Creating the Zhuang: Ethnic Politics in China 9781626373228

Citation preview

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page i

Creating the Zhuang

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page ii

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page iii

Creating the Zhuang ETHNIC POLITICS

IN

CHINA

Katherine Palmer Kaup

b o u l d e r l o n d o n

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page iv

Published in the United States of America by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. 1800 30th Street, Boulder, Colorado 80301 www.rienner.com and in the United Kingdom by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. 3 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, London WC2E 8LU © 2000 by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kaup, Katherine Palmer, 1968– Creating the Zhuang : ethnic politics in China / by Katherine Palmer Kaup. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-55587-886-3 (hc : alk. paper) 1. Chuang (Chinese people). 2. China—Ethnic relations—Political aspects. 3. China—Politics and government—1949– . I. Title. DS731.C5K38 2000 323.1'195919—dc21 99-051386 British Cataloguing in Publication Data A Cataloguing in Publication record for this book is available from the British Library. Printed and bound in the United States of America The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1992.

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page v

CONTENTS

List of Illustrations Acknowledgments

vii ix

1

Introduction: Ethnic Nationalism Ascendant

1

2

The Zhuang Setting: Guangxi and Yunnan on the Eve of the Communist Revolution

25

Early CCP Minority Policy: The Decision to Recognize the Zhuang

51

4

Politics: The Consolidation of Central Control

73

5

The Expansion of Regional Autonomy and the Growth of Zhuang Activism

111

Culture: The Creation and Promotion of the Zhuang Cultural Heritage

125

7

Economics: Development and Disparity

149

8

The Rise (and Fall?) of Zhuang Ethnic Nationalism

171

3

6

Appendix: The Law of Regional Autonomy, 1 October 1984 Bibliography Index About the Book

v

183 199 215 221

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page vi

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page vii

ILLUSTRATIONS

Maps China, Showing Yunnan and Guangxi Provinces The Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Prefectures Guangxi Counties with More than 90 Percent Zhuang The Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Counties

xi xii xii xiii

Tables 2.1 2.2 4.1 6.1 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5

Zhuang Population Distribution Within the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, 1990 Number of Zhuang Living Outside of Guangxi and Yunnan Provinces The Phases of Zhuang-State Political Interaction Educational Levels in Guangxi Labor Force, 1990 Guangxi’s Per Capita Economic Indicators Compared to National Indicators, 1993 Western Guangxi Versus Eastern Guangxi Economic Indicators, 1993 Comparison of Employment Structure in Guangxi, 1990 Comparison of Western and Eastern Guangxi Per Capita Rural and Urban Income, 1993 Guangxi’s Total Fixed-Assets Investment by StateOwned Enterprise Compared to the National Average

31 33 75 131 150 152 160 161 163

Figures 2.1 3.1

Photographs: Members of Sha, Tu, and Nong Zhixi Ethnic Group Distribution Patterns

vii

39 57

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page viii

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page ix

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Over the course of my research I have accumulated innumerable debts to colleagues, friends, and family members. I would particularly like to thank my colleagues Brantly Womack, John Israel, John Echeverri-Gent, and John Shepherd at the University of Virginia and James Scott at Yale University for contributing a wealth of insight from their respective fields of political science, history, and anthropology as they commented on drafts of my manuscript. Funding for this project was provided by the Institute for the Study of World Politics, the University of Virginia–Yunnan Nationalities Visiting Scholar Fellowship, and Furman University. I received extensive assistance and guidance from scholars in Kunming, Yunnan, and Nanning, Guangxi, as well as a generous welcome from those I interviewed in the countryside. Although my conclusions on the evolution of the Zhuang nationality were ultimately quite different from those held by my colleagues in China, I will forever be indebted to the generous guidance of He Shaoying and Huang Huikun at the Yunnan Nationalities Institute; He Zhengting, Lu Huoye, and Nong Kaiwen of the Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association; my teachers and friends Gu Youshi, Luo Shujie, Zhang Zengye, Fan Honggui, and Qin Guosheng at the Guangxi Nationalities Institute; and Qin Chenghao and Wei Shiquan at the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission’s Research Institute. I would especially like to thank Qin Naichang, director of the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission’s Research Institute and secretary of the Guangxi Zhuang Studies Association, who provided me with invaluable assistance. His generous support, enthusiasm for the Zhuang and for the government’s minority nationality policy, and openness to alternative scholarly approaches were much appreciated. And finally, as always, I am particularly grateful to my husband, John, and my parents, who were my primary sources of support and encouragement in this, as in so many other projects. —K. P. K.

ix

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page x

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page xi

China, Showing Yunnan and Guangxi Provinces

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page xii

The Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Prefectures

Legend: (1) Baise; (2) Hechi; (3) Nanning; (4) Nanning; (5) Nanning City; (6) Fancheng City; (7) Liuzhou; (8) Liuzhou City; (9) Qinzhou; (10) Beihai City; (11) Guilin; (12) Guilin City; (13) Wuzhou; (14) Wuzhou City; (15) Yulin.

Guangxi Counties with More than 90 Percent Zhuang

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page xiii

The Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Counties

Legend: (1) Longlin Gezu Zizhixian; (2) Xilin Xian; (3) Tianlin Xian; (4) Leye Xian; (5) Lingyun Xian; (6) Baise Shi; (7) Napo Xian; (8) Jingxi Xian; (9) Tian'e Xian; (10) Fengshan Xian; (11) Bama Yaozu Zizhixian; (12) Tianyang Xian; (13) Debao Xian; (14) Nandan Xian; (15) Donglan Xian; (16) Tiandong Xian; (17) Tiandeng Xian; (18) Daxin Xian; (19) Longzhou Xian; (20) Pingxiang Shi; (21) Hechi Xian; (22) Dahua Yaozu Zizhixian; (23) Pingguo Xian; (24) Long'an Xian; (25) Chongzuo Xian; (26) Ningming Xian; (27) Huanjiang Maonanzu Zizhixian; (28) Du'an Yaozu Zizhixian; (29) Mashan Xian; (30) Wuming Xian; (31) Nanning Shi; (32) Fusui Xian; (33) Shangsi Xian; (34) Fangcheng Gezu Zishixian; (35) Yishan Xian; (36) Xincheng Xian; (37) Shanglin Xian; (38) Yongning Xian; (39) Qinzhou Shi; (40) Luocheng Mulaozu Zizhixian; (41) Liucheng Xian; (42) Liujiang Xian; (43) Heshan Shi; (44) Laibin Xian; (45) Binyang Xian; (46) Heng Xian; (47) Lingshan; (48) Hepu Xian; (49) Rongshui Miaozu Zizhixian; (50) Rong’an Xian; (51) Liuzhou Shi; (52) Xiangzhou Xian; (53) Wuxuan Xian; (54) Guigang Sh; (55) Pubei Xian; (56) Sanjiang Dongzu Zizhixian; (57) Yongfu Xian; (58) Luzhai Xian; (59) Jinxiu Yaozu Zizhixian; (60) Guiping Xian; (61) Yulin Shi; (62) Bobai Xian; (63) Longsheng Gezu Zizhixian; (64) Lingui Xian; (65) Lipu Xian; (66) Mengshan Xian; (67) Pingnan Xian; (68) Beiliu Xian; (69) Luchuan Xian; (70) Ziyuan Xian; (71) Xing’an Xian; (72) Lingchuan Xian; (73) Guilin Shi; (74) Yangshuo Xian; (75) Teng Xian; (76) Rong Xian; (77) Quanzhou Xian; (78) Guanyang Xian; (79) Gongcheng Yaozu; (80) Pingle Xian; (81) Zhaoping Xian; (82) Cangwu Xian; (83) Cenxi Xian; (84) Fuchuan Yaozu Zizhixian; (85) Zhongshan; (86) He Xian; (87) Wuzhou Shi; (88) Beihai Shi.

Kaup-FM.Finalrev

1/11/10

4:59 PM

Page xiv

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 1

1 Introduction: Ethnic Nationalism Ascendant

Over the past decade a seemingly endless wave of bloody ethnic nationalist battles has flooded the globe. In Europe, Yugoslavia erupted in violent civil war as competing ethnic groups claimed sole rights to their “homelands.” The Soviet Union shattered along ethnic lines, and Chechen separatists threaten to topple the precarious hold of the Russian government. In Africa millions of Hutus and Tutsis fled their homelands to escape the horrors of ethnic genocide, as Eritreans celebrated their liberation from Ethiopia. The Middle East remained a hotbed of conflict as Palestinians and Jews continued to see hopes for peace torched under the fire of ethnic hatred. Kurds continued their unsuccessful quest for independence from Iran, Iraq, and Turkey. In the Americas, Quebecois nationalism drew world attention, and ethnic separatists in Mexico resorted to violence to make their demands known. In those areas where minority separatists did successfully negotiate control over their own territory, new ethnic divisions often developed, which yet again challenged the new state boundaries. Within the world’s most populous multinational state, the People’s Republic of China, ethnic activism has also been on the rise. The economic and political decentralization measures initiated in 1979 by Deng Xiaoping have increased centrifugal forces in society, widening the divisions among ethnic groups. For many nationalities within China, the reforms, and indeed communist rule more broadly, have highlighted the minorities’ inferior political, economic, and social status. Numerous groups, including the Tibetans, Mongols, and several Muslim nationalities, have openly challenged the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) right to rule. Tibet and Xinjiang Provinces in particular have been intermittently rocked by violence since the Communists first declared them “liberated” shortly after ousting the Nationalist forces in 1949. Over the past ten years alone, ethnic groups have rebelled against the Chinese government more than a dozen times. Tibetans rioted on several

1

Kaup-1.Final

2

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 2

Creating the Zhuang

occasions in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and several monks immolated themselves in protest against CCP rule. In Xinjiang Province, Uighur and Kazahk nationalists clashed with government forces in 1993 and 1997. Although the CCP downplayed the extent of the protests, Hong Kong and Western press sources report that more than five hundred people died in each conflict.1 Many of the most active separatists have organizational support from outside China. Ethnics in the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region have at least two organizations, the Self-Governing Committee of Inner Mongolia and the Asian Mongolian Freedom Front, demanding independence for a “Mongolian Republic” with Outer Mongolia. Clashes between Mongol activists and the government reportedly left two hundred dead in May 1990.2 Even groups that have traditionally been hailed as little different from the majority Han population have begun agitating for greater political autonomy. Only weeks after the government crackdown on dissident activity in Tiananmen Square in 1989, an article appeared in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region’s (GZAR) main minority journal urging members of China’s largest nationality, the Zhuang, to “wake up” and “take charge of the leadership in Guangxi.”3 In January 1991, 270 Guangxi Zhuang intellectuals and government officials announced the formation of the first nongovernmental Zhuang Studies Association. Two years later more than five hundred Zhuang in neighboring Yunnan Province petitioned the government for recognition of an independent Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association. Articles began to appear in the southwestern provinces bordering Vietnam demanding legal guarantees for Zhuang autonomy, 4 preferential taxation terms,5 bilingual education for Zhuang children, 6 affirmative action programs, and greater Zhuang control of government positions.7 One article stated that without more Zhuang cadres, the regional autonomy promised the Zhuang in the early 1950s would become “empty superficialities and sink into the abyss of meaninglessness.” The article notes that “economic and cultural inequalities still exist” and can be eliminated only through “proper minority self-consciousness” and “calls for the strengthening of Zhuang minority consciousness.”8 There are over 16 million Zhuang living in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and Yunnan Province. The Zhuang is by far China’s largest nationality. No other nationality has a population of more than 10 million, and only four groups have more than 7 million members. Over one thousand kilometers of Zhuang territory borders Vietnam, making the assurance of the local population’s loyalty to the Chinese state of particular strategic concern to Beijing. Since their formation, the Zhuang Studies Associations have been nurturing new academic and economic exchange programs with their ethnic counterparts across international borders. The associations’ founding members emphasize that properly considered, the

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 3

Introduction

3

Zhuang, along with the Dai, Shui, Dong, Buyi, and Li nationalities of China, the Thai of Thailand, the Lao of Laos, the Nong of Vietnam, and the Shan of Burma, are all part of a greater Tai nation with over 250 million members.9 The political significance of this group, these activists contend, cannot be ignored. Despite these warnings, the Zhuang nationality has been largely ignored both in the West and within China itself. Its very existence as a nationality is even frequently denied. Bai Zongxi, one of the leaders of the Guangxi Clique, which ruled Guangxi during the Nationalist era, reportedly accused the Communist Party of creating an artificial minority grouping when it recognized the Zhuang. Bai claimed that there were no differences between the “so-called Zhuang” and the Han majority. Bai’s commentary is particularly significant given that he was himself a member of a Muslim minority and was an advocate of minority rights.10 Even segments within the Zhuang population itself assert that the Zhuang are no different from the Han. In the West, Zhuang have been casually dismissed by scholars as “Sinified” and fully integrated into the Han majority. No major study has been conducted on the Zhuang in English in any field. Early Western studies that tangentially referred to the Zhuang concluded that they were indistinguishable from the majority Han and “as a minority group actually do not pose any minority problem for the Chinese administration.”11 Yet today Zhuang peasants, intellectuals, workers, and cadres proudly assert their membership in an ancient and culturally rich minority group. Nearly two millennia of discriminatory policies against the Zhuang, these nationals contend, have pushed the Zhuang into geographically hostile regions, where they live in depressed economic conditions relative to their Han counterparts. Zhuang activists demand the right to govern their own internal affairs and to receive compensation for what they see as centuries of exploitation by the Han, Mongol, and Manchu Imperial rulers. Educational levels among the Zhuang are significantly lower than the nationwide average, and they remain locked in agricultural subsistence economies while their Han neighbors rush to seize the advantages of a rapidly developing market economy. Zhuang intellectuals adamantly demand the promotion of the Zhuang written script throughout Zhuang territory in an effort to “regain” control of Zhuang history, which they claim has been expropriated by Han historiography. Who are these mysterious Zhuang? Do they, in fact, constitute a “unique nationality, with a rich ancient history and culture,” as the CCP and Zhuang activists claim? Or are they simply, as one Western scholar has suggested, a purely artificial recent construct of the Communist Party? 12 Are they, in other words, really any different from the Han? The cause of the Zhuang enigma is not difficult to ascertain. None of the regimes preceding the Communists recognized the Zhuang as a nationality.

Kaup-1.Final

4

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 4

Creating the Zhuang

Indeed, even the Communist Party itself made no reference to the Zhuang during the first seventeen years it was developing its minority policy. The CCP made no move to establish an autonomous region for the Zhuang during the first two years it controlled Zhuang-populated Guangxi and eastern Yunnan Province. Most of the Guangxi population denied its Zhuang heritage in the early 1950s, claiming instead to be Han. There was little interaction among the Zhuang, and little sense of a unified ethnic consciousness. The vast majority of peoples now considered Zhuang affiliated most closely with their locality or with groups that the CCP contends are not separate nationalities, but branches within a large Zhuang nationality. And then suddenly, in 1953, the Communists proudly announced that China’s largest nationality, the Zhuang, had “stood up” and formed the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture. Under the CCP’s administration, the previously unrecognized nationality was now officially granted numerous rights, including the right to govern its own internal affairs, to have proportional representation in local and national political organizations, and to develop its language and culture. In 1958 the CCP expanded the territory under Zhuang control and announced the establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, one of only five provincial-level autonomous units in the country. Given that the Zhuang were not recognized as a separate nationality by the pre-Communist leadership and on the eve of the Communist takeover made few demands either for recognition as a group or for Zhuang autonomy, why were they granted one of only five provincial-level autonomous regions in 1958? Was the CCP’s policy toward the Zhuang a response to specific pressures from below? Or, if the Zhuang were not actually mobilized to pressure the government, did they nonetheless pose specific challenges to the CCP’s policy objectives that made it necessary or expedient to grant them autonomy? If, as Western scholars suggest, the Zhuang were not a political force, what was driving the CCP’s policy toward the Zhuang? Determining why the Zhuang were granted recognition is a necessary step in assessing the even more important question of how central policy has affected political developments in Zhuang areas. Though a very small movement, some Zhuang activists assert that the members of the greater Tai nation should secede from their respective countries and form an independent state. Less radical activists work within the Chinese state system to chart out greater political, economic, and cultural autonomy for the Zhuang, who they argue have the right to govern themselves. Zhuang peasants proudly assert their Zhuang nationality affiliation and argue that the Zhuang are finally beginning to receive the glorification they deserve. Less than fifty years ago, however, most of the people who now call themselves Zhuang had no sense of a common ethnic identity. Peasants

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 5

Introduction

5

who today proudly assert their Zhuang nationality acknowledge that they did not call themselves “Zhuang” prior to the Communist takeover, but rather referred to themselves as members of one of the more than twenty local ethnic or tribal groups found scattered throughout southwestern China. Villages today labeled “Zhuang” often broke into violent warfare with one another in the past. Their rallying cries to battle were not targeted against a particular village, but against a particular other “people.” What was the nature of internal interaction among the Zhuang on the eve of the Communist takeover? What factors limited their ability to mobilize as a nationality? What best explains the evident rise in Zhuang ethnic consciousness after 1949? Can this rise in ethnic activity be attributed solely to the role of the Chinese state, or can prevailing theories about the origins of nations contribute to our understanding of the Zhuang? Conversely, what will our study of the Zhuang tell us about broader theories of ethnic identity and ethnic political mobilization? The exponential rise in ethnic movements globally has spurred a rich and nuanced literature on ethnic movements, particularly since the end of World War II. Although China is the world’s largest multinational state, Western studies on Chinese nationalities have remained limited until recently. Until the late 1980s, scholarship on China’s minority nationalities focused almost exclusively on the central government’s minority policy without considering how the CCP’s policy has altered ethnic identity and the boundaries of political mobilization. Wolfram Eberhard and Herold Wiens, for example, have contributed important ethnic histories detailing the Chinese government’s relations with frontier tribes.13 Although both utilize an immense body of local histories, each concentrates primarily on the pre-communist Han-minority relations and look little at the CCP’s minority policy. June Dreyer’s seminal China’s Forty Millions offered the first, and for nearly two decades the only, major political study of the Communist Party’s overall minority policy.14 Relying on archival materials and a limited number of interviews with émigrés, Dreyer’s piece does not focus on minority consciousness or processes of identification. Her thoroughly researched and detailed study pays little attention to how central government policy shaped ethnic groupings, focusing instead on the political and economic effects of such policy. Dreyer notes that the central government imposed rigid nationality classifications, and that the actual ethnic mosaic was much more complex than could be accounted for by the party’s fifty-six nationality categories. She does not focus, however, on the negotiating process involved in ethnic identification. Until the end of the 1980s, the vast majority of studies on China’s minorities concentrated on the northern and northwestern nationalities. Owen Lattimore, for example, has written extensively on the historical, geographic, and economic demarcation of the center and periphery and the consequent

Kaup-1.Final

6

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 6

Creating the Zhuang

political relations between the central government and the nationalities based in Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia.15 Linda Benson and Donald McMillen have also contributed important studies of Xinjiang, 16 as have Chae-Jin Lee and Bernard Olivier on the Koreans,17 and numerous scholars on the Tibetans.18 Dru Gladney’s 1989 study of the Hui in China was one of the first major studies seeking to understand processes of ethnic identity in China.19 Gladney’s study reflects the current trend in the broader ethnic nationalist literature to examine the content of ethnicity as it is shaped both by ethnic elites and state policy. Gladney’s study, like the numerous ethnic studies that followed in the early 1990s, is predominately an anthropological study and focuses on exactly what the term Hui means for the people who find themselves members of the officially designated Hui nationality. He does not assess why these people were classified as a single nationality by the central government. In the early 1990s a number of important anthropological studies began addressing issues of ethnic identity and began to examine many of the previously little-studied southern and southwestern nationalities. Using postmodern approaches and analyzing “ethnic narratives” and cultural and political “discourses” and “imaginings,” these anthropologists have sought to understand how members of ethnic minority groups define themselves.20 These studies look at the complexities of ethnic identity and note the interactive discourse and mutual influence the ethnic groups, their elites, and official state categories have on one another. Political analysts studying China’s nationality policy generally examine the government’s attempts to integrate the diverse minorities into a unified Chinese state. These analysts tend to portray the nationalities as reified, preexisting groups and the “state” as a centralized monolith. The political analysts, as exemplified by Colin Mackerras, examine how the central government’s policy affects minority economics, politics, and society, without concentrating on how the central government’s policy and the numerous variations in local government implementation shape ethnic groupings and the self-identity of nationalities. The cultural anthropologists, on the other hand, aim to show how members of ethnic groups negotiate their ethnicity with the Han Chinese and how this negotiating process influences the ultimate content or “boundaries” of their ethnicity. The anthropologists argue that the central government has been “narrating” a history of the Chinese nation and has rewritten history to illustrate close interaction between the Han and the minorities to prove the existence of a unified and historical “Chinese nation.” Steven Harrell clearly articulates the prevailing anthropological stance on the Chinese government’s “civilizing mission” toward the ethnic groups:

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 7

Introduction

7

Any government that wishes to gain the loyalty of its citizens must convince them that they are citizens by virtue of their historical and cultural attachment to the nation and that this attachment is a long, glorious, and immutable one. A government must not simply ignore, it must also actively attempt to hide, the fluid, multivalent nature of ethnic identity. It does this, ordinarily, by constructing narratives of national unfolding, what Homi Bhabha calls “the attempt by nationalist discourses persistently to produce the idea of the nation as a continuous narrative of national progress”21 or what Benedict Anderson characterizes as “the process of reading nationalism genealogically—as the expression of an historical tradition of serial continuity.”22 These narratives of unfolding are stories of the processes by which an ancient people has come down through the ages as agent, as victim, as subject and object, but most importantly as a unity. Any narrative of unfolding must replace the actual history of fusion and fission, alliance and conflict, and above all of negotiation, that is the real process.23

These anthropologists have debunked earlier assumptions that nationalities were reified groups, and have begun the important study of how state policies shape ethnic identity. The numerous studies emerging on China’s minorities, as well as the vast body of theoretical literature on ethnic nationalism more broadly, have greatly contributed to our understanding of minority mobilization within the People’s Republic of China. However, current studies fall short in two key areas: First, though recent studies have clearly demonstrated that ethnic identities are multivalent, fluid, and susceptible to manipulation by political leaders, both political and anthropological studies have failed to address what specific pressures the Chinese Communist Party has faced in its relations with the minorities and what political motivations influenced the decision to recognize particular groups while refusing to recognize others. Without clearly understanding both at what level and by whom state policy has been formulated, it is impossible to explain why certain policies have been stressed. Second, though numerous studies have attempted to outline the interactions between the state and particular minority groups, they fail to show that the nature of the relationship between ethnic groups and the state has changed radically over the course of the CCP’s rule. Careful examination of government policy toward the Zhuang clearly demonstrates this process. A thorough analysis of the fascinating interactions among the diverse members of China’s Zhuang nationality and the group’s relations with the elaborate Chinese state hierarchy reveals the dynamic and changing influence that the CCP has played in altering Zhuang identity and political mobilization. Early CCP policy was largely driven by the central government’s attempts to unify and integrate diverse and isolated groups of

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 8

8

Creating the Zhuang

people into the greater Chinese nation-state. The minorities posed a number of administrative challenges to the central government. The government’s minority policy was initially inspired by central goals and implemented by centrally selected officials operating within local administrative structures. The Zhuang were offered a variety of preferential policies to gain their loyalty and to integrate them politically, culturally, and economically into the unified Chinese state. Early CCP policy toward the Zhuang, as Chapters 2 and 3 clearly indicate, was designed to weaken localist tendencies among the southwestern peoples. Once the central government became convinced that its citizens’ political loyalties had been successfully transferred from their localities and their locally defined ethnic groups to the greater Chinese nation-state, it began to lose interest in promoting minority rights. By the end of the 1980s the central government began reducing the preferential policies offered the Zhuang, which led to greater grassroots political mobilization by the Zhuang themselves. As Chapter 4 demonstrates, Zhuang-state political interaction has radically changed since the CCP came to power. Policies promoting the Zhuang were initially sponsored by the central government in order to integrate linguistically and culturally diverse peoples into a centralized state. Differences among the Zhuang were thus downplayed by the central government officials, and control over Zhuang historiography was closely monitored by centrally appointed cadres. By the end of the 1980s the central government became less concerned with controlling the discourse on minorities and with fostering a sense of unique Zhuang traditions. By the end of the 1980s, therefore, Zhuang interests began to be promoted by the Zhuang themselves. This book does not focus solely on the political activities of the central government, local officials, or Zhuang citizens, but gives careful consideration to the interactions among these three groups, revealing that though Zhuang ethnic consciousness has increased exponentially since 1949, the political influence of the Zhuang as a people actually declined in the 1990s despite an increase in grassroots activity among ethnic Zhuang elite.

Structure of the Book The scope and complexity of Zhuang politics does not lend itself either to a purely chronological or to a purely topical survey. The structure of this study is therefore divided into two sections. The first section presents a historical account of the development of the CCP’s early minority policy; the second examines the three primary areas of state policy toward the Zhuang after the Communists took control of the country in 1949. The first section analyzes what motivated the CCP to recognize the Zhuang and

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 9

Introduction

9

grant them their own autonomous region. Chapter 2 examines the Zhuang on the eve of the CCP takeover, clearly illustrating the challenges they posed to the party’s efforts to integrate all of China into a single administrative, social, and economic unit. This chapter shows the initial lack of cohesion among the Zhuang and provides evidence that the Zhuang were not organized enough to pressure the CCP for regional autonomy in the early 1950s. Chapter 3 then traces the early formation of CCP minority policy, showing that the policy was devised and implemented from the top down. The next four chapters then thematically examine the content of minority policy in Zhuang areas from 1949 to 1998. These chapters separately address the political, cultural, and economic content of minority policy in Guangxi and Yunnan. Each chapter examines the major shifts in policies and the motivations behind them. This second section unveils the new institutions and incentive structures developed in Zhuang areas over the past fifty years. One of the first tasks of the CCP in minority territories was to improve the political representation of the various nationalities. The party established territorial autonomous units staffed by ethnic nationals in each area with a large concentration of non-Han people. After declaring the establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and Yunnan Province’s Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture, the party launched a massive campaign to recruit and train an indigenous Zhuang ethnic cadre corps. These cadres were hand-selected by central officials in the party nomenklatura system and trained in party- or government-run schools. Have these cadres proved to be effective implementors of central policy as the party intended? Or have they, as indicated by the recent burst of activism among Guangxi and Yunnan Zhuang officials, become more closely affiliated with their local ethnic group? What accounts for the apparent growth in the Zhuang elites’ ethnic identity? Is it representative of a more broadly based growth in ethnic solidarity among various segments of the Zhuang, or are these officials simply exploiting ethnicity as a means of maintaining their own privileged position within the administrative system? Cultural policy in Zhuang areas has focused on both improving educational levels among the Zhuang and cultivating a greater sense of Zhuang solidarity, largely by disseminating the party’s version of the history of the unified Zhuang people. Peasants who had little access to modern educational resources prior to the Communist takeover have been gradually integrated into a unified Chinese educational system. Thousands of Zhuang have been trained in institutes of higher learning established solely to teach ethnic students and Han officials who plan to work in minority areas. How have the radical changes in education, controlled largely by the central government, affected Zhuang ethnonationalism? Has the party’s control over the schools’ curriculum and over the admissions process into

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

10

11:20 AM

Page 10

Creating the Zhuang

each higher level of education increased the Zhuang’s desire to participate in the unified education system? Or has it, conversely, merely served to bring the Zhuang into contact with an alien culture and alien institutions, resulting in increased ethnic consciousness? Likewise, has control over Zhuang historiography traded hands since the Zhuang nationality was officially recognized for the first time in history by the Chinese Communist Party? Has party propaganda on the Zhuang successfully unified the Zhuang, or are there still clear divisions among them? As in the political and cultural realms, economic policy in Zhuang areas has changed dramatically since 1949. The party intially offered all minority nationalities, including the Zhuang, preferential development policies. Zhuang autonomous areas were granted higher budgetary freedoms and special investment funds designed to compensate them for years of “exploitation” by the Han. The economic reforms initiated by Deng also led to greater Zhuang activism due to the increased salience of Zhuang economic concerns. The disparities between the Han and non-Han areas’ agricultural and industrial per capita production more than tripled in the first ten years of the Dengist reforms.24 Although the nationalities constitute only 8 percent of China’s total population, more than 50 percent of the 181 counties below the officially defined poverty line in 1985 were minority areas. Many of these counties were found in western Guangxi and in Yunnan Province. By 1988, 74.5 percent of the poorest counties were occupied by minorities, and the discrepancies continued to grow well into the 1990s. The final chapter of the book examines Zhuang reaction to these CCP minority policies, by examining how minority policy and the process of modernization have affected Zhuang political attitudes and behavior. Interview data highlights the different political attitudes and behavior of Zhuang peasants, urban workers, and intellectuals. This chapter shows that the lowest level of Zhuang society, the peasantry and the urban workers, wants fuller integration into the Chinese state rather than greater autonomy. Most nationalist Zhuang demands are being promoted by the intellectuals and the cadre corps trained, ironically, in party-administered schools. The final chapter concludes with an examination of the limits to further Zhuang activism, and future prospects of Zhuang-state interaction.

