as “champions of the people” deliberately making use of the pressure exerted by the social will. This is so particularly in the case of up-and-coming new arrivals on the scene, who are even more inclined to adopt such pretension in order to buttress up their fragile position. The reason why they feel that the people’s support can be used as a weapon is because the pressure of the social will does in fact carry considerable weight. Rulers who stand on the side of the social will almost always emerge as the winners of inner power factional struggles.

Pressure serves to induce those in power to make inner adjustments calculated to prevent social turmoil and destruction. Pressure in the normal ranks of society is bound to arise and express itself as a matter of common occurrence. For this reason it functions as the social wills main method of restricting the power will and also of countering warping. Especially today when in democratic societies officials in power can be changed through elections, it appears that pressure has become the only method used by the social will to restrict the power will. In democratic society all political activities from bottom to top are ultimately carried on for the purpose of exerting pressure against the power holders. It follows that in face of this pressure, the power will, must make concessions in the course of wielding power.

The experience of democratic societies demonstrates that allowing pressure due channels of expression prevents it from building up, and society can avoid the suffering brought on by outbreaks of violence. In the past, mankind has all along been cyclically beset by disasters brought on by brute force.

3.      Power and Its Forcible Replacement

In an authoritarian system, society has no line of communication with power. If the rulers are muddle-headed, or surrounded by sycophants, so that they cannot accurately gauge the strength of the social will’s counter-distortion, or they consider themselves able to deal with such situation through suppression, as long as the social will’s pressure has no outlet, the strength of its counter-warping can gradually evolve into brute force which ultimately resorts to as a means of replacing the power and realizing the social will.

Although suppression by the authority in power may for a long time warp the social will, nevertheless the strength of society’s counter-warping can in turn promote the linking up and development of “opposition”–type groups such as underground political parties, military uprisings and so on. Although autocratic power monopolizes the well-springs of force and occupies a position of dominance, nevertheless once people who represent the social will organize, they also have forces of their own forces. The decisive role of the social will lies in its power to attract followers—its supporters can keep growing in number and agreement reaching countless thousands, while those who stand against it find themselves deserted by followers and forsaken by friends. Therefore the former are bound to overthrow the latter to bring about a complete transformation in the power over society.

After the new rulers are swept into power, society returns to its place as before under the authority of the power-holders, but because the new regime, supported and elevated to its position by the social will, may perhaps at the beginning to some degree keep “in touch” with it, the social will is enabled to attain relatively full realization.

Then everything starts out from the beginning again. Step by step the power-will splits with the social will, so that readjustment through pressure and change by force pass through the rounds of yet another cycle.

A society of binary structure may be compared to a drama about heroes: A stage brightly lit, the beautiful scenery breath-taking, lighting focused on the rulers, while society is only the wooden floor beneath their feet. Nevertheless, in reality, the vicissitudes of the “heroes” are determined by the “ordinary people” while the social will, through readjustment by pressure on the power will or through forceful take-over dramatizes its own choice of the path of history.

4.      Inevitable Lag of a Binary Structure

Even if readjustment through pressure, or a change-over through force, exerts a restraining influence on the power will, nevertheless the nature of a binary society determines that only through the strength of counter-warping can the social will effect a complete break with the power will and maneuver a total change-over. This kind of restraining influence, therefore, involves unavoidable lagging: First of all, counter-warping only after the social will has already undergone twisting, that is to say, after it has already suffered harm. This is the “lag in the rise of pressure”. In the second place, the response to pressure in a binary society is far from timely, and not full. The power holders are far from likely to readjust immediately as soon as they feel pressured, but always tend to wait until its force rises to a severe pitch before they face up to it. This “lag in the effect of pressure” causes the harm to intensify. Thirdly, the harm does not immediately come to an end after those in power make readjustments, but continues for some time. This is “lag in the ending of harm”.

Forceful methods to effect a change-over in power cause even greater harm to society. It always accompanies war and leads to disaster, the “lag” is even more serious.

Worse still, since in binary society, a split between the power-will and the social will is inevitable, then adjustment under pressure, or a forced change once established cannot last, but continuous efforts and repeated trials of strength are called for, again and again; that is to say, the inherent lag described above, is bound to function and persist, harm is bound to result repeatedly, and the whole of society, too, is fated to suffer the aftermath time after time, eventually lapsing into retrogression.

V. Brief Summary and Questions

Is it only through methods of pressure or force that the social will is able to express itself? How is it that mankind must endure repeated harm before the vehicle of society can be steered over to the correct road? Is it possible to find a way for the social will to express itself free of obstruction and thereby enable it to attain full and lasting realization?

The following diagram illustrates a summary of the main points covered above:

 

POWER-WILL

SOCIAL WILL

INDIVIDUAL WILL

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                                       

DIAGRAM  A

In Diagram A, u stands for INPUT, y for FEEDBACK. The square marked “INDIVIDUAL WILL” represents the system’s source of motive power, while the “DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIETY” is the goal of the system.

Two key components of society are shown, one consists of the people who make up society, the other is their communication with one another. These two components, which have a decisive role in promoting “social development”, are indicated by U1 and U5 respectively. Every person strives to satisfy his individual will; each and every effort has a direct bearing on “social development”. The combined efforts of all members of society fill the U1 space. The other social development “input” line, U5, consists of communications. In a binary society, communications emanating only from the “power-will” can influence “social development”.

Actually, Diagram B (a section of Diagram A) represents the present-day structure of a binary society. As a model, it typifies the split between the “power-will” and the “social will”. Here, the “social will” can influence the “development of society” only through the “power-will”, while the “social will” can succeed in restricting (U4) the “power-will” only by means of “pressure” or “force”.

POWER-WILL

SOCIAL WILL

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DIAGRAM B

In Diagram B, the long connecting-line with a question mark (?) beside it, represents the crucial question we are addressing: Would it not be possible to find some means whereby the “social will” need not exert “pressure” or “violence”, but is enabled to communicate directly with the “power-will” and thereby express itself free of obstruction?

Input U5 from top to bottom starting from the “power-will”, if not beneficial to “social development”, will come into contradiction with input U1 from bottom to top, and pass on through feedback Y1 to “individual will”. At this, “individual will” cannot but be dissatisfied and the dynamic for promoting social development weakens accordingly.

Besides, the direct impact of the “power-will” on the members of society(as through policy decisions of officials at all echelons of power, or through rewards and punishments)is shown by feedback line Y3. The “power-will” deflects the “individual will” through two channels: one, indirect (U5     y1), the other, direct, that is, y3.

The individual will of each and every member of society, joined together with all the others through U2, makes up the “social will”. Deflection of the individual wills of the majority results in deflection of the “social will”. As a corresponding counter-deflection drive mounts it transforms into “pressure” or “violence”, with the aim of inducing the “power-will” through input U4, to undertake a readjustment or be placed. In this way, the clash between the “power-will” and the “social development” inputs U5 and U1 eases.

One can also see from Diagram A that apart from receiving input U4 from the “social will”, another input comes from “individual will”, i.e. U3. This indicates that persons in power, the rulers, seek to satisfy their own individual will. In a binary society the individual will of the rulers almost always impels the power-will to split with the social will. But U3, the line leading from the “individual will” of the rulers to the “power-will” is unimpeded, while on the other hand, the input U4 from the “social will” to the “power-will” involves “pressure” and “violence” against blocking. Therefore ordinarily, the power-will can more often be influenced by U3, while the efficacy of U4 lags behind. This directly explains the reason why U5 is so easily isolated from the “social will”.

The symbol y2 represents the feedback that the “power-will” receives from “social development”. If the feedback is prompt and accurate it should enable the power-will to recognize the contradiction between U5 and U1, make adjustment with U5 to bring itself into gear with social advance. But this feedback is of no use in two situations: 1. when the direct interests of power itself are opposed to the interests of society, and to make allowances for the interests of society could harm its own interests; 2. if the feedback channel is blocked or the feedback information is false, both contingencies can result in failure to adjust, or even in maladjustment.

In Diagram A and B there is a connecting line with “?” beside it. The line represents direct input from the “social will” to the “power-will” without the use of  “pressure” or “violence”. This is equivalent to the unification of the “power-will” and the “social will” superceding their dualistic division into separate units. All four compartments of Diagram B also combine to make up the “social will” as shown in a structure in Diagram C:

SOCIAL WILL

INDIVIDUAL WILL

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DIAGRAM C

In Diagram C the input and output lines are clear; there are no hitches or obstructions. The structure itself is smooth and expansive, the links well defined. It represents, as it should, a structure calling for the least effort, yielding the highest efficiency, allowing for easy adjustment and offering the greatest advantage for fulfilling the ultimate goal.

How, then, can this “?” connecting line be transformed into actual existence? How can it be made real?

As explained above, the communication structure, because it does not permit communication, undergoes alienation and assumes the form of power. If, by way of reversal, society is enabled to communicate with it, power can once again become the communication structure. The basic difference between power and the structure of communication is that one works from the top down, the other from the bottom up. If this up-side down situation can be reversed and turned right-side up, that is, if we can change the graded system of making official appointments from the top down, to a system graded from bottom to top, for electing a person to take charge of a communication center, this change, cutting to the heart of the problem, solves it at one stroke.

The way to achieve this change is explained as follows, by means of an Electoral System of Consecutive Levels.

 

SECTION 2：THE DISSOLUTION OF POWER

 

I.       Vector-Summary of the Individual Will

The previous section dealt with the two basic characteristics of human society today: 1. its binary structure, splitting power from society; 2. its structure for gauging individual will numerically. These two characteristics are symbiotic; as long as the structure is binary, it is only possible to summarize numerically, but if the binary structure is to be transformed, summation according to number must be changed to vector-summation.

Finding the numerical sum is simple and easy to administer, but is there a method of operation for finding the vector-sum？If this cannot be handled, if this is but a theoretical elaboration void of any practical significance, then the question whether or not a method can be found for handling vector-summation emerges as crucial to whether or not it is possible to transform the binary structure of society.

This part deals with how vector-summation of the individual will is to be handled in the most basic unit; the following part deals with whether or not it is possible to set up a “vector-type structure for summation” which includes the whole of society.

 

1.      Four Conditions for Handling Vector-Summation of the Individual Will

As a matter of fact, vector-summation of the individual will takes place all the time in everyday life; the difficulty is how to do it through our the whole of society. At the same time, vector-summation requires preparation of the following four conditions, while up until now no form of society has been able to manage this.

Condition 1: Sum Up From Bottom to Top

Vector-summation means first, to take single vectors, divide them into several groups, and separately sum up each group. Then find a higher-level sum from the vector-sums of the several separate groups…… until in the end, the sum of all the vectors is found. This sort of procedure can only be handled from bottom to top. Otherwise, if in the opposite direction—from top to bottom—the only possible result can be a numerical summation.

Western democratic societies practice summing up from bottom to top but can come up with only two numbers—one “in favor”, one “opposed”, and not a vector-sum. This is because the following conditions are missing.

Condition 2: Sum Up Common Experience

This condition is crucial. Each individual will, include in the vector-sum, must be part of a sphere of common experience.

As far as the individual will is concerned, there are only two categories of common experience: one, a common life experience; the other, participation in the same “sphere of activity”. A tribe or a traditional rural village may be considered as having a common life experience. As modernization spreads, this category is gradually shrinking; life and work are becoming separated and people are joining up in different groups. At present, the category of common experience mostly falls into that of “activity”. Those participating in the same “activity” may not necessarily understand each other in regard to other aspects of their lives, but as to the “activity” itself, they engage in mutual contact in a sphere of common experience and for this reason the individual will of each can find the vector-sum of that “activity”.

One can define the sphere of experience from the point of view of communication as that within which full, direct communication is possible. Therefore the number of persons involved must of necessity be limited.

Why is it that within the sphere of experience, individual wills can find vector-summation? How can they go about it? What is the vector-summation which they finally arrive at? The answer to these questions follows a logical sequence:

A.    The significance of a person’s life lies in seeking satisfaction of his individual will;

B.     The standard for judging the quality, soundness or success of a common life experience or of an “activity” is based on whether the individual will of every member has attained the highest possible average degree of satisfaction.

C.    The pooling of the efforts of each member within the sphere of experience seeking satisfaction of his individual will creates the motive force for moving the community forward.

D.    Within the sphere of experience, the goal and decision of each member can be established and acted upon without the necessity of finding intermediate help from any communication link or authority. For this reason the individual will makes up a complete vector and consequently can participate in vector-summation.

E.     The sphere of experience can minimize the limits of an individual will to the lowest degree. This is one of its most valuable characteristics. As each member understands the whole situation, he comes to understand his own relationship with the others as well as his own status in the whole set-up. In general, this kind of vector of an individual will is fairly correct. (There may be disagreements, but disagreements mostly arise from differing standpoints or causes outside of the limitation.)

F.     Within a community, there are different persons with different standpoints. There is contradiction and competition. Nevertheless, tension between competition and cooperation can enable the community to reach its optimum situation. The vector-summation of the individual wills is the process through which the relation between cooperation and competition is adjusted.

G.    Competition and cooperation within the sphere of experience can achieve just the right compromise, because the sphere of experience enables each member to be assured of his best position along the “competition-cooperation” curve, to gauge the limits of the other person’s tolerance and the lasting value of emotional investment as well as the practical plan for compromise, the step by step measures to be taken and methods of implementation—this is in fact the vector of the individual will as defined above. The result achieved by all the members from this kind of summing-up through getting to know yourself and know the others must necessarily bring about the best possible solution for the whole community. The average value of the benefit gained by all the members is certainly also the greatest. This kind of summing up involves a process of development; if it cannot reach a more or less mathematically accurate balance, there can be no end to the “bargaining”.

The above discourse does not consider influences from outside the circle of experience. In fact even if in real life, a circle does exist as described above which suits the definition, nevertheless the vector-sum cannot necessarily be realized. The reason is that the very forces of society itself—its structure and so on—are far stronger than those within the circle of experience. The reason why influences from the outside are disregarded and why the circle of experience is conceived of as a small island, is to bring the principles of individual—will summation into sharp focus.

Given only that the logic described above can be built up under conditions free of outside influences, this exposition proceeds as follows:

Condition 3: Language Alone Is Inadequate (Reliance on Language Alone Is Inadequate)

Vector-summation of the individual will may be described as a conference of the members within their circle of experience. The vector-sum is the result of compromises arrived at in the course of the consultations. Nevertheless, outside of some simple problems, a summing-up of this sort is really difficult to carry out. While consultation as such must take place through the use of language, the problem is precisely that language as a vehicle cannot fully express the individual will. People often experience “indescribable” feelings in the course of their lives; therefore to engage in consultations through the use of language as the sole medium cannot guarantee accuracy free of misconceptions. Furthermore, life goes on, but since language-based settlement through consultation requires relative stability, it is impossible to avoid its falling behind development continuously.