Sources As previously mentioned, Western language sources on the Zhuang are extremely limited. Jeffrey Barlow has written two articles on the Zhuang during the Song and Ming dynasties,25 and Diana Lary has written on a Zhuang peasant uprising in the 1920s and on ethnic historiography,26 but

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 11

Introduction

11

no major study has yet focused primarily on the Zhuang. Though in a new important study of CCP nationality policy Colin Mackerras briefly notes a growing sense of Zhuang pride,27 the Zhuang are generally dismissed by scholars as being no different from the Han and fully assimilated. June Dreyer mentions the Zhuang only briefly with such comments as “most Chuang [Zhuang] had been assimilated to the point of thinking of themselves as Han and felt no ties with any foreign power.”28 In one of only two studies that focus on minority policy in the southwest, David Deal dismisses the Zhuang in one sentence by declaring “as the Chuang [Zhuang] have been largely Sinicized long before the present century their culture will not be discussed.”29 Despite the dearth of information in the West, however, dozens of major studies have been conducted on the Zhuang within China, both by the Zhuang themselves and by Han scholars through government-sponsored research projects.30 In the early 1950s the central government sponsored a major project to investigate and record the social histories of all the officially recognized minorities. The seven-volume collection on the Zhuang, 31 which was not published until 1984 because publication was blocked during the Cultural Revolution, was one of the first studies on the Zhuang. Zhuangzu jianshi [A Brief History of the Zhuang] was published in 1980, though it appeared in draft form in 1957. The study was expanded by the author’s students into Zhuangzu tongshi [A General History of the Zhuang], which appeared in 1988. In 1997 a comprehensive history of the Zhuang in Yunnan and Guangxi was published.32 The Guangxi and Yunnan Zhuang Studies Associations are now actively petitioning the government for research and publication funds for works on inter alia Zhuang history, literature, politics, art, education policy, and language. Guangxi minzu yanjiu [Guangxi Nationalities Research], a quarterly journal published by the Guangxi Nationalities Research Institute, focuses primarily on the Zhuang. The journal began publication in August 1985 and is one of the best sources for detailed studies of contemporary Zhuang issues. Zhuangzu baike cidian [The Encyclopedia of the Zhuang] solicited article contributions from over one hundred Zhuang scholars and was published in 1993. The Chinese government continues to view ethnic studies as a particularly sensitive topic. Although thousands of books on the nationality question have been published in China since 1978 alone, statistical data is still difficult to obtain, and the government does not permit publication of statistics based on ethnic divisions. Even sources such as the Minzu tongji nianjian 1949–1994 [Statistical Yearbook of Minorities 1949–1994], though useful, base nearly all of their statistics on geographical divisions rather than on ethnic divisions. Rather than comparing educational levels between the Zhuang and Han, for example, the charts compare educational levels within Guangxi compared to national figures. Given that only 33.8

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

12

11:20 AM

Page 12

Creating the Zhuang

percent of Guangxi’s population is Zhuang, these types of statistics obviously limit the ability of scholars to describe with accuracy broad trends in interethnic relations. Although officials within the Nationalities Affairs Commission (NAC; Minzu shiwu weiyuanhui) confided during private discussions that ethnic-specific statistical studies have been and continue to be conducted by the NAC, these figures continue to be guarded carefully as the most sensitive of neibu internal documents. When I tried to obtain copies of studies conducted by county-level NACs on income figures for separate nationalities within western Guangxi counties, I was politely but flatly refused. In some counties individual Zhuang activists have attempted to collect estimated figures on educational and economic statistics, whereas in other counties these types of studies seem of little interest to NAC officials. In several counties NAC officials “requested” to see all of the written documents I collected in their counties, and specific figures on poverty alleviation work in minority areas were systematically extracted. Many of my statistical findings, therefore, have been compiled by first determining the ethnic composition within each county in Guangxi and the Yunnan Province Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture, and then utilizing county-level (where available) or prefectural-level statistics to make the best approximations available. This technique offers infinitely more accurate statistics than provincial-level comparisons, given, for example, that western Guangxi is home to nearly 90 percent of the Zhuang population, whereas eastern Guangxi includes only 10 percent Zhuang. This same technique used to compile statistical data has had to be adapted to determine how ethnic considerations have influenced the government policymaking process in Zhuang areas. Although numerous policies have been promoted as specifically Minority Policy by the party and government at each level of administration (from the central government to the village level), in many cases ethnic concerns have undoubtedly influenced policy without the government openly acknowledging it. I have therefore used sources such as Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi [Contemporary Guangxi], Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang [An Introduction to the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region], and numerous local histories as important sources for determining ethnic activism, or of demonstrating ethnic inactivism. Most of the fieldwork for this project was conducted in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Yunnan Province, and Beijing between January and July 1995, in the summer of 1998, and in the spring of 1999. I conducted over one hundred extended interviews with Nationality Affairs Commission officials, members of the Minority Nationalities Language Commission, Zhuang scholars, nationality students, teachers, laborers, and migrant workers in the two provincial capitals of Nanning, Guangxi, and Kunming, Yunnan. In Beijing I met with scholars and nationality students at the Central Nationalities College and with officials at the Central

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 13

Introduction

13

Nationalities Affairs Commission. In the spring of 1999 I attended the First International Zhuang Studies Symposium and met with over 150 scholars from nearly a dozen countries and more than a dozen provinces within the People’s Republic of China. I also conducted extensive interviews in Yunnan Province’s Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture, where in early 1995 I lived in Zhuang villages and interviewed NAC officials in four counties: Wenshan, Guangnan, Funing, and Qiubei. I returned to Wenshan in 1998 and had the advantage of working not only with government officials, but informally with contacts I had maintained for three years. Accompanied during part of the trip by Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association members, I interviewed peasants and village leaders in both Zhuang and Miao villages. I conducted two similar sets of interviews in Guangxi throughout the counties of Hechi, Nandan, Donglan, Bama, Tianyang, Jingxi, and Napo. Particular care was taken to interview a diverse pool of respondents. I noted the influence of age, gender, location, educational background, work unit affiliation, and historical experience in interviewees’ responses. To differentiate attitudes and political needs of the various levels of government, I interviewed central, provincial, prefectural, county, and village officials and citizens. I conducted both individual and group interviews. Although many of my interviews were formal and followed a set group of questions, other information was garnered from multiple meetings with teachers, cadres, and villagers with whom I had extended contact. While I was in Guangxi, my research was initially carefully monitored by the government. During my first two weeks in the region, many of the officials I interviewed were questioned by the GZAR Public Security Bureau. The access I was accorded and the restrictions placed on my movement seemed evidence of the conflicting interests of the Zhuang themselves and those departments within the government that were not controlled by Zhuang cadres. I was invariably offered more research freedom by members of minority groups, be they Zhuang or other non-Han groups, than by Han officials. Those Han, however, working within government organizations specifically handling minority affairs—the Nationalities Affairs Commissions, for example—were clearly more willing to grant me research access than were those Han in non-minority-specific government branches. Zhuang NAC officials were extremely willing to help, although they were less forthcoming when discussing any signs of discord within the Zhuang movement.

Theoretical Issues and Definitions Analysis of Zhuang-state interactions ultimately reveals that the central government, for reasons driven by conditions both inside and outside Yunnan

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

14

11:20 AM

Page 14

Creating the Zhuang

and Guangxi, created the Zhuang nationality by grouping together several smaller ethnic communities and labeling them “Zhuang.” Once indoctrinated through the central government’s massive propaganda campaign to build Zhuang ethnic solidarity, the Zhuang nationality began to take on a life of its own. Working largely within the confines of the official government nationality classification system, Zhuang elites began demanding more benefits for their nationality. Zhuang ethnonationalism clearly is on the rise. Yet what exactly is a nationality, and what spurs ethnonationalist activism? Nationalist theorists have been debating these two precise questions for decades. Perhaps in no other field of research is the primary focus of the study so poorly defined. Scholars often use the related terms ethnic, ethnicity, community, communality, nationality, nation, and state interchangeably.33 Almost all scholars utilize these terms differently to explain similar processes of nationality formation, further confusing the inherent ambiguity of the subject itself. There is no agreement on the relative importance of subjective criteria, such as group consciousness and selfidentity—and objective criteria, such as language and dress, in defining ethnic groups. Nor is there agreement on the relationship between ethnicity and ethnic nationalism. According to the subjectivist school of thought, no objective cultural markers are required to distinguish one nation from another. A nation is defined, rather, by its members’ subjective belief that they constitute a unique group. The members of the given nation need only be conscious of their community and believe that they have a unique claim to govern themselves. As long as the members agree that they constitute a unique nation, they do. Ernest Renan, a key founder of the school, argues that a nation is a “grand solidarity constituted by the sentiment of sacrifices which one has made and those that one is disposed to make again. It supposes a past, it renews itself especially in the present by a tangible deed: the approval, the desire, clearly expressed, to continue the communal life.”34 Renan contends that “a nation is an everyday plebiscite.” The moment a people stop perceiving of themselves as a nation, the nation ceases to exist. Whereas Renan epitomizes the subjectivist school of thought, Joseph Stalin clearly represents the objectivist line of argument. Stalin defined a nation as “a historically constituted, stable community of people, formed on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life, and psychological make-up manifested in a common culture . . . It is only when all these characteristics are present together that we have a nation.”35 For Stalin, and for those who offer different objectivist criteria for defining a nation, a nation exists independent of a group’s subjective consciousness of it. Objective markers, in other words, define a nation. The inherent limitations to both approaches are clearly portrayed in the arguments each uses against the other. Objectivist scholars attack

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 15

Introduction

15

purely subjectivist approaches by noting their inability to explain what initially causes a group to develop a sense of national identity. The objectivists argue that unless this fundamental question is answered, it becomes impossible to predict which individuals will coalesce into ethnic groups and what types of policies should be pursued to limit or channel ethnic sentiments. Likewise, the subjectivist theorists attack objectivists for failing to explain exactly which objective criteria are salient at particular moments in time, and who or what ultimately decides which criteria will be used to define a nationality. A number of scholars have tried to bridge the gaps between the subjectivist and objectivist schools of thought by semantically differentiating ethnic groups and nations and placing them in a continuum of growing self-awareness. Nearly all theorists agree that ethnic groups are fundamentally different from any other social grouping due to the putative common descent required for membership. One is born into a particular ethnic grouping, and it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, ever to change one’s ethnicity. Walker Connor defines a nation as a self-conscious or selfaware ethnic group. “An ethnic group may be readily discerned by the outside observer, but until the members are themselves aware of the group’s uniqueness, it is merely an ethnic group and not a nation,” he contends.36 Paul Brass views nationality formation as a three-step process of people moving from ethnic categories to ethnic communities to nationalities. The ethnic category, Brass writes, is “a group of people dissimilar from other peoples in terms of objective cultural criteria and containing within its membership, either in principle or in practice, the elements for a complete division of labor and for reproduction.”37 Once a group actively appeals to one of these objective differences “in order to create internal cohesion and differentiate itself from other groups,” it becomes a self-conscious ethnic community. Ethnic groups that demand corporate rights within the political systems as a whole have made the leap from ethnic community to nationality. Brass also distinguishes interest groups from nationalities. Selfconscious ethnic communities that utilize ethnicity to make political demands for changes in the status, economic position, civil rights, or educational opportunities of individuals within their group are engaging in interest group politics. Once they go beyond this demand for individual equality and demand corporate rights within the political system as a whole, or over a particular piece of territory within the country or separate from it, they are a nationality. “A nation, therefore, may be seen as a particular type of ethnic community or, rather, as an ethnic community politicized, with recognized group rights in the political system.”38 Karl Deutsch views nationality formation as a progression toward increasing levels of common consciousness and an increasing desire to avoid external influence on its membership.39 Deutsch defines the progression as

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

16

11:20 AM

Page 16

Creating the Zhuang

one from society to culture to community to nationality. He defines society as a group of individuals made interdependent by the division of labor. Increased interaction may lead to the development of a common culture, defined as “a common set of stable, habitual preferences and priorities in men’s actions and behavior, as well as in their thoughts and feelings.” If these common cultural traits facilitate greater communication among members of the group than with those outside of the group, then they may be considered a community. A community that mobilizes to gain effective control over the behavior of its members Deutsch considers a nationality. The common finding of these representative scholars is that ethnic groups should be defined on the basis of both objective cultural criteria and with reference to subjective ethnic consciousness. Once these ethnic groups begin to make collective political demands for control over their own membership, they have become a nationality. Exactly what motivates people to shift from an ethnic group to a mobilized self-conscious nationality, and exactly who manipulates which cultural symbols to inspire ethnic loyalty? Literally thousands of theories have emerged to explain the roots of ethnic group formation, each providing new nuances to existing theories and rich new historical analyses of particular case studies. Each approach tends to use one, or some combination, of four primary approaches: primordial, instrumental, structural, and hegemonic. Most scholars combine elements of at least two of the different approaches. None, however, note that the relative importance of each of the four approaches changes with time as the political, economic, and social context of ethnic group-state interactions change. It is only by utilizing all four approaches, and by acknowledging the primacy of different approaches at various points in the course of Zhuang-state relations, that we can fully understand the growth and limits of Zhuang ethnic mobilization. The primordialists, most clearly represented by Clifford Geertz, contend that ethnic nationalist sentiment evolves from the increasing salience of “primordial sentiments.” According to this school of thought, certain “givens” of social existence into which one is born determine one’s group loyalties. Some primordialists argue, for example, that ethnicity is biological or genetic,40 whereas others contend it is derived from one’s place of birth, religion, kinship ties, or specific cultural practices. Clifford Geertz writes: By a primordial attachment is meant one that stems from the “givens”— or, more precisely, as culture is inevitably involved in such matters, the assumed “givens”—of social existence: immediate continuity and kin connection mainly, but beyond them the givenness that stems from being born into a particular religious community, speaking a particular language, or even a dialect of a language, and following particular practices. These congruities of blood, speech, custom, and so on, are seen to have

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 17

Introduction

17

an ineffable, and at times overpowering, coerciveness in and of themselves. One is bound to one’s kinsman, one’s neighbor, one’s fellow believer, ipso facto; as the result not merely of personal affection, practical necessity, common interest, or incurred obligation, but at least in great part by virtue of some unaccountable absolute import attributed to the very tie itself. The general strength of such primordial bonds, and the types of them that are important, differ from person to person, from society to society, and from time to time. But for virtually every person, in every society, at almost all times, some attachments seem to flow more from a sense of natural—some would say spiritual—affinity than from social interaction.41

The primordialists acknowledge that the strength of these primordial ties varies among different individuals, places, and time. Nonetheless, as Geertz asserts, nationalist affiliation does not spring primarily from instrumentalist desires to improve one’s political or economic interests, but rather from a natural spiritual bond determined by the culture into which one is born. The instrumentalist school argues that primordial attachments, though at times influential, are variable, contingent, and subject to manipulation. The categories used to define primordial “givens” are themselves artificial constructs that individuals emphasize at various moments in order to promote their specific interests. According to this line of argument, ethnicity develops as individuals utilize ethnic markers to achieve instrumental goals. Individuals may not consciously be aware of the instrumental nature of their ethnic affiliation, but ethnicity gains salience as it proves useful to members of a particular ethnic group in serving societal needs or promoting material rewards. Scholars who favor this approach understand ethnic groups and ethnic nationalist movements as “one form in which interest conflicts between and within states are pursued.”42 Many conflate ethnic groups and interest groups, viewing the former as “a communal type of organization manipulated by an interest group in the course of its struggle to develop and maintain its power.”43 Rational choice approaches to understanding why individuals affiliate with ethnic groups fall within this broad instrumentalist approach, as do resource competition theories.44 Most instrumentalist theorists view ethnic elites as the primary agent defining the boundaries of ethnicity and encouraging mass allegiance to their ethnic group. Instrumentalist Paul Brass acknowledges the limitations placed on the ethnic elites by existing primordial attachments. He notes the utility of the primordialist approach for understanding which cultural features can be manipulated by elites for instrumentalist objectives: In short, the values and institutions of a persisting cultural group will suggest what appeals and symbols will be effective and what will not be

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

18

11:20 AM

Page 18

Creating the Zhuang and may also provide traditional avenues for the mobilization and organization of the group in new directions. Nevertheless, the leaders of ethnic movements invariably select from traditional cultures only those aspects that they think will serve to unite the group and that will be useful in promoting the interests of the group as they define them.45

Brass writes that the “study of ethnicity and nationality is in large part the study of politically induced cultural change.” He rejects the notion that ethnic groups are entirely malleable and/or that they can be created from thin air. Brass, like most of the instrumentalist thinkers, believes that it is the ethnic elites who select and give meaning to the cultural symbols around which nationalities form. Elites respond to government policies that alter the material incentive structure. If the government makes it profitable or useful to be a member of a particular ethnic group, then ethnic elites rally the masses and strive to create greater ethnic cohesion. Brass, like numerous others who emphasize the instrumentalist nature of ethnic formation, acknowledges the importance of the state in influencing ethnic identity and views the boundaries of ethnic groupings as mutable categories, fluctuating in response to government incentives. His studies focus on “how and why some ethnic categories and not others, in particular times and places, form themselves into self-conscious communities.”46 In the Zhuang case, however, the state played the primary role, without the help of Zhuang elites, in building Zhuang ethnic solidarity. The party did not shape its policies in response to Zhuang elite activity. The party created the Zhuang elite. Many instrumentalists also use elements of the third primary approach to understanding nationality formation: the structural approach. Structuralists clearly distinguish themselves from primordialists by stressing the fluid nature of nationality boundaries. They differ from the instrumentalists, however, in that they attribute the growth of national identity to larger societal forces, which gradually alter both the ideological environment and the incentive structure within which individuals and elites operate. Whereas the instrumentalists focus their analyses on how ethnic elites and individuals manipulate cultural symbols in order to achieve material rewards or cultural power, the structuralists seek to understand the environment in which these actors are operating. Michael Hechter, for example, views ethnic mobilization and nationality formation largely as a result of an uneven distribution of economic resources, or as what he calls “internal colonialism.”47 Given the unequal division of resources, it becomes rational for groups to coalesce, thus aiding weak individuals to escape from their impoverished position in society, and for other groups to struggle to maintain their privileged access to markets. Marxist analysis of nationality formations also falls within the structuralist school.

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 19

Introduction

19

Benedict Anderson and Karl Deutsch offer structuralist arguments, though they focus less on economic factors and more on changing cultural environments and communication networks that facilitate the growth of nationalism. In his seminal work, Imagined Communities, Anderson denies the existence of objective and immutable primordial cultural markers and argues that national sentiment emerges instead as a result of “political imagining.” Unlike instrumentalist theorists, Anderson does not primarily emphasize the role of elites in manipulating cultural symbols, but focuses on larger cultural changes that allow the development of nationalism. He argues that the rise of Enlightenment thinking over the religious worldviews dominant prior to the eighteenth century, along with the fall of the dynastic system in Europe, contributed to the rise of nationalism. The decline of the religious community and dynastic realms, together with the rise of what he terms “print-capitalism” and postreformation literary forms that portray the nation as a community of people who exist independent of time and space, allowed people to form communities of interest larger than previously possible. The fourth approach to nationality formation is the hegemonic approach, most clearly articulated by David Laitin. Laitin examines the political cleavages in Yorubaland and determines “a plausible explanation of the way in which primordial identities become politically forged and how, once forged, these identities become common-sensically real.”48 Laitin argues that the Yorubas organize themselves politically on the basis of their membership in “ancestral cities” rather than along religious lines, even though few Yorubas live in their ancestral cities and the latter category actually accounts for more discernible differences in socioeconomic opportunities. He argues that this pattern of political cleavages developed out of the colonial administration’s ruling strategy, which sought to differentiate and co-opt elites from these ancestral cities. Laitin summarizes his argument as follows: This discussion of indirect rule in Yorubaland focuses on an important social force missed by theories of both primordial attachment and rational choice: the role of a hegemonic state in fashioning a cultural product. . . . The need for efficient social control led British colonial administrators to create incentives for certain groups to form and to repress other groups. In any state, but especially in colonized states, the political organizations that make demands on the state are themselves partly a function of state actions. Although patterns of social stratification may be a function of a range of social and economic variables, the terms of politicized cleavages may be better understood to be largely a function of the strategies of political control by hegemonic states.49

The Chinese state is the quintessential Laitinian hegemonic state. In no other system has the central government so markedly sought to impose

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

20

11:20 AM

Page 20

Creating the Zhuang

its own objective and clearly defined nationality classification on its population. The Chinese case is not simply one of the government’s creation of an incentive program for various nationalities. It is one of the state mandating which individuals would be considered part of which bounded and non-overlapping nationality categories. To understand properly the dynamics of nationality politics in the People’s Republic of China, we must acknowledge the primary role of the state in creating boundaries of ethnicity. We must, therefore, examine the impact of the state’s nationality classification (minzu shibie) system. Within the Chinese experience, the Zhuang most clearly illustrate the general impact that minority classification imparted. The Zhuang case provides one of the clearest examples of the state imposing its own classification system on a people who previously did not perceive of themselves as a bounded group. In no other situation is a government’s active attempt to impose a minority nationality status on a group more pronounced.50 As we will see in the chapters that follow, the Zhuang were not initially a viable political challenge or pressure group on the state. There was not a group of “Zhuang elites” with whom the state had to contend, but rather a collection of local leaders who did not feel their ethnicity of much political importance. The CCP did not merely offer a selected group of ethnic elites individual incentives for cooperating with the party’s new conception of the Zhuang nationality. The party launched a concerted and prolonged propaganda campaign to teach ethnicity, as it were, to all levels of Zhuang society. In 1949 few elites perceived of themselves as Zhuang. The government’s recognition of the Zhuang nationality and the bestowment of autonomous status were not a concession to Zhuang elite demands. Should we, then, focus only on government policy and how it has affected Zhuang ethnicity, assuming that Zhuang elites played little or no role? The answer, of course, is no. Governments cannot form ethnic groups from thin air, and ethnic groups are not infinitely malleable. Government policy greatly influences ethnic consciousness, but the nature of this ethnic consciousness, and the extent to which it leads groups to mobilize politically, in turn influence government policy. All four approaches to understanding nationality formation must be employed to appreciate the complexities of Zhuang-state interaction. During the first four decades of CCP rule, nationality policy toward the Zhuang was dominated by the central government’s hegemonic goals. The state utilized existing “primordial” loyalties to convince the Zhuang that they were acquiring “self-government” under the CCP’s administration. Once new categories, or new structures, of ethnic differentiation were in place, however, they began to take on a life of their own. Further structural changes in the educational system and in the economy after 1979 inspired

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 21

Introduction

21

the newly created Zhuang elites to mobilize for instrumentalist goals. As we look move into the new millennium, Zhuang elites are forming action groups to solidify ethnic solidarity and to pressure the government for a greater number of preferential policies. In order to assess the impact of the state’s minority policy on the current status of Zhuang ethnic identity among the various levels of Zhuang society, we should first examine the political, economic, and social status of the Zhuang prior to the Communist takeover.

Notes 1. Takashi Sugimoto, The Political Stability of Ethnic Regions in China: A Methodological Study (Tokyo: International Institute for Global Peace, April 1993), 1. 2. Moming, “Explosive Independence Movement in Inner Mongolia,” Zhengming, July 1990. 3. Xu Jieshun, Qin Naichang, “Zhuangzu minzu yishi qianlun,” Xueshu luntan 6 (1989): 36 [“A Brief Discussion on Zhuang Nationality Consciousness,” Academic Forum 6 (1989)]. 4. Xiu Dao, “Shilun woguo minzu quyu zizhi zhengce de nixiang fei minzuhua,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993) [“The De-Nationalization of China’s Regional Autonomy Policy,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]; Guo Hongsheng, “Minzu quyu zizhifa de xiuding zai bixing,” Guangxi minzu xueyuan xuebao 4 (1994) [“Needed Reforms of the Regional Autonomy Law,” Journal of the Guangxi Nationalities Institute 4 (1994)]; Yang Houdi (ed.), Zhongguo minzu fazhi jianghua (Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1993) [Discussing the National Minority Legal System (Beijing: Central Nationalities College Press, 1993)]. 5. Xu Jieshun, Qin Naichang, Minzu zizhiquan lun (Nanning: Guangxi jiaoyu chubanshe, 1991) [Nationality Autonomy Theory (Nanning: Guangxi Educational Press, 1991)]; Yang Zuolin (ed.), Minzu diqu jingji fazhan tongsu jianghua (Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993) [A General Discussion of Minority Economics (Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993)]; Zhonggong guangxi dangwei xuanchuanbu (ed.). Mao zedong yu guangxi (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993) [The Guangxi Party Propaganda Bureau, Mao Zedong and Guangxi (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993)]; Li Yiran, “Dui xian jieduan minzu yiwu daihuan zhengce jiqi fazhan tujing de tantao,” Minzu jingji 1 (1989): 34–36 [“Regarding Preferential Policies in Minority Trade and Other Development Paths in the Current Era,” Minority Economics 1 (1989)]; Shi Jianeng, “Fenshuizhi yu minzu diqu xiancheng jingji de fazhan,” Zhongnan minzu xueyuan xuebao 1 (1995): 26–29 [“The Division of Taxes and the Development of the Local Economy in Minority Areas,” South-Central Institute of Nationalities 1 (1995)]; Wu Yangxiong, “Bufen minzu diqu dui fenshui de fanying,” Minzu jingji 3 (1994): 45–48 [“Reaction of Selected Nationality Areas Toward the Division of Taxes,” Nationalities Economics 3 (1994)]; Chuxiong yizu shuiwuju he shuiwu xuehui, Lun minzu diqu shuishou (Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993) [Chuxiong Yi Nationality County Tax Bureau and the Chuxiong County Tax Studies Association, Talks on Minority Nationality Taxation (Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993)]. 6. Wei Yiqiang, “Guanyu zhuangyuwen shiyong he fazhan de jige wenti,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 1 (1986): 18–26 [“A Few Questions Regarding the Use and

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

22

11:20 AM

Page 22

Creating the Zhuang

Development of the Zhuang Script,” Minority Culture Research 1 (1986)]; He Minghui, Meng Yuanyao “Tan zhuangwen zai kaifa zhuangzu ertong zhinengzhong de zuoyong,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 26–28 [“The Use of Zhuang Script in Developing the Intellect of Zhuang Children,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. 7. Nong Caiwen, “Chongfen fahui zhuangzu ganbu zai minzu quyu zizhizhong de zuoyong,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1992) [“Thoroughly Develop the Use of Nationality Cadres Within Autonomous Regions,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1992)]. 8. Xu Jieshun and Qin Naichang, Nationality Autonomy Theory, 189. 9. David K. Wyatt writes that there are 70 million Tai in Southeast Asia. David K. Wyatt, Thailand: A Short History (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984). 10. Diana Lary, Region and Nation: The Kwangsi Clique in Chinese Politics 1925–1937 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974). 11. F. Lebar, G. Hickey, and J. Musgrave, Ethnic Groups of Southeast Asia (New Haven, Conn.: Human Relations Area Files, 1964), 76. 12. G. F. Hudson, “The Nationalites of China,” St. Anthony’s Papers (London: Chatto & Windus, 1960). 13. Wolfram Eberhard, China’s Minorities: Yesterday and Today (Berkeley: University of California, 1982); Herold Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion in South China (Hamden, Conn.: Shoe String Press, 1967). 14. June Teufel Dreyer, China’s Forty Millions (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976). 15. Owen Lattimore, Pivot of Asia: Sinkiang and the Inner Asian Frontiers of China and Russia (Boston: Little, Brown, 1950). 16. Linda Benson, The Ili Rebellion: The Moslem Challenge to Chinese Authority in Xinjiang (London: M.E. Sharpe, 1990), and Donald H. McMillen, Chinese Communist Power and Policy in Xinjiang, 1949–1977 (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1979). 17. Chae-Jin Lee, China’s Korean Minority: The Politics of Ethnic Education (Boulder: Westview, 1986), and Bernard Vincent Olivier, The Implementation of China’s Nationality Policy in the Northeastern Provinces (San Francisco: Mellen Research University Press, 1993). 18. For example, see Melvyn Goldstein and Cynthia M Beall, Nomads of Western Tibet: The Survival of a Way of Life (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990); Ronald D. Schwartz, Circle of Protest: Political Ritual in the Tibetan Uprising (London: Hurst, 1994). 19. Dru C. Gladney, Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People’s Republic (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991). 20. Melissa Brown (ed.), Negotiating Ethnicities in China and Taiwan (Berkeley: Berkeley Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, 1996). 21. Homi Bhabha, “Introduction,” in Homi Bhabha (ed.), Nation and Narration (London: Routledge, 1990), 1. 22. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London and New York: Verso, 1991), 195. 23. Steven Harrell, “Introduction,” in Melissa Brown (ed.), Negotiating Ethnicities in China and Taiwan (Berkeley: Berkeley Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, 1996), 4. 24. Yang Zuolin, A General Discussion, 13.

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

11:20 AM

Page 23

Introduction

23

25. Jeffrey G. Barlow, “The Zhuang Minority Peoples of the Sino-Vietnamese Frontier in the Song Period,” Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 18, no. 2 (September 1987): 250–269, and “The Zhuang Minority in the Ming Era,” Ming Studies 28 (1989): 15–41. 26. Diana Lary, “Communist and Ethnic Revolt: Some Notes on the Chuang Peasant Movement in Kwangsi 1921–1931,” China Quarterly (January-March 1972), 126–135, and “The Tomb of the King of Nanyue—The Contemporary Agenda of History: Scholarship and Identity,” Modern China 22, no. 1 (January 1996): 3–28. 27. Colin Mackerras, China’s Minorities: Integration and Modernization in the Twentieth Century (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1994), 144. 28. June Teufel Dreyer, China’s Forty Millions, 127. 29. David Deal, “National Minority Policy in Southwest China, 1911–1965,” Ph.D. diss. (University of Washington, 1971), 13. 30. For a discussion on the status of Zhuang studies, see Zhang Shengzhen, Jianli zhuangxue tixi dangyi, Guangxi minzu yanjiu 1 (1997) [“A Modest Proposal for the Establishment of Systematic Zhuang Studies,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 1 (1997)]; for the most thorough bibliographies on Zhuang materials see Fan Qixu, Qin Naichang (eds.), Zhuangzu baike cidian (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993), 113–132, 193–196, 231, 306–311, 407–409, 414–415, 458– 462, 491–493, 550–553, 616–617 [The Zhuang Encyclopedia (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993)]; Yang Zhihui, Minzu wenxian tigao (Kunming: Yunnan jiaoyu chubanshe, 1990) [Bibliography of Minority Articles (Kunming: Yunnan Educational Press, 1990)]; Chen Zuomao, Guangxi shaoshu minzu wenxuan mulu (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989) [Bibliography of Articles on Guangxi’s Minority Nationalities (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1989)]. 31. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu bianjizu (ed.), Guangxi zhuangzu shehui lishi diaocha (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1–7, 1984–1987). [Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Committee (ed.), Investigation of the Guangxi Zhuang Nationality’s Society and History, vols. 1–7 (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1984–1987)]. 32. Zhang Shengzhen (ed.), Zhuangzu tongshi (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1998) [History of the Zhuang (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1998)]; Huang Xianfan, Zhuangzu tongshi (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1988) [Huang Xianfan, Overview of the Zhuang (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1988)]. 33. Ernest Renan, Qu’est-ce qu’une nation, Ida Mae Synder (trans.) (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1882), 26. 34. Ibid. 35. “Marxism and the National Question,” in Bruce Franklin (ed.), The Essential Stalin: Major Theoretical Writings 1905–1952 (Croom Helm: London, 1973), 60. 36. Walker Connor, “The Politics of Ethnonationalism,” Journal of International Affairs 27, no. 1 (1973): 3. 37. Paul R. Brass, Ethnicity and Nationalism: Theory and Comparison (New Delhi: Sage, 1991), 18. 38. Ibid., 20. 39. Karl W. Deutsch, Nationalism and Social Communication (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1966). 40. Pierre L. van den Berghe, “Race and Ethnicity: A Sociological Look,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 1, no. 4 (October 1978).

Kaup-1.Final

1/7/10

24

11:20 AM

Page 24

Creating the Zhuang

41. Clifford Geertz, “The Integrative Revolution: Primordial Sentiments and Civil Politics in the New States,” in Clifford Geertz (ed.), Old Societies and New States: The Quest for Modernity in Asia and Africa (New York: Free Press, 1963), 112. 42. Nathan Glazer and Daniel P. Moynihan, Ethnicity: Theory and Experience (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975), 8. 43. Abner Cohen, “Variables in Ethnicity,” in Charles F. Keyes (ed.), “Towards a New Formulation of Ethnic Group,” Ethnicity 3, no. 3 (September 1976): 202– 213. 44. Joane Nagel, “Resource Competition Theories,” American Behavioral Scientist 38, no. 3 (January 1995): 442–458. 45. Paul Brass, “Elite Groups, Symbol Manipulation and Ethnic Identity Among the Muslims of South Asia,” in David Taylor and Malcolm Yapp (eds.), Political Identity in South Asia (London: Curzon Press, 1979), 40. 46. Brass, Ethnicity and Nationalism, 271 (my emphasis). 47. Michael Hechter, Internal Colonialism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975). Hechter is often labeled a rational choice theorist, which illustrates the overlap between the two categories. 48. David Laitin, “Hegemony and Religious Conflict: British Imperial Control and Political Cleavages in Yorubaland,” in Peter Evans (ed.), Bringing the State Back In (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), 308. 49. Ibid. 50. Dru Gladney and Steven Harrell have examined nationality formation issues among the Hui and other nationalities.

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 25

2 The Zhuang Setting: Guangxi and Yunnan on the Eve of the Communist Revolution

Who are these Zhuang? Why were they given their own autonomous region in 1958? The Zhuang nationality is almost entirely unknown to Westerners. Few non-Sinologists have even heard of the group, and those scholars who mention the Zhuang at all in their analyses overwhelmingly dismiss them as “fully assimilated” and essentially no different from the Han majority. Examination of the Zhuang setting, particularly focusing on the political, social, and economic situation of the Zhuang on the eve of the Communist takeover, clearly indicates that the peoples of western Guangxi and Yunnan Provinces posed an entirely different set of administrative challenges for the young CCP regime than those it encountered in Han-dominated areas. The CCP’s response to unique circumstances in the southwest defined the boundaries of a new Zhuang ethnic identity. By offering a brief introduction to the Zhuang around the time of the CCP’s assumption of power in Guangxi, this chapter shows that they clearly were not integrated into the broader nation-state system prior to the Communist takeover, nor were they integrated as a unified nationality. Indeed, those today classified as “Zhuang” affiliated most closely with those in their immediate locality with whom they shared a common language. By creating the Zhuang category, the central government hoped to weaken these localist ties and begin building loyalty to a larger collectivity. Once smaller localities accepted that they shared common interests and that these interests were being protected under the party’s minority policy, the CCP hoped the Zhuang could then be directly linked into the broader nation-state.

Origin of the Zhuang The Zhuang are a group of peoples concentrated almost exclusively in western Guangxi and eastern Yunnan, with small patches of communities

25

Kaup-2rev.Final

26

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 26

Creating the Zhuang

in eastern Guangxi and western Guangdong. Prior to the early 1950s, many of those now considered Zhuang did not perceive of themselves as such. The peoples of western Guangxi and eastern Yunnan used a variety of terms to describe themselves, which corresponded to smaller ethnic groups that the government now declares are part of the greater Zhuang nation. The boundaries of Zhuang ethnicity, as with any ethnic group, have constantly been created and re-created in a complex process over the centuries. Under the Chinese Communist Party, these people were first required to register their nationality affiliation officially. The people now known as Zhuang were categorized into finite and nonoverlapping categories under the CCP’s supervision, 1 and it is the prehistory of the CCPdefined category “Zhuang” that will be analyzed in this chapter. The first references to the Zhuang appeared during the Han dynasty (206 B.C.–220 A.D.). The name disappeared a few hundred years later and resurfaced during the Song dynasty (960–1279). Though Tang histories mention minority people in Guangxi, they contain no definitive mention of the Zhuang. 2 Unlike the Korean minorities in China’s northeast or the Muslim groups in the northwest, whose immigration into China can be traced with relative certainty, the history and origin of the Zhuang peoples is extremely complex, and scholars continue to offer conflicting accounts of the group’s evolution. Over the past two millennia, as new groups have migrated into the Lingnan region of Guangxi and Guangdong,3 and others have moved to different regions within Guangxi, they have intermixed and influenced one another. The names of some groups mentioned in historical records later disappear from usage, often exhumed centuries later. Tracing Zhuang history involves tracing the mutual influence of dozens of groups that used a variety of names at different times. The most generally accepted theories on the origin of the people now called “Zhuang” fall into three main camps: those who believe the Zhuang migrated from outside the Guangxi area, those who contend that the Zhuang are original inhabitants of the area, and those who believe that outside people intermarried with local people and evolved into the Zhuang.4 Within China the second and third schools have gained increasing prominence over the past few decades. The first school of thought is prevalent mostly among the Zhuang peasantry. Though the Communist regime has tried to decrease discrimination against the minorities, historically many minority peasants were ashamed of their ethnicity and tried to conceal it by claiming Han ancestry. Before the CCP came to power, the minorities were often blatantly discriminated against, and many peasant families sought to disguise their ethnic origins by falsifying their family lineages. For many families this process began generations ago, and the current family members reject the notion that their family lineages are anything but factual. Many trace their

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 27

The Zhuang Setting

27

family ancestry back to the Shandong region and to the Zhejiang and Fujian areas. Zhuang with the surname Zhao, for example, claim to descend from the palace retinue of the Song court. Scholars who have researched this question, however, contend that these peasants more likely descended from members of the common clan surnamed Nong. After a major Zhuang uprising was suppressed in 1053, all of the Nong clan members who surrendered were bestowed the surname Zhao.5 Likewise, Zhuang with the surname Wei often claim they descend from the Han Dynasty general Han Xing.6 According to village legend, when the general was executed, one of his closest friends took the general’s young son to southern China. In order to disguise the boy’s identity, the friend removed the left half of the character for Han, which left a character pronounced Wei. A number of scholars also assert that the Zhuang came to the Lingnan area from the north or west. Xu Songshi, for example, contends that there were two main migrations of Zhuang into the Lingnan area: one in the ancient pre-Zhou period (Zhou dynasty 1122–221 B.C.) and another later during the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368).7 He argues that the second Zhuang migration came from the west out of Guizhou and Hunan when the Mongol troops pushed them from the area. There has been a gradual move away from the nonindigenous school of thought over the past several decades, and most Zhuang scholars now contend that the Zhuang are the original inhabitants of the Lingnan area.8 The Encyclopedia of the Zhuang states that the Zhuang “evolved from China’s ancient Southern Baiyue peoples.” The Baiyue, literally “Hundred Yues,” refers to a collection of ancient peoples living scattered throughout Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangxi, southern Hunan, Guangdong, Guangxi, and Vietnam. Though Herold Wiens notes that the Yue group was a political concept by the seventh century B.C. at the latest, there were no formal political organizations linking the various Yue groups together. After the Han dynasty, the term Yue gradually faded from usage, and a number of names referring to smaller collectivities began to appear. Wolfram Eberhard concludes that because the Zhuang name began to be used at this time, and there are no accounts of the disappearance of the Yue people, the Zhuang must be related to the Yue.9 The Zhuang scholars who told me that the Zhuang were original inhabitants seemed to take great pride in this fact. While traveling with these scholars, I often witnessed them arguing adamantly with Zhuang peasants who claimed their ancestors were from the north. One peasant interviewee, for example, discussed a number of Zhuang issues with me and my Zhuang research assistant for over an hour. He seemed very interested in Zhuang economic concerns and very pleased that a foreigner would be interested in Zhuang culture. After about an hour he proudly took us to a stone tablet inscribed with his family’s lineage record. He explained that

Kaup-2rev.Final

28

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 28

Creating the Zhuang

his ancestors came from Shandong. My research assistant then interrupted him, explained that this was not possible, and asked, “Who do you think lived here before the Zhuang? The land couldn’t have been completely empty!” After arguing a few minutes, the peasant left, looking very insulted. Scholars who believe the Zhuang are the original inhabitants of Guangxi generally tend to stress at least one of the following proofs in asserting that the Zhuang have been in Guangxi much longer than have the Han. First, they point to the terms used by both Zhuang and Han to refer to themselves. Many Zhuang refer to themselves as bouxdoj or vwngzdog in the Zhuang language, both of which mean “local people.” The Zhuang terms for the Han also lend credence to the theory that the Han arrived after the Zhuang. Zhuang often call Han bouxhek, which means “guest people.” They also call them bouxgvmn, which means “speakers of the official language.” The Han peoples’ self-references and the terms they use for the Zhuang also support the indigenous theory. Though the Han use innocuous self-references such as huaren or huaxia, meaning “Hua people,” to describe themselves, they also use the term lairen, which can be loosely translated as “newcomers.” They use the term turen when referring to the Zhuang, which means “local people.” The derogatory term tulao has the same meaning. Many proponents of the indigenous school also show that ancient place names in Guangxi often come from the Zhuang language. Bya, which the Han transliterate as Ba, means “mountain” in Zhuang. Dozens of mountain villages and towns in Guangxi begin with the character Ba. Bama County, Batou township, and Babie are but a few examples. Likewise, the term Bai means “opening” in Zhuang and is used in several villages that are viewed as transit points. Bainan village, for example, sits on the southern border with Vietnam. Nan is the Chinese word for “south.” A book published at the end of the eighties, Guangxi zhuangyu diming xuanji [A Selection of Zhuang Language Place Names], gives multitudinous examples.10 Support for the indigenous origins of the Zhuang also comes from the numerous ancient artifacts found in the region.11 Zhuang scholars claim that the skeletons found in the region, for example, prove not only that there have been people living in the area long before the Han are generally purported to have arrived, but that the skeletons have physical characteristics that more closely resemble the Zhuang than the Han. The physical differences between the Zhuang and Han are slight, and many people today say they cannot distinguish between members of the two groups. The Zhuang emphasize, however, that “true” (biaozhun) Zhuang characteristics include a protruding forehead, inset eyes, and higher cheekbones than their Han counterparts. The most systematic classification by a Western scholar of the cultural complexities in southwestern China remains Wolfram Eberhard’s 1944

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 29

The Zhuang Setting

29

classic.12 Eberhard contends, through his readings of ancient Chinese texts through 1800, that all 290 of the various tribes he distinguishes in southwest China could be divided into two major groups, the Zhuang and the Yao. The Zhuang, Eberhard asserts, were centered in the valley regions of Guangxi and spread throughout Guangdong, Fujian, Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Hunan, Guizhou, Sichuan, and Yunnan. This Zhuang culture, from which the Tai people evolved, was predominately a wet-rice agricultural culture in contrast to the mountain-dwelling slash-and-burn agricultural culture of the Yao. According to Eberhard, the forbidding mountainous terrain and poor communication networks made communication among the various tribes extremely difficult, and they gradually evolved into numerous unique cultural groupings.

Geography of Guangxi and Eastern Yunnan The geographical setting in which these minority people lived had a fundamental influence on nearly every aspect of their lives. The rugged harshness of Guangxi’s and eastern Yunnan’s topography segmented Zhuang communities from one another and isolated them from the central government’s influence, severely inhibiting their integration both into a cohesive greater-Zhuang nationality and into the Chinese state. The region’s geographical makeup also significantly influenced the course of economic development in the area and led to the vast variations in dialects that have inhibited the creation of a unified written Zhuang script. The harsh mountainous terrain of China’s southwest has historically kept the area even more removed from the central government than has its actual distance from the capital. Of Guangxi’s more than 230,000 square kilometers, over 70 percent are covered with mountains and 20 percent with rivers, leaving only 10 percent suitable for farming. The population density averages 178 persons per square kilometer, the lowest of China’s coastal provinces and regions. Guangxi is ringed by high mountain ranges in the west and the north, which makes communication with its neighboring provinces of Hunan, Guizhou, and even Yunnan difficult. Yunnan’s Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture has 33,659 square kilometers, most of which are covered by stony mountain ranges. Scattered among the mountains are small valleys, most barely large enough to cultivate or to develop villages. The harsh mountainous terrain, vast differences in altitudes within a small geographic area, and poor infrastructure have contributed to the isolation and self-sufficiency of many villages and ethnic groups. Northern Guangxi rises into the Miao mountain range north of Guilin. The Wu Ling (Five Mountain Ranges) form the northeastern provincial

Kaup-2rev.Final

30

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 30

Creating the Zhuang

border. The only natural break in the mountains barring Guangxi from the rest of China occurs along its southeastern border with Guangdong. The West River flows from Guangxi into Guangdong and is the only major waterway connecting Guangxi with an outside province. The relations between Guangxi and Guangdong have been much closer than Guangxi’s contacts with other provinces, including neighboring Yunnan. Throughout much of the Imperial era, Guangxi and Guangdong were ruled as a single administrative unit under a variety of names such as lingnan, huguang, and liangguang. Eastern and western Guangxi are divided into distinct geographical areas, each unique in terms of topography, climate, and social makeup. The province rises in elevation from the plains in the southeast to mountains in the northwest. The eastern portion, the Guangxi Basin, has average elevations of 1,500 to 3,000 feet, whereas the Guizhou-Yunnan Plateau in western Guangxi has an average elevation of between 3,000 and 6,500 feet. The eastern portion of Guangxi, running from the eastern border of Nanning Prefecture east, is inhabited predominately by Han and Hakka Chinese. The first penetration into this area by northern Han came in 234 B . C . 13 The Qinshi Emperor (222 B . C .) sent 500,000 military agricultural colonists to the region, and the first Han attempts to administer the area began. Until the Ming dynasty, there were large settlements of Zhuang in the eastern areas. With the Ming expansion southward, however, new Han settlers forced the Zhuang out of their fertile land and into the mountainous areas in the west. Settlers in the southeast came to Guangxi along the West River from Guangdong, which explains the wide use of the Cantonese language in the area today. In the northeastern area, Han immigrants came along the West River tributaries from Hunan Province, bringing the Mandarin Chinese language to the area. Southeastern Guangxi has a tropical climate, facilitating rich agricultural development in the fertile wet plains. Historically, rice has been the main agricultural crop in eastern Guangxi, though a number of new cash crops have begun to be cultivated over the past decade. Sugarcane, for example, is also a major cash crop now, along with a variety of tropical fruits. After 1979 the eastern areas began growing mango, litchi, longan, banana, pineapple, shaddock, and other cash crops. Eastern counties now export their fruit both to other provinces and foreign nations. Seventy-two percent of Guangxi’s agricultural fields are still rice patties, however, and rice accounts for over 80 percent of Guangxi’s total food production. The northwestern portion of the province is much cooler, and largely mountainous. Humus-deficient yellowish laterite predominates in the northwestern area, making it largely unsuitable for rice cultivation outside of small valley pockets. Corn and potatoes are the main agricultural crops in this area. This area, as well, has begun to develop its cash crops under

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 31

31

The Zhuang Setting

the loosened agricultural policies since 1978. Many counties are investing heavily in pseudo-ginseng (sanqi), fennel, and fennel essence production. These products, which are largely unique to western Guangxi, are mostly sold domestically, though there has been a recent push to develop greater international interest in them. Ninety-two percent of the Zhuang population lives in the four prefectures and two cities of western Guangxi: Nanning, Baise, Hechi, and Liuzhou Prefectures, and Nanning and Liuzhou Cities. The Zhuang made up 67.1 percent of the western Guangxi population in 1953, whereas less than 10 percent of the population in eastern Guangxi was Zhuang. Even after decades of gradual Han migration into western Guangxi and the limited movement of Zhuang to eastern Guangxi, the ethnic breakdown between eastern and western Guangxi remains largely the same (see Table 2.1). Nearly 20 percent of Guangxi is covered with rivers, providing an extensive water transportation network and offering a source for hydroelectric power that was not developed until after the CCP took control of the area. The West River system has over fifty branches, which come together at Wuzhou. Four head streams form the upper West River system: the Zuo, You, Qian, and Gui Rivers. The Zuo and You Rivers meet at Nanning, and then intersect with the Qian River at Guiping. This river then flows to meet the Gui River at Wuzhou. The river is called the West River once it enters Guangdong, and the resulting drainage system forms a fertile basin in Guangdong. The West River links Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, and Guangdong. Guangxi and Yunnan have a wealth of natural resources, which have not been fully exploited. Guangxi’s forests have large yields of cedar and horsetail pine. The Liuzhou fir, silver fir, and camphor trees prevalent

Table 2.1 Zhuang Population Distribution Within the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, 1990 Prefectural-Level Administrative Units Western total Nanning Prefecture/City Baise Liuzhou Prefecture/City Hechi Eastern total Qinzhou Yulin Guilin Wuzhou Beihai City

Zhuang 12,760,000 5,070,000 2,740,000 2,570,000 2,380,000 1,419,000 570,000 550,000 200,000 90,000 9,000

Total

Zhuang % of Total

20,609,500 7,994,700 3,518,000 5,450,800 3,646,000 20,620,830 2,970,000 9,359,200 3,384,900 3,606,400 1,300,330

Source: Compiled from the 1990 Census and The Guangxi Yearbook, 1994.

63.25 63 78 47 65 6.8 19 6 6 2 1

Kaup-2rev.Final

32

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 32

Creating the Zhuang

throughout the province’s western mountain areas are rare in the rest of the country. Guangxi’s manganese and tin deposits constitute 33 percent of China’s total manganese and tin resources. Guiping is a tin-producing center. Antimony, produced in Hechi and Nandan, represents 40 percent of Chinese reserves, second only to Hunan. The area is rich in limestone, which is used for raw material in fertilizer and plastics. Other mineral resources include iron, wolfram, gold, copper, aluminum, stibium, and zinc. Guangxi’s geographic location has also greatly influenced the central government’s concern with the minorities in the area and impacted the course of development in the region. Guangxi and Yunnan have more than 1,400 kilometers of international border. Ten counties and cities in Zhuang territory border Vietnam, and more than 80 percent of the population in these counties is made up of minority nationalities.14 Guangxi has several ports that provide the country’s closest access to the Middle East and Eastern European markets. Its strategic position along the Vietnamese border has also influenced the course of economic development in the area, as I will examine in detail in Chapter 7.

Minority Population Distribution The Zhuang is the largest of twelve minority nationalities residing in Guangxi. The Han account for 61.7 percent of the population, followed by the Zhuang with 33.8 percent. In northwestern Guangxi there are large pockets of Miao and Yao villages, though they make up only 0.9 percent and 2.4 percent, respectively, of the province’s total population. The other minority groups include the Yi, Dong, Mulam, Maonan, Hui, Jing, and Shui. Although Yunnan has large populations of more than twenty-six minority nationalities, nine nationalities make up 55.1 percent of Wenshan’s total population. The Zhuang constitute nearly 30 percent of Wenshan’s total population, or 53.6 percent of the total minority population.15 George Moseley notes that the demographic distribution of Guangxi’s minorities is better conceived as altitudinal than geographical.16 The Han and the Zhuang tend to live in the valley regions, whereas the Yao, Miao, and Yi, the largest of the other minority groups, tend to live in the higher mountain regions. As the original inhabitants of the region, the Zhuang tend to have better land than the immigrant Han in the western sections of Guangxi. The province’s best land, however, is concentrated in the east, where the majority of the population is Han. Although the vast majority of Zhuang are concentrated in the western portion of the province, seventy of Guangxi’s eighty-three counties have at least ten thousand Zhuang residents. Over 5 million Zhuang are concentrated

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 33

33

The Zhuang Setting

in fifteen counties in Guangxi, making up 92.5 percent of those counties’ total population. The counties are as follows: Yongning, Wuming, Longan, Daxin, Tiandeng, Longzhou, Xicheng, Tianyang, Tiandong, Pingguo, Debao, Jingxi, Napo, Donglan, and Shangsi. Yunnan Province has 1.3 million Zhuang, the vast majority (870,000) of whom are concentrated in the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture. The remainder of Yunnan’s Zhuang are dispersed as follows in seven other prefectures and Kunming City: Honghe Prefecture, 83,000; Dianjing Prefecture, 25,000; Kunming City, 8,000; Zhaotong Prefecture, 5,000; Yujiang Prefecture, 4,000; Dali Prefecture, 2,000; Xishuangbanna Prefecture, 2,000; and Simao Prefecture, 1,000.17 Although the Zhuang are less territorially dispersed than many minority groups, there are also large numbers of Zhuang outside Guangxi and Yunnan Provinces. According to the 1990 census figures, Guangdong claims 149,000, Guizhou 38,000, and Hunan 29,000. There are over 17,000 Zhuang residing in Hebei Province, 4,506 of whom live within Beijing Municipality. Shanghai claims only 893 Zhuang, whereas Tianjin has 2,565. The remaining provincial distribution of Zhuang is shown in Table 2.2.18 The great majority of Zhuang live in the countryside. Less than 1 percent of the Zhuang population was engaged in nonagricultural labor in 1949. By 1986 only 3 percent of Guangxi’s Zhuang lived in cities.19 According to

Table 2.2 Number of Zhuang Living Outside Guangxi and Yunnan Provinces Location Anhui Fujian Gansu Heilongjiang Henan Hubei Inner Mongolia Jiangsu Jiangxi Jilin Liaoning Ningxia Qinghai Shaanxi Shandong Shanxi Sichuan Tibet Xinjiang Zhejiang

Number of Zhuang 2,684 7,836 819 3,242 3,264 5,299 1,503 4,361 2,868 1,254 2,760 370 671 1,384 4,965 2,230 4,639 53 6,179 4,361

Kaup-2rev.Final

34

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 34

Creating the Zhuang

the 1990 census, only 7.1 percent of Guangxi’s Zhuang population lived in county-level cities or larger.20

Lack of Integration on the Eve of the Communist Takeover The harsh mountainous terrain kept the peoples of western Guangxi largely isolated from the rest of China. Numerous other factors exacerbated the Zhuang’s isolation and prohibited their integration into the broader Chinese state. By examining in turn the Zhuang’s lack of administrative, cultural, and economic integration both in terms of their integration as a unified nationality and in terms of their integration into the broader Chinese system, it becomes clear that the CCP faced a tremendous challenge in Guangxi in its campaign to unify the country under a single administrative system. Administrative integration was severely hampered in Guangxi by the lack of a developed communication and transportation infrastructure. What infrastructure existed was predominately concentrated in the eastern sections of the province. Western Guangxi’s harsh geographical setting made the development of a transportation and communication infrastructure nearly impossible, given China’s low technological development through much of this century. Guangxi’s first modern public road was laid in 1906.21 The Guangxi government launched a major road-building program in 1926 and by 1933 had more roads than any other province save Shandong and Guangdong.22 By 1949 more than 3,497 kilometers of road had been built. The vast majority of these roads were concentrated in central and eastern Guangxi, however, far from the most densely populated minority areas. Dozens of counties in western Guangxi were not even accessible by road in 1949. Villagers coming to the county seats for market or to petition the government had to walk up to fifty miles, often over treacherous mountain passes, to reach their destination.23 Railroad construction began in 1936 in Guangxi, but, again, none of the lines penetrated into Zhuang territory. Two lines connected Guangxi to Hunan and Guizhou Province, but these lines were used primarily for military purposes and did not facilitate much interflow of peoples. Due to the damage incurred during the Japanese War, most of the railway could not be used when the CCP took control of the area. 24 Guangxi’s main transportation network, its inland waterway system, was also concentrated in the eastern section of the province. Communication facilities were also more poorly developed in Guangxi on the eve of the revolution than throughout much of China. Guangxi opened its first post office in 1896, but few postal services reached into

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 35

The Zhuang Setting

35

western Guangxi. By 1949 the province had 706 operating offices, though nearly 80 percent of these were not fully functioning facilities (daibansuo). There were 24,900 kilometers of mail routes, but only six postal trucks and seventy-seven bicycles.25 The traditional governing system in Zhuang areas also limited Zhuang intraethnic integration as well as Zhuang integration into the Chinese state. Zhuang areas were officially incorporated into Greater China during the Han dynasty (221 B.C.), though the Imperial government’s administrative power in the region was tenuous at best. During the Han period, the Han were concentrated almost exclusively in the eastern portion of the province.26 Han penetration into the Zhuang heartland in western Guangxi did not start until the Tang dynasty (618–907). Han Chinese immigrated into the region gradually until the Ming dynasty, when tens of thousands of immigrants rushed into Guangxi to avoid warfare and famine in the north. The Han population constituted less than 20 percent of the Guangxi population in the mid–sixteenth century. By the end of the nineteenth century this percentage had increased to over 50 percent and, by the mid– twentieth century, was nearly two-thirds.27 The Chinese Imperial rulers’ control over the Guangxi area was limited, despite continued efforts to consolidate their administration in the region. The central government maintained its nominal control of western Guangxi through the jimi [loose reins] and tusi systems, which required local leaders to pledge loyalty to the Imperial regime but did not dictate how these rulers should govern within their independent realms. The tusi system began during the Tang dynasty, though the tusi installed at the time held little affection for the central leaders who placed them in power, and frequently rebelled against Imperial dictates. Han Chinese administrative penetration increased in Zhuang areas in the Song dynasty. In 1041 a Zhuang from the powerful Nong clan, named Nong Zhigao, declared an independent state for his followers in the Longzhou area. For over a decade Nong Zhigao vexed Imperial efforts to rein him in. Once the movement was finally quelled in 1055, however, the central authorities were able to install tusi who professed loyalty to the court, and Chinese administrative and economic development in the area accelerated.28 The local chiefs, or tusi, were selected within the localities and officially approved by the Imperial court. They were allowed a great deal of autonomy in exchange for nominal loyalty to the emperor. Tusi were not required to take the civil service examination required by Han administrators to gain their official posts. They were required to renounce independent statehood, follow the Imperial calendar established by the center, and send tributes of agricultural products to the center. Unlike the Han civil service positions, the tusi positions were hereditary.

Kaup-2rev.Final

36

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 36

Creating the Zhuang

Though the tusi acknowledged the emperor’s suzerainty, the center’s control was extremely precarious. The official Yuan dynastic history summarized the southwest as follows: “The land is large and so wild that it has no government. How can it be said that the Mongols are in possession of it?”29 The fact that the central government did not—indeed, could not— dictate how the tusi should govern their subjects led to great variation among the tusi territories.30 With the influx of a large number of Han immigrants in the early years of the Ming dynasty, the central government was able to increase its control over the Lingnan region, though the area still remained segregated from the rest of China. The Ming rulers required new tusi to show proof of their lineage and to have their right to inherit the tusi position approved by Han officials in the area. Once approval was received, the tusi had to travel to the capital to receive the personal approval of the emperor. By the middle of the Ming dynasty, the tusi had become increasingly tyrannical, according to several Chinese sources.31 Though each tusi’s administration differed, several commonalties appeared by the Qing era, each further contributing to the lack of integration in Zhuang areas. Tusi generally prevented their minority subjects from taking the Imperial examination, though there are examples of Zhuang reaching the highest jinshi civil service levels. The tusi placed rigid restrictions on emigration, forbidding their subjects to leave the area. They also placed heavy taxes on Han traders coming into their domain. These taxes ranged from transit taxes to taxes for inter alia drinking water, exchanging money, and crossing rivers. Restrictive taxation gradually led to a decrease in trade between the Han outsiders and the minorities living within the tusi ’s jurisdiction.32 Each tusi ruled his area as an independent kingdom. The high taxes on goods traded with those outside the tusi’s domain and the limitations on immigration greatly weakened the interaction among Zhuang in different localities. The tusi system clearly limited the development of greater Zhuang ethnic consciousness. Toward the middle of the Qing dynasty, the Imperial regime began a process of “replacing locals with officials” (gaitu guiliu). Under this new policy, the tusi were gradually, and at times forcefully, edged out of power and replaced with Han civil service officials. Several Zhuang tusi remained in power after the turn of the twentieth century, however. Even in those areas where the tusi were officially removed from their administrative positions, they and their descendants often remained the true power holders and controlled much of the area’s land. The Zhuang language also posed a series of obstacles to integrating the Zhuang into the Chinese state, and to integrating the numerous Zhuang localities into a single unified nationality. Scholars differ on exactly how the Zhuang language should be classified. The Chinese government classifies

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 37

The Zhuang Setting

37

Zhuang as part of the Dong-Tai branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family, though many Western scholars argue that it is related more to Austronesian.33 There are two main dialects: northern and southern Zhuang. Although debate rages over the extent to which the different divisions overlap, the large majority of published materials suggest that common vocabulary among the different divisions ranges from 60 to 86 percent.34 There are eight major northern Zhuang dialects and five southern ones. Approximately two-thirds of the Zhuang population speaks some derivative of northern Zhuang. The grammar of the various divisions is more or less the same, the main difference being in pronunciation and vocabulary. Though there are no conclusive statistics on the percentage of Zhuang who could speak Mandarin before 1949, Zhuang scholars agree that likely less than 10 percent were verbally fluent and far fewer were literate in Chinese. The language barrier was a decisive impediment to Zhuang integration into the Chinese state. Although published sources contend that speakers of the various Zhuang dialects can understand at least 50 percent of what is said by Zhuang using other dialects, in practice the language barriers have often proved quite difficult to overcome. Though the speakers of various dialects may have noticed some commonalities if they came into contact with outsiders, the languages were different enough that the peasants did not believe they were speaking different dialects, but that they were using different languages. In the countryside today many peasants still contend that their particular local language is not the same as “Zhuang language.” These vast differences in Zhuang dialects and the lack of a unified written script have clearly limited integration among the Zhuang. Zhuang integration was further inhibited by numerous branch divisions within the Zhuang nationality. On the eve of the Communist takeover, the Zhuang generally affiliated more closely with what the government today defines as “branches” (zhixi) of the Zhuang nationality than they did with the greater Zhuang nationality. Branch, or zhixi, affiliations remain more pronounced in Yunnan Province today than in Guangxi. Prior to the Communist takeover, Guangxi Zhuang also affiliated more closely with their zhixi than with the Zhuang as a whole.35 In Guangxi, however, practically all references to separate zhixi have been expunged from the media and press as part of the government campaign to increase Zhuang solidarity. Zhixi loyalties have consequently gradually faded in importance in Guangxi. In Yunnan, however, where censorship on Zhuang discourse has been comparatively slack, there remains a strong sense of loyalty to separate zhixi among the people. There are three main Zhuang branches in Yunnan, the Nong, the Sha, and the Tu. Each of the branches speaks its own language, which is largely unintelligible to the other two branches. Though there are further divisions

Kaup-2rev.Final

38

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 38

Creating the Zhuang

within each of the branches, people from each of the three wear clothing that clearly marks their branch affiliation. Few of the Zhuang in Yunnan refer to themselves as “Zhuang,” but rather as a member of one of the three branches. Even after more than forty years of concerted government attempts to downplay branch differences, many Zhuang still view their zhixi identity and Zhuang identity as mutually exclusive categories. Several villagers in Wenshan directly told me that “the Nong nationality” was not the same as the Zhuang. When I asked a group of women in Guangnan County, a heavily Nong-populated area, what language they were speaking, they replied, “Nong.” When I asked what nationality (minzu) or what people (ren) speak the Nong language, they replied, “The Nong nationality” (nongzu). “Isn’t Nong just another name for Zhuang?” I asked. A definitive no was the response. When asked how the two groups differed, the women could not give a clear response but repeated several times, “They’re just different is all. They’re Zhuang. And we’re Nong.” Fifty-three percent of the Zhuang population in Yunnan considers itself Nong. Folk legend in Wenshan contends that the Nong, Sha, and Tu all descended from three brothers. The Nong brother was the eldest and lived as a farmer along the river. The middle brother, the Sha’s ancestor, was also a farmer but settled along the edge of a lake. The Tu brother, the legend holds, was just an infant when the brothers’ parents died and their household had to separate. This legend reflects the relative socioeconomic position each of the branches holds in Wenshan society. The Nong, numerically dominant, also view themselves as socially superior to the other two sects, with the Tu falling below the other zhixi in numerous socioeconomic indicators. A Nong villager reflects this attitude in describing the conflicts that have often erupted between his Nong village and the neighboring Sha village: “We all considered the Sha dirty and backward,” he said. “They just weren’t as well educated and had a very bad work ethic. Sure, men from our village would fool around with their women, but we had no intention of marrying them. It would have been like a step down. A lot of the fights between the villages were over women. They’d insist that we marry the women if we fooled around, but forget it! The whole village would get roped into these escalating and bloody fights.”36 Another Nong listened patiently while a Sha restaurant owner told me that the Sha were generally the “sharpest and brightest” academically of the three groups. After the meal this Nong escort took me aside and whispered, “I didn’t want to embarrass him at dinner, so I didn’t say anything. But he’s just saying that about the Sha because he is Sha. Everybody knows that it’s not true. The Nong are much better educated than either the Sha or the Tu. We even had several Jinshi scholars during the Qing dynasty. That was really rare for any other groups in this area.”

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 39

Photos courtesy of Lu Huoye, Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association

Figure 2.1 Pictured here are members of the Sha (right), Nong (below), and Tu (bottom) zhixi wearing the garments typical of their respective branches.

Kaup-2rev.Final

40

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 40

Creating the Zhuang

During the tusi era the Nong lived under the most powerful tusi in Wenshan. The Sha were reportedly “exploited not only by their own officials, but also exploited by the ‘Nong People’ and the leadership from other nationalities.”37 Scholars in China debate the exact relationship among the three branches. The CCP has discouraged open discussion or emphasis of branch differences, and most studies confirm the common origin of the three branches. Exactly what these origins are, however, is not clear. There are several explanations of the origin of the Nong, for example. He Zhengting, the current director of the Law and Politics Division of the Yunnan Nationalities Affairs Commission and native of Qiubei County, uses a linguistic analysis to link all three Zhuang branches back to the earliest inhabitants of the Yunnan area. 38 He refutes scholars who contend that the Nong came to the area in the eleventh century with Nong Zhigao, who led the separatist revolt against the emperor that established a short-lived independent kingdom. He asserts that the term Nong derives not from Nong Zhigao’s name, but from the word in the Nong language that means “original inhabitants who live by the water’s edge.” Likewise, the Sha, he contends, are descendants of the same original inhabitants of Yunnan and selected a name for themselves meaning “grand original inhabitants.” Many Sha, nonetheless, believe their ancestors came from Guangdong and refer to themselves not as “Sha,” but as “Guang People.” Each of the three Yunnan branches is further divided into subdivisions according to dress. The Wenshan Nong typically wear dark-colored pants and a blue smock top with buttons running down the right side from the right shoulder. The upper center of the smock is often embroidered in the elaborate knotted-brocade design on which the Nong pride themselves. The women wear a floral towel twisted on their heads. Although few women in the cities or county capitals wear traditional minority garb, in many villages the characteristic blue is the only color of apparel to be found. The percentage of women wearing minority clothing in a village increases the farther removed they are from the nearest city.39 The Sha do not wear the blue smocks and pants characteristic of the Nong, nor do they use towels as head covering. There are more subdivisions in Sha dress than among the Nong. The two largest divisions are between those wearing all black and those wearing all white. Women who consider themselves of the more numerous Black Sha People (heisha ren) wear dark black pants and a matching black top. They often wear elaborate silver hairpieces that drape down their backs in square paneled designs. The Sha wear a number of different head wrappings, though none that I saw wore towels, as do the Nong. Some of the head wrappings are worn by folding several meters of plain black cloth in an elaborately intricate pattern and securing the silver-paneled hairpiece from the top of the wrapping.