In addition, reality by nature is generally complicated and varied. The use of words in an effort to grasp all the details can render the process unbearable because of the great proliferation of language involved; therefore it becomes necessary to simplify and generalize. Linguistics, although it tries to keep simplification from affecting expressiveness, nevertheless, life being a conglomeration of countless odds and ends, abbreviation and simplification likewise can also conglomerate, so that the void between language and life keeps widening along with the expanding coverage and the mounting degree of abstraction. The gap between real life and a culture conveyed by language is difficult to bridge, the simplistic nature of language certainly comprising one of the major reasons for this; therefore it would be impossible to bring about an accurate vector-summation of the individual will by means of communication through language alone.

Vector-summation of the individual will can only be accomplished under conditions of “holographic communication” so to speak. This consists of confining the process of communication within an integrated environment with its own complete sequence of events, keeping the communicators strictly confined within the sphere of common experience; communicating in addition to the use of language, makes more important use of tacit agreements reached on the basis of mutual understanding.

“Tacit agreement” means sensing an idea and accepting it even without language communication and is often used in describing the best relationships. As a matter of fact, reaching a tacit agreement as described, means people finding the vector-summation of one another’s will without the use of words. In real life, consultations during which it is difficult to reach explicit agreement, may quite often—either deliberately or unavoidably—end in “silent acquiescence”. Such choices as “put it off”, “wait and see”, or “let nature take its course”, in the last analysis, can generally achieve better solutions than “the best-laid plans of mice and men”.

Language cannot be isolated from its environment and the most prolific language environment is the sphere of experience. The language within the sphere of experience does not consist of disconnected abstract concepts, but involves “history” and also is “pictographic”. Every word, every statement, contains much that can be sensed but not expressed in words, as to background, thinking, differences, implications, attitudes—much that makes up and can be called the “field” of language. By comparison, the characteristic of the individual will’s vector is to be found much more in this kind of “field” than in whatever can be expressed through language itself. If such a “field” did not exist, vector-summation of the individual will would be deprived of its base, and language could only turn out to be unconvincing and far removed from life.

Condition 4: Needed: A “Sum-Carrier”

If the relationship is only “one-to-one”, mutual tacit agreement comes easily, but in a group made up of many persons it involves much more difficult. Theoretically a unified tacit agreement can be reached by repeatedly integrating a series of conformities. Each person keeps communicating with another separately, ponders, sounds out alternatives, initiates minor trials of strength or throws out challenges, then draws comparisons with many others, summarizes, revises, and in the end finds a common feature which enables him to reach unanimity with everybody else. When at length each member of the group has found this feature, which finally brings mutual agreement, then only can the group be considered to have realized the sought-after conformity, and with it, the possibility of united action as well. To reach conformity like that, one can only imagine what a great expenditure of time and energy would be required. Furthermore, if one considers that adjustments would be necessary whenever the situation changed, and that even within the sphere of experience the expenditure would be too great, then there is no way this sort of procedure can be considered practical.

For the purpose of cutting down costs, it is necessary to simplify this kind of sequential arrangement as a way of reaching conformity. The method required is to build a public functional center in which each member plays a direct role, simplify the original relation of one-to-many, to a one-to-one relation and proceed to build conformity separately, and finally at that center realize the comprehensive result of the conformity, namely, the vector-sum of the wills of all the members. The public center, therefore, can be called a “sum-carrier”.

A suggestion (or a draft) is one form of  “sum-carrier”. A group, when a situation arises, even if it is some member briefly offering a small suggestion, a “sum-carrier” comes to life. Here, not every member needs to interact separately. It is only necessary for each one to consider the suggestion, make known his attitude, and offer revisions or additions. The process of discussing the suggestion, bargaining with another member, from the “preliminary draft” to the “finalized text”, leads to the vector-sum of the wills of all the members in regard to that particular suggestion or issue. On the other hand, in using a language-produced result as a “sum-carrier” it is not possible to avoid the problem described in “Condition 3”, while at the some time, it would not be possible to solve the problem of the enormous cost involved in reaching consensus. In a group, if every member tries to be the first to suggest a draft, whether the matter is big or small, and the process must proceed from discussion to revision, to implementation and, after all-round understanding is reached, most of the time and effort may be wasted in quibbling over wording. Therefore the “public center” must not be a product of language, but must itself have the capacity to generate tacit agreements, to make up for the inadequacies of language.

In the world, Only people have the ability to carry on activities based on tacit agreement?

Therefore the best method is to choose a person from within the sphere of experience to act as the “sum-carrier”, and allow him to anticipate group’s consensus through tacit understanding. After that, he decides on his own policy and substitutes it for the actual consensus of the group, while at the same time he can still correctly reflect the result reached by the group’s actual consensus. Only in this way can the cost of the individual wills undertaking vector-summation be brought down to a sustainable level, as well as prevent waste of time in verbose give-and-take.

The logic behind allowing a person to assume the role of “sum-carrier” is as follows:

A.    As long as the sphere of experience allows for full and direct communication, the “sum-carrier” can correctly and sensitively gauge the individual will of each member.

B.     The “sum-carrier” ponders over the individual will of each member as if in his own mind he has used a style of tacit understanding to reach conformity with the individual will of each.

C.    Since the sphere of experience has no boundaries, the tacit understanding of the “sum-carrier” is, in general, unlikely to deviate widely from the correct vector-sum.

D.    Even if the “sum-carrier” does deviate from the vector-sum, the members of the group can confront him, keeping up their contacts with him until he is compelled to shift to the correct “sum”.

E.     The nature of the sphere of experience, namely, its absence of limitations and openness to full communication, enables each member of the group to recognize, very early on, any deviation from the vector-sum on the part of the “carrier”, compel him to correct it, and in this way to avoid bringing on any harmful result.

F.     Owing to the “sum-carrier’s” skill in the use of tacit understanding, it is not necessary for the members of the community to contact him repeatedly; he can “understand tacitly” how to correct a deviation. Thus, the cost involved is low, the expenditure of time, minimal.

G.    Outside of the rare contingencies when an objective is crucial or an important decision is in order, making it necessary for the members to engage in extensive mutual contacts with the “sum-carrier” to reach conformity, the multifarious daily trivialities can be decided by the “sum-carrier” on his own to cut down on unnecessary conformities.

H.    Even without engaging in interaction, since direct communication is always possible, the “sum-carrier” as a matter of fact is constantly in a position open to interaction with each and every one, because he only needs to show some sort of bias to bring on eventual interaction.

I.       The “sum-carrier” on his own initiative grasps developments promptly and with foresight, and consciously readjusts the existing aim and policy to suit a new situation. This can turn the vector-summation into an on-going process. This continuity does not demand that all members keep pushing each step of the way. Only when the “sum-carrier” falls behind developments would it be necessary for other members to join in.

   The core of the logic described above is to allow real conformity to emerge as rarely as possible, but to guarantee that it emerges always as a “poll test” and serves to restrict the “Sum-Carrier”. If any one of these aspects is lacking, the vector-summation of the individual will cannot be completed.