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 41

The Zhuang Setting

41

Another headpiece often worn by Sha women is an approximately sixinch-wide embroidered band, which is wrapped once in a circle from the forehead to the back of the head, leaving the top of the head exposed. The women generally wear their hair long, twisted into a knot in the middle of the embroidered band. The Tu branch also has a variety of different clothing styles, clearly distinguishing them as a unique group, different from either the Nong or the Sha. There are four main divisions within the Tu group, each distinguished largely by headdress. The Tu women generally wear long black dresses rather than pants. These dresses are worn in the rice fields and while fishing, as well as for formal occasions. The Tu take great pride in the unique embroidery of their minority costumes, which are very different from that of the Nong. Nong patterns are flowing designs, often with representations of animals and birds. Tu patterns, in contrast, are geometric, in vibrant triangles and squares of fuchsia, green, electric blue, and purple. The Tu headdress is also distinguishable from the other branches. The typical Tu woman wears a dark head wrapping that entirely covers the head and is overwrapped by a vibrant embroidered band. In areas where different branches live in close proximity to each other, dress styles often blend. Nong living in densely Tu-populated areas wear the blue-dyed cloth of the Nong, yet wear longer black tunics of the Tu underneath their blue smocks. In this way the Nong distinguish themselves from the neighboring Tu, though they are visibly different from the Nong living in purely Nong-populated areas. Another indicator that the Zhuang have not considered themselves part of a unified nationality can be seen in the plethora of names used by different Zhuang communities to refer to themselves. Although some groups in 1949 perceived of themselves as Zhuang, most did not. There are at least twenty different names used by Zhuang in different areas to refer to themselves. In terms of self-address alone, in Guangxi there are no fewer than five major divisions of Zhuang.40 Although the largest group refers to itself as “Buzhuang” or “Zhuang people,” most in the northwest and central western areas of Guangxi refer to themselves as “Buyue,” “Buyeyi” or “Buyi”; those in southern Guangxi and the You River Basin refer to themselves as “Butu”; and those in the Zuo and You River Basin refer to themselves as “Bunong.” Another large group calls itself “Budai.” Some groups also define themselves according to where they live and in what type of agriculture they are involved. The Buban, for example, call themselves “valley people” rather than “Zhuang.” Unlike the Tibetans, or the Muslim nationalities, the Zhuang do not have a unified religion, which has further inhibited their integration as a single nationality. Many Zhuang villages share the common practice of polyanimist worship, but there is not one common spirit worshiped by all,

Kaup-2rev.Final

42

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 42

Creating the Zhuang

and there is no hierarchical religious leadership that ties together the different villages. Moreover, the wide differences in religious practices and the tendency to worship specific natural features near a particular village, such as a particular mountain or river, reinforce localist sentiment. A large percentage of Zhuang villages have a particular tree that the residents believe provides the area protection. Other villages worship nearby mountains or rivers. A number of different animals are worshiped in particular regions. The Maguai or Toad Festival, for example, is celebrated in only a few counties in western Guangxi.41 Villagers in these areas believe that the toad was sent by his father, the Lightning King, to mediate between the heavenly and earthly realms. In ancient times, the legend holds, villagers could tell the toad when their crops needed more rain, and he would carry the message to his father. Relations between the Lightning King and the Zhuang villagers proceeded peacefully until a villager accidentally killed the toad by spilling scalding water on him. In a rage the Lightning King refused to provide the earth with water. To appease their Lightning God, the villagers declared an annual holiday to honor the toad during the first month of the agricultural calendar. The Toad Festival begins on the first day of the new agricultural year. At dawn villagers wake to the sound of clanging brass drums and rush to the fields to unearth a hibernating toad. The first person to find a toad is proclaimed the master of that year’s Toad Ceremony. The village religious leader, known as the shigong, recites eulogies to the toad, which is then placed in a sedan chair and carried to the center of the village. For thirty days village children parade the toad in its sedan chair to each of the village households. A constant vigil is kept over the toad, and incense and offerings are made twenty-four hours a day. After at least twenty days of offerings, the festival reaches its climax with the toad-burying ceremony. Villagers carry the toad in its sedan chair to a designated burial site. Before the toad is buried, the shigong, or village chief, first exhumes the previous year’s toad and examines its bones. If the toad’s remains are a golden brown, the villagers rejoice in this omen for an abundant new harvest. If the toad’s remains are a black or deep brown, however, the villagers believe this portends either drought or floods and a consequent scant harvest. The current year’s frog is then buried in place of the exhumed remains, and the ceremony is completed. The Toad Ceremony is not celebrated outside western Guangxi, though there are different ceremonies for other animals accorded supernatural powers. Many areas that use cows to aid in plowing worship cows as semideities, whereas the duck is worshiped throughout much of Wenshan Prefecture. The origin of duck worship is explained in the folk legend “The Origin of the Yangang River.”42 According to legend, a Zhuang youth

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 43

The Zhuang Setting

43

named Yangang endured “a thousand hardships and ten thousand bitternesses” and, with the aid of a “duck maiden,” searched “all of the earth’s waters” to find a massive dragon’s egg. Yangang used the magical dragon’s egg to quell the giant fires then raging the earth’s surface. Yangang then turned into a mountain, from the mouth of which sprang a brook. This brook, later named the Yangang River, brought new life to the scorched earth. The duck spirit is worshiped for the help it gave Yangang. The Zhuang also practice several forms of shamanism. The religious leaders of this form of worship are not organized into any pan-village organizations that could provide a unifying force, such as that offered by the Lamaist leadership of the Tibetans or the Islamic Ulama. There are at least two main types of shamanist religious heads: the male wugong, and the female xianpo or wupo.43 The wugong-led religious ceremonies tend to be somewhat more standardized than the xianpo-led rituals, though both forms vary greatly among regions. The wugong must follow a specific initiation process before he can be considered an official religious head. Each village in which shamanism prevails has an elder wugong. Any boy wishing to become a wugong must first learn to read the village’s religious texts, known as the wujing, before petitioning the elder wugong for formal instruction. The wujing are written in traditional Zhuang script, using Han characters to transliterate Zhuang sounds. The written wujing are thus different in each of the main dialect areas, prohibiting exchanges between wugong. If the elder wugong accepts the initiate, the student enters a two-week course of training in which he memorizes the wujing and the various religious ceremonies that he will later be required to orchestrate. After the student passes his instruction, he is initiated as a wugong at a ceremony led by the religious elder. A chicken is killed and its blood placed on an altar, which is hung with an altar inscription written by the initiate. The elder wugong reports the new initiate to the gods, and after the new wugong reads the wujing, he is officially ready to lead his own ceremonies. The initiation process and ceremonies led by the female xianpo, or Mystical Immortals, are even less systematized than the wugong rites and vary greatly depending upon the personal characteristics of the particular Immortal. The xianpo are believed to be interpreters between individual villagers and the gods. As Zhuang scholar Huang Xianfan explains: “Becoming a xianpo is definitely not something decided upon based on the interests of the particular individual. Some want to become one and cannot, others in contrast do not want to become one but are recruited nonetheless. According to the superstitious, it is determined by the gods.”44 All xianpo are survivors of severe illness. They are identified by villagers if, in the throes of delirium, they sing traditional mountain songs that exactly match the local mountain songs. Once they have been identified,

Kaup-2rev.Final

44

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 44

Creating the Zhuang

they need not memorize any texts and need only study a few simple ceremonies. The only set requirement the xianpo must follow is that they must not eat dog or beef. The Zhuang, like the Han, also worship their ancestors. Most homes have an altar built to honor their predecessors, and the Zhuang have specific days on which they are required to sweep their ancestors’ graves. This, again, reinforces localist tendencies because sons who are away from home and therefore unable to perform the grave-sweeping rituals are viewed by others as unfilial. The more unified religions are not widespread among the Zhuang. Though Daoism has mingled with the traditional Zhuang animist practices to form unique religious blends in many areas, Buddhism has met with greater resistance among the Zhuang.45 Western missionaries began filtering into Guangxi in the nineteenth century, though they often met with fierce resistance from both the Zhuang and the local Chinese officials, who were particularly worried about Christian influences after the Taiping Rebellion, which began in Guangxi. Though there were over thirty thousand Christian converts in neighboring Guangdong Province in 1890, there were just over twelve hundred in Guangxi.46 After extensive research on the conversion of Taiwanese aborigines to Christianity, John Shepherd has concluded that marginalized groups in Taiwan often converted to Christianity more quickly and in greater numbers than the majority population.47 That little inroads were made by the missionaries into Zhuang territory may further suggest that the Zhuang did not perceive of themselves as marginalized and in need of promotion in relation to the Han. Samuel Pollard spent nearly thirty years among the Miao in Guangxi and led a “very prosperous enterprise [of mission work] among the Miao”48 while reporting practically no Zhuang converts. By 1907 there were fifty Catholic churches and twenty-nine Protestant churches in Guangxi and Wenshan Prefecture. These churches often had only a handful of parishioners. In 1937, for example, missionaries built the Wuming County Protestant Church. Though the church was located where transportation was relatively efficient and accessible, after more than a decade of operation the church had only thirty-five members.49

Zhuang Interaction with Other Nationalities The interaction among Zhuang and neighboring nationalities, as might be expected, varied greatly from region to region around the time the CCP took control of Guangxi. A few general characteristics of the interaction, however, prove useful in analyzing policy in Zhuang areas and in determining the degree of integration among the various minority groups.

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 45

The Zhuang Setting

45

First, villages tend to be single-ethnic units. Although many counties have a mixture of nationalities, the villages within these counties generally each contain only one nationality. Prior to the Communists’ Nationality Classification Work, villagers lived among members of their own zhixi. Neighboring villages were divided between the Nong, Sha, Tu, and other zhixi, each of which had very limited, if any, interaction with those outside their zhixi. There are exceptions, of course, and over the past fifty years the CCP has moved different nationalities into the same village when a particular village has been deemed capable of sustaining outside people from uninhabitable areas. In the few villages that have more than one nationality, however, the nationalities are still divided locationally. Xinxing village in Guangnan County, Wenshan, for example, is hailed as a “multinationality village.” The village is almost perfectly split between the Zhuang and Miao nationalities. The eleven Zhuang households, however, are in the center of the village, whereas all ten of the Miao households are scattered along the outskirts of the village. Differences in relative wealth among the nationalities greatly influences their interaction. Which groups hold the best land primarily determines which hold preferred socioeconomic status. Generally speaking, the Zhuang and Han live in the most fertile valley areas and grow rice as their main crop. The Yao, Miao, and Yi, which are the groups in closest proximity to the Zhuang, tend to live in the more mountainous areas. Practically all of the people I interviewed at one time or another chanted a common jingle: “The Miao live at the head of the mountain, the Zhuang at the head of the river, and the Han at the head of the street.” “Head of the street” implies that the Han live in the cities and centers of trade. The earliest inhabitants of the Zhuang areas tend to live on the best land. Although the Zhuang were pushed off the fertile rice-lands in eastern Guangxi during the Han influx of the Ming dynasty, they generally hold better lands than the Han in western Guangxi. Han did not arrive in western Guangxi until the late Qing era, or even as late as the mid-1930s as they fled from Japanese invaders during the Sino-Japanese War. They came to the area more as refugees or as individual traders than as strong colonizers and therefore were able to seize only unoccupied lands. Needless to say, most of the scarce arable land was already under cultivation by the time these newcomers arrived, and they had to content themselves with the more rocky mountainous land. Many of the Han who came to the area, however, did not rely solely on agriculture but ventured into trade. The Yao hold an even weaker socioeconomic position than the Han farmers. Relations between the Zhuang and the Yao have been strained for centuries. Under the tusi system, the majority of the local rulers came from the larger Zhuang nationality. Though these tusi became increasingly exploitative of their fellow nationals as well as other groups, they were

Kaup-2rev.Final

46

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 46

Creating the Zhuang

reportedly particularly ruthless toward the Yao. Zhuang scholar Mo Junliao cites a number of Qing period records of tusi atrocities directed toward the Yao. Though they had far fewer resources than either the Han or Zhuang, the Yao were reportedly forced to pay ten times the land rent of the Han. “The moment a local [particularly a local Yao] committed a crime, the tusi would tie him up and kill him. He would then force the victim’s family to pay a ‘knife cleaning’ charge. These charges were exorbitant, often as high as sixty or forty liang, and never less than twenty-four. There was every type of physical exploitation imaginable.”50 One tusi reportedly forced four Yao subjects to kneel and support his dinner table at each meal. In this way they “formed the four legs of the table. They were not allowed to make even the slightest of movements or the punishment would be instant decapitation,” Mo reports. Strained relations among the Zhuang, Han, and Yao often exploded into violent conflict prior to the Communist takeover.51 The work teams sent by the central government to Guangxi in the 1950s reported bloody ethnic battles in Zile County in northwestern Guangxi, for example. The Zhuang in this area did not refer to themselves as Zhuang, but as “Buduo.” They referred to the Han as “guest people.” Of these “guest people,” the Zhuang called those who spoke Mandarin “Buhe,” and those who spoke Cantonese “Buguang.” Although these Zhuang people clearly viewed the Yao, Miao, and Han living in the area as “others,” the ethnic boundaries were not purely divided into those officially recognized by the post-Liberation classification teams. Though the Zhuang reportedly referred to the Yao as “Bulao,” meaning “Yao people,” they also referred to them as “Bulang,” which meant “Rogue People.” “Rogue People” also referred to the Miao living in the area. The research teams who went to the country in the late 1950s noted a long history of violent conflicts among the minorities, particularly between the immigrant Han and the Zhuang. Conflicts among the groups increased in size, frequency, and intensity toward the end of the Qing dynasty, and were renewed in the late 1940s. During the reign of the Kangxi emperor (1661–1722), the Zhuang often rallied to fight the Han with the slogan “Kill the outsiders and leave the locals” (sha ke liu tu). The Han responded with the reverse slogan. The conflict between the Han living in the mountains and the valley-dwelling Zhuang became so pronounced that all travel between the areas was banned and all trade frozen. Many lives were lost and villages burned. The ethnic fighting reached such proportions, the team reported, that many of the local officials abandoned their offices and fled for the Xilin County capital. There was obviously much resistance to the Han, who arrived under the banner of the Communist Party in Zile County. The research team reports that

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 47

The Zhuang Setting

47

this type of inter-ethnic animosity continued at various levels of intensity throughout the Republican Era until the eve of Liberation. In 1948 there were landlords who, in order to bureaucratically organize the bandit fighting and cheat the masses into trusting them, encouraged the violent chaos. They used the slogan ‘Kill the outsiders and leave the locals’ to conspire and cause inter-nationality murders. They used the banner of minority fighting to quell the dynamic struggle taking place at the time to liberate the area. This led to the worsening of minority relations.52

These types of strained relations between the Zhuang and neighboring nationalities clearly made their integration into a unified state system difficult. The isolating mountainous terrain, poor infrastructure, self-sufficient economies, and lack of a unified religious or political leadership all contributed to the weak sense of Zhuang identity on the eve of the Communist takeover. Yet within eight years after officially taking control of Guangxi, the Communist Party announced the formation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and declared that the Zhuang region would enjoy limited independence from central control. What inspired the party to recognize the Zhuang and to award them one of only five provincial-level autonomous regions? Special measures were clearly required to handle the complex challenges to integration posed by the Zhuang. Perhaps the primary reason, however, rested thousands of miles to the north.

Notes 1. Siu-Woo Cheung, “Representation and Negotiation of Ge Identities,” in Melissa Brown (ed.), Negotiating Ethnicities in China and Taiwan (Berkeley: Berkeley Instititue of East Asian Studies, University of California, 1996), 226. 2. Herold Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion in South China (Hamden, Conn.: Shoe String Press, 1967), 116. 3. The Lingnan area is the drainage basin that includes the West, North, and East Rivers. This area roughly covers all of Guangdong and Guangxi Province, as well as most of Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture. 4. Xie Qiguang, Lingwai zhuangzu huikao (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1989), 99 [A Collection of Essays on the Zhuang Within and Outside of Lingnan (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1989)]. 5. Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion, 34. 6. Dai Yonghui, “Zhuangzu ‘weixing hanyi’ kao,” in Gu Youshi, Fan Honggui (eds.), Zhuangzu lungao (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989), 82. [“On the Reliability on the ‘Han Lineage’ of Zhuang with the Surname Wei,” in Gu Youshi and Fan Honggui (eds.), Collected Works on the Zhuang Nationality (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1989)]. 7. See Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion, 272–274. 8. Xie Qiguang, A Collection of Essays, 99. 9. Discussed in Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion, 29–34.

Kaup-2rev.Final

48

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 48

Creating the Zhuang

10. Zhang Shengzhen (ed.), Guangxi zhuangyu diming xuanji (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1988) [Selected Place Names in the Zhuang Language (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1988)]. 11. Jeffrey G. Barlow, “The Zhuang Minority Peoples of the Sino-Vietnamese Frontier in the Song Period,” Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 18, no. 2 (September 1987): 250–269. 12. Wolfram Eberhard, Kultur und Sidelung. Eberhard’s classification is summarized in Herold Wiens’s Han Chinese Expansion, 29–34. 13. Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion, 132. 14. Yang Zuolin (ed.), Minzu diqu jingji fazhan tongsu jianghua (Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993), 100 [A General Discussion of Minority Economics (Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993)]. 15. Wenshan zhuangzu miaozu zizhizhou gaikuang bianxiezu, Wenshan zhuangzu miaozu zizhizhou gaikuang (Kunming: Yunnan minzu chubanshe, 1986), 18 [The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture Editorial Board, The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture (Kunming: Yunnan Nationalities Press, 1986)]. 16. George V. H. Moseley, The Consolidation of the South China Frontier (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973), 24. 17. He Zhengting, “Yunnan zhuangzu zuyuan yu chengwei xintan,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1991): 77 [“A New Examination of the Origin of the Yunnan Zhuang and Their Terms of Self-Address,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1991)]. 18. Figures provided by Gu Youshi, research fellow at the Guangxi Nationalities Institute. 19. Fan Qixu, Qin Naichang (eds.), Zhuangzu baike cidian (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993), 25 [The Zhuang Encyclopedia (Nanning: Guangxi Peoples’ Press, 1993)]. 20. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 26. 21. Wei Chunshu, Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi (Beijing: Danddai zhongguo chubanshe, 1992), 491 [Contemporary China’s Guangxi (Beijing: Contemporary China Publishers Press, 1992)]. 22. Diana Lary, Region and Nation: The Kwangsi Clique in Chinese Politics 1925–1937 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974), 191. 23. Wei Chunshu, Contemporary China’s Guangxi, 495. 24. Ibid., 491. 25. Ibid., 511. 26. Barlow, “The Zhuang Minority Peoples,” 252. 27. Huang Junqing, “Lun jimi-tusi zhidu dui guangxi minzu guanxi de yingxiang,” Xie Qiguang (ed.), Lingwai zhuangzu huikao (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1989), p. 861. [“The Impact of the Jimi-Tusi System on Minority Relations in Guangxi,” in Xie Qiguang (ed.), A Collection of Articles on the Zhuang Within and Outside of Lingnan (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1989)]. 28. Barlow, “The Zhuang Minority Peoples,” 261. 29. Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion, 163. 30. Ibid., 230. 31. Ibid.; Huang Junqing, “The Impact of the Jimi-Tusi System,” 861. 32. Huang Junqing, “The Impact of the Jimi-Tusi System,” 861. 33. Steven Harrell, “Linguistics and Hegemony in China,” International Journal of Sociology of Language 103 (1993): 104. 34. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 402.

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 49

The Zhuang Setting

49

35. Katherine Palmer, “Redefining Ethnicity in Local Chinese Politics,” and “Regionalism Versus Ethnicnationalism in the People’s Republic of China,” papers presented at the 1998 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, 3–6 September 1998. 36. This story was recounted to me in an effort to show the improvements brought by the CCP. These two villages now have very good relations, and both groups “recognize that we’re really part of one big nationality. We just didn’t know it before the CCP taught us how the earlier regimes had manipulated us and played upon our differences,” my source relayed. 37. The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture Editorial Board, The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture, 21. 38. He Zhengting, New Examination, 83. 39. Few children wear traditional minority garb, though this does not necessarily represent a generational shift away from wearing the ethnic clothing. Rather, younger children wear manufactured clothing produced outside the villages. Manufactured clothing can be obtained more cheaply and with less effort than can the traditional clothing, which is made by individuals through a laborious dying and weaving process. The embroidery adorning many of the minority costumes can take weeks of full-time effort to complete a small design. Once reaching their teens, however, young girls begin asking to wear the traditional clothing. Older Nong women also discard the blue smocks in favor of all black clothing and singlecolored head towels in either solid black or white. 40. Manuscript notes for a Guangxi Zhuang Studies Association work in progress. 41. Huang Xianfan, Zhuangzu tongshi (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1988), 757. [Overview of the Zhuang (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1988)] lists Ningming, Chongzuo, and Fuhuan Counties, whereas Fan Qishu and Qin Naichang, 356, lists Donglan, Bama, Fengshan, and Tiane. 42. Huang Xianfan, Overview of the Zhuang, 727. 43. Ibid., 729–732. 44. Ibid., 731. 45. Ibid., 739. 46. Louis-Eugene Louvet, Les missions catholiques au XIX siecle (Lyons: Lille, and Paris, n.d.); Adrien Launay, Histoire des Missions de China: Mission du Koung-si (Paris, 1903), 313, 315. 47. John R. Shepherd, “From Barbarians to Sinners: Collective Conversion among Plains Aborigines in Qing Taiwan, 1859–1895,” in Daniel H. Bays (ed.), Christianity in China: From the Eighteenth Century to the Present (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996). 48. Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christian Missions in China (Taipei: Cheng New Publishing Company, 1966). 49. Huang Xianfan, Overview of the Zhuang, 724. 50. Huang Junqing, “The Impact of the Jimi-Tusi System,” 862. 51. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang bianxiezu, Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1985), 366–368. [The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Board, The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1985)]. 52. Ibid., 367.

Kaup-2rev.Final

1/8/10

4:04 PM

Page 50

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 51

3 Early CCP Minority Policy: The Decision to Recognize the Zhuang

What inspired the Chinese Communist Party to grant the Zhuang a provinciallevel autonomous region? Though few Western scholars have addressed the complex factors behind the formation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (GZAR), those who have offer two primary explanations as to why the CCP granted the Zhuang autonomy. Both approaches implicitly deny that the central government believed the Zhuang could best be—or indeed needed to be—governed through a system of regional autonomy. Both fail to recognize that although the Zhuang were not able, or motivated, to pressure the Communist regime into offering them autonomous privileges, the central government nevertheless recognized that there were concrete reasons for recognizing the Zhuang. The first approach currently used to explain the government’s motivation for creating the GZAR is best represented by G. F. Hudson. Hudson contends that the CCP offered the Zhuang autonomy in order to confuse the issues of Xinjiang, Tibet, and Mongolia. “It can be argued by Peking,” he writes, “that whatever is suitable for Chuang . . . must be suitable for the less numerous Uighurs, Tibetans, and Mongols. However, the latter people all have highly developed cultural traditions . . . and the standards normally accepted in the contemporary world qualify them as nations entitled to statehood.”1 Careful examination of the early formulation of CCP minority policy, however, shows that just the opposite process drove the decision to establish the Zhuang Autonomous Region. Minority policy was not formulated in Zhuang areas and used to justify party policy in the north. Rather, policy was developed in reaction to northwestern demands and then adjusted to fit, albeit awkwardly, the situation in the south. By examining the theoretical underpinnings of the CCP’s minority policy, and the chronology of the changes in Zhuang policy, it becomes clear that the minority policy was first developed to address the more intransigent minorities in the north, then used to integrate the diverse peoples of the south into a unified state.

51

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

52

11:34 AM

Page 52

Creating the Zhuang

The second explanation of the central government’s creation of the GZAR also contends that the CCP was not driven primarily by its concern with how best to govern the diverse Zhuang. Noting the lack of Zhuang demands for autonomy, George Moseley concludes that the project [to establish the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region from the Western Guangxi Autonomous Region] does not seem to have been related to any real need, nor to any acute sense of dissatisfaction, felt within the province itself. The whole effort could have served only one vital political purpose: namely, the smashing of Kwangsi Han Chinese opposition to the Communist Party itself. . . . The establishment of the Kwangsi Chuang Autonomous Region may be seen, then, as the coup de grace for the local Chinese in their struggle against the CCP. The CCP had found an ally in the Chuang, who, according to the testimony of a former resident of the province, were the main force in the provincial Party apparatus.2

Diana Lary’s assessment of the creation of the GZAR closely parallels Moseley’s. Lary argues that Guangxi and Guangdong had traditionally demanded greater autonomy than was accorded the country’s central provinces. Moreover, the two provinces often were administered, and their populations tended to view themselves, as part of a single political unit— Lingnan. Lary suggests that the Zhuang Autonomous Region was created in an effort to separate the two Guang provinces from each other, to break up the sense of a natural Lingnan unity and at the same time to weaken the region’s tendency to autonomy. The creation of a Zhuang administrative entity meant the elevation of Zhuang to senior positions and the parallel downgrading of Han, including Han from the riverine cities of Guangxi who were ethnically Cantonese. Guangdong also lost a big piece of its territory, the Nanlu area in the southwest of the province, to Guangxi . . . it means that a policy that seemed to be an attempt to give due recognition to a minority nationality, the Zhuang, was actually an attempt to weaken a subethnic group, the Cantonese, by reducing their influence in the neighboring province, by taking away part of their territory, and by breaking up the Lingnan combination.3

These three authors, and practically all other Western sources that mention the Zhuang, conclude that there were no pressing reasons posed by the Zhuang themselves for granting them autonomy. This false premise results largely from misunderstanding the internal dynamics of the Zhuang, and from the inaccurate assumption that nearly all of the Zhuang had been Sinicized by 1949. Scholars who mistakenly view the Zhuang as little different from the Han Chinese then conclude that the central government had ulterior motives for creating and developing a sense of Zhuang ethnic identity that had little to do with the internal situation of the

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 53

Early CCP Minority Policy

53

Zhuang. This dominant view of state-Zhuang relations is only partially valid at best. It is certainly true that early CCP policy was driven by the central government and its policy agenda, rather than by organized grassroots pressure from the Zhuang. The party skillfully utilized every means possible to appeal to the western ethnic groups and, as Moseley notes, attempted to solidify Zhuang support by offering them autonomy. Lary’s analysis also cannot be discounted, as the recognition of the Zhuang did begin to shift the distorted balance of power within Guangxi away from the eastern sector’s dominance and toward the western minority regions. Although the Zhuang had no formal ethnic organizations, had little sense of ethnic consciousness, and were therefore unable to make concerted political demands on the central government, special policies were nonetheless needed to integrate them into the greater Chinese state. Hudson, Moseley, and Lary all fail to acknowledge this crucial fact. The CCP’s early minority policy evolved from a Marxist-Leninist theoretical framework. Initially highly influenced by the Soviet Union’s nationality policy and traditional Chinese conceptions of which groups constituted unique nationalities, the CCP was forced to adjust its policies once it encountered the diverse peoples of the southwest. During the first two decades of its existence, the CCP accepted prevailing views on which groups constituted unique minorities and recognized only a limited number of nationalities residing in the north and northwest. The earliest minority policy was thus clearly developed to deal with these northern groups. By the mid-1930s the CCP began recognizing a much more diverse group of peoples’ claims to nationality status. Once the party gained formal control over the southwestern regions after 1949, it realized its minority policy could not be implemented in Yunnan and Guangxi without concerted efforts to alter the ethnic identity of several minority groups. The party did not simply fabricate the Zhuang minority for political purposes, as commentators such as G. F. Hudson suggest. The complex history of the diverse peoples living scattered throughout western Guangxi and eastern Yunnan made some groups identify more closely with one another while viewing other groups as outsiders. Those today labeled “Zhuang,” whether they referred to themselves as “village people” or “valley dwellers” or “descendants of Nong Zhigao,” clearly viewed certain groups in their immediate vicinity as not belonging to their group. These various Zhuang peoples would not have been satisfied being labeled “Yao,” for example, as they clearly distinguished themselves from the Yao and felt socially superior to them. Nonetheless, the various groups that the party lumped together as the Zhuang did not feel any greater Zhuang identity with other Zhuang groups living outside their immediate area. They had little or no knowledge of those living outside their immediate vicinity.

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

54

11:34 AM

Page 54

Creating the Zhuang

Although Western scholars have yet to examine Zhuang ethnic issues, Steven Harrell’s recently proposed three-pronged approach to understanding the reciprocal relationship between the state’s rigid hegemonic classification system and the local identities of minorities provides insight into Zhuang political identity: ethnic consciousness and identity arise in a three-way interplay between a group that considers itself distinctive, neighboring groups from which the group distinguishes itself, and the state, which establishes official categories of group identification and distributes benefits to the groups so identified. . . . Neither the rigid hegemonic structures conceived by the state nor the fluid local interactions among groups themselves exist in isolation one from the other, but must be considered in their reciprocal interaction. In particular historical situations, when state classification intrudes on a scene where the classificatory process has not previously been undertaken, fluid identities are precipitated or crystallized, and ethnicity may reduce, partially or nearly completely, to state categories.4

Although certain characteristics, which Edward Shils and Clifford Geertz would term “primordial,”5 defined the parameters in which the CCP could operate, the party clearly concertedly manipulated the boundaries of Zhuang ethnicity for political and administrative purposes. Exactly how this classification work was carried out will be discussed in further detail in Chapter 4. The CCP attempted to integrate the Zhuang and assure their political allegiance. This creation of a greater Zhuang was intended as a means of integrating the southwestern ethnic groups into the unified administration of the Chinese state. The manipulation of Zhuang ethnicity was not intended purely as a means of assimilating them, or of imposing external controls over them. The CCP’s goal was not, as many theorists have suggested, to effectively eliminate the nationalities or to assimilate them completely into the Han majority, but rather to integrate them into a greater Chinese state. With the exception of the Cultural Revolution, during which all differences within the population were viewed with suspicion, nationalities that did not threaten secession or openly challenge the party’s right to rule were granted a greater degree of cultural autonomy than nonautonomous areas. This chapter first examines republican minority theory and practice, to demonstrate the influence that traditional government attitudes toward minorities wielded on the Chinese Communist Party’s application of Marxist directives. It then examines Marxist-Leninist nationality theory and the Soviet model, and their early influence on CCP policy formulation. The chapter next traces the CCP’s move away from both the Soviet federalist system and the Nationalists’ assimilationist policy toward one designed to integrate the diverse minority peoples into a unified state by recognizing their differences.

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 55

Early CCP Minority Policy

55

Republic of China Policy Toward the Minorities The Republic of China’s minority policy greatly influenced CCP conceptions of which groups constituted distinct nationalities. The CCP was also able to learn from the mistakes made by the Nationalists in developing their nationality policy. Although over 57 percent of those currently recognized as nationalities live in the southwest, minority policy during the first half of this century was overwhelmingly dominated by concerns in China’s north and northwestern regions. From 1935 to 1947, for example, a total of 837,867,088 yuan was allocated by the Ministry of Education for border education, yet only 16 percent of this total was reserved for the southwest.6 Ethnic nationalists in Tibet, Mongolia, and Xinjiang repeatedly challenged central Chinese rule throughout the first half of the twentieth century, while British and Russian forces struggled to gain dominance over these areas. The number of major secession movements in the northwest far exceeded those in the southwest, which led the Guomindang (GMD) to focus the bulk of its attention on the more pressing issues in the north. As long as the minority groups in the southwest did not openly rebel against the central authorities, the Guomindang did not feel compelled to channel scarce resources into integrating them into the predominately Han state system. Local administrative control was in the hands of local warlords and their successors and was not a matter of direct responsibility for the central government as long as these leaders remained submissive. The GMD’s early focus on the northern and western groups is clearly reflected in which nationalities it recognized and in the organizational structure of minority affairs. The situation in the northwest differed radically from that in the southwest in at least five politically significant aspects. First, demographically, the northwestern minorities were more clearly demarcated and separated geographically from the Han. Second, the northwestern minorities’ religions were much more centralized than those practiced among the southwestern minorities. Their religion not only increased the northern minorities’ sense of unity, but provided a leadership structure separate from the Guomindang government. The religions practiced by the Mongols, Tibetans, and Uighurs had standard texts and a much greater degree of unified religious leadership than did those practiced by the minorities in the south. Third, the languages of the major minorities in the north were more unified than those of the southern minorities. Not only was the spoken language of each of the main northern minorities generally more internally unified than the dialect-fractured southern languages, but each had its own written script. Fourth, each of the main northwestern minorities, including the Uighurs, Tibetans, and Mongols, had recent claims to statehood. Each of the three groups actively petitioned for national statehood, and all three

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

56

11:34 AM

Page 56

Creating the Zhuang

had declared independent territories within the past century. Finally, the active involvement of external powers, predominately Great Britain, Russia, and Japan, increased the political significance of the northwestern minorities’ calls for greater independence from the Chinese central government. Demographically, the northwestern minority groups were more densely concentrated than their southwestern counterparts and lived in greater isolation from the Han. In Tibet, for example, less than 5 percent of the population was Han. Not a single highway led into Tibet in 1949, and reaching the region from outside could take weeks, if not months. Those nonTibetans who did venture into the region had to make their way during the nonwinter months and contend with an alien and inhospitable climate. Xinjiang Province, likewise, was cut off from the rest of China proper by the great Gobi desert. More than 75 percent of the population in 1949 was Uighur, with the Han making up only 6.71 percent of the province’s total population.7 Although by the twentieth century the Mongols were actually a minority in the area now constituting the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region, the influx of Han Chinese did not begin to any large extent until the late Qing era.8 A mass influx of Han Chinese in the first half of the twentieth century quadrupled the number of resident Han from 1.5 million to roughly 5.2 million, bringing the Han population to 83.6 percent of the region’s total population.9 In the southwest, by contrast, the Han and the minority peoples lived in much closer proximity to one another and were more evenly distributed numerically. Though there were certainly clusters of minority communities in the southwest far removed from Han penetration, often the nationalities were segregated simply by village rather than by larger geographical distances. In Yunnan and Guangxi, for example, very few administrative districts were strictly composed of one nationality, but rather of several singleethnic villages coexisting side by side. Although interaction with outside minority groups may at times coalesce nascent ethnic nationalist sentiment, the demographic complexity of the ethnic breakdown in the southwest limited the development of ethnic consciousness across large areas. The poorly developed infrastructure and communication network limited interaction across large distances, and within smaller district-sized regions there were too many different nationalities to build large territorial ethnic group identity. Although a particular village may have recognized that its population was different from its neighboring villages, it did not have any sense of being related to other nonadjoining villages. Figure 3.1 illustrates this phenomenon. When a group of people are in frequent contact with one another and on certain occasions interact with an outside group, the interaction with the outside group can serve to reinforce the first group’s commonalities in contrast to the out-group’s dissimilarities from the group. The circles on the left in

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 57

Early CCP Minority Policy

57

Figure 3.1 illustrate this type of group interaction, and are indicative of group interactions in the northwest. If groups frequently interact with outside groups and rarely interact with others from their own group, as occurs with each of the numbered circles on the right in the diagram below, each group will likely only recognize its own uniqueness without being conscious of the commonalities it shares with similar groups outside its communication network. This type of distribution of ethnic groups in the southwest encouraged the development of village localism to take precedence over pan-ethnic nationalism. Differences in religious practices also have played a significant role in the minorities’ ethnic consciousness and consequently in their political identity. Whereas the vast majority of the southwestern minorities practice a wide assortment of polyanimist religions or nonhierarchically administered Buddhism, the three main minorities in the north adhere to religions that each possess a standard body of texts and a centralized religious leadership. The importance of the Tibetan religion in cementing Tibetan nationalism, for example, cannot be underestimated and has no parallel among the southwestern groups. The whole of Tibetan society has revolved around the Lama religion. When the Communists first “liberated” the area in 1950, 20–33 percent of the male population were monks.10 Tibetan Lamaism did not override all divisions within Tibetan society, to be sure. Numerous groups within Tibet proved willing to ally with the Han at times to gain a degree of independence from the Tibetan rulers.11 Nonetheless, the Tibetans’ nominal acceptance of the Dalai Lama’s theocratic rule provided a key symbol demarcating those who accepted his authority from those who did not. The Mongols also adopted a form of Lamaist Buddhism in the seventeenth century. For the Mongols and the Tibetans alike the monastery was the source of nearly all education and literature. The southwestern minorities had no parallel unifying religious leadership or unified religious schools. The Uighurs’ adherence to Islam heavily influenced their interaction with the Chinese central government. Islam served as a unifying force for

Figure 3.1 Ethnic Group Distribution Patterns

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

58

11:34 AM

Page 58

Creating the Zhuang

the Uighur people, while excluding all nonbelievers forever to the realm of “outsider.” As historian Joseph Fletcher noted in his study of the Xinjiang Muslims: “Their world view challenged the very cornerstone of imperial order: the emperor’s ultimate authority. Without being a lamaist the emperor could reign as the legitimate patron of the lamaist church, but he could not, as an unbeliever, have such a role in the Muslim world.”12 The Uighur Muslims aspired to implement sharia, Muslim law as proscribed by the Quran. Though the Islamic faith has a less formal organizational structure than the Christian church or the Judaic faith, nonetheless the learned religious scholars, the ulema, were an alternative source of authority to the central government. Islam served not only as a unifying force within the nationality, but also as a link to a wider arena of religious compatriots. The Uighurs were, and continue to be, able to appeal to Muslims outside China to garner support for their demands of greater autonomy from the non-Muslim Chinese. The vast majority of the nationalities in the south, and certainly the Zhuang, had no parallel unified religion or authoritative body of religious scholars. In addition to having centralized religions, the northern minorities also had unified written scripts. Few minorities in the southwest had written scripts of their own. Though some groups, such as the Yi, did have ancient scripts, the written word was often as varied as their numerous spoken dialects. By contrast, the written scripts of the Mongols, Tibetans, and Uighurs served as an important communication tool and unifying force for the northern groups. The Uighurs, for example, have had a unified script since before the seventh century, though the written language underwent several changes in the first few centuries of its existence. The Uighurs gradually began using the Arabic script in the thirteenth century, when they started their conversion to Islam. Their language is relatively unified, dialect differences minimized by the frequent commercial interaction among the separate oasis towns spread across the desert.13 In the southwest, by contrast, minorities tended to be more localized, with a less developed trade network linking the disparate, isolated villages. The lack of interaction among members of a given nationality led to vast regional differences in dialect, as noted in Chapter 2 and discussed in more detail in Chapter 6. The northern and northwestern minorities were more concentrated demographically and internally bonded by their religious affiliations and common language than were the southwestern groups. In addition, each of the main minorities in the northwestern region had made claims to statehood in the past. Whether or not these plays for independence were ever successful, historical claims to statehood offered a symbol around which ethnic activists could narrate their claims of uniqueness as a nation. The

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 59

Early CCP Minority Policy

59

numerous ethnic uprisings in the region proved a much more pressing challenge for the Guomindang than any of the ethnic issues in the southwest. The struggles for independent statehood in Xinjiang began long before the Guomindang took power, and continued through the first half of the twentieth century. The nineteenth century was particularly racked by interethnic fighting, and dozens of what the Chinese government now refers to as “splittist” rebellions raged.14 Xinjiang was officially incorporated as a province in 1884, though relations between the region and the central government remained extremely strained. As Dru Gladney and others have persuasively shown, “Uighur,” like “Zhuang,” is a relatively recent name for an eclectic group of peoples who formerly identified most closely with their locality, rather than with the larger nationality group.15 Unlike the Zhuang, however, who developed a common sense of nationality only after it was imposed upon them by the government, ethnic delegates from both the Soviet Union and China voted themselves to take the name “Uighur” at an East Turkic conference in Tashkent in 1921. In 1931 over one hundred thousand people were reportedly killed in the first of a series of major twentieth-century rebellions by Muslims against the Chinese authorities. 16 In 1933 rebels in southern Xinjiang announced the establishment of an independent Turkish-Islamic Republic of Eastern Turkestan. The rebellion was quelled by February 1934, though Uighurs continue to refer to the independent kingdom to justify their claims to independent statehood today. In November 1944 another independence movement erupted in violence in the province. Rebels in Yili announced the East Turkestan Republic’s independence from China. The rebels advanced eastward, aspiring to claim all of Xinjiang as part of the new republic. After a number of unsuccessful attempts to crush the Muslims militarily, Chiang Kaishek dispatched General Zhang Zhizhong to negotiate a settlement with the rebels. A number of the provisions reached would later be included in the CCP’s regulations on minority affairs throughout the century. First, Xinjiang citizens would be able to elect their own leaders, and at least one of the vice chairmen of the province would come from the Ili region. The agreement promised religious freedom throughout the province and granted the local nationalities the right to use their own languages in primary and secondary schools, though Chinese language would be a required course in secondary schools. Minorities were granted the freedom to develop their own arts and literature and were officially allowed freedom of assembly, speech, and publication.17 In one of the most extensive studies of the rebellion, Linda Benson describes how these policies were never fully implemented. The obvious incongruence between government promises of “nationality unity” and the central military’s intrusive interference in the province’s internal affairs served to further exacerbate the existing strained relations between the Xinjiang minorities and the GMD.

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

60

11:34 AM

Page 60

Creating the Zhuang

Meanwhile, in Tibet, relations between the Tibetan nationality and the central leadership were also strained. The Tibetans had a central government that held relatively strong control over the local feudal lords. The Lhasa government maintained a military force, issued currency and postage stamps, negotiated with foreign governments, and served as the final court of appeal. Whether or not the Dalai Lamas were truly able to govern entirely independently of the Imperial court prior to 1911 is an issue of much debate.18 What is beyond debate is the fact that numerous Tibetans claim that Tibet has been a free nation since at least the Tang dynasty. Though minorities in the southwest argue that they are the original inhabitors of the southwestern territory, they make few claims to independent statehood. Numerous Tibetans, on the other hand, point to various moments in history as evidence that Tibetan leaders functioned not only as religious leaders, but also as political leaders of an independent state. Tibetan claims to statehood increased with the fall of the Qing, with Tibetans declaring independence almost immediately after the regime fell in 1911. Tibetan nationalism was, and is today, quelled primarily through military force. Foreign involvement in the north and northwest also greatly increased the Chinese government’s determination to keep the nationalities within the folds of a unified state. Although the British and French were making moves from the south into Yunnan at the turn of the century, they made little headway in extending their influence into China. Among the northern and northwestern minorities, however, the British, Russians, and Japanese all were intricately involved in regional politics and sought to lure the nationalities away from the Chinese. The British made their interest in Tibet clear with the dispatchment of Colonel Francis Younghusband in 1903. After the Younghusband mission crushed Tibetan opposition to British involvement in the area, the British and Tibetans signed the Anglo-Tibetan Lhasa Convention in September 1904, barring all other foreign powers from entering Tibet without British consent. When Tibetan forces declared full independence from China after the fall of the Qing, the Chinese sent forces into Tibet in an effort to force their compliance and acceptance of the new republic. In response the British minister in Beijing sent a formal memorandum to the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, asserting that China had no right to interfere in the internal affairs of Tibet. The memorandum declared that Great Britain would not accept the incorporation of Tibet as a Chinese province or the maintenance of Chinese troops in Tibet. The vast differences in the northwestern and southwestern minority contexts contributed to the government’s focus on northwestern nationality issues and the near total disregard for the southwestern nationalities. Indeed, though the Guomindang government was clearly aware of the “barbarian tribes” in the southwest, they did not recognize them as unique

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 61

Early CCP Minority Policy

61

nationalities. The traditional conceptions of which groups constituted separate nationalities highly influenced early CCP policy, for the CCP developed its earliest policy on the assumption that China had a limited number of nationalities, primarily concentrated in the northwest. Officially, the republican government recognized only five nationalities: the Han, Mongols, Manchus, Tibetans, and Tartars. On 22 April 1912 the new republican president, Yuan Shikai, declared, “Now that the republic of five nationalities has been established, all areas of Mongolia, Tibet and Xinjiang are integral territory (lingtu) of our Republic of China, so that all the nationalities (minzu) of Mongolia, Tibet, and Xinjiang are citizens of our Republic of China.”19 The new republican flag had five stripes of equal width, each one representing a nationality. Sun Yatsen also recognized five nationalities: the Han, Mongols, Manchus, Tibetans, and Muslim Turks (Huijian zhi Tujue ren).20 On 27 January 1924 Sun gave a lecture on nationalism that defined a “nation” using five criteria. First, he defined a nation in racial terms as a group of people sharing blood ties. In addition to having common ancestry, a nation shares its livelihood, spoken language, religion, and customs and habits. Using Sun’s formula, the GMD recognized only the northwestern groups and termed the southwestern groups “tribes” (yi buluo). The Zhuang, certainly, were not recognized as a nationality, and the Guomindang government did not even mention the term “Zhuang” in any of its minority policy documents. The administrative organs established by the Guomindang to manage minority affairs also focused primarily on the northwestern minorities. Until the Japanese invaded China, all of the central commissions and ministries established to handle minority affairs were limited to handling Tibetan and Mongolian affairs. Immediately after seizing power, the republican government replaced the Court of Colonial Affairs with the Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs Bureau. The bureau was elevated to a separate ministry in 1927, then lowered to commission level under the Executive Yuan in 1929. A Mongolian and Tibetan School trained minority cadres and those slated to work in the area. In 1930 a separate Mongolian and Tibetan department was created in the Ministry of Education. At the provincial level governments recognized a number of “tribes,” and special policies were designed to assimilate or at least to integrate them. Though central nationality policy focused on the northwestern groups, in the early 1930s Guangxi established “Border Education” programs, which set up special schools for the “border population,” largely made up of those who were later classified as unique nationalities. Even these policies rarely mentioned the Zhuang, however, focusing rather on the Yi and Miao “tribes.” In addition to recognizing only five nationalities, the Republic of China’s nationality policy differed markedly from the CCP’s policy in that

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

62

11:34 AM

Page 62

Creating the Zhuang

it was openly assimilationist. Although the original Nationalist flag touted five stripes, each representing one of the five recognized nationalities, the official policy called for “the strict implementation of racial assimilation.” Indeed, this call was deemed pressing enough to rank among the five points included on the first Nationalist Party manifesto in 1913.21 On 6 March 1921 Sun declared, The name “Republic of Five Nationalities” exists only because there exists a certain racial distinction which distorts the meaning of a single Republic. We must facilitate the dying out of all names of individual peoples inhabiting China, i.e., Manchus, Tibetans, etc. In this respect we must follow the example of the United States of America, i.e. satisfy the demands and requirements of all races and unite them in a single cultural and political whole.22

For a brief period from 1923 to 1925, the GMD eased its assimilationist tone. By 1923 the GMD was heavily influenced by the Soviet Union. After signing the Sun-Joffee agreement with the Soviet Union in 1923, the GMD renounced its earlier assimilationist stance in its Manifesto of the First National Congress and declared its support of “the right of self-determination of all the nationalities within China” and called for “a free and united Republic of China formed by the free association of all the nationalities.”23 Shortly after Chiang Kaishek came to power, however, the GMD once again withdrew its support for self-determination and pursued a more assimilationist strategy. Chiang changed the five-striped flag representing the five nationalities to a sun banner with a single white background and frequently substituted the term “Chinese nation” for “Republic of China.”24 In June of 1929 the Guomindang officially repudiated its earlier support for self-determination for the Mongolians and Tibetans. In his book China’s Destiny, Chiang Kaishek again repudiated the notion that China is composed of numerous nationalities, each having the right to maintain its uniqueness. Chiang wrote that “the differentiation among China’s five peoples is due to regional and religious factors, and not to race or blood.”25 Nationalist administrators throughout China did not hide their assimilationist tendencies. The provincial governor of Guizhou, Yang Sen, for example, declared that “no nationality may have different clothes, scripts, or spoken languages” and predicted that “within a few years it will be impossible any longer to hear disparate languages in Guizhou, to see any strange costumes, or to find any differences among the ethnic groups.”26 The CCP utilized the minorities’ discontent with Guomindang policies to gain the support of various nationalities. Early CCP policymakers adopted the GMD’s assumptions that China’s large nationalities were all located in the north and northwest. To formulate its policy, the CCP

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 63

Early CCP Minority Policy

63

combined this understanding about which groups constituted unique nationalities with Marxist-Leninist theory on nationalities.

Marxist-Leninist Nationality Theory and the Soviet Model Early CCP policy was modeled after the Soviet Union’s and based on Marxist-Leninist theories of nationality. Marxist theory held that nations were a reflection of bourgeois capitalist relations and would fade of their own accord as communism gained strength throughout the world. Nations, according to Marx, originate in the transition from feudal to capitalist society. The emergence of capitalism requires greater coordination among workers than under feudalism and consequently a more unified system of government and language. Whereas feudal fiefdoms might remain relatively isolated, the capitalist revolution requires greater centralization and a larger number of citizens. According to Marx, the modern capitalist nation requires a clear division of labor, a population large enough to subdivide into competing classes, and a territory large enough to support a viable state.27 Marx judged national movements as progressive or reactionary depending upon what stage of development the society had reached. If the rise of nationalism reflected the shift from feudalism to capitalism it was deemed progressive, whereas those nationalist movements that occurred within a maturing capitalist system were deemed reactionary, as capitalism must be allowed to reach its fullest development before the proletariat can achieve revolutionary consciousness. Exactly how large a state Marx envisioned as ideal is unclear, but he tended to favor large, centralized regimes. In his address to the London Conference in 1850, Marx clearly attacked attempts to create a German federation: The workers . . . must strive for a single and indivisible German republic, but also within this republic for the most determined centralization of power in the hands of the state authority. They must not allow themselves to be misguided by the democratic talk of freedom for the communities, of self-government, etc. In a country like Germany where there are still so many relics of the Middle Ages to be abolished, where there is so much local and provincial obstinacy to be broken, it must under no circumstances be permitted that every village, every town, and every province should put a new obstacle in the path of revolutionary activity, which can proceed with full force only from the centre.28

Though Marx favored the centralization of government, he did concede the “right to self-determination” in the 1865 Declaration on the

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

64

11:34 AM

Page 64

Creating the Zhuang

Polish Question approved by the London Conference of the First International.29 Marx, however, never clearly explained what “self-determination” entailed. Whether it implied the right to independent statehood or simply the right to a degree of autonomy was left unresolved. Discussion of nationalism was not a high priority for Marx, largely because he felt that national sentiment would inevitably fade with the progress of the communist revolution. In the Communist Manifesto (1848), for example, he states: “National differences and antagonisms between peoples are daily more and more vanishing, owing to the development of the bourgeoisie, to freedom of commerce, to the world-market, to uniformity in the mode of production and in the conditions of life corresponding thereto. The supremacy of the proletariat will cause them to vanish still faster.”30 The Soviet Union accepted the Marxist description of nationalities as a manifestation of the bourgeois-capitalist stage of society and held that minority differences would fade as socialism took hold. Though clearly unprepared to allow the nationality areas to leave the Soviet Union, the Soviet constitution theoretically acknowledged the minorities’ right to full independence, including the right to secede from the “freely formed Union of Soviet Republics.” Lenin struggled against opposition within the Soviet Communist Party to assure that the Soviet nationalities were constitutionally guaranteed these rights; nevertheless, he demonstrated that the party would have the final say as to which nationalities would be allowed to exercise this right by stating, “We are not obliged to support ‘every’ struggle for independence or ‘every’ republic or anti-clerical movement.” 31 It was left to the vanguard party to decide which nationalist movements were beneficial to revolutionary progress and which were being manipulated by the capitalist classes. Stalin was even more clear on this point when he stated, “All this points to the necessity of interpreting the principle of selfdetermination, not of the bourgeoisie, but of the toiling masses of the given nation. The principle of self-determination must be subordinated to the principles of socialism.”32 Stalin’s theoretical views on the nationality question also heavily influenced the CCP’s early development of its nationality policy. Stalin rallied the minorities by asserting that the Soviet Communist Party would eradicate centuries of minority oppression by the czarist regime, much as the CCP would later argue that the Imperial regime denied the nationalities’ very existence in an effort to impose an exploitative imperialist order. CCP propaganda constantly referred to the former regime’s concerted effort to keep the minorities in a subservient, economically repressed position. Stalin argued that the loyalty of the nationalities to the communist cause could best be achieved by recognizing their right to develop their own language and culture, and to educate their children in nationality

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 65

Early CCP Minority Policy

65

schools.33 Stalin maintained that the nationalities would naturally join the communist cause once they were educated in Marxism and once strides began to be made toward decreasing the economic cleavages between the nationality and the Russian areas. The Soviet Union began a system of korenizatsiia, or indigenization, in the early years of its consolidation.34 This system replaced many of the Russian officials in nationality areas with members of the indigenous nationality. Much of the blame for the reluctance of nationalities to join the communist movement, Stalin contended, was due to a dearth of minority cadres versed in Soviet doctrine, capable of educating the minorities in their own language.

Early Chinese Communist Party Policy Highly influenced by the Marxist-Leninist theory of nationalities and the Soviet model, the CCP trusted that minority differences would fade as communism gained strength throughout the country. The CCP’s earliest policy formulations came before the party had extensive contact with minorities. Initial party statements reflected a combination of Marxist-Leninist theories of nationality with the prevailing Chinese understanding of which groups constituted unique nationalities. Though initially recognizing only those minorities officially recognized by the GMD, the party sought to differentiate its policies from those of the Nationalists. The CCP therefore emphasized that it would not rush the minorities to assimilate with the Han Chinese. Moreover, until 1938 the party followed the Soviet model in openly supporting the minorities’ right to national self-determination (zijue). During much of the CCP’s first decade, it showed little interest in developing a broad minority policy of its own and appeared satisfied to mimic the Soviet Union’s general policies. The CCP primarily focused on urban revolution throughout the First United Front (1923–1927) and therefore had little contact with the minority populations, which were concentrated primarily in the rural frontier. Minorities were not seen as a major concern in the early years of the party. The party did not even mention the minorities in a 1922 document listing the nine most important tasks facing the party.35 Following traditional views of which groups constituted unique nationalities, the Chinese Communist Party and its influential founding members initially focused only on the northwestern nationalities when mentioning the minority question. Mao’s earliest views on the minorities appeared in a 1920 letter to his close personal friend Cai Hesen. In the letter Mao indicated both his support for the minority regions’ right to

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

66

11:34 AM

Page 66

Creating the Zhuang

independence and his understanding of the “national question” as one primarily revolving around the northwestern peoples. He stated: “Our tasks are not limited to China. It is my view that while we must have people working within China, it is even more necessary to have people working internationally. We must, for example, assist Russia in completing her socialist revolution; assist Korea in achieving independence; help Southeast Asia (Nanyang) reach independence; and aid Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibet, and Qinghai in achieving self-government and self-determination (zizhi zijue).”36 He did not mention the southwestern groups at all. In another article entitled “The Fundamental Issue in the Problem of Hunanese Reconstruction: The Republic of Hunan,” published on 3 September 1920, Mao bemoaned the “annihilation of the Manchus and the reduction of the Mongols, Huis, and Tibetans to their last gasp.”37 Again, no mention of the southwestern minorities was made. In a later article on the Hunan federal movement, Mao denounced big states for repressing minorities within their borders: “Broadly speaking, there has hitherto been a fallacious argument to the effect that ‘only great states will be able to struggle for existence in the world of the future.’ The baneful influence of such views has served to expand imperialism, to repress weak minorities in the mother countries, and in the struggle for colonies overseas to turn semicivilized or uncivilized nations into utter slaves, depriving them of the right to survive and develop, and forcing them into unconditional obedience and submission to its power.” 38 Mao’s Hunan Reconstruction articles advocate independence for the “twenty-two existing provinces, three special areas, and two frontier regions [Mongolia and Tibet]” and argue that “the foundation of a big country is its small localities.” 39 These early statements clearly reflect Mao’s acceptance of prevailing views on which groups constitute nationalities, as well as Soviet-influenced openness to independence movements based on a subprovincial or nationality basis.40 Mao’s essays on the Hunanese reconstruction movement suggest that he believed grants of self-determination would not lead to the permanent dismemberment of China but would eventually lead to reunification. Marxist readings of the nationality issue would only lend credence to this view. Mao’s trust in the future reunification of China can be found in statements from the Hunan articles such as “for the time being there is no hope for nationwide general reconstruction”; “in the case of China we cannot start with the whole, but must start with its parts”; and “today the only way [to plan for the whole] is to break down the foundationless big China and build many small Chinas.”41 In October 1920 Mao stated that “many people already realize that self-determination and self-rule in each province is the only way to rebuild a genuine China.”42 The earliest CCP statement on minority affairs was issued at the Second Party Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in 1922. The docu-

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 67

Early CCP Minority Policy

67

ment proclaimed Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Turkestan (Huijiang) to be autonomous states but made no reference to the southwestern nationalities. The party’s minority policy was highly influenced by concerns with the northwestern minority situation. In October 1925 the party called for the creation of a Mongol National Revolutionary Party. This party would represent the political and nationality concerns of the Inner Mongolian people. In a resolution drafted at the Enlarged Meeting of the Fourth CCP Plenum, the party acknowledged a large degree of ethnic consciousness among the Mongols and presented the creation of such a Mongol political party as the sole realistic means of enticing them to support the Communist revolution being carried out throughout the rest of the country.43 The party’s first autonomous region was established in Inner Mongolia on 1 May 1947, years before the establishment of a southwestern autonomous region. With the breakdown of the First United Front in 1927 and the party’s move into the countryside, contact with minorities increased throughout the country. The party’s encounters with the minorities in the latter part of the decade, including increased contact with the ethnic groups in western Guangxi, demonstrated the need for further research on the ethnic composition of the country. The Sixth National Congress of the CCP in September 1928 listed “Ten Great Demands of the Chinese Revolution,” the third of which read “Unify China and recognize national self-determination.” 44 The party declared the nationality question to be “of great import to the Revolution,” and the Central Committee was told to gather materials on the nationality question, which would be discussed as part of the Seventh Congress’s party program.45 The research program proposed by the Sixth Congress was never carried out, however, because the party once again turned toward the urban centers as the focus of the revolution under the leadership of Li Lisan. Although local peasant associations and party branches began mentioning the southern minorities by the mid-1920s, central party documents almost entirely neglected the southwestern groups until 1938. The first meeting of the Hunan Peasant Representative Congress in January 1926 issued a “Resolution on Liberating the Miao and Yao Nationalities.”46 By 1928 the party had begun refining traditional Chinese views of which groups constituted unique nationalities. In July 1928, the party listed minorities as “the northern Mongols, Hui, the beautiful tall Manchurians, the Taiman peoples of Fujian, the aboriginal (yuanshi minzu) southwestern peoples such as the Miao and Li; the Xinjiang people and Tibetans.”47 After 1928, however, the southwestern minorities were not consistently treated as significant minorities. Numerous references to the “nationality problem” continued to address only the northern and northwestern groups. In its January 1929 report, for example, the Fourth Red Army announced its support for “Manchu, Mongolian, Hui, and Tibetan” self-rule. It did not refer to the southwestern groups.48

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

68

11:34 AM

Page 68

Creating the Zhuang

While the party gained some experience with minorities in the Jiangxi era (1928–1934), contact with the nationalities increased exponentially during the Long March. The party was driven through the most thickly concentrated minority regions on its push to Yanan. The Guomindang initiated an intense propaganda campaign against the “atheistic Communists” intended to incite religious minorities against the Long Marchers. Although many contemporary Chinese accounts describe the minorities as welcoming the Communists with open arms, participant accounts offer stories of brutal minority attacks against the Long Marchers. 49 The practical necessity of traveling through the minority regions forced the party to learn how to relate to interests of the nationalities. By the end of the Long March the necessity of appealing to these interests was apparent. As the First Army Corps’s political department noted: “There are more than ten million Mohammedan’s in the North-west occupying an extremely important position. Our present mission and responsibility is to defend the North-west and to create an anti-Japanese base in these five provinces . . . it would be impossible to carry out our mission if we failed to win over the Mohammedans to our sphere and to the anti-Japanese front.”50 The CCP itself acknowledges its preoccupation with the northwestern groups in the development of its nationality policy. The authoritative collection of minority documents published by the Central Party Press in 1991 states: Although our party already had a long history of minority work, we did not utilize a Marxist theoretical approach and systematically research our country’s own minority situation until the creation of the Northwest Work Committee [Xibei gongzuo weiyuanhui] in 1939. In April 1940 the Northwest Work Committee promulgated “Regarding the Huihui Issue” and in July of that same year issued the “Outline Regarding the Mongol peoples during the Anti-Japanese War.” After being approved by the CCP’s General Secretary, these two outlines became the basis for all other minority work documents.51

Even after the CCP began to recognize the diverse minorities in the southwest, the bulk of investment continued to be channeled into the northwestern areas. Between 1949 and 1959, for example, the government oversaw the construction of approximately one hundred thousand kilometers of highways in the national minority areas, only forty-six hundred kilometers of which served the minorities in the southwest.52 Less than 5 percent of the new roads constructed in minority areas, therefore, served over 50 percent of the total minority population. Since its inception the Chinese Communist Party had unfailingly promoted itself as the only party capable of granting the nationalities self-rule.

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 69

Early CCP Minority Policy

69

However, the earliest CCP advocacy of self-determination for the nationalities gave way after the outbreak of war with the Japanese to the complete renunciation of independent governments for the minorities and the shift to promoting regional autonomy within a unified state. By the early 1940s the CCP began to recognize that the minority situation was much more complex than it had initially realized and would require more than a resolution to the northern and northwestern minorities’ calls for independence. As the party seized control of the government in 1949, it suddenly became faced with the challenge of incorporating dozens of ethnic groups that had existed largely outside the central administrative system. In a 1950 speech welcoming the arrival of the centrally dispatched Southwest Nationalities Work Team, Deng Xiaoping reiterated the party’s inexperience in the Guangxi area and its willingness to apply techniques developed in the northwest to the area: The arrival of the Center’s Southwestern Nationalities Work Team will certainly be of major assistance to us. You have much greater research experience and therefore a greater understanding than we do here on the northwestern minorities. You will therefore be able to uncover a great number of issues once you actually personally go down into the [southwestern] areas. We hope that you comrades will thoroughly research all of the different issues, and come up with all sorts of new suggestions. Don’t worry about your ideas being superficial—they will certainly be more productive than no ideas at all. The bitterness of our current situation is precisely that we have no ideas.53

Believing that nationality differences would gradually fade once the minorities were brought into the socialist system, the party began the arduous task of consolidating central administrative control over the diverse ethnic groups in China’s great southwest using the policy developed in the northwest. Chapters 4 and 5 examine the evolution of the CCP’s political relationship with the Zhuang from the party’s assumption of power to the present day.

Notes 1. G. F. Hudson, “The Nationalities of China,” in St. Anthony’s Papers (London: Chatto & Windus, 1960), 61. 2. George V. H. Moseley III, The Consolidation of the South China Frontier (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973), 85. 3. Diana Lary, “The Tomb of the King of Nanyue—The Contemporary Agenda of History: Scholarship and Identity,” Modern China 22, no. 1 (January 1996): 21–22. 4. Steven Harrell, “The Nationalities Question and the Prmi (sic.) Problem,” in Melissa Brown (ed.), Negotiating Ethnicities in China and Taiwan (Berkeley: Berkeley Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, 1996), 274–275.

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

70

11:34 AM

Page 70

Creating the Zhuang

5. Edward Shils, “Primordial, Personal, Sacred and Civil Ties,” British Journal of Sociology 8 (1957): 130–145 and Clifford Geertz, “The Integrative Revolution: Primordial Sentiments and Civil Politics in the New States,” in Old Societies and New States, ed. C. Geertz (Glencoe, Ill.: Free Press, 1963), 105–157. 6. David Deal, “National Minority Policy in Southwest China 1911–1965,” Ph.D. diss. (University of Washington, 1971), 90. 7. Colin Mackerras, China’s Minorities: Integration and Modernization in the Twentieth Century (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1994), 252. 8. Robert H. G. Lee, The Manchurian Frontier in Ch’ing History (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970), 127–128. 9. Mackerras, China’s Minorities, 252. 10. Tom A. Grunfield, The Making of Modern Tibet (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1987), 23. 11. June Teufel Dreyer, China’s Forty Millions (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976), 34. 12. Joseph Fletcher, “The Heydey of the Ch’ing Order in Mongolia, Sinkiang and Tibet,” in John K. Fairband (ed.), The Cambridge History of China, Volume 10, Late Ch’ing 1800–1911 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), 407. 13. S. Robert Ramsey, The Languages of China (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987), 189. 14. Ma Yin, China’s Minority Nationalities (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1989), 139–142. 15. Gladney, “The Ethnogenesis of the Uighur,” Central Asian Survey 9, no. 1: 1–28; Justin Jon Rudelson, Oasis Identities: Uyghur Nationalism Along China’s Silk Road (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998). 16. Aitchen K. Wu, Turkistan Tumult (London: Methuen, 1940), 72. 17. Linda Benson, The Ili Rebellion, The Moslem Challenge to Chinese Authority in Xinjiang, 1944–1949 (New York and London: M.E. Sharpe, 1990), 185–187. 18. See, for example, Michael C. van Walt van Paag, The Status of Tibet: History, Rights, and Prospects in International Law (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1987); and Li Tieh-tseng, Tibet, Today and Yesterday (New York: Bookman, 1960) and Highlights of Tibetan History (Beijing: New World Press, 1984). 19. “Zhongguo da shiji,” Dongfang Zishi 8, no. 12 (1 June 1912): 3, in Mackerras, China’s Minorities, 53. 20. Sun Zhongshan, “Sanminzhuyi,” in Sun Zhongshan xuanji, vol. 2 (Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1956), 591–593 [“Three People’s Principles,” Selected Works of Sun Yatsen]. 21. Sun Zhongshan, Guofu quanji, vol. 1 (Taibei: Zhongguo Guomindang Zhongyang weiyuanhui dangshi weiyuanhui, 1973, 1981), 795, in Mackerras, China’s Minorities, 55. 22. Sun Yat-sen, Memoirs of a Chinese Revolutionary: A Programme of National Reconstruction for China (New York: AMS Press, 1970), 229. 23. Sun Zhongshan, “Zhongguo Guomindang diyici quanguo daibiao dahui xuanya,” in Sun Zhongshan xuanji, vol. 2 (Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1956), 526, in Mackerras, China’s Minorities, 55. 24. Mackerras, China’s Minorities, 58. 25. Chiang Kaishek, China’s Destiny and Chinese Economic Theory (New York: Roy Publishers, 1947), 40. 26. Cited by Colin Mackerras, China’s Minorities, 60. Also see Colin Mackerras, “Compilation Groups,” Miaozu jianshi (Guiyang: Nationalities Press, 1985), 246. 27. Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto, in David McLellan (ed.), Karl Marx: Selected Writings (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977), 225.