 

2.      Election Within the Sphere of Experience—Emergence of the “sum-carrier”

The specific method by means of which this takes place can be summarized as follows: the “sum-carrier” emerges through election within the sphere of experience.

As for elections, people have taken part in many all along, but never in the past has an election been carried out within a “sphere of experience” stipulated as a limitation, for most elections extend far beyond any sphere of experience.

The sphere of experience is characterized by full communication, mutual understanding, and convenience of contact; therefore an election is very simple, and as for such large-scale procedures as electioneering, campaigning for office, voter registration and casting votes at the ballot box, not one is needed; moreover, elections can be held at any time.

Large-scale elections only allow the voter a choice of “yes” or “no”, and for this reason the special advantageous characteristics of the vector are lost. Moreover, the quantity of information available during elections in the sphere of experience is unlimited. Even if a person remains “for” or “against” an elected candidate, nevertheless he has already reported his all-round individual will—the reason he agrees or opposes, his judgment, demands, aim, and what he wishes the elected official to do for him—all this is in his vote “for” or “against”. He can speak up to express his ideas, or he can use the “field” of language to do so. As long as it is within the sphere of experience, his individual will can emerge in vector form, and also can definitely be transmitted to the other members correctly—including, needless to say, the name of person he wishes to elect. As compared with the Yes/No form of election outside one’s sphere of experience, this type can be called a “holographic election”.

A “holographic election” enables a candidate for office to be clear about the reasons for his being supported or opposed, what the voters expect of him, what he should do to attract more support and lessen opposition, and the fact that he can be elected only if he satisfies the individual will of the voters to the utmost possible degree. This may prompt a prospective candidate to start campaigning, and to strive for the highest degree of average satisfaction attainable for the group, that is to say, realization of the vector-sum of the individual wills of the group members (“the collective will”).

Therefore, if the candidate’s aim to be elected is the same as his individual will, then, when dealing with the affairs of the collective, his own individual will does not become involved and he relinquishes his own “domain” to take on convey the burden of the collective will, thus willingly becoming the “sum-carrier” of the collective. In this way, apart from the election itself, a real conformity can be reached, while all former conformities were “poll tests” in the mind of the candidate. Whenever the candidate sets a policy, he makes clear the position of the others in advance, mulls over in his mind how to go about bargaining, where the dead-line of each person is and also at what point a balance can be reached through mutual compromise……He needs only to turn things over in his mind and he can more or less correctly find the resulting conformity. If this imagined conformity exhibits a divergence from the real conformity, the members of the collective can sense it and through feed-back to the official using holographic communication prompt him to reconsider the matter, to undertake yet one more mental “poll-test”, correct the deviation and in this way, to approach the actual vector-sum more closely each time the process is repeated.

This kind of mental experimentation requires little cost and yields high returns, therefore taking the elected official as “sum-carrier”, substituting his mental poll-testing for the real consensus, is the best way to realize the vector sum of the individual will.

Within the sphere of experience, the “holographic poll” in combination with the “optional poll” can lead to an excellent situation—whenever the official makes a decision of any kind whatever (in exercising his role as a “sum-carrier”), he faces the possibility of a new election. This prospective election may not actually take place, but because its imminence is only too real, it can hover in the mind of the official. To avoid dismissal his only recourse is to closely abide by the collective will as a way of maintaining a position, from beginning to end, as the most correct and responsive “sum-carrier”. In fact, the “optional poll” is only a possibility to which the elected official is sensitive, so that he is always ready to readjust his position to suit the will of the collective, so that in the long run the “optional” eventuality need not take place at all.

 

II. An Election System of Consecutive

 

The number of people in a sphere of experience is limited. If a particular limit is exceeded, communication cannot be adequate and the range of experience cannot completely include the whole group. However, since the number of people in any society for exceeds this limit, how, then, would it be possible to engage a whole society in vector-summation? At this point, it is necessary to expand the method described above to include different levels, forming a “vector-summation structure”.

 

1.        The Group Leader of “n” Villagers

Suppose that “y” represents the limit of the number of people in a sphere of experience, while “n” a smaller number, that an administrative village has “n” small groups of villagers (natural villages) and each small group of villagers is made up of “n” villagers. A “sum-carrier”(a village group leader) can be elected inside each group to realize the vector-sum of their individual wills; while this would not be possible within the scope of the administrative village, because its number of persons (“n” X “n”) would exceed the numerical limit of a sphere of experience. In an election for example, if an administrative village has 1,000 people, it is certain that they would not understand each other, would not ordinarily intermingle, and therefore a “holographic election” could not be carried out. In such a situation, a person elected numerically could in no way become a “sum-carrier”, because in his mind he could not possibly conceive of a consensus of the will of 1,000 persons, while at the same time, being detached from their experience, he also might tend to deceive the members of the collective. In addition, it would be difficult for 1,000 people to engage in optional elections and consequently they would be deprive of any means of holding him accountable when necessary, and all the disadvantages of traditional elections would reappear.

A small group of villagers makes up a sphere of experience, and the group leader elected by them is their “sum-carrier”. If vector-summation, according to its own principles, is applied to the vector-sums of the heads of small groups of villagers, the result should be exactly the same as the vector-sum of the individual wills of the 1,000 villagers of an administrative village. Let us therefore consider the case of “n” heads of village groups to see whether or not finding their vector-sum fulfills the required four conditions for vector-summation.

Condition 1: it is clear at a glance that the heads of “n” groups of villagers were elected from “below”, and if they hold another election and find the vector-sum, it will certainly be from below to above.

Condition 2: Do the leaders of “n” groups of villagers belong to the same sphere of experience? Consider this question a focal point.

Whereas the number of people in a natural administrative village exceeds the limit for a sphere of experience, nevertheless the “n” leaders of groups of villagers do not exceed the limit ”y”. Let us consider the management of an administrative village as a project: the members of the project are the group leaders of the villagers. The function of the administrative village is to act as coordinate or among the small groups of villagers. In carrying out the project, each and every leader of a village group must maintain contacts and engage in consultations. While the ordinary members of the various small groups may be unacquainted with each other, even having had little connection with each other in the past unless necessary, nevertheless, it is a “must” for the leaders of the groups of villagers to be in constant touch; at least regarding whatever concerns the management of the administrative village, they must definitely be on familiar terms with each other. Through their contacts, their familiarity has drown as if always  within sight and hearing; they personally experience “holographic communication”. Their exchanges during consultation do not depend only on language, but thrive much more on mutual understanding. Among themselves they make up a common sphere of experience; therefore, while complying with Condition 2, they also suit the Condition 3, namely, they “refrain from relying on language alone”.

What about Condition 4? The vector-summation of “n” leaders of small groups of villagers also requires a “sum-carrier” (head of the administrative village). The method by means of which he emerges is the same, that is to say, he is elected within the sphere of experience from among the “n” leaders of groups of villagers. The principle is as explained above: The administrative village head must act within the bounds of the “holographic election” and the “optional poll” in order to satisfy his individual will to be the elected official, and among the projects related to the administrative village, he can only represent the vector-sum of the will of “n” leaders of groups of villagers.

Some questions may arise: At the level of the administrative village, is the will of each leader of a group of villagers still the vector-sum of the will of the members of his group? This will determine whether the vector-sum borne by the second-level “sum-carrier”(the administrative village head) is in fact the vector-sum of the will of all the members of the administrative village, or is it only the vector-sum of the individual wills of the “n” leaders of villager-groups? Is it possible that the leaders of the village groups will make use of a lack of understanding on the part of the members of the village small groups regarding the situation in affairs of the administrative village and seek private ends or the interests of a small clique instead?

This situation cannot possibly arise for these reasons:

A.    An election within the sphere of experience enables the members of the village small group to fully understand the person they vote for; this, as well as his ability and behavior, guarantees the character of their elected leader.

B.     The administrative village is not completely cut off from the members of the ordinary village small groups; their partial experience can be passed on. In any structure made up of parts, the parts all have the ability to extend their experience, or function, to the whole structure. Likewise in all his doings, a village group leader up at the level of the administrative village, at the very least in respect to comparatively important events, cannot completely dissociate himself from the influence of the village small group’s experience.

C.    A cause-and-result linkage within the “mother-and-child” structure plays a decisive role even if a village group leader seeking personal gain may conceal it for a time, His will harm the interests of the village group so that sooner or later it will be reflected back to the village group, through the cause-and-result linkage in the “mother-and-child” structure, and be exposed.

D.    Other persons within the village small group, who would like to be elected its representative, may keep a watchful eye over the administrative village, stand judge over the current elected official’s activities, and encourage the village small group to take an active interest in the goings-on of the administrative village. All this constitutes a kind of goad that the current elected official cannot but constantly feel qualms about.

Therefore, in the vector-summation from the small village group (“child” structure) to the administrative village (“parent” structure) the “sum-carrier” (the village leader) of the “child” structure unmistakably represents the collective will of the “child” structure when participating in summation and must not do so according to his own individual will. That is to say, in this way the “sum-carrier” of the “parent” structure, elected from among the “sum carrier” of the “child” structures, conveys the vector sum of the collective will of all the “child” structures, and this equals the vector-sum of all the individual wills within the “parent” structure.

 

2.        The Structure of Vector Summarization

Call any sphere of experience made up of voters and their elected representative a “level-precinct”. For example all the members of a small group of villagers (A) and their elected leader (A) are referred to as “level-precinet A” All the members of village small group (B) and their village small group leader (B) may be called “level-precinct B”, and so on. “Level-precinct A” and “level-precinct B” are two different units, or “precincts” of the same “level”. Then, all the small village group leaders (including village group leaders (A) and (B)) and their elected head of the administrative village make up still another “level-precinct ”. This makes up a “precinct” of one “level” higher, as compared with “level-precincts” “A” and “B”. Each village group leader among them has two identities: he is an elected representative of a lower-level precinct and also a voter in his current higher-level precinct. They make up a sort of liaison department between the successive level-precincts.

The structure of vector-summation, taking this kind of “level-precinct” as the basic unit, is made up of a combination of consecutive levels. The principle for the vector-sum of any one level-precinct among them is the same as for “n village-group leaders”. Instead of the village group leader, it is necessary only to substitute the administrative village leader, district director, county commissioner, or the mayor of a city, right up to the top-level precinct of the state leader elected by “n” number of provincial governors.

As the levels go up, the distance between precincts of the same level may become greater, while the child-parent structures connected from below may also increase in number of levels. Such being the case, is it possible to guarantee a common sphere of experience among the voters of higher-level precincts? Can the will of members of the basic levels of society still have an influence on the upper levels? As to this, let us examine the precincts at the highest levels of society; if there are no problems at the highest level-precincts, then those at the middle levels need cause no worry at all.

The centers of “n” number of provincial governors are at least more than 100 kilometers apart, so that their opportunities for face to face contacts, as compared with that of farmers living in the same village, are fewer by far. Nevertheless, provincial governors using the means of communication at their disposal can guarantee to keep in touch at all times. Similarly, electing a new head of state can be undertaken at any time, and would in fact be even more convenient than calling a village election, because electric current covering several kilometers’ distance in an instant is certainly faster than a person walking from one end of a village to the other.

Governors of provinces cannot keep in touch with everything that goes on in the same way that villagers get to know about every local happening such as which housewife is short of some kitchen or other. Outside of holding joint discussions on state affairs, they probably have no other contacts. Does a certain villager get along well with his wife? Is he a good fisherman? It is not necessary for a governor to understand aspects of society not connected to issues of running the whole country. Nevertheless, once the question of respect for one’s wife impinges upon national affairs, investigation of such a case would present no difficulty at all since many resources, such as reports and funds, are available to the governor.

As the levels ascend, metaphysical reflection in regard to communication and summarization will occupy an increasingly important position. Still, nevertheless, experience is basic as always. Regardless of how high the degree of stratification, in the vector-summarization of each and every level-precinct. All require direct communication based on experience. This is the basic attribute of the level-precinct structure. All the conditions and procedures for finding the vector-sum as explained above—whether in electing a “sum-carrier”, or using “holographic communication”, or estimating the vector-summarization through mental calculation through a poll-test of his level-precinct by the “sum-carrier”—are exactly the same for the highest level-precinct as well.

Generally speaking “the extension of experience” exists only between a “parent-child” structures at adjacent levels. But this is like piling up dominos, where one weighs on the other. In order to stand the last piece (the highest level) on end, then one must put up all the fore-going pieces to make this possible. The first domino (at the lowest-level precinct) although there is only a small part of it resting on the second, nevertheless all the dominos behind it are weighing on it and supported by it. For this reason, the level of a provincial governor or the head of state is many levels removed from the ordinary members of society but cannot break free from their restrictions. Moreover, because the control comes from below, it is a case of many controlling a few. Ordinary people vote only for the first-level “sum-carrier”, but this is more thorough, more dependable, as far as securing their own interests, than dealing with autocratic power based on a small number controlling a large number.

 

3.An Electoral System of Consecutive Levels

The following outline of “An Electoral System of Consecutive Levels” is only a visualized application of “The Structure of Vector-Type Summarization” as a concept in a real social system. Difficult to understand, as it may unavoidably turn out to be, additional commentary follows description of the main principles.

 

An Electoral System of Consecutive Levels

 

1.Voting

Article I 

1.      Leaders of each rank in public power organizations, equally taking “n” as the basic number^①, are elected by a majority of two-thirds; the term of office is unlimited but subject to change at any time by those who voted for him;

2.      A voter is not allowed to vote for himself.

Article II

In society any organization based on people’s rights may choose whether or not to use the electoral system of consecutive levels.

Article III

1.      An organization based on people’s rights that adopts the electoral system of consecutive levels may voluntarily be entered into the electoral level-precinct corresponding to that of a civil rights organization to participate in elections of the same level as that of a civil rights organization.

2.      The grade-level and precinct level of a people’s rights organization entered into the elections of a civil rights organization is based on its number of members and its locality and as specifically set by law.

3.      A people’s rights organization entered into the grade elections of a civil rights organization can have only one civil rights electoral identity at a time; if its subordinate organization independently participates in the voting grade of a civil rights organization, when deciding on the level-precinct of the civil rights organization in which the people’s rights organization is to participate, the number of members in its subordinate organization is deleted from its total number of members.

Article IV

1.      A citizen’s individual identity as a voter in consecutive levels elections is not limited.

2.      Every citizen has at least one identity for enrollment as a voter in level elections of a civil rights organization.