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 71

Early CCP Minority Policy

71

28. Karl Marx, “Address to the Communist League,” in David McLellan (ed.), Karl Marx: Selected Writings (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977), 284. 29. Dreyer, China’s Forty Millions, 45. 30. Marx, The Communist Manifesto, 236–237. 31. V. I. Lenin, The Right of Nations to Self-Determination: Selected Writings (New York: International Publishers, 1951), 111. 32. Jesse Clarkson, A History of Russia (New York: Random House, 1961). Stalin’s article was published on 12 December 1917. 33. J. V. Stalin, “Marxism and the National Question,” in Works, vol. 2 (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1953), 300–381. 34. June Dreyer offers a concise summary of the phases of Soviet minority policy, in Dreyer, China’s Forty Millions, 54–59. 35. “First Manifesto of the CCP on the Current Situation (June 10, 1922),” cited in Walker Connor, The National Question in Marxist-Leninist Theory and Strategy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 69. 36. Hao Shiyuan, “Mao zedong dui jiejue zhongguo minzu wenti de lishi gongxian,” Minzu yanjiu 5 (1993): 1 [“Mao Zedong’s Historical Contribution to Resolving the Nationality Question,” Nationalities Research 5 (1993)]. 37. Stuart Schram (ed.), Mao’s Road to Power: Revolutionary Writings 1912– 1949, vol. 1 (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1992), 43–44. 38. Schram, Mao’s Road, 544. 39. Ibid. 40. Mao’s acceptance of the minorities’ right to independence was not solely a reflection of Soviet influence, but part of Mao’s broader theoretical support for a federation of independent states as the sole means of rebuilding a strong central government. See Katherine Palmer, “Mao Zedong and the Sinification of China’s Minority Policy,” Southeastern Review of Asian Studies 17 (1995): 1–20. 41. Schram, Mao’s Road, 544, 547 (emphasis mine). 42. Ibid., 80. 43. Zhonggong zhongyang tongzhanbu, Minzu wenti wenxian huibian (Beijing: Zhonggong zhongyang dangxiao chubanshe, 1991), 38–39 [The Central Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Bureau, A Collection of Articles on the Nationality Question (Beijing: The Central Academy of the Chinese Communist Party Press, 1991)]. 44. Connor, The National Question, 69. 45. Hao Shiyuan, “Mao Zedong’s Historical Contribution,” 2. 46. Xie Qiguang, Lingwai zhuangzu huikao (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1989), 547 [A Collection of Essays on the Zhuang Within and Outside of Lingnan (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1989)]. 47. The Central Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Bureau, 87. 48. Xie Qiguang, Collection of Essays, 547. 49. Dreyer, China’s Forty Millions, 68. 50. “The Mohammed Problem,” Company Discussion Materials, First Army Corps, Political Department, 2 June 1936, cited in Edgar Snow, Red Star over China (New York: Random House, 1938), 347. 51. The Central Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Bureau, 7. 52. Deal, “National Minority Policy,” 181. 53. Deng Xiaoping, “Guanyu xinan shaoshu minzu wenti,” Zhonggong zhongyang tongzhanbu (7/21/50), 61 [“The Southwestern Minority Nationality Problem,” in The Central Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Bureau, 21 July 1950] (emphasis mine).

Kaup-3.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 72

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 73

4 Politics:The Consolidation of Central Control

On 8 November 1949, a month after Mao Zedong proclaimed the birth of the People’s Republic of China, Communist forces launched a three-pronged attack against the remaining Nationalist stronghold in Guangxi Province. Within thirty-nine days more than 170,300 Nationalist fighters were dead and the CCP announced the “complete liberation of Guangxi.” The party found itself in official control of a province with a decimated infrastructure, rampant inflation, more than 2 million homeless peasants, a paralyzed industrial sector, and a massive underground anti-Communist resistance movement. The party’s limited and inexperienced cadre corps was barely equipped to begin addressing single components of the explosive situation, and numerically much too small to handle the complexity of the demands. Further aggravating the administrative challenges, within the mountains of western Guangxi local people spoke a variety of non-Han languages. As the CCP poured into these regions, it was often met with outright resistance and distrust. At best party members were welcomed by a local population that may have heard of their political mission but was unable to work with the new cadres on administrative projects due to language barriers. The party had little hope of implementing its broad economic and social plans before solidifying administrative control over its territory. Unifying the fragmented province under a single administrative system with “unified leadership and decentralized management”1 thus became the primary focus of early CCP policy. Incorporating the minority areas, which had historically been only loosely integrated into the political system, proved a particular challenge for the regime. Within the first four years of the CCP’s administration, more than four hundred local groups demanded recognition as unique nationalities, along with the accompanying rights such recognition accorded. Each of these groups clearly perceived of itself as different from the Han or “official” Chinese. As the party struggled to integrate the minorities and implement its earlier promises of self-government, it was forced

73

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

74

11:34 AM

Page 74

Creating the Zhuang

to limit the number of ethnic groups that could receive official recognition. Unable to offer autonomous territorial governments to all of the groups clamoring for recognition in western Guangxi, the CCP devised a strategy to convince several local groups that they could achieve self-rule in the greater Zhuang autonomous region. The first step toward consolidating administrative rule thus became convincing millions of Guangxi residents that they were members of the larger minority the government designated “Zhuang.” The establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in 1958 radically altered the existing regional conceptions of ethnic boundaries, which in turn has altered the course of Zhuang ethnic identity and politics in Guangxi and Yunnan. The Chinese Communist Party’s efforts to consolidate its control over the nearly 16 million people now officially recognized as Zhuang divides into three primary phases (see Table 4.1). During the first phase of central administrative consolidation from 1949 to 1966, political policy in Zhuang areas was driven by the central government’s desire to further national political integration. Zhuang areas had never been fully incorporated into the national political and economic system, making their primary loyalties to their region, rather than to the Chinese state. During this first phase the Zhuang were not yet a unified nationality capable of making organized demands on the state. Policy was thus driven by the central government and motivated by its desire to shift Zhuang loyalties from their basic regional group to the larger Chinese state. In an effort to incorporate the previously isolated minority groups, the government launched a major propaganda campaign denouncing what it excoriated as concerted efforts by earlier regimes to exclude the minorities from the national political system. Full participation in the Communist system, the party argued, would provide the minorities their rightful equality with the Han. Though Marxist theory contends that political reforms are meaningless without changes in economic relations, ironically during the height of orthodox Marxism under Mao Zedong’s leadership the party asserted that equality among the nationalities could be achieved only by first granting them formal political equality. During the second phase—the chaos of the Cultural Revolution— minority work was thoroughly dismantled. While the Zhuang were not persecuted on the basis of their ethnicity as much as many of the other nationalities were, the Cultural Revolution proved nonetheless extremely disruptive to minority work in Guangxi. During the third phase—the expansion of regional autonomy and the rise of middle-level Zhuang activists from 1978 to the present—the party shifted its focus in minority work from political integration to economic development. The party denounced earlier minority policy for achieving “equality on the surface, inequality in actuality.”2 Having established territorial autonomous units throughout the country and having formally incorporated the

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 75

Politics

75

Table 4.1 The Phases of Zhuang-State Political Interaction Phase one: central administrative consolidation, 1949–1966 The establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region 1949–1952, discovering the Zhuang 1952–1956, defining the Zhuang 1956–1958, promoting the Zhuang 1958–1966, administering the Zhuang Phase two: chaos and the Cultural Revolution, 1966–1978 Phase three: expansion of regional autonomy and the rise of middle-level Zhuang activists, 1978–present 1978–1984, centrally directed compensation for the Cultural Revolution 1984–1990, generalizing decentralization 1988–present, activism among middle-level Zhuang cadres and intellectuals

minority areas into a unified administrative system by 1979, the party began dedicating more energy to economic development and less to assuring minority loyalty to the state. The first half of this period was marked by an initial surge in the number of preferential policies offered the minorities to compensate for abuses suffered during the Cultural Revolution, and constant party assertions that the nationalities’ socioeconomic development must be elevated to Han levels. In 1984 the party announced the Law of Regional Autonomy, which went further than any previous effort in clarifying the legal and economic rights of the minorities in relation to the state. The party’s confidence in national administrative unity and its new focus on effective economic management during this time led it to implement a number of decentralizing reforms throughout the country. Though these reforms increased the Zhuang’s political autonomy, they also granted nonautonomous governments increased autonomy and generalized a number of autonomous privileges previously restricted solely to the minorities. Despite the increase in political autonomy, the Zhuang found themselves at a comparative disadvantage economically in a national decentralized administrative system that recognized increasingly fewer distinctions among nationalities. The effects of the party’s increased focus on economic rather than political integration led to the growth of middle-level ethnic activism, which began in the late 1980s and continues to develop. The shift away from purely self-sufficient agricultural economies toward a more integrated and interdependent economy in the 1980s lessened the party’s earlier reliance on administrative structures to achieve national integration and cohesion. Economic development in China began to illustrate that minorities could be lured into the unified state with economic incentives, rather than with political incentives such as regional autonomy.3 As the central government focused increasingly on economic efficiency in the second phase of minority work, and phased out many of the preferential policies initially offered

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

76

11:34 AM

Page 76

Creating the Zhuang

the Zhuang, the Zhuang middle-level cadres began to become increasingly vocal in demanding special privileges for their nationality. Under Mao’s early leadership, the Zhuang tried to downplay their differences from the Han, preferring not to be distinguished as a separate minority at all. Over the course of the first decade of Deng’s reforms, the Zhuang increasingly emphasized their ethnicity in order to retain special privileges that would help reduce the regional inequalities exacerbated by the market reforms. The Zhuang were initially recognized and granted an autonomous region in order to integrate them politically into a unified Chinese administrative system. Once this objective was met by the end of the Maoist era, the central government’s interest in building Zhuang ethnic solidarity and pride began to fade. Initial recognition of the Zhuang and the establishment of a territorial Zhuang homeland, however, spurred the Zhuang cadres to demand preferential treatment for their group. By the end of the 1980s, policies advocating special privileges for the Zhuang were no longer being promoted from the top down for central integrationist purposes. The Zhuang middle-level cadres, who had been trained and promoted by the central government, now mobilized to demand ethnic rights for their nationality.

Phase One: Central Administrative Consolidation, 1949–1966 Although the Chinese government stresses that a unified multinational Chinese state has been in continuous existence since Qin Shi Huangdi unified the country in 202 B.C., the defining characteristic of Chinese politics over the past two millennia has been an ongoing struggle to quell the centripetal forces threatening to shatter the center’s tenuous control. Regional and ethnic fragmentation soared in the modern era, beginning with the Taiping Rebellion in 1850, and reached its peak during the Warlord Era from 1916 to 1927. Early PRC documents consistently stress the primacy of consolidating political control throughout the country. Even before the CCP took control of the country, and while advocating the minorities’ right to complete independence and self-determination at the Party’s Second Congress in 1922, the party proclaimed its priorities to be “First: Eliminating internal chaos, defeating the warlords, establishing peace within the country.” 4 In a speech to the Central Committee in October 1938, Mao declared that unifying the nationalities was one of the major tasks facing the government. The major tenets of the party’s minority policy, he declared, should be carried out in order to unify the nationalities.5 Although the party at times acknowledged that economic development was an essential component of

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 77

Politics

77

minority policy, it was primarily concerned with economic issues in minority areas only insofar as they were perceived to affect national unity. The chairman of the Nationalities Affairs Commission, Wang Feng, reflected the primacy of political unification in a 1959 report titled “The Great Victory in Our Nationalities Policy,” summarizing nationality work during the transition from capitalism to socialism (1950–1956). Feng stated that the primary objective of minority work during the preceding decade had been “to strengthen the unification of the motherland and the unity of the nationalities in order to build the country into a large family where there will be complete equality and regional autonomy for the minorities, and the minority peoples will be aided in undertaking social reforms and developing their economics, politics, and cultures so that the backward may catch up with the advanced in the transition to socialism.”6 The party’s efforts to consolidate administrative control over Guangxi and Yunnan occurred in four areas. First, the party sought to establish the administrative regional autonomous units and institutions that would administer minority concerns. The first decade of minority policy was marked by an effort to define which areas would become autonomous regions and to clarify the degree of autonomy that would be granted the minorities within these autonomous units. In the course of this work the party recognized the inadequacy of the current minority classification process. Dispatching work teams throughout the country to determine officially which peoples could be classified as minorities and thereby become eligible for autonomous status thus became the second component of minority work during the early implementation of minority policy. It was during this second phase that the party began to group together many different ethnic groups under the single rubric of the Zhuang nationality. The party’s official recognition of the Zhuang significantly altered the boundaries of Zhuang ethnic identity and began the development of Zhuang ethnic consciousness. Once recognizing the Zhuang, the party began a major campaign to develop a Zhuang cadre corps. This third component of the early implementation of political policy in Zhuang areas has also had a major impact on the nature of Zhuang politics. It is precisely this government-created and government-trained cadre corps that began to develop into a mobilized political force under Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms. Finally, although various segments within the Zhuang nationality clearly resented outside Han control over their internal affairs, there was little sense of Zhuang solidarity throughout Guangxi and Yunnan during the early Maoist era. In an effort to convince the diverse ethnic elements within Zhuang territory that they were being represented by members of their own nationality, the party began a major political socialization campaign to strengthen both Zhuang internal unity and Zhuang “feelings of fraternity” with the Han and other

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

78

11:34 AM

Page 78

Creating the Zhuang

nationalities. This socialization campaign marked the fourth component of early minority policy in Guangxi and Yunnan.

The Establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Before I examine the decisions informing the creation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in March 1958, a brief sketch of the broader policy guidelines for establishing regional autonomous units and the formal organizational structure for implementing minority work is in order. An examination of the broad policy prescriptions will demonstrate how the government struggled to impose on Zhuang areas the guidelines it had devised to handle the northwestern minorities. Minority policy in the early 1950s was broadly summarized in three main party documents: the Common Program (1949), The General Program for the Implementation of Regional Autonomy for Nationalities in the People’s Republic of China (1952), and the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China (1954). Between 1944 and 1954 three main organizational bodies were vested with the task of implementing the minority work outlined by these three documents. The Common Program was promulgated in September 1949 and detailed the constitutional structure of the new People’s Republic of China. Articles 50 through 53 outline the broad tenets of early minority policy: Article 50. All nationalities within the boundaries of the People’s Republic of China are equal. They shall establish unity and mutual aid among themselves, and shall oppose imperialism and their own public enemies, so that the People’s Republic of China will become a big fraternal and cooperative family composed of all nationalities. Great Han nationalism and chauvinism shall be opposed. Acts involving discrimination, oppression, and splitting of the unity of the various nationalities shall be prohibited. Article 51. Regional autonomy shall be exercised in areas where national minorities are concentrated and various kinds of autonomous organizations of the different nationalities shall be set up according to the size of the respective populations and regions. In places where different nationalities live together and in the autonomous areas of the national minorities, the different nationalities shall each have an appropriate number of representatives in the local organs of political power. Article 52. All national minorities within the boundaries of the People’s Republic of China shall have the right to join the People’s Liberation Army and to organize local people’s public security forces in accordance with the unified military system of the state. Article 53. All national minorities shall have the freedom to develop their dialects and languages, to preserve or reform their traditions, customs, and religious belief. The People’s Government shall assist the masses of

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 79

Politics

79

the people of all national minorities to develop their political, economic, cultural, and educational construction work.

During the first two years of the party’s administrative consolidation, minorities joined the predominately Han peasant congresses, or “all-circles congresses,” and were guaranteed a number of representatives proportional to their percentage in the population of the territory. In areas with a dense population of minorities, “all-nationalities congresses” were established at the county and city level, with the express chief function of popularizing government regulations.7 The nationalities-congresses were promoted more as a means of disseminating top-down directives from the central government than as a means of guaranteeing the nationalities self-government. The General Program for the Implementation of Regional Autonomy for Minorities, issued in August 1952, offered further guidelines as to how autonomous areas were to be established, though they remained vague. Article 5 stated that autonomous areas should be established “according to economic, political, and other requirements of locality, and with due consideration of historical background.” The program emphasized that each autonomous government, while exercising some degree of autonomy, remained “an integral part of the territory of the People’s Republic of China” (Article 2). Article 2 also stated that “the autonomous organ of each autonomous area is a local government led by the government of the next higher level, under the unified leadership of the central government.” Exactly which areas would be granted autonomous status was to be decided “through consultation between the government of the next higher level and the representatives of the minority or minorities concerned. These proposals shall be submitted to the government of the next higher level for approval” (Article 9). Autonomous areas at the county level and higher had to be approved by the central government. Those below the county level had simply to register with the central government after receiving approval from the government immediately above them. The program also mandated that the autonomous government be composed mainly of members of the minority or minorities exercising regional autonomy, though other groups should be given “appropriate” representation (Article 12). The autonomous governments would use the language most commonly used in the area, though they were required to provide translators for those who could not use the main minority language (Article 15). The autonomous governments were given the power to choose the language of medium in local schools (Article 17). The autonomous government was also granted the right to administer its local finances, though the parameters of its control were only loosely defined as follows: “The autonomous organ of an autonomous state may, subject to the unified financial control of the state, administer the area’s

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

80

11:34 AM

Page 80

Creating the Zhuang

finances within a sphere prescribed by the central government and the local governments above its level” (Article 19). Furthermore, the development of the economy had to “be in accordance with the unified economic system and plan for economic construction of the state” (Article 20). The autonomous governments were also officially granted greater flexibility in developing their own regulations than were nonminority areas. The autonomous governments were given the power to “draw up special regulations for the area” as long as they were “in compliance with the provisions of the laws and decrees of the central government and the local governments of higher levels” (Article 23). All special regulations had to be approved by the two next higher levels of government and then be submitted through successive levels to the central government for registration. Although the local autonomous governments were given more leeway to develop regulations that suited the particular customs of their nationality, they were required at all times to “educate and guide the people living in the area towards unity and mutual assistance between all nationalities of the country, and towards love for the People’s Republic of China in which all nationalities live together in a spirit of fraternity and cooperation like one big family” (Article 29). The guidelines formulated in the Common Program and the General Program for the Implementation of Regional Autonomy for Minorities were confirmed in the nation’s first constitution, adopted by the First National People’s Congress on 20 September 1954. Three key governing organizations were established from 1944 to 1954 and entrusted with implementing minority policy. The United Front Work Department was the party organ most closely associated with minority work. Established in 1944, the UFWD was formally in charge of developing broad guidelines for minority work. The Nationalities Affairs Commission was established in February of 1952 and reported directly to the Government Administration Council (later the State Council). The 1954 constitution established a Nationalities Committee directly accountable to the National People’s Congress. Though this body was formally empowered to deliberate on the merits of autonomous regulations submitted for NPC approval by the various autonomous areas, in actuality the Nationalities Committee has played a very slight role in minority work.8 The bulk of day-to-day minority affairs is assumed by the State Council’s Nationalities Affairs Commission and its local branches. Nationalities Affairs Commissions were established from the national level down to the xian level. The NAC assumes a number of tasks and is formally in charge of dealing with all matters that impact nationality equality and autonomous rights. The central NAC was delegated the following responsibilities:

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 81

Politics

81

1. To supervise the implementation of national regional autonomy, to deal with matters concerning ensuring the minority people equality and autonomous rights, to take charge of the work of correctly identifying scattered ethnic groups, and to strive to strengthen the unity of the nationalities; 2. To publicize policies concerning minority nationalities and check up on their implementation; 3. To make concerted efforts in conjunction with the relevant departments within the State Council to promote socialist economic and cultural construction in the minority areas, particularly those situated in the frontier lands or whose inhabitants are largely engaged in livestock breeding; 4. to take charge of work related to minority languages in general, and the translation and publication of works in the minority languages in particular; 5. To take charge of minority nationalities’ institutes and the work of training minority cadres and scientific and technological personnel; 6. To organize and facilitate minority people’s visits to the hinterland and cities of the coastal provinces, and to handle matters related to visits to minority areas and relevant visits abroad; 7. to conduct constant study and investigation of minority nationalities and their areas, and to sum up experience in ethnic work; and 8. to carry out tasks assigned by the State Council concerning nationalities affairs, and to give guidance to the nationalities affairs organs of the various provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities in conducting their administrative work.9 The cornerstone of minority policy in the first decade of Communist rule was the establishment of territorial autonomous units. There were three primary reasons given for the establishment of autonomous regions, though the first clearly dominated. First, the central authorities viewed regional autonomy as a means toward improving national unity. A lengthy article in the Renmin Ribao on 15 June 1953, for example, wrote that “autonomous governments should steadily become truly national in character. This is the key to the consolidation of national unity and to strengthening the ties between the government and the people.” The same article notes that “unity must be strengthened and consolidated both between and within the various nationalities. This is a requisite for regional autonomy and one of the aims of regional autonomy.”10 The central government also viewed regional autonomy as a means of involving the minorities more in the development process. For centuries, the party argued, the minorities had been “brutally oppressed and exploited.”

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

82

11:34 AM

Page 82

Creating the Zhuang

Disenfranchised and with little hope of improving their position in life, the minorities had become passive and unwilling to strive to develop their localities. Official party articles contended that “the exercise of these autonomous rights will arouse the initiative of the various minorities in their different stages of progress to a great degree and therefore provide an impetus to the political, economic, and cultural development of these areas.”11 And, finally, the party asserted that regional autonomy was the “right of the minorities.” Positioning itself in contrast to the Nationalists, the party railed upon the GMD for not recognizing the nationalities and attempting to assimilate them forcibly. Party rhetoric attacked the “Guomindang’s systematic oppression of the minorities”12 and blamed ethnic friction on the predecessors to the CCP’s “manipulative policy of splitting and dividing the nationalities . . . and playing one minority group off of the other to impose their tyrannical rule.”13 These general guidelines and objectives for establishing autonomous areas, as outlined in the preceding chapter, were highly influenced by the party’s experiences with minorities in the north and northwest. Autonomous areas were not immediately awarded the Zhuang in 1949 but were, rather, gradually established as the party became more familiar with the nationality context in Yunnan and Guangxi. The establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region occurred in three stages, each granting greater autonomy and larger resources to the Zhuang (see Table 4.1). During the first stage, from 1949 to mid-1952, the party scarcely mentioned the Zhuang. During these first three years of the party’s rule, the Zhuang did not perceive of themselves as a single nationality and were not mobilized to demand autonomy from the government. The party showed little interest in the Zhuang, much less in awarding them a sizable autonomous territory. During the second phase, however, from 1952 to 1956, the party showed increased interest in the Zhuang and began to redefine the boundaries of Zhuang ethnicity. The party first began to mention the Zhuang’s political significance late in 1952 and within a year had established the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture. From 1952 to 1956 the central government dispatched work teams to classify which groups should be considered part of the Zhuang nationality and began efforts to increase Zhuang consciousness among the various groups that were designated as part of the Zhuang. Work teams significantly expanded the number of people classified as Zhuang. After lumping several different ethnic groups together under the single heading of “Zhuang,” the party began plans to establish a provincial-level autonomous region for the Zhuang in late 1956. The third phase in the establishment of the Zhuang Autonomous Region, from 1956 to 1958, was characterized by a major push to develop Zhuang consciousness in preparation for the announcement on 8 March 1958 of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 83

Politics

83

1949–1952: Discovering the Zhuang Zhuang autonomy was not granted immediately upon the Communists’ assumption of power. During the first three years of Communist rule, the party scarcely mentioned the Zhuang and showed no signs of offering them an autonomous area. The party had had significant contact with western Guangxi minority groups in the late 1920s when it joined a peasant movement led by a Zhuang named Wei Baqun in Donglan County. Yet even when working almost exclusively with non-Han Chinese during the Donglan uprising, as discussed later in this chapter, the party did not specifically mention the Zhuang nationality or its right to autonomy. The Zhuang were simply not unified enough or politically conscious enough to pressure the government for specific ethnic rights. The Zhuang population’s primary loyalties were to their localities and members of their locally defined ethnic group, or zhixi. Although the party had difficulty communicating with the Zhuang, who generally could not speak Mandarin, these non-Chinese speakers were not a powerful enough political force to warrant special party attention. They were fragmented by local interests that hindered their coalescing as a single ethnic group. Most of the party’s operations in the 1930s and late 1940s, moreover, were launched from urban centers, which were home primarily to Han Chinese. The importance of the urban areas further diminished any imperative to woo the loosely affiliated minority groups with promises of autonomy. Even after the PRC was forced into closer contact with the minorities during the first few years of its rule, the new administration failed to give attention to the Zhuang as a unique minority group. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) entered Guangxi on 7 November 1949 and within a few weeks had captured several key urban centers, including Guilin, Liuzhou, and Nanning. As the CCP swept south from Shanghai, it pushed the Guomindang into the mountainous border and minority areas. The border areas with Vietnam proved a strong base for the Nationalists, who used the area as a launching point for raids against the Communists. Over 470,000 antiCommunists were reportedly killed and 440,000 captured in Guangxi in the first two years of the Communist occupation alone.14 These areas were inhabited primarily by minority peoples, making their cooperation, or at the very least their nonopposition, of essential importance to the new Communist regime. That the Zhuang were scarcely mentioned during the entire “AntiCounterrevolutionary Movement” from March 1950 to 1952 underscores the weakness of the Zhuang nationality as a political player at the time. The Guangxi Province People’s Government was formally announced on 8 February 1950. Han national Zhang Yunyi assumed the chairmanship of the government. Chen Manyuan, Li Renren, and Lei Jingtian were appointed vice chairs. No specific mention of their nationality was made,

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

84

11:34 AM

Page 84

Creating the Zhuang

further indicating the lack of importance accorded ethnicity in the Zhuang area. In June 1950 and 1951 the Central People’s Government sent work teams to all the minority areas. Li Dechuan headed the team to Guangxi, and the famous Chinese anthropologist Fei Xiaotong assumed the vice chairmanship of the team. Li noted in her report that many Zhuang were not willing to be classified as Zhuang, preferring to be called Han.15 No specific recommendations were made for organizing a large-scale Zhuang autonomous area. The bulk of the work team’s efforts were directed toward establishing autonomous areas for the Yao and Miao and easing their drastic economic straits. The work team proposed a county-level multinational autonomous area in the Longshen area, for example, which was proclaimed on 19 August 1951. The first autonomous areas to be created were not in Zhuang-dominated areas, but rather in areas with a dense concentration of the Miao, Yao, and Dong minorities. On 1 July 1952 the Guangxi government and party announced that by the end of 1952, autonomous counties would be established in the Dongpopulated Sanjiang County, Miao-dominated Damiao Mountain, and multinational Longlin County. Prefectural-level autonomous areas were to be established in the Fangcheng, Shangsi, and Zhenbian areas, all of which had a mixture of nationalities. Though still making no specific recommendations for Zhuang autonomy, the party emphasized the necessity of training minority personnel to carry the Communist message to the minority masses. The vast majority of party members and officials in the area were Han, from both inside and outside the province. Very few cadres were minority nationals, and those who were rarely emphasized their nationality affiliation. In August 1951, 219 minority cadres were sent to the Southern Minority Nationalities Institute for a one-year training course. In March 1952 the party established the Guangxi Nationalities Institute in Nanning and recruited the first class of 150 students. New cadres were trained for six months before being dispatched to minority areas to implement party policy and propagate official views on minority rights. In the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture, until the Land Reform was launched in minority areas in 1952, not even one of the county mayors or party chairs was a minority. Within the prefecture’s eight counties, the highest-ranking minority cadres were vice mayors, and there were only three of these. Until 1952 there were only 430 minority cadres of any rank. This figure represented 11.67 percent of the 3,685 cadres in the area, despite the fact that minorities accounted for over 55 percent of the prefecture’s population.16 During the first two years of the CCP’s control over Guangxi, the Zhuang were generally not included among the minorities chosen to receive special government treatment. The early stages of land reform are a

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 85

Politics

85

prime example of the Zhuang’s exclusion from minority status. Although land redistribution work was postponed in the Miao, Yao, Dong, and “other minorities” areas until December 1953, Zhuang lands were redistributed along with Han lands beginning in late 1950. No special distinctions were made between Han and Zhuang territories, though a directive entitled “Law on the Implementation of Land Reform in Minority Areas” called for special tactics in “Miao, Yao, Dong, and Other Minority Areas.”17 That no special mention was made of the Zhuang, and that they were excluded from preferential treatment, suggest that they were not yet considered a full-fledged nationality, or at least not one capable of demanding special treatment from the government. Gu Youshi, a prominent Zhuang historian at the Guangxi Nationalities Institute in Nanning, published a controversial article in May 1989 criticizing the party’s failure to separate the Zhuang’s land-tenure system from that of the Han. 18 During the initial stages of the land reform movement in 1950, work teams from the county level and higher were dispatched to villages to determine which households should be listed as landlord, rich peasant, middle peasant, poor peasant, or worker households. According to several Zhuang scholars, the party suggested quotas for determining the percentage of households falling into each category. These percentages, the scholars relate, were developed in the Han areas and simply imposed upon the Zhuang territories without considering the different land distribution system in the Zhuang areas. Gu Youshi provides abundant citations from village surveys conducted in the 1930s through the early 1950s to show that land was fairly evenly distributed among the Zhuang in most areas, while the Han in the eastern portion of the province had a clearer division between landlords and tenant farmers. In his 1934 book entitled A Survey of the Guangxi Economy, for example, researcher Qian Jiaju explicitly notes the differences between landholding patterns in eastern and western Guangxi: “Generally speaking those in the west till their own land, while those in the east farm as tenants.”19 Qian conducted a survey of three villages in Wuming County, populated almost entirely by Zhuang, and found that only 1.7 percent of the villagers were tenant farmers. The remainder of the peasants tilled their own land. One of these middle peasant households owned 70 mu of land, more than three times the average landholding of those classified as landlords in neighboring Baise County, another Zhuang county to the west. Despite the relatively even distribution of landholding, land reform was carried out in the same manner in both Zhuang and Han areas. Gu Youshi argues that the Zhuang have been held back economically due to the government’s failure to recognize their uniqueness as a nationality.20 In September 1952 the government sponsored a Guangxi nationalities work conference. Prior to this conference there was no mention of the

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

86

11:34 AM

Page 86

Creating the Zhuang

creation of a Zhuang autonomous unit. George Moseley concludes that “there is considerable evidence that the Chuang were not then considered to be a national minority at all, and that it was only at the September work conference that a decision to this effect was made.”21 Although the party, on occasion, referred to the Zhuang as a separate nationality after 1938, all evidence indicates that prior to September 1952 it did not view the Zhuang as numerous or concentrated enough to warrant an autonomous government. By September 1952 the party decided to recognize the Zhuang and to declare the launching of preparations for establishing a Zhuang autonomous area.

1952–1956: Defining the Zhuang Although the Zhuang were not organized politically to articulate specific demands on the state, the party realized the practical merits of recognizing the Zhuang and awarding them autonomy as it became more familiar with the Guangxi and Yunnan context. During a seminar on Zhuang ethnic consciousness in June 1995, a leading scholar at the Guangxi Nationalities Research Institute summarized the situation for me as follows: The Zhuang may not have been organized or had a strong sense of ethnic consciousness before the party came to power, but it would be ridiculous to therefore assume that the decision to recognize them was simply created from the top down with no pressures from below. There were a number of grassroots reasons for recognizing the Zhuang and awarding them autonomy. First, Zhuang had their own cultural traditions. If you didn’t understand the Zhuang culture, and just waltzed in with outside directives, you couldn’t hope to get a single thing accomplished. You simply had to have Zhuang leadership, or central policies would never reach the people. Second, linguistic considerations were a key reason for encouraging Zhuang cadres to take rule over their own internal affairs. It’s easy enough to see. The CCP didn’t simply decide that the Zhuang should be ruled by their own people: the party had no choice since it didn’t have administrators trained in the Zhuang language or familiar with the Zhuang culture. That was a type of grassroots pressure, you could say.

Perhaps also spurred by the promulgation of the General Program for the Implementation of Regional Autonomy for Minorities on 8 August 1952, the party formed a twenty-four-person preparatory committee for the establishment of the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture (WGZAP) in early October 1952. The committee held an expanded meeting on November 6 with over 150 delegates from county governments and representatives from each of the nationality groups. Though precise minutes from the meeting are not publicly available, all references to the meetings

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 87

Politics

87

suggest that there was much resistance, even from the Zhuang themselves, to establishing a Zhuang autonomous area. A recent study of the meeting conducted by several of the most vocal Zhuang activists acknowledged that “since the Zhuang had been exploited and their very nationality denied for so long by the ruling class, they often thought of themselves simply as ‘base locals’ (turen, tulao), and did not speak out for Zhuang self-rule.” 22 Few Zhuang actively promoted a Zhuang autonomous unit, and many actively resisted it. After the preparatory meeting concluded, three work teams were dispatched to each county in the proposed area of the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture. The work teams comprised members from work teams at the three different administrative levels—the central government, the South-Central Military Administrative Region, and Guangxi Province. The primary task of the work teams was to convince “both cadres and the masses of the importance of establishing an autonomous area.” 23 The pressure to create the Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture clearly did not emanate from the grassroots level by the Zhuang themselves. Rather, the proposal was actively promoted by the central government and systematically propagated by the three levels just mentioned. The work teams constantly had to overcome Zhuang contentions that the Zhuang were not a unique nationality, but rather “Han who can speak the Zhuang language.” One report notes that the teams often heard the question, “We’re all Chinese, so why do we have to split into different nationalities?” The masses reportedly did not understand “what kind of people count as Zhuang.”24 The first Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture AllNationalities All-People’s Congress held its first meeting 3–9 December 1952. The Congress’s two major reports—“Implementation Essentials of the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Area” and “Regulations on the Establishment of the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Area Government”—announced that the first and most essential responsibility of the government would be the consolidation and strengthening of nationality unity.25 The birth of the WGZAP government was officially announced on 10 December 1952 by the newly appointed WGZAP governor, Qin Yingji. The Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture had a population of 6.26 million, 78.2 percent of whom were minorities. The Zhuang made up 67.1 percent of the area’s total population, whereas the Han accounted for 21.8 percent of the composition.26 Despite these official figures, when individuals were asked to declare their nationality in the first national census in June 1953, significant portions of the “Zhuang” population did not register as such. Many either continued to register as Han, or listed their zhixi as their nationality.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

88

11:34 AM

Page 88

Creating the Zhuang

Indeed, more than four hundred different nationalities registered for recognition throughout China in this first CCP census. Census takers were told to let the people declare their own nationality status for the record. The obvious impracticality of awarding territorial autonomy and proportionate congressional representation to such a large number of groups was evident. From 1952 to 1956, then, the government began a massive campaign to clarify which groups could be considered separate nationalities, and in Guangxi and Yunnan to examine which should be recorded as Zhuang. In early 1953, the party began to dispatch identification teams to investigate the claims made by the various groups seeking recognition; in 1956 it began the classification work in greater earnest and dispatched sixteen separate identification teams throughout the country, with a total of more than one thousand anthropologists, linguists, historians, and political scientists participating. Even if political considerations could be extracted from the classification process, clarifying which groups should be considered separate nationalities was, and continues to be, an extremely complicated problem for the Chinese administration. The CCP broadly adopted the definition of nationality first formulated by Stalin in his 1914 monograph Marxism and the National Question: “A nation is a historically formed stable community of people arising on the basis of common language, common territory, common economic life, and a typical cast of mind manifested in a common culture.”27 The CCP instructed the Chinese work teams to use Stalin’s criteria flexibly, however, and constantly consider “China’s concrete conditions and the wishes of the minorities concerned.”28 The Classification Teams were instructed to make their final decisions based on the particular economic conditions, historical background, and internationality relations in a particular area. “We did not try to impose nationality on anyone. If they were not willing to be classed a particular minority, then we didn’t force it upon them,” an original member of the Guangxi Classification Team in the 1950s recounted during an interview. “Likewise, if they wanted to be called a certain minority, then we called them that. That was one of our guiding principles.” Political considerations factored heavily, nonetheless, into which groups would be labeled “Zhuang,” and some force was used to “convince” local ethnic leaders to accept the Zhuang classification. By the original classification team member’s own admission, individuals and even entire districts were often saddled with minority labels that they did not accept. Guangxi, Yunnan, and Guizhou were each investigated by different teams, and the division of nationalities, not surprisingly, often was determined more by where they lived than by any “objective” Stalinist criteria. The division between the Zhuang and the Buyi nationality, found primarily in southern Guizhou, for example, was largely determined by provincial

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 89

Politics

89

divisions rather than by purely Stalinist criteria. Many of the people labeled “Buyi” in Guizhou are actually blood relatives of those labeled “Zhuang” across the border in Guangxi. In some cases, according to villagers near the border, immediate family members were often labeled as two separate nationalities if they straddled the border. According to participants in the classification process, the director and vice director of the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission went to Guizhou in 1952 to discuss classification work with their Guizhou counterparts. The Guizhou NAC representative told them that how Guangxi chose to label its nationalities was up to Guangxi, but that the Guizhou Buyi were unwilling to be classified as “Zhuang.” Many educated Zhuang are aware of the arbitrary nature of the division of the two groups. A prominent Zhuang scholar informed me that “everyone in China knows that during a meeting on nationality policy in the early 1950s, Zhou Enlai decided to divide the Zhuang into smaller groups so that they wouldn’t become overly powerful”—though without documentation, I present his account more as evidence of contemporary concern that Zhuang power has been concertedly limited by the central regime than as proof thereof. In private interviews with two members of separate classification teams, both frankly acknowledged that political considerations played a role in distinguishing which and what size groups would be considered nationalities, though one interviewee stressed that these were not the primary considerations. Although some groups, such as the Buyi and Zhuang, were arbitrarily divided into separate nationalities, dozens more that considered themselves distinct nationalities were lumped together under the rubric of one greater Zhuang nation. A participant in the classification process offers the following example: There were four counties in Guangxi where the people called themselves Budai29 and we considered labeling them Dai.30 There was an argument for calling them Dai, but they could also be viewed as Zhuang, so we just decided to call them Zhuang and forget about it. Some of these Budai cadres understood the debate, though, and wanted to be called Dai. They began making demands. Some of them were very unhappy about being called Zhuang. They’ve written several reports and have unceasingly demanded that the authorities change their status. It’s still being considered in Beijing now.

Recognizing the Budai as Dai rather than as Zhuang would allow them to establish autonomous Dai counties within Guangxi, in accordance with the regulations on autonomous regions and with the constitution. Guangxi’s reluctance to acknowledge another minority within its borders and the central government’s reluctance to complicate further the gerrymandering of

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

90

11:34 AM

Page 90

Creating the Zhuang

autonomous areas sensitized the classification issue. In 1984 a member of the original classification team brought the concerns in Guangxi to the attention of the Central NAC at a conference of local Nationality Affairs Commissions. He mentioned groups in Nandan County that wanted to change their classification to Yao, the population of the four counties that wished to be considered Dai, and several areas with populations wishing to be labeled Buyi. Prominent anthropologist Fei Xiaotong also attended the conference and dismissed his report by stating that the Miao and Yao were after all of the same family,31 as were the Zhuang and the Dai. People had become used to the classifications they were given, and there was really no need to confuse the whole situation all over again, he stated. “All I could do was report the people’s concerns. Whether or not these concerns were taken up or not, was not up to me,” the original classification team member explained. He alluded to the politically sensitive nature of even mentioning changes in minority classification by repeating, “I brought the issue to the government’s attention. I dared to speak out. I dared to speak out.” Dozens of similar examples abound of people being labeled “Zhuang” who themselves did not, and do not, wish to accept the classification. More than thirty-four thousand people living in Daxin County in Guangxi, for example, denied their Zhuang identity when the initial classification process began. They continued to contest their nationality status until the Guangxi NAC classification department definitively resolved the Daxin issue in 1980 by declaring all thirty-four thousand people Zhuang. Classification teams sent to Yunnan Province in 1954 lumped together the numerous groups living in Wenshan Prefecture as belonging to the Zhuang nationality. Despite the groups’ contention that they belonged to the “Sha nationality” or “Tu nationality” or one of the other groups now considered branches of the Zhuang, the classification teams dismissed the groups’ self-identifications as “misunderstandings” of their nationality. Official government publications explain the classification of the various branches as a single Zhuang nationality by noting “their close contact with the Guangxi Zhuang, and their strong sense of minority solidarity with the Guangxi Zhuang.”32 As Chapter 2 indicated, however, groups in Guangxi had little contact with neighboring villages and little sense of the “minority solidarity” the government used to justify grouping them together. In 1953, 98.28 percent of all Zhuang resided in Guangxi. After the party’s work teams concluded that the various sects in Wenshan should all be included as Zhuang, as well as several communities throughout the southwest that originally listed themselves as “Zhuang-speaking Han,” only 92.36 percent of Zhuang lived in Guangxi. Whether or not the Wenshan classification system was intended to divide the Zhuang across provincial borders, from the central government’s perspective surely such a phenomenon eased any latent fears of Zhuang at some point organizing territorially in opposition to central authority.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 91

Politics

91

When asked to declare their own nationality in 1953, only 6.61 million people registered as Zhuang. By 1990 more than 15,490,000 Chinese citizens were registered as members of the Zhuang nationality. The number of Zhuang rose to 7,748,600 by the second census in 1964. This represented a 19.92 percent increase in the Zhuang population. During the first three years of the party’s rule, when it encouraged minorities in Guangxi and Yunnan to utilize the privileges bestowed them by the party’s minority policy, the number of people living in the fifteen most concentrated Zhuang counties increased from 2,775,900 in 1950 to 2,942,700 in 1953. This represented an increase of 6 percent, or an average of 1.5 percent annually. After the establishment of the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture and the dispatchment of central classification teams, the number of people classified as “Zhuang” rose at an even quicker rate. From 1953 to 1958 more than 244,500 people who previously had denied their Zhuang ethnicity were classified by the work teams as “Zhuang.” During this fiveyear period, the number of Zhuang increased by 8.31 percent, or 1.6 percent annually.33

1956–1958: Promoting the Zhuang Given the lack of grassroots support for regional autonomy in the primarily minority-populated Western Guangxi Autonomous Prefecture, the motivations for expanding regional autonomy to the provincial level appear particularly puzzling. Again, the decision to expand the autonomous prefecture into the provincial-level Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region clearly seems to have been instigated from the top down in order to integrate the diverse localities. On 27 September 1956 Zhou Enlai met with nine members of the Guangxi Provincial Communist Party. On the second of October this Guangxi committee submitted a report to Zhou entitled “Some Suggestions Regarding the Establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.” The report indicated that more than thirty-seven thousand Zhuang cadres had been trained after the establishment of the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture and that they were now ready to aid in the establishment of a provincial-level autonomous area. From October 1956 through June 1957 the party began a mass campaign to prepare the Guangxi population and cadres for the establishment of the autonomous area. During the preparatory stages, three key issues were discussed in a series of enlarged party and government meetings at every level of the Guangxi administration.34 The party’s resolution on each of these issues had a profound impact on the course of Zhuang-state interaction throughout the next four decades. The first issue discussed was the most basic, yet had the most profound impact on the future evolution of Zhuang consciousness:

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

92

11:34 AM

Page 92

Creating the Zhuang

Should the Zhuang receive their own autonomous region? Although the exact minutes of the meetings are not publicly available, Chinese accounts of the meetings strongly suggest that the government still struggled to convince the Zhuang that they were a separate nationality. The accounts of the discussion give no indication that the Zhuang were actively seeking an autonomous area and, rather, suggest that the decision to create the GZAR was made at the top and promoted from the top down. At a 25 March 1956 Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) meeting before the major preparation work began, Zhou Enlai stated that “Some people say the Zhuang have few distinctive characteristics and they have left little mark on history. But it’s impossible to say that they are less of a minority than the Manchus. The Zhuang have their own language and their own culture. These are their distinctive markers.” The tone of the remarks that follow indicate that many within the administration were not convinced that the Zhuang should even be recognized as a minority, much less that they should receive their own autonomous area: “Many of our country’s nationalities had not reached the stage of capitalist development before Liberation,35 but their nationality characteristics nonetheless existed at various stages of development. We have to recognize and appreciate the various historical and concrete conditions limiting nationality development, or we will have no way of uniting the nationalities. Starting from this understanding, there is no doubt we should recognize the Zhuang as a nationality.” In advocating the establishment of the Guangxi Autonomous Region, the central government blamed the lack of Zhuang consciousness on the earlier exploitative rulers: “The reactionary ruling class historically implemented a policy of forced assimilation and incorrectly viewed the Zhuang as ‘local people’ or ‘Han local people’ or ‘yokels,’ entirely refusing to recognize them as a separate nationality.”36 Whatever the cause, even the party recognized that the Zhuang lacked ethnic consciousness. The second issue addressed during the preparatory stage was whether Guangxi should be divided into two administrative areas or unified into one. Those advocating separate administrations for western and eastern Guangxi argued that such a division better reflected the ethnic distribution throughout the province. Sixty-seven percent of the Western Guangxi area’s population was minority, whereas only 38 percent of the entire province was non-Han. Again, the decision to unify the province seems to have been made at the top. Reports suggest that the Zhuang believed they would be outnumbered by the Han in their own autonomous area, whereas the Han worried that they would lose representation and be exploited if they were ruled by an autonomous minority government. The government appealed to the interests of both sides by stressing the “mutual benefits of unity and the mutual detriments of separation (hezi liangli, fenli lianghai).”

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 93

Politics

93

The chair of the United Front Work Department, Li Weihan, gave reasons for unifying the province that seemed to appeal more to Han interests, further illuminating the weakness of Zhuang input in the decision to establish the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Li stated that the Zhuang-inhabited areas amount to 60% of Guangxi’s territory, while the Han occupy only 30% and the other minorities together have only 10% of the land. The proportion of land occupied by the Zhuang and Han is in inverse proportion to the percentage of the total population they each make up. If Guangxi is divided into two administrative areas, the new Guangxi Province would make up only 30% of the current territory, obviously an extremely small amount. It would be much more appropriate to combine both the population and land together. Guangxi has already developed into a single entity. In terms of transportation, economics, and all other aspects, it is obvious that unity is advantageous, separation detrimental.”37

The Han were also reminded of the rich natural resources lying beneath western Guangxi soil, which could be exploited only with the “help of the advanced technology and expertise of the relatively advanced Han nationality.”38 The government argued that the Zhuang would also benefit from unification with eastern Guangxi. With unification, the preparatory meetings stressed, the Zhuang would have access to a seaport, located in eastern Guangxi. The government also stressed that the Zhuang would have little means of exploiting their natural resources without technical assistance from the Han. The third issue that required resolution was the name of the proposed autonomous area. Many delegates resisted calling the new area the “Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region,” advocating instead the “Guangxi Han-Zhuang Autonomous Region,” the “Guangxi Provincial Autonomous Region,” the “Guangxi Autonomous Region,” or the “Guangxi Multinationality Autonomous Region,” The establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in March 1958 had a profound influence on the future evolution of Zhuangstate interaction and Zhuang ethnic mobilization. Anthony Smith argues that the “territorialization” of ethnicity is a necessary stage in the evolution of ethnic groups to nations. “Only in and on a homeland,” Smith writes, “can state or elites mobilize ‘citizens’; so that a precondition of the nation is the acquisition of a homeland, as so many Diaspora or divided and subordinated communities like the Armenians, Kurds, Ewe and Somali have found.”39 The official recognition of the Zhuang and the establishment of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, promoted by the central government during its first decade in power, thus spurred the development of the modern Zhuang nation.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

94

11:34 AM

Page 94

Creating the Zhuang

Hagiography. Once the party made the decision to create the Zhuang Autonomous Region, it needed to build Zhuang cohesion and increase Zhuang ethnic pride. One of the vice chairmen of the Nationalities Affairs Commission, Wang Feng, stated in his report at the third session of the NAC in June 1953: “In the work of advancing regional autonomy, efforts should be made to strengthen and secure the internal unity of the nationality group concerned. This also requires that before the autonomous region is established, great effort be directed to organizing each tribe and each region, and each religious faction so as to educate them in organization and so as to resolve the existent conflicts and discord and get rid of all obstacles among them.”40 During my interviews with peasants in Guangxi and Yunnan, I was often told both by common peasants and communist officials that the Zhuang had no sense of ethnic identity because they had no “heroes,” either currently or historically. “The Zhuang have no confidence in themselves,” one young Zhuang teacher in Wenshan told me. “We have no confidence in ourselves, so we don’t try to pull ourselves out of our economic depression. We have no confidence largely because we don’t have any historical heroes. We are the largest minority in China, and yet we’re probably the only group with no heroes.” Seeking to build internal Zhuang cohesion, emphasize Zhuang historical cooperation with their “Han big brothers,” and build Zhuang pride, the party began to develop a gallery of Zhuang heroes after 1952. A number of historical and legendary figures from Zhuang areas were hailed as symbols of the “great contribution” the “Zhuang nationality” had made to the “motherland.” Although the party portrayed these historic figures as leaders of the Zhuang people, the figures themselves rarely mentioned their own nationality and did not address the Zhuang as a people. Perhaps the best example of this post-Liberation secular hagiography is the party’s treatment of Wei Baqun. Born in 1894, Wei Baqun led a series of peasant uprisings in 1923 in Zhuang-dominated Donglan County in western Guangxi. Seizing on the opportunities presented by the peasant movement in Donglan, the central CCP sent representatives to the area in the late 1920s and established the Right River Soviet. The movement expanded throughout much of western Guangxi and became known as the Baise Uprising. After 1949, the party began a massive propaganda campaign to “honor the achievements of the great Zhuang hero, Wei Baqun.” Mao Zedong hailed Wei as “the son of the Zhuang people” and “great leader of the peasantry.”41 The Baise Uprising is one of the rare examples of Zhuang history examined by Western scholars. In addition to her broader work on Guangxi politics in the 1920s and 1930s, Diana Lary has specifically studied the

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 95

Politics

95

movement led by Wei Baqun. She concludes that the Baise Uprising was “motivated more by racial, anti-Han feelings than by a desire for social revolution.”42 During the 1920s, however, Wei Baqun himself rarely, if ever, mentioned his nationality and did not appeal to uniquely Zhuang concerns to inspire a following. References to the Zhuang were entirely absent in Wei’s writings and those who were involved in the movement attest that Wei did not view the movement in ethnic terms.43 Lary contends that “there was no Marxist flavor to the Chuang peasant movement which Wei helped to organize in 1923, in the hills of Tunglan hsien, to the east of the Right River. It was simply a movement of selfprotection and ethnic protest.”44 Careful analysis of the movement and of recently discovered sources, however, clearly shows that the movement was not inspired by ethnic concerns, but rather by economic and political issues. Although the Baise Uprising was later hailed as the largest Zhuang uprising and a cornerstone of Zhuang involvement in the Communist revolution, during the movement itself there was no mention of Zhuang ethnicity either by the Zhuang participants or the Han cadres sent to the area. There is no indication that the Zhuang participants targeted their disgruntlement against Han specifically, and no reason to believe that the uprising led the party later to feel that it should grant the Zhuang special privileges. The economic and political, as opposed to ethnic, nature of the movement can be illustrated by examining the causes of the uprising, the ideological statements made by Wei Baqun and the Right River Soviet leadership, and the organizational structure and policy agenda of the Soviet. Donglan County is predominately Zhuang. Eighty percent of the population is Zhuang, 12 percent Yao, and only 8 percent Han. In the 1920s a handful of landlords owned between 60 and 70 percent of the land. The remainder of the population paid between two-thirds to three-fifths of their income to the landlords and provided fifteen days of corvée labor each year.45 As in many other Zhuang areas, relations between the Zhuang and Yao were strained. The Zhuang in the area contend that their ancestors came to the region from Shandong and Shanxi Provinces and found the area inhabited by Yao. Local Zhuang legend holds that the Yao occupied the best valley lands when the Zhuang first arrived. To avoid continuous fighting, the Zhuang ancestors challenged the Yao to an archery competition. Whoever won could keep the fertile land, and the losers would be banished to the infertile mountains. The victorious Zhuang thus began their economic and political dominance over the Yao.46 The Han in the area began arriving in Donglan toward the end of the Ming dynasty. By this time the Zhuang were securely in control of the arable land and Zhuang tusi carefully monitored Han activity in the area.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

96

11:34 AM

Page 96

Creating the Zhuang

The tusi favored the Zhuang and openly discriminated against both the Yao and Han.47 Neither minority was allowed to sit for the imperial exam, for example, and the most menial of the corvée tasks were consistently thrust on the Yao. Though there are clear signs of tensions among the three different nationalities in the area, the demarcations among the groups were not always clearly drawn. Class distinctions and location often greatly influenced group identity. The Zhuang in Donglan did not refer to themselves as “Zhuang,” for example, but rather as “villagers” (bouxman in Zhuang). Exactly how they viewed the Zhuang living in the cities, therefore, is not clear. The Zhuang called the Yao bouxyao, meaning mountain people. During my interviews in the area, several Zhuang told me that even if the government classified someone as “Zhuang,” and even if that person spoke the Zhuang language, the valley Zhuang would still refer to Zhuang living outside the valley as bouxyao—the same term used to refer to members of the Yao nationality. Although the Han in the area clearly perceived some difference between themselves and the Zhuang, they did not seem to believe they were of different origin or ethnic stock. In the 1920s the Han living in Donglan referred to themselves as “late Han” and the Zhuang as “earlier Han,” indicating that the Zhuang arrived in the area earlier but were not fundamentally different from the Han.48 Many of the Zhuang landlords and elite lived in the area’s small cities and had more contact with Han than did the Zhuang living in the rural valleys. Taxes in the area were exorbitantly high. Although set taxes placed many farmers in difficult financial straits, the real source of peasant irritants was the surplus taxes levied by local tax collectors. 49 These tax collectors demanded dozens of “special supplementary” taxes, including taxes on marketing, straw sandals, contracts, oils, tobacco, and teas. Peasants paid three taxes on each pig they raised for slaughter: 10 percent on piglets, 15 percent on grown pigs, and 25 percent on slaughtering. Tax collectors also extracted funds to support local militias, demanding that each peasant household pay a soldier tax, military dormitory fees, and an “autonomy tax.”50 Peasants who could not pay their taxes were imprisoned or beaten. Despite Lary’s suggestion that Wei Baqun’s early movement was ethnically rather than politically or economically based, the main targets of the movement were Zhuang landlords rather than Han. One of the earliest targets of the movement, for example, was Wei Longpu. Wei Longpu was not only a Zhuang, but a descendant of the Zhuang tusi who had ruled under the Qing. Wei was a major landowner and held the top political post at the lowest government administrative level (tuanwu zongjuzhang). The peasants so feared and loathed Wei Longpu they referred to him as the “Living King of Hell.”

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 97

Politics

97

Lary contends that Wei was not a Marxist in the early 1920s, and that his early revolutionary calls were motivated by ethnic concerns rather than class concerns. The documentary and interview data do not support Lary’s assertion, and there is much to suggest the opposite. Lary writes that “Chuang clashes with local landlords were not preceded by invocations of Marx and Lenin, but by the drinking of chicken’s blood and the swearing of ritual oaths.” 51 That traditional minority rituals would have been used should not seem surprising, nor should it be viewed as proof that the attacks on the landlords were therefore ethnically motivated. First, as already shown, the targets of the attacks were landlords and officials, not Han per se. Second, although Wei did not specifically refer to Marx and Lenin to rally the peasants immediately before attacking the landlords, the rhetoric used was nonetheless Marxist in tone, and clearly not ethnic. Wei’s early training and writings closely parallel the training of other Marxist revolutionaries. Wei was born into an affluent landowning home in 1894. In 1914 he left home to study and travel in Sichuan, Guizhou, and Guangdong. Wei was in Guangdong during the height of the May Fourth Movement and was highly influenced by his reading of both Sun Yatsen’s works and a collection of “progressive works” including New Youth.52 While in Sichuan and Guangdong, Wei wrote a number of scathing essays under the pseudonym “Indignant of Inequality” (fen buping). He mailed several volumes of New Youth to classmates back in Donglan. May Fourth ideals were not totally alien to the citizens of Donglan County. A man named Wei Qingyun organized a group of students and teachers from the Second Normal University in Guilin to spread the message of May Fourth and sent a team of students and faculty to markets throughout Donglan county.53 The most representative of Wei’s early articles, “A Call to Our Countrymen” (1922), clearly indicates the prominence of class, as opposed to ethnic, theory in Wei’s appeals. Wei’s opening paragraph proclaims: Countrymen, carefully listen: feeling indignant and without means of breaking free of my hatred and anger, I have traveled the country for two years with a few of my comrades. During these two years, from all I have seen of our country’s internal chaos, [I can tell you] all is a result of the warlords’ usurpation of our land, politicians fighting over the public pot, bureaucrats hoarding building lands, the gentry squabbling over grain and meat, landlords pillaging the peasants, the wealthy calculating against the poor, destruction from bandits and the military, and famine. Everywhere it is like this. It is desperately serious! There is no other way to deal with the situation than to implement Sun Yatsen’s nationalism, democracy, and people’s livelihood. I hope our countrymen will unite. We must first strike down the foreign devils invading our land, eradicate the bandit warlord troops, and implement the National Revolution.54

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

98

11:34 AM

Page 98

Creating the Zhuang

Each paragraph of the essay then addresses in turn Wei’s “beloved” students, peasants, workers, businessmen, and brigands and urges them to “awaken” and join the movement. Nowhere in this call to arms does Wei mention ethnicity. Indeed, none of Wei’s early writings mention the Zhuang, though they clearly argue for economic and political reforms. Party historiography emphasizes Wei’s calls for all three nationalities to unite and work together. In an essay written for the Fiftieth Anniversary Commemoration of Wei Baqun’s death, the leading Zhuang official in Guangxi, Wei Guoqing, hails Wei Baqun as “the good son of the Zhuang nationality” who led the Baise Uprising “in order to liberate each of China’s nationalities and implement the far-sighted ideals of Communism.” Wei Guoqing writes that “Wei Baqun placed extreme emphasis on implementing the party’s minority policy in order to mobilize each of the nationalities to unite in making revolution. Early on, even before the establishment of the Seventh Route Army, he called for ‘Zhuang, Han, and Yao equality.’”55 Yet none of the voluminous documents from the time even hint at Wei Baqun’s alleged concern for Zhuang affairs. Though some readers may contend that most of the available documents have been compiled under CCP censorship, and may have been purged of any “splittist” references favoring the Zhuang over other nationalities, interview data confirm Wei’s lack of emphasis on Zhuang ethnic concerns. One of Wei Baqun’s few surviving compatriots still lives in Donglan County. Ya Meiyuan, born in 1903, studied and worked closely with Wei. Wei mentioned Ya by name in several of his correspondences with associates. In an August letter in 1927, for example, Wei mentioned to an associate that Ya was one of the leading members of a special military team that had rounded up and jailed five “enemies.” 56 In his nineties, Ya today proudly tells of the heroic uprising of Wei Baqun. During our extended interview in the summer of 1995, Ya often mentioned that Wei was a great man and a “Zhuang hero.” When I asked him if Wei ever specifically appealed to Zhuang ethnicity as a means of mobilizing the peasants, however, he seemed almost indignant. “No,” he said quickly, shaking his head. “The movement was one which included Yao, Zhuang, and Han all together. He never specifically mentioned the Zhuang nationality.” While touring the Wei Baqun Museum in Donglan, a Zhuang NAC official explained why Wei Baqun did not stress Zhuang concerns: “Wei Baqun only mentioned needing equality for the Yao and not for the Zhuang because here in Donglan, the Zhuang and the Han are pretty much equal. When you’re in the majority, you don’t think about your rights. The Zhuang are the big majority here. If you talk about equality for the Zhuang, it’s in relation to the rest of the country, not within the county.” During a three-day series of interviews with peasants in Donglan County, I interviewed a seventy-nine-year-old woman in Wei Baqun’s

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 99

Politics

99

home village. She said she vividly remembered her mother’s stories of Wei Baqun. “He wasn’t an ethnic leader. He was a peasant leader. The whole area was Zhuang. We certainly didn’t intermarry with any outsiders, but that was because transportation was so bad. We didn’t think about being Zhuang because everyone around us was just the same. It wasn’t like now with bicycles and cars and roads. Everyone we came into contact with was Buban.” The use of the term buban further emphasizes the lack of a greater Zhuang inspiration for the Baise Movement. Zhuang in Donglan did not even use the word Zhuang to refer to themselves. Documentary and interview sources all suggest that the peasant movement was not ethnically inspired in Donglan. The lack of references to minority issues once the new soviet was established also indicates that minority issues were not high in priority. No references were made of the Zhuang, much less of offering them special privileges or compensations, by the Soviet government. The October 1929 “Draft of the Guangxi Donglan County Revolutionary Committee Meeting’s Most Basic Government Guidelines” lists nine issues of top concern to the new government. The only mention of nationality affairs is found in Issue Three, headed “In Regard to Yao Nationality Issues.” The new government proposed four ways of aiding the Yao: 1. Improve Yao education. 2. Guarantee Yao equality with other people in the areas of economics, government, education, and wages. 3. Strictly prohibit abuse of the Yao people. 4. Confiscate the mountain landowners’ farms, lands, and forests and divide them among the Yao people.57 No mention was made of the Zhuang at all. The Yao were guaranteed equality with “all other people” rather than with the Han and the Zhuang per se. It appears that the Zhuang were not even perceived of as a separate category of peoples, and certainly not as a unique nationality during the entire Donglan peasant movement. The Right River Soviet government structure, which Wei Baqun and the CCP established in the late 1920s, had no special organizations or personnel to handle minority affairs. At the village (xiang) level, administrative affairs were divided into six divisions: land, health, grain distribution, dispute and counterrevolutionary settlements, culture, and finances.58 In typical CCP fashion the Donglan Soviet leadership began a massive propaganda campaign to build support among the peasantry. None of the slogans (xuanchuan biaoyan) collected from the late 1920s by the Guangxi Propaganda Bureau mentioned minority concerns.59 Had ethnicity been a potent mobilizing force, the party surely would have sought to exploit it.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

100

11:34 AM

Page 100

Creating the Zhuang

Though the party’s historiography can rightly be viewed with circumspection, had minority concerns been an important motivating force behind the Donglan uprising, the leadership certainly would have utilized it in the propaganda campaign. However, minority concerns were not mentioned once in the fifty-seven slogans recorded by the Propaganda Bureau in 1930. Rather, the focus was on traditional party themes, with slogans such as “Unite the Revolutionary Strength of the Workers, Peasants, Military, and Masses,” “Confiscate the Imperialists’ Banks and Enterprises on Chinese Soil,” “Kill the Despots, Gentry, and Landlords!” In a May 1930 article on “The Guangxi Soviet Situation” appearing in the party’s theoretical journal Red Flag, no mention was made of minorities at all.60 The articles discussed the status of land reform and taxes in the area but made no mention of either the Zhuang or the Yao. At no time was the minority issue considered of primary importance for the Donglan Soviet. In March 1930 the official emphasis was placed on land redistribution.61 Party cadres and government workers studied four primary documents for guidance during this period: “Current Government Policy Implementation of the Chinese Workers, Peasants, and Seventh Red Army,” “Report from the Government Department of the Chinese Workers, Peasants, and Seventh Red Army Headquarters,” “General Order of the Right River Soviet Government,” and “Land Reform.” In none of these guiding documents were minorities mentioned. No special policies were proposed in these documents to aid the minorities during this time. That the Zhuang were not considered a unique minority of political consequence at this time is further suggested in the lack of special programs designed to build a Zhuang cadre corps. The party did note the limited number of Yao cadres, however, and established a special class in 1930 to train more Yao party members. The first four-month class trained forty Yao students. The second class lasted three months and trained fifty students.62

Political ritualization of traditional Zhuang festivals. In addition to building a gallery of Zhuang heroes, the party sought to co-opt traditional local festivals, assuring that ethnic rituals would not reinforce nationality divisions but, rather, highlight the CCP’s pivotal role in protecting the minorities’ right to celebrate their traditional holidays. The CCP presents itself as the liberator and protector of the Zhuang nation. Under the former regimes, the party emphasizes, the Zhuang were so exploited and looked down upon that their very existence as a people was denied. While emphasizing that the party is willing to recognize and even promote traditional Zhuang customs and festivals that do not directly challenge socialist principles, the party has simultaneously and skillfully manipulated these festivals. Festivals that were once carried out at the village level have been expanded to

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 101

Politics

101

include not only all Zhuang, but all minorities. The party’s sponsorship of the March Third Festival offers a clear example. Sanyuesan is the largest and one of the most sacred of the Zhuang festivals. Sanyuesan is held on the third day of the third lunar month. The festival lasts either one or two days and is marked most by singing traditional Zhuang mountain songs (duige). The festival is held just outside Zhuang villages. While many festivals are attended by only one village, several larger Sanyuesan festivals attract tens of thousands of villagers. Traditionally, the duige were spontaneous songs. One singer would improvise words, often in the form of a riddle or romantic proposition, and the responding singer, without missing a rhythmic beat, would have to respond to the first singer before adding his or her own lyrics. The party was quick to utilize this traditional Zhuang festival to spread its political message to the Zhuang. Traditional Zhuang rhythms were given political lyrics, ranging from praise of the land reform in the early 1950s, to calls to participate in the Great Leap Forward, to glorification of the Four Modernizations. The nature of the government support of Sanyuesan festivals varies greatly depending on the administrative level of the government. At the county level, for example, the festivals remain predominately Zhuang celebrations, and villagers continue to sing traditional spontaneous duige. This is particularly true in counties with predominately Zhuang populations. At the provincial level, however, the government has utilized the holiday to deemphasize the specifically Zhuang nature of the holiday and, rather, to stress a broader ethnic base to the festival. In 1985 the Guangxi government renamed the festival the “Guangxi Nationalities Art Festival.”63 In addition to the official hosting of traditional ethnic festivals, the party holds festive awards ceremonies and sports events that honor “nationality unity.” In 1984 the Guangxi Party and government jointly hosted an awards ceremony to honor model organizations and individuals whose work fostered nationality unity. A committee headed by Politburo member Song Renlao attended the ceremony to bestow greater importance on the event.64 More than 1,100 minorities attended the conference, where 165 work units and 840 individuals received recognition as “Advanced Promoters of Nationalities Unity.” In 1988 more than 5,614 individuals and 1,746 work units received the distinction. The government also began hosting a major multiprovincial “Minorities Sports Festival” in the 1980s, which celebrates the traditional sporting events of each of the minority groups.