Note: “n” is a sphere or category decided and regulated by law. The basic principle for determining “n” requires that all the persons within the designated sphere, can participate in full and direct communication.

 

II Rights

Article V

Each level-precinct elected through consecutive layers and all the subordinate members under its leadership make up an autonomous unit. It has all the rights not clearly prohibited by the upper level-precinct and complete autonomy in areas where it does not violate the laws of a higher level.

Article VI

The voters and their elected official of each level-precinct together make up the level-precinct and the legislative organs of all its subordinate members. Laws or legal decisions are passed by a majority of two-thirds; a law or a legal decision is abrogated or annulled by a majority of two to one.

Article VII

Laws passed by a civil rights organization are effective over all its subordinate organizations and persons (including mass organizations not yet entered into consecutive-level elections of the civil rights organization, and private organizations). If any laws or legal decisions passed by a lower level-precinct or by any type of organization run counter to laws or legal decisions of an upper level, the upper level-precinct has the right to annul the law and when necessary impose sanctions or punishment.

Article VIII

The elected official of each level-precinct is the highest administrative head and legal representative of his level-precinct and of all the subordinate members.

Article IX

Persons assigned to help the administrative head implement his power over public affairs, persons concerned with work in public affairs, and personnel comprising functional set-ups are appointed by the administrative head or his entrusted assistant.

Article X

The voters of a level-precinct may cancel an administrative decision by a majority of two to one.

Article XI

Judicial power is invested in legally assigned judges of all ranks. The position of judge is established by a two-thirds majority vote of the voters and their officials of the respective level-precincts as elected by consecutive levels. The position cannot be held by a voter or an official. The term of a judge is not limited; he can be replaced by an election at any time.

Article XII

1.      The inspector of each rank installed according to legal stipulation is responsible for carrying out the procedure for entering human rights organizations into the consecutive levels elections of civil rights organizations; he guarantees that all citizens can participate in the consecutive levels elections of the civil rights organizations, supervises the lower ranks in execution of laws passed by the upper ranks and represents civil rights organizations in conducting legal proceedings.

2.      Public procurators of all ranks are elected by a two-thirds majority of the voters and officials of the corresponding level-precinct of the electoral system of consecutive levels. The term of office is unlimited, while the official can be replaced at any time by an election.

Article XIII

The elected official of the highest level-precinct, having emerged through civil rights organization elections according to consecutive levels, is the representative of sovereignty with full powers to conduct foreign relations and command the armed forces.

 

III Explanatory Notes

Article XIV

These rules take precedence over all laws. Any laws, regulations, commands, decisions or actions in violation of these rules are completely invalid.

Article XV

The free right to decide on these rules belongs to the highest level-precinct which has emerged through consecutive levels elections by civil rights organizations.

Article XVI

The right to interpret the laws of each rank is invested in the judge elected by the level-precinct which established the law.

 

Owing to limitations of space, the following covers only briefly some of the more important concepts and principles.

 

⊙ Types of Social Organizations

A “civil rights organization” is invested with and exercises public power, engages in public administration, and undertakes to fulfill public social welfare obligations. This role has always been assumed by organs of state power (governmental, legislative and judicial). The civil rights organization formed through the system of election by consecutive levels, differs from former state power organizations, it is not a minority organization made up of official functionaries, but is an organization of the whole people which includes all members of society.

Election by consecutive levels differs from direct popular elections of the Western democratic system. An election in the Western democratic system is a kind of procedure, not an organization. It is a voting procedure for electing a power organization. Even though a cause-and-result relationship exists between elections and power, nevertheless the common people are still cut off from the organs of power. On the other hand, the public power organization generated by the system of elections by consecutive levels is itself an organization of the whole people. Therefore in fact, power and society become completely integrated.

In the electoral system of consecutive levels, setting the number “n” is of crucial significance for realizing the acquisition of power by the whole people. The number “n” guarantees that all elections are carried out within the sphere of experience. This causes a qualitative change in the nature of elections. Such election, no longer for choosing an agent to act on one’s behalf, transforms an elected official into a “sum-carrier”, an instrument of the voters. Voters become the real masters and wielders of power,  the side commanding the initiative, they no longer hand over power to someone else.

Using “n” as a basic number, how can one set up the sequence of a civil rights organization election by consecutive levels? At first one can simply continue the present structure into which Chinese society is divided and follow its sequence, –for example the small group of villagers of a rural neighborhood, the village committee members of an administrative village, country towns, while higher up. There is the county, district, province…… Eventually after the all-round realization of the electoral system of consecutive levels, a more accurate basic numbers (“n”) and sequence will be adjusted gradually in an orderly way.

The situation in urban areas is more complicated than that in the countryside. People live away from where they work and live separate lives. The electoral system of consecutive layers requires that the civil rights organizations can include every member of society; therefore it might be fairly suitable to set up the basic units of a civil rights organization according to place of residence. A start could be made y running elections in local social organizations (such as a village small group, residence committee……) and then extending the layers district-wide and city-wide.

Holding consecutive level elections exclusively according to residence may not be conclusive because home and family are only one part of a person’s life, while work is another important part. According to Article IV of the Rules: “A citizen’s individual identity as a voter in consecutive levels elections is not limited”; in this way a member of society who has a work unit, while voting at his place of residence, can at the same time also vote at his work organization according to the stated system and can in this way express his individual will in regard to his work.

Nevertheless, except for “state-owned” enterprises and institutions, other types of work organizations cannot be regarded as civil rights organizations and for this reason cannot be expected to adopt the electoral system of consecutive levels. Particularly if ownership is that of a private enterprise (“private rights organization”) the workers fall into the category of hired hands, and for them to engage in election by consecutive levels would infringe upon the ownership. Therefore, in the rules, the system of election by consecutive levels is not proposed for them, although “people’s rights organizations”, which fall between public rights organizations and private rights organizations, can themselves decide whether or not to adopt the system. Nevertheless, even if a private rights organization or a people’s rights organization does not participate in the elections by consecutive levels of the civil rights organization, it still must respect the laws set by the civil rights organization of their area (Article VII).

“People’s rights organizations”, as I see it, should make up the main fabric of the future society. The main function of a civil rights organization is to administer the affairs of society, while a people’s rights organization is an autonomous community that works together on specific functions and aims, such as daily life, production, religious activities, education, and various other causes. Ownership rights belong to all the members. Article III stipulates: “An organization based on people’s rights which adopts the electoral system of consecutive levels may voluntarily be entered into the corresponding electoral level-precinct to participate in elections of the civil rights organization.” If a food-processing factory owned by the workers who hold stock in common voluntarily uses the electoral system of consecutive levels, it can connect with a non-civil rights organization in respect to voting activities. Yet, a possibility which is even more worth while for the enterprise, might be to join the level elections of a civil rights organization, because in that way it can influence wider policy decisions in seeking bigger benefits for the enterprise. If the food factory has 1,000 employees, and the number is in the same category as that of the residence committee, then the level-precinct of the civil rights organization elections by consecutive levels, into which the food factory is admitted must be the level-precinct from which the factory head and the local residents’ committee chairman together elect the responsible head of the residential area.

The head of the food factory becomes a voter and a legislator in the community level-precinct. In the process of summarizing the whole community’s will, the vector-sum of the factory workers can be included, bringing relations between the food factory and the community closer. The factory can give the local community special consideration and can coordinate with it in respect to environmental protection, employment, and payment into the public welfare fund. The community can take into consideration the needs of the factory in respect to overall planning, services and public safety. When the person in charge of the community who fills the role of “sum-carrier” enters a higher-grade level-precinct as a voter and a legislator, moreover, he can also transmit the factory’s vector-sum together with that of the community’s will.

If the food factory does not need to maintain frequent contact with the community but has close links with the city food-enterprise, it may, instead, opt to join the consecutive levels elections there. For example, “n” number of factories through such an election may form an association, which would be responsible for coordinating their activities and promoting cooperation among them, such as unified shipping of materials, joint marketing, and control over unfair competition. The factory heads of “n” number of food factories elect a person as responsible leader of the association.

When the association decides to combine with a civil rights organization in elections by consecutive levels, its appropriate level would probably be on a par with that of the community. The head of the association, on an equal basis with the community leader, would vote for the district manager, so that at this higher level he could further the interests of the workers.

As the food factory, it would be in its interests to participate in elections together with community civil rights organization while at the same time voting in the level elections of the food industry, but Article III section 3, stipulates: “A people’s rights organization entered into the level elections of a civil rights organization can have only one identity at a time as a civil rights voter; if its subordinate organization independently participates in the voting grade of a civil rights organization, when deciding on the level-precinct of the civil rights organization in which the people’s rights organization participates, the number of members in the subordinate organization is deducted from its total number of members.” This is to say, the food factory, once having joined in the elections of the civil rights organization in the community can still take part in election-level of the food industry, but when the association of food producers also joins in the civil rights organization grade elections, the number of employees of the food factory must be subtracted from the total number. Then the level-precinct to which it belongs in the grade election of the civil rights organization can be decided. The aim in setting up this sort of restriction is mainly for the purpose of preventing some people’s rights organizations (particularly a large-scale organization) from expanding its influence inordinately through repeatedly entering civil rights organization grade elections.

Of course this stipulation only adds to the technical complexity of elections by consecutive layers. Because of all sorts of difficult problems arise, such as calculating the number of people, determining the appropriate level-precinct, confirming an elected official, adjusting to changes and so on. Nonetheless, in the first place, mankind has now entered the age of the computer and the network, laying a technical foundation for solving difficult problems such as these; secondly as soon as election by consecutive levels begins to function, its mechanism for automatic correction can come into play and eventually find the best solution.  

 

⊙ Determination of the Number “n”

The basic number “n”, on which the electoral system of consecutive levels is based, is crucial. The core of the reason why this system surpasses other systems of election is the fact that all voting must take place within the sphere of experience, and this can be put into practice only according to the number “n”. Without the limitation of “n”, running consecutive levels elections only in form cannot essentially break away from the old types of election. At present in China elections of the “People’s Congress” are also run according to the form of consecutive levels, but precisely because the basic number of voters exceeds the number “n” by far, the process becomes a sham.

How then is the number “n” determined? The rule is explained in this way: “ ‘n’ represents a sphere determined and regulated by law. The basic principle for setting the number ‘n’ is: Within this sphere all persons can realize full, direct communication.”

The number “n” cannot be constant because the structure of the system of election by consecutive levels and the organizational structure of society itself form an organic whole and real life cannot be regulated according to a constant number; therefore ‘n’ can only be set according to a sphere:

 

x≤n≤y

 

Number x and number y are constant numbers, “n” can represent any integral number between x and y. The problem of determining “n” now becomes one of how to determine x and y. As discussed above, the known number represents all the persons who can guarantee full direct communication mutually, and the upper limit of y must not exceed the maximum number of people who can guarantee full communication. What the exact maximum number is can be determined scientifically, and without difficult can be assessed by relying on a general knowledge of life. The specific number can be tested and revised in the course of practice.

The lowest number in an election cannot be one person alone, since an election cannot be run with one person and according to Regulation I, item 2: “A voter cannot vote for himself.” An election consisting of 2 persons can only result in an impasse, with each one voting for the other. According to regulation, a person must be elected “by a two-thirds” majority to be an official and to pass laws; therefore the lowest limit cannot be less than three persons. This also is in keeping with the customary lowest limit among social organizations in general.

As a matter of fact, it is not necessary at present to focus on the number “n”. At first, in using the electoral system of consecutive levels, it can not be so strictly confirmed; simply to vote according to the already existing structure for social communication and the ordinary organizations would be suitable. Once the principle of this system of elections is established and adopted throughout society, an appropriate “n” can be found, then implemented according to law and adjusted as changes in the situation take place.

 

⊙ A Citizen’s Identity in Election by Consecutive Levels

Article IV, regulation 1. stipulates: “ A citizen may individually have many kinds of identities as a voter in elections according to consecutive levels.” This means a citizen may simultaneously act as a voter and an elected official in many organizations that implement this system. For example, a citizen, as an ordinary employee of a food factory, participates in electing a group leader. At the same time, as an enthusiastic activist in the neighborhood he is elected small group leader. Also, he is a regular member of the Green Party, and in addition was elected responsible head of the National Amateur Surfing Club. If the food factory, neighborhood small group, Green Party, and Surfing Club all implement the system of elections according to consecutive levels and have all joined in the alignment of the civil rights organization elections, then this citizen has four identities in the elections of the civil rights organization. He has four channels through which to express his personal will in the vector-summarization of the civil rights organization. Is this phenomenon reasonable? Can it inappropriately magnify the personal influence of a citizen who has a fairly large number of identities in the electoral system?

Not at all. This is indeed one of the outstanding merits of this electoral system. The vector-sum of the individual will, as referred to, is not a simple unitary element. A person’s will invariably forms as a specific reaction in relation to a particular problem or question, different aspects of which evoke a different will. This type of election which accommodates many types of identities is eminently suited to this characteristic, for it provides many channels to enable the individual will to be reflected from various sides in all its dimensions. But no matter how many voting identities a person has for expressing the many various aspects of his will, they represent only a process of refinement of his individual will, and in no way can his individual will undergo aggrandizement.

Modern social life is becoming more and more divided up into separate compartments. The “tribal” quality of life that confined an individual from birth, through old age, illness, and death, within one sphere, where clothes, food, shelter and work were available, is declining day by day. Under these circumstances to restricting the vote to a single identity is obviously not in keeping with the development of society. Today voters in the West elect officials of different levels in a vertical direction: town, city, state, nation…… each time, voting at a distance further away from their own locality, while on the other hand the system of election by consecutive levels mainly develops voting horizontally with more than one voter-identity. This sort of election may not be as exciting or as bombastic as vertical elections, but it has much greater significance and effectiveness for fully realizing the individual will, while the ultimate realization of the social will may also well exceed by far the results of vertical voting.

The stipulation of Article IV, rule 2, that “every citizen has at least one identity for enrollment as a voter in a civil rights organization” applies mainly to members of the migratory population who have no way of joining a civil rights organization which is set up according to residence, and also to those who work in a factory or company which does not adopt election by consecutive levels. All this may result in their being deprived of a channel for expressing their individual will, while their interests in general cannot receive proper consideration. What channel would enable them to join in elections by consecutive levels of a civil rights organization? Joining a trade union, or the local residence committee? There may be many choices.

 

⊙ The Integration of Power

The electoral system of consecutive levels does not adopt principle of separation of powers. The purpose behind separation of powers is to maintain a balance; and to treat society is a structure split in two. In this way it is difficult for society to communicate with power or to restrict it. The only method for preventing corruption and abuse of power is to take pains in designing the structure of power, and only after that, set up the separation of powers. This sort of structure is by no means naturally reasonable, but exists  as a sort of last resort in the absence of any better alternative. It is like letting each of a person’s four limbs go its own way independently. No matter how ingenious the design for coordinating relationships to achieve and maintain balance, problems inevitably arise.

The consecutive levels electoral system enables power and society to coalesce and integrate into one unit. This dispenses with the state of duality; power once again returns to the communications structure and is controlled by all the members of society. Restrictions exist in every cell of society and become functional at any time, therefore the separation of powers as a system for maintaining balance is no longer necessary. The integration of power does not lead to dictatorship or corruption; moreover precisely because of this, it can be much more rational, highly efficient and flexible.

In this system, outside of the voters in the lowest rung and the head of state at the highest level, persons in the middle strata belong to two level-precincts at the same time; a person in the lower level-precinct is an elected representative, in the upper he is a voter. In each of these roles, he has the following functions:

l      Legislation

Here, “legislation” is a broad concept. It can mean drawing up the nation’s laws, setting up a routine decided by factory workers or finalizing an agreement reached by several villages to form a county township. Every level-precinct has this kind of “legislative” function, the only difference being that legislation at the higher level-precincts is more often drawn up in formal written form, while at the lower level-precincts rule-of-thumb methods will do.

“Legislation” impinges upon “basic state policy” and is not so much concerned with daily administrative trivialities; therefore this system stipulates that all the members ( “n” number of voters plus one elected representative) of a level-precinct draw up laws together. (Their elected representative joins in for the purpose of linking up with legislation of the upper level. This ensures full expression for the legal intentions of the lower level-precinct as well as prevents clashes between the two levels in the course of their legislative work.) The relationship between an upper level-precinct and a one is as follows: If the lower level-precinct is subordinate to the upper (regardless of how many levels separate them, as long as they are in the same cluster, the upper level-precinct may over-ride the legislation of the lower, and the lower level-precinct must abide by the decision. The legislation of the lower level-precinct is valid only on condition that it does not run counter to that of the upper one.

l      Administration

Here, for better understanding, ordinary decision-making is referred to as “administration” by way of analogy despite the basic difference. Thus, it may be formulated in this way: In the consecutive levels electoral system, the elected leader of each level-precinct acts as head of the administration and as its legal representative in dealing with its daily policy decisions.

l      Appointments

As the level-precincts rise a higher, the related subordinate “cluster” enlarges, while the volume of administrative work necessarily increases; so that the executive head unable deal with it on his own, needs an assistant or special group to help. A society that operates according to the electoral system of consecutive levels requires that all civil rights organizations use this system; only the personnel helping the leader at each rank to carry out his official duties are appointed from above. Although the assistants also exercise power, nevertheless, power of this kind does not actually belong to them. The power they wield is delegated to them by the leader. This appointment system is necessary to guarantee that power follows the consigner.

But the appointment system does not deny the assistant functionary the right to vote; he has other concurrent identities which offer him many opportunities to participate in elections and to various channels through which to express his individual will.

l      Administration of Justice

The electoral system of consecutive levels requires that all ranking judges and procurators are elected from their respective level-precincts. At the lower levels, the administration of justice and the procuratorial work may simply consist of settling quarrels, or supervising and inspecting; if may not necessarily require a special official position. At certain higher levels, however, it may be necessary to provide for a qualified full time person to handle legal matters.

The judge and the procurator are voted into office and can be replaced. For this reason, it behooves them to pay strict attention to the wishes of the voters. In this context, the power to mete out justice is basically in the hands of the voters, while the judge and the procurator are only functionaries of the judicial establishment. Still, they differ from the administrative assistant appointed from above by an elected official and assigned work by him personally. The judge and the procurator must follow the instructions of all the level-precinct members who elected them and not those of any one individual. The reason why it is stipulated that the vote for judges and procurators should be a two-thirds majority in the precinct is to guarantee their relative independence. Moreover, as long as they do not come into conflict with the precinct’s majority on any major issue, even the administrative head himself has no power to interfere with them—on this point, also, the administration of justice is guaranteed independence.

In practice, the administration of justice is far more complicated than the promulgation of laws. The question of how the judiciary is established in a society based on the electoral system of consecutive levels must be postponed for the present and reserved for future discussion.

 

※                    ※                         ※                          ※

 

The communication structure through alienation turns into power. This has resulted from the continual inadequacy of society to deal with the growing complexity of the communication structure, which became split off from society and taken over as privately owned premises. The electoral system of consecutive levels builds a society with the sphere of experience as the basic unit, and for this reason, whatever the complication–whether technology, a procedural problem, or even intrigues or plots–it cannot possibly be hidden, and for the same reason, alienation of the communication structure loses its base.

At a time when power, isolated from society, exists independently, even if the power-will happens to “touch” the social will which thereby attains expression; one still cannot maintain that power is not private. The electoral system of consecutive levels uses officials “sum-carriers”, who can exercise power only according to the collective will or the social will. Then power is truly no longer private.

One can see that the structure of elections by consecutive levels and that of indirect communication are exactly the same. In this electoral system, power is no longer a “solid body” split off from society, but instead, it is dissolved and absorbed into every cell of society, and therefore society is no longer a duality.

Once power returns again the basic purpose for which it emerged, and becomes the structure for indirect communication, pressure and force are no longer necessary to adjust or replace it. Therefore, as to the “?” in Diagram A, its answer is—the electoral system of consecutive levels. This system enables 4 parts of Diagram B to combine as “social will”; in that way, it realizes the unitary society described in Diagram C.

That society will be such that any social unit can become autonomous while at the same time every autonomous unit constantly merges with other ones to become a higher-level autonomous entity. Social information circulates within the autonomous unit5. Each unit needs only to go through a channel (the “sum-carrier”) for outside communication to receive instructions or report results. The specific procedures for communication are completely up to the autonomous unit itself to decide. For this reason, a large volume of whatever news or information emerges, does so spontaneously and disappears the same way. It is digested and absorbed within the confines of the autonomous unit. As the news continues to spread, even if it reaches the highest precinct of the state, it consists of only what has passed in and out of “n” number of provinces. The bulk of the information will already have been absorbed completely at one layer after another. For this reason, no matter how much the scale of society expands or how dramatically news “break”, it cannot undermine the ability of society to maintain order.

The expression “small is beautiful” speaks to the exigency which mankind is up against, but if one tries the method of turning social development backward as a solution, it can only represent a sensitive viewpoint but cannot be taken up as a useful approach. The electoral system of consecutive levels can not only allow the scale of society unlimited growth but can also allow each and every autonomous unit to maintain its sphere of experience free of information overload. In this way, all autonomous units can become equally small. This adopts “small is beautiful” from a fresh angle, while at the same time presents mankind with the possibility of creating a perfect society of great harmony.

Beijing, May, 2000

Democracy of the Western style has its restraints; it cannot resolve the overall disjuncture between those who control power and the rest of society. For example, any given election can only create a few positions within the power structure, providing limited channels for  communication. Considering that elections are held only once in several years, the communication they provide is actually spotty.