Administering the Zhuang, 1958–1966 Although the central authorities expended a great deal of resources promoting an image of the Zhuang that suited the government’s administrative

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

102

11:34 AM

Page 102

Creating the Zhuang

needs, Zhuang areas were not impervious to the nationwide political campaigns that ravaged the country in the late 1950s. As the central authorities were discussing the creation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, the Hundred Flowers Campaign began and was thoroughly crushed almost as rapidly. The Antirightist Campaign began in earnest in Zhuang areas only months before the creation of the GZAR was formally announced, and within weeks of its establishment several of the region’s top leaders fell victim to allocations of “localism” and “ethnicnationalism.”65 Very few reports have been published that specifically address how the Zhuang were treated during the Great Leap Forward and the years leading up to the Cultural Revolution. The three most definitive histories of the Zhuang outline Zhuang history in great detail up to the establishment of the Autonomous Region, then either abruptly stop their narratives66 or switch from a detailed chronological history to a thematic approach, 67 only briefly touching on the 1958–1966 time period. Nonetheless, an overview of Zhuang-state interactions during this period can be garnered from interviews, general histories of Guangxi, and reports on nationality work throughout the country as a whole. Although the party continued to maintain that the Zhuang were a “unique nationality with a long and glorious history,” propaganda campaigns beginning in late 1958 though the Cultural Revolution began to focus more heavily on national economic development plans. Zhuang areas were not excused from the massive communalization campaigns of the Great Leap Forward. In September 1959 more than 70,000 Agricultural Producers’ Cooperatives were combined into 918 large-scale communes. Though the average size of the communes was around 4,400 households, 52 communes had over 10,000 households.68 On average the communes were nearly two hundred times the size of the average Mutual Aid Teams of the early 1950s and between twenty and forty times the size of Agricultural Producers’ Cooperatives. The massive size of the communes necessarily meant that disparate areas would be combined into single communes. During the height of communalization, commune members ate in communal kitchens, slept in common dormitories, and shared their commune’s production equally. This led to a great deal of resentment among those living in the more prosperous regions who were now forced to share their scarce output with those members of their commune living in nonproductive areas. The minorities tended to live in less fertile regions than the Han, and the period of large-scale communalization likely exacerbated ethnic tensions.69 As in much of the rest of the country, Guangxi and the Zhuang were hit by widespead famine beginning in 1959. After less than a year of operation, more than 40 percent of the communal canteens had ceased operation by April 1959 due to the severe grain shortage. Numerous county and

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 103

Politics

103

commune leaders were accused by provincial authorities of “hiding production to split the spoils” (manchan sifen) and were forced to report higher food production to central leaders. The result was greater distortions in economic planning and more hardship for the local residents. Throughout the Antirightist Movement and the Great Leap Forward, accusations of nationality chauvinism would occasionally arise, but the central government’s official stance remained that the Zhuang warranted their own autonomous region and, with proper assistance from their Han “brothers,” could develop their own cultures within the greater “multinational unitary motherland.” Zhuang areas were incorporated into the nationwide economic and political campaigns of the late 1950s and early 1960s, but until 1966, minority institutions and cultures per se were not attacked.

The Chaos of the Cultural Revolution, 1966–1979 The party’s recognition of the Zhuang nationality, creation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, and the propaganda campaign to promote Zhuang consciousness contributed greatly to the growth of Zhuang solidarity. The Cultural Revolution years and those immediately following the fall of the Gang of Four dismantled the nationality affairs organizational structures and quieted the party’s glorification of the “ancient and rich Zhuang culture.” Although recent studies suggest that the Cultural Revolution may have erupted in more violent forms in Guangxi Province than anywhere else in China, there is little evidence of an ethnic component to the movement.70 Nationality issues were scarcely mentioned within Guangxi, in sharp contrast to the violent attacks against “splittists,” “local chauvinists,” and “minority nationalists” raging throughout the other four autonomous regions. This lack of minority discourse during the violence of the Cultural Revolution years in Guangxi lends further credence to the argument that the Zhuang did not pose a serious challenge to the central government, and that ethnicity was still not a particularly salient issue around which groups were rallying in the pre-Deng years. Nonetheless, even without the party’s support a nascent Zhuang movement was forming among the ethnic intellectuals who had already been touched by early CCP policy. For these intellectuals and party cadres, the nationwide attacks on minorities and on the class-based nature of ethnicity during the Cultural Revolution focused their attention on issues of nationality. As Zhuang read or heard about the “evils” of the “Four Old Customs,” and saw how minority traditions in Xinjiang and Tibet particularly were attacked as imperialist traditions, they continued to examine their own ethnicity. This introspection contributed to an opening of Zhuang activism once the political restraints of the 1960s were lifted.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

104

11:34 AM

Page 104

Creating the Zhuang

As the country moved toward the Cultural Revolution, the party began to stress the class-based nature of nationality. In an important report entitled “The Current Nationality Question and Class Struggle” (30 June 1964), written by the deputy director of the United Front Work Department and vice chairman of the NAC, Liu Chun, the party confirmed that “the nationality question is in essence a class question.” Throughout the country, minorities suffered extreme discrimination and brutal treatment under this new formulation. The director of the United Front Work Department, Li Weihan, was attacked for “revisionism” and for contributing to the growth of individual “minority kingdoms.” The minorities—granted a number of special privileges throughout the first decade and a half of Communist rule, including the right to maintain their traditional customs and dress— were targeted during the sixties as some of the staunchest holdouts of the imperial and capitalist orders. The Muslim groups were perhaps treated most harshly. In many areas they were forced to raise pigs for slaughter, and pork bones were thrown into village wells to torment local believers. 71 The attack against minorities began in earnest with the August 1966 fall of the United Front Work Team at the Eleventh Plenum of the Eighth Party Congress.72 United Front, Religious, and Minority Organizations immediately began to be dismantled after the meeting’s scathing attack on the principles of United Front work. Numerous autonomous territorial units were dissolved and blended into neighboring counties. As the Cultural Revolution spread in intensity, minorities were attacked for protecting the “Four Olds,” and earlier promises to protect minority traditions were revoked. In November 1969 the Guangxi Nationalities Research Institute was dismantled and its entire personnel sent down to the countryside. Between 1969 and 1973 practically all minority work in Guangxi screeched to a halt. Minority schools were closed in 1969, and the Nationalities Affairs Commission was disbanded. Prior to the Cultural Revolution, official sources report, there were 1,694 publishing houses printing non-Han-language materials. More than thirty-six different minority-language journals were printed, with a circulation of just over 2,680,000. During the Cultural Revolution fewer than a quarter of the publishing houses remained open, and only five journals continued to circulate, though their readership dropped by more than two-thirds.73 Documentary sources on the Cultural Revolution in Guangxi are extremely difficult to obtain. Most sources offer superficial, largely scripted accounts of events. The History of the Zhuang People was published in 1988, yet contains practically no mention of the Cultural Revolution. Likewise the General Introduction to Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region richly details minutiae of the pre– and post–Cultural Revolution situation and scarcely refers to the “leftist” era at all. Although the most powerful leader in Guangxi, Wei Guoqing, was Zhuang, the attacks against him during the Cultural Revolution did not

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 105

Politics

105

allude to his minority status. The allegations made against him were not those of “nationality chauvinism” or “splittism,” as they were against the top leadership in the four other autonomous regions, but rather of more broad “extremism.” As was true throughout the rest of China, the Cultural Revolution was an extremely turbulent time in Guangxi, one in which alliances between competing factions fluctuated more quickly than the participants could foresee, and in which one’s petty, personal grievances could be vented with only the slightest manipulation of the chaos caused by rampant and insidious political lunacy. A scholarly attempt to categorize the numerous alliances as either primarily motivated by, or entirely devoid of, an ethnic component would overly simplify the movement and ignore important features of Guangxi’s demographic and historic makeup. Among those I interviewed in Western Guangxi and Eastern Yunnan, most recall that they were not persecuted specifically on the basis of their nationality. Most Zhuang in western Guangxi continued to wear their traditional clothing, for example, whereas those in the cities followed the nationwide current and donned the drab blue or green Mao suits. However, much of the most intense fighting, interviewees recall, was between neighboring villages. Although fighting often erupted among villages of common ethnic origin, in some cases Zhuang villagers would find themselves in open political conflict with Yao, Yi, Miao, or Han villagers. Though ethnicity may not have been the primary stated, or even conscious, cause of the fighting, the impact of the Cultural Revolution on interethnic relations cannot be completely ignored. Thousands of Han schoolchildren and cadres were shipped into Zhuangdominated villages as part of the xiafang campaign, in which thousands of urban residents were sent to the countryside to “learn from the peasants.” By the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, after nearly two decades of concerted efforts to integrate the minorities into the unified administrative system, the Communist administration reached into nearly all the villages. Though the largely Han-dominated system penetrated into each village, many of the CCP cadres at the grassroots level were minority nationals. Work teams in the 1950s and early 1960s had come into the villages to conduct extended research projects, but most of these researchers were accompanied by Zhuang, and most teams stayed no longer than a few months. The local population always knew that these work teams were temporarily dispatched to their area and would be moving on once their work was complete. The influx of Han during the xiafang movement was different, however, and likely had a different impact on ethnic interaction. The xiafang movement was one of the first times in modern history that the Han were sent to live within Zhuang villages for an extended period of time. These workers were not simply sent to investigate and expound upon the “rich

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

106

11:34 AM

Page 106

Creating the Zhuang

heritage” of the Zhuang people, and they were not sent with the express mission of spreading goodwill among the nationalities, or of fostering ethnic solidarity among the Zhuang. Rather, they were sent to farm. They were sent to areas where land was already scarce, in which the people spoke in incomprehensible tongues, in languages that during the Cultural Revolution were seen as backward rather than glorified as the medium of unique cultures. Many of the Han intellectuals sent to the countryside had no agricultural experience and were perceived as weak and cumbersome by the local minorities. As the minorities and Han came into this close and protracted contact, surely both grew more aware of their uniqueness vis-à-vis the other. Although the process did not occur overnight, Zhuang consciousness appears to have risen in response to the increased contact with the outsider Han in their midst. The collection of minority folklore and myths, which began under the party’s leadership in the 1950s, ground to an official halt during the Cultural Revolution. Nonetheless, a number of Zhuang writers continued to gather their materials secretly. Zhuang writer Lu Cheng served in the military during the Cultural Revolution, but continued to gather Zhuang folktales and record them secretly. After the Cultural Revolution he became the secretary of the Communist Party office in Wenshan and in 1981 finally began to publish the materials he had been collecting for almost a decade. “I never forgot about our heritage,” he recalled. “I couldn’t publish things and it was dangerous, but I just collected materials whenever I could.” In 1982 he received the Wenshan Prefecture Prize for literature, and in 1990 the Wenshan Literary Excellence Award. Most minority organizations were dismantled by the end of 1969 and did not begin to be gradually reinstated until 1973. By mid June 1973, the Revolutionary Committee approved the reopening of the Nanning and Guilin minority teachers colleges. In September the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission was reinstated.74 A major Nationalities Meeting was held in December of that year, attended by 126 cadres and administrators from the minorities departments of the United Front and administrators from institutes of higher learning. After the death of Mao Zedong and the fall of the Gang of Four in 1976, Hua Guofeng became premier and began to ease the attacks on minority culture that had prevailed nationally throughout the Cultural Revolution. Although Hua did not take an assertive role in protecting the rights guaranteed the minorities in the 1950s, he did urge cadres to “learn the area’s language and respect its customs and ways.” 75 It was Deng Xiaoping’s assumption of power at the Third Plenum of the Eleventh Party Congress in December 1978, however, that truly opened the way for a reversal of the Cultural Revolution’s minority policy and the resurgence of government support for Zhuang issues.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 107

Politics

107

Notes 1. Mao Zedong, “We Must Learn to Do Economic Work,” in Selected Works of Mao Zedong (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1967), vol. 3, 190. 2. Guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui, zhonggong zhongyang wenxian yanjiushi, Xin shiqi minzu gongzuo wenxian xuanbian (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 1990), 5 [The Central Nationalities Affairs Commission and the Central Chinese Communist Party’s Collections Research Office, Selected Essays on Minority Work During the New Era (Beijing: The Central Collections Press, 1990)]. 3. This is not to suggest that regional autonomy was devoid of economic meaning. Granting nationalities the right (at least in theory) to control their own budgets and fiscal policies was a crucial component of regional autonomy. Nonetheless, market forces have begun to play an integrative function in China as many minorities jockey for greater inclusion in the national system, more government subsidies, and increased state investment. This process will be more fully discussed in Chapter 7. 4. Zhonggong zhongyang tongzhanbu Minzu wenti wenxian huibian (Beijing: Zhonggong zhongyang dangxiao chubanshe, 1991), 2 [The Central Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Bureau, A Collection of Articles on the Nationality Question (Beijing: The Central Academy of the Chinese Communist Party Press, 1991)]. 5. Ibid., 595. 6. Renmin Ribao, translated in Harvard University, Communist China 1955– 1959: Policy Documents with Analysis (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1959), 563. 7. Xinhua yuebao (Xihua Monthly), no. 5 (1950). 8. Based on interviews with government officials and scholars at the Guangxi Nationalities Institute. 9. Ma Yin, Questions and Answers About China’s Minority Nationalities (Beijing: New World Press, 1985), 19. 10. Translated in U.S. Consulate-General, Hong Kong, Current Background, no. 264 (5 October 1953), 12–23. 11. Ibid. 12. Wei Chunshu, Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi, vol. 2 (Beijing: Danddai zhongguo chubanshe, 1992), 268 [Contemporary China’s Guangxi (Beijing: Contemporary China Publishers Press, 1992)]. 13. Zhang Shengzhen (ed.), Zhuangzu tongshi, vol. 3 (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1998), 1128 [History of the Zhuang (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1998)]. 14. Renmin Ribao, 1 November 1951. 15. Renmin Ribao, 23 December 1951. The report was delivered on November 16 to the Government Affairs Council. Cited in George V. H. Moseley, The Consolidation of the South China Frontier (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973), 41. 16. Wenshan zhuangzu miaozu zizhizhou gaikuang bianxiezu, Wenshan zhuangzu miaozu zizhizhou gaikuang (Kunming: Yunnan minzu chubanshe, 1986), 75 [The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture Editorial Board, The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture (Kunming: Yunnan Nationalities Press, 1986)]. 17. Wei Chunshu, Contemporary China’s Guangxi, 1: 48–52. 18. Gu Youshi, “Shilun jiefang qian zhuangzu de ziran jingji,” in Gu Youshi, Fan Honggui (eds.), Zhuangzu lungao (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989), 176–199 [“The natural economy of the Zhuang before liberation,” in Collected Essays on the Zhuang (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1989)].

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

108

11:34 AM

Page 108

Creating the Zhuang

19. Qian Jiaju, Guangxi sheng jingji gaikuang, Liwu yin shuguan 31 (1936), 63 [The General State of the Guangxi Province’s Economics, Liwu Book Distributors 31 (1936)]. 20. Gu Youshi, “The Natural Economy of the Zhuang,” 198. 21. George V. H. Moseley, The Consolidation of the South China Frontier (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973), 56–57. 22. Zhang Shenzhen, History of the Zhuang, 1128. 23. Ibid. 24. Ibid. 25. Ibid. 26. Guangxi minwei, Guangxi minzu quyu zizhi wenjian ziliao huibian 71 (Neibu ziliao, 1988) [Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission, Collected Documents of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, internal publication only, 71 (1988)]. 27. J. V. Stalin, “Marxism and the National Question,” in Works, vol. 2 (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1953), 307. 28. Deng Liqun, Ma Hong, and Wu Heng (eds.), Contemporary China’s Minority Work, vol. 1 (Beijing: Contemporary China Press, 1993), 277. 29. Bu means “people” in Zhuang. The term Budai, therefore, literally means “Dai people.” 30. A nationality concentrated primarily in Yunnan Province. 31. By this Fei alluded to the official theory that certain minorities shared common ancestry, which then split into separate nationalities at various points in history. 32. Deng Liqun et al., Contemporary, 1: 288. 33. Figures compiled are from statistics provided by the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission and The Zhuang Encyclopedia. 34. Unpublished draft manuscript on the Zhuang people by the Guangxi Zhuang Studies Association, 1996. 35. The CCP had earlier suggested that Stalin’s definition of a nation was most appropriate in the European context, in which the various nationalities had all developed out of capitalist relations. 36. Records from the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Research Institute; also Zhang Shengzhen, History of the Zhuang, 3: 1128. 37. Li Weihan, “Some Views and Ideas on Establishing the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region,” in Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission, collected documents, 109–110. 38. Deng Liqun et al., Contemporary, 1: 227. 39. Anthony D. Smith, The Ethnic Origin of Nations (New York: Basil Blackwell, 1986), 168. 40. Herold J. Wiens, Han Chinese Expansion in South China (Hamden, Conn.: The Shoe String Press, 1967), originally published under the title China’s March Toward the Tropics (1954), 258. 41. Zhonggong guangxi dangwei xuanchuanbu (zhubian), Mao Zedong yu guangxi (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993), 8 [Guangxi Party Propaganda Bureau, Mao Zedong and Guangxi (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993)]. 42. Diana Lary, Region and Nation: The Kwangsi Clique in Chinese Politics 1925–1937 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974), 103. 43. Interview with Ya Meiyuan, Zhuang participant in the Baise Uprising, 26 July 1995. 44. Diana Lary, “Communism and Ethnic Revolt: Some Notes on the Chuang Peasant Movement in Kwangsi 1921–31,” China Quarterly (January-March 1972): 126–135.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 109

Politics

109

45. Lu Xiuyang, Donglan geming genjudi (Donglan: Zhonggong donglanxian weidanshi bangongshi, 1990 [The Donglan Revolutionary Base Area (Donglan: The Chinese Communist Party’s Donglan Branch Party History Office, 1990)]. 46. Guangxi Zhuangzu zizhiqu gainkuang bianxiezu, Guangxi Zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang, vol. 5 (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1985), 131 [The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Board, The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press 1985)]. 47. Ibid. 48. Ibid. 49. Ibid., 144. 50. Ibid. 51. Diana Lary, “Communism and Ethnic Revolt,” 128. 52. Lu Xiuyang, Donglan Revolutionary Base, 3. 53. Ibid. 54. Ibid., 67. 55. Ibid., 147. 56. Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Committee, Investigation, 5: 174. 57. Lu Xiuyang, Donglan Revolutionary Base, 36. 58. Ibid., 55. 59. “Current Propoganda Slogans, collected 1 August 1930,” in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Committee, Investigation, 5: 169. 60. Lu Xiuyang, Donglan Revolutionary Base, 73–75. 61. Ibid., 9. 62. Ibid., 13. 63. Fan Qixu, Qin Naichang, eds., The Zhuang Encyclopedia (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993), 359. 64. Wei Chunshu et al., Contemporary China’s Guangxi, vol. 2 (Beijing: Contemporary China Publishers Press, 1992), 353. 65. Ibid., 1: 92–93. 66. Huang Xianfan, Overview of the Zhuang (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1988); Zhang Shengzhen, History of the Zhuang. 67. The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Board, The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, 1985. 68. Wei Chunshu, Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi, vol. 1 (Beijing: Danddai zhongguo chubanshe, 1992), 99–100 [Contemporary China’s Guangxi (Beijing: Contemporary China Publisher’s Press, 1992)]. 69. Deng Liqun, Ma Hong, and Wu Heng (eds.), Contemporary China’s Minority Work, vols. 1 and 2 (Beijing: Contemporary China Press, 1993). 70. Particularly Zheng Yi, Scarlet Memorial: Tales of Cannibalism in Modern China (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1997). 71. Dru Gladney, Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People’s Republic (Cambridge: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1991), 138. 72. Deng Liqun et al., Contemporary, 1: 147. 73. Ibid., 158. 74. County-level NACs were not reestablished until September 1979. 75. Hua Guofeng, “Unite and Strive to Build a Modern, Powerful Socialist Country,” Peking Review, 21, no. 10 (10 March 1978): 34. Discussed in Colin Mackerras, China’s Minorities: Integration and Modernization in the Twentieth Century (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1994), 252.

Kaup-4.Final

1/7/10

11:34 AM

Page 110

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 111

5 The Expansion of Regional Autonomy and the Growth of Zhuang Activism

After a nearly ten-year hiatus in minority affairs work, the party once again began stressing the nationality issue after the Third Plenum of the Eleventh Congress in December 1978. In February 1979 the party reversed its 1964 verdict against Li Weihan and the United Front Work Department. The reversal was expanded later in the year to vindicate all minorities and United Front workers save those who openly challenged the Communist Party or the Socialist Way.1 In May 1979 the Nationalities Affairs Commission announced that minority work in China had entered a “New Era.”2 The primary focus would now shift to “modernizing socialism.” In a lengthy speech delivered to the Central NAC, NAC Chairman Yang Jingren applauded the progress made by the minorities under the leadership of the CCP, but argued that the party until that point had been successful only in establishing the principle of equality for all nationalities. The “New Era” of minority policy would focus on eliminating “actual inequality” (shishishang de bu pingdeng). Nationality work during the first decade of this “New Era” focused on three key areas. The primary goal of early CCP policy had been to integrate the minority areas into a unified administrative system and assure their loyalty to the Chinese state. By the end of the Cultural Revolution, all of the minority areas had been officially incorporated into the administrative system. The attacks against minorities during the Cultural Revolution, however, had scarred interethnic relations and challenged the minorities’ trust in the Communist regime. The first priority of post-1979 minority work, therefore, was to restore minority policy as it existed prior to the Cultural Revolution and to convince the minorities again that their interests were best safeguarded by the Communist Party. The first few years of the New Era concentrated on clarifying the party’s theoretical stance on nationalities and on reestablishing the autonomous rights initially awarded the minorities in the fifties and early sixties. Second, the party and central

111

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

112

11:35 AM

Page 112

Creating the Zhuang

government agreed that the parameters of the nationalities’ autonomous rights needed to be legislated more clearly in order to protect against both “Han Chauvinism” and “local splittism.” This trend reflected Deng Xiaoping’s broader efforts to increase the rule of law throughout China and culminated in the promulgation of the Law of Regional Autonomy on 31 May 1984 (see Appendix). And finally, after 1979 the central government stressed that minority policy must achieve economic parity between the Han and non-Han people, and not simply political equality. The post-1979 efforts to promote regional autonomy (albeit under the limits defined by the central government) coincided with a national campaign launched in the early 1980s to decentralize the government and to delineate more clearly the separate functions of the Communist Party and the Chinese government. The party’s decision to redefine the nomenklatura system in 1984, and the numerous initiatives beginning in the early 1980s to extract party involvement from the daily operations of the government, increased the Zhuang’s political autonomy significantly. Although their political autonomy and their representation in the official cadre corps increased throughout the 1980s, the Zhuang’s economic position vis-à-vis the rest of the nation began to crumble during this same period. The 1980s, therefore, saw the simultaneous expansion of Zhuang political autonomy and the rise of many Zhuangs’ dissatisfaction with their political and economic lot. By the end of the 1980s Zhuang middle-level cadres began to mobilize and to articulate their group demands to the state.

Reestablishing Pre–Cultural Revolution Autonomous Privileges Only a month after the close of the Third Plenum of the Eleventh Party Congress, the newly appointed chairman of the Nationalities Affairs Commission presented a speech that clearly articulated the order of priorities in minority work for the next several years. “Of course the primary task is to promote the Four Modernizations,” he stated, “but how is this to be done?”3 In order to promote unity and pave the way for the “liberated thinking by minorities” needed to develop the Four Modernizations, Yang listed three primary tasks requiring immediate attention. Each of the three required a thorough overturning of the minority policy promoted during the Cultural Revolution and a return to the policies of the fifties and sixties. First, Yang contended, the importance of the minority question had to be recognized and the party’s minority theory taught more effectively: Each and every government department and each and every person must study the minority policy. Regardless of which department is issuing a

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 113

The Expansion of Regional Autonomy

113

regulation, it must carefully consider whether or not it is appropriate for the minority context. Is it beneficial to the minorities? If they overlook this question, it will inevitably hurt the party’s minority work and be detrimental to the unity of all nationalities. Even if a particular area is purely Han and doesn’t have a single minority, problems will arise which cannot be resolved [if the minority issue is not considered in each decision].4

Second, Yang stated, the Nationalities Affairs Commission and all those concerned with the minority issue had to strive to overturn the mistakes and the “pernicious influence of the Gang of Four.” Yang presented a long list of the erroneous theories promoted during the Cultural Revolution, including the notion that nationalities were mere reflections of class relations. A number of important articles and editorials followed Yang’s speech, including a 5 July 1980 lead article in the People’s Daily clearly rejecting the linking of class and nationality: “It is essential not to confuse the two entirely separate issues of nationality and class. . . . Comrade Mao Zedong also said that ‘First, classes will be eliminated, then nations, and finally nationalities. Throughout the world it is the same.’ . . . It is therefore impossible to claim that ‘Nationality is in essence a class issue.’”5 The final component of minority work outlined by Yang’s February 1979 speech was the reestablishment of the ethnic cadre corps and of the autonomous governments. Yang noted that when the autonomous regions were first established, most of the officials were drawn from the nationalities, but that all progress on this front had been overturned during the Cultural Revolution. One of the party’s leading slogans on the minority issue in the pre–Cultural Revolutionary years was that minorities should become the “Masters of Their Own Home.” Yang proclaimed that “there are still many places where the first and second in command remain Han. This leads instead to the ‘Han being the Master of the Minorities Home. . . . . We must nationalize nationality policy,” he declared, “or it will be impossible to connect with the local nationalities.” Although the party had called for ethnic government cadres prior to the Cultural Revolution, Yang pushed the principle further and declared: There is more. The first in command within the party organizations must also gradually be drawn from the minorities. We must rigorously create the conditions necessary to see this actualized. Minorities have brought this up, and foreign visitors have brought this up. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs says that they don’t know what to say when foreign visitors ask ‘if all the party leaders are Han, how can you really say this is regional autonomy?’ From the looks of it, this is a question we must resolve.”6

Yang also called for the prompt reestablishment of all the autonomous areas that had been dismantled during the Cultural Revolution. A number of

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

114

11:35 AM

Page 114

Creating the Zhuang

the autonomous areas lost significant segments of their territory to neighboring, nonautonomous provinces during the height of the Cultural Revolution. Although similar patterns occurred across the country, the most blatant reduction of autonomous territory awarded to a single minority occurred in Inner Mongolia, where several leagues were apportioned for administration by Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning, Ningxia, and Gansu Provinces. Prior to the reapportionment, more than 1.9 million Mongols lived within the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region. Only 400,000 remained in the autonomous area after the territorial gerrymandering; the remainder lost their autonomous privileges at the provincial levels.7 The three focus areas announced by Yang had a significant impact on minority work in Guangxi. After nearly ten years with only a few sporadic meetings on minority issues, after 1979 the entire region began to teem with special conferences and directives regarding minorities in the “New Era of Minority Work.” Many of the new programs involved special affirmative action programs in education and cadre training, a spurt of special publications on minorities, and economic development projects specifically targeted to promote minority trade and business. These policies will be more thoroughly discussed in the chapters on culture and economics. Guangxi’s local autonomous organizations began to be reinstated shortly after Yang’s February 1979 speech. Although the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission had been reestablished in 1973 after being closed for four years, the local NACs did not begin to be reestablished in significant numbers until September 1, after Yang’s speech. In December of that year, the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Research Institute was founded to provide in-depth studies on minority history, language, theory, and ethnicity. In 1983 the Guangxi party announced the formation of another nationalities organization. A Minority Works Party Core Group (minzu gongzuo ling dao xiaozu) would be established “in order to achieve further progress, emphasize the importance of minority work, and open a new stage in Guangxi’s minority work.”8 Yao nationality member Jin Yusheng, the vice chair of the Guangxi Autonomous Region Party, was named chairman of the Core Group, with a very strong proponent of greater Zhuang rights, Zhang Shengzhen, named the vice chairman. The remaining members were not listed, though several were declared to be “advisers” chosen from the ranks of retired cadres with a “thorough knowledge and enthusiasm for” minority work. The creation of the Core Group indicated the importance the party accorded the minority question but suggested that some restrictions were placed on Zhuang political autonomy. Although the constitution and several regulations dictate that government bodies within the autonomous areas should have the “appropriate” percentage of minority cadres, no similar quotas exist on the ethnic makeup of party organizations.

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 115

The Expansion of Regional Autonomy

115

Though the Nationalities Affairs Commissions largely consisted of minority nationalities, the exact membership of the Party Core Group was not publicly known. In addition to reestablishing and creating new organizations to handle minority affairs, the party renewed its efforts to complete the ethnic classification process and assure that each minority group had the autonomous governments required by the constitution and relevant guidelines. Almost immediately after Yang’s speech, the Guangxi NAC began a major campaign to complete the classification process. In August 1980 the Guangxi NAC’s Classification Team ruled that the 34,000 people living in Daxin County who refused to accept their Zhuang nationality status were indeed Zhuang, regardless of the local inhabitants’ failure to understand their true heritage.9 The Guangxi NAC Classification Team sent research groups to eighteen counties in August 1981 to complete the classification process for those individuals who either did not clearly conform to one of the government’s defined nationality categories or refused to accept the label given them by the classification teams dispatched by the central government in the 1950s. Significantly, both of these reclassification campaigns in 1980 and 1981 were administered by the Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission and not the central government’s teams. Whereas outsiders pushed the Zhuang to accept their designated classification status in the first two decades of the CCP rule, now it was the provincial authorities, many of whom were Zhuang, who were pushing the locals to accept their Zhuang membership. The increase in political authority and years of the central government’s political indoctrination were already beginning to inspire an activist Zhuang cadre corps. In addition to the continuation of classification efforts, the creation of more autonomous units continued in the first decade of the post-Mao era. Four new autonomous counties were established within Guangxi: Fuchuan Yao Autonomous County, 1 January 1984; Luocheng Mulao Autonomous County, 10 January 1984; Huanjiang Maonan Autonomous County, 24 November 1987; and Dahua Yao Autonomous County, 23 December 1987. Although the leading cadres in each autonomous county had to be drawn from the titular minority group, nontitular minorities often were quite pleased to see their county become autonomous. All those living within the autonomous county, several interview respondents told me, benefited from the preferential fiscal policies and legislative powers accorded the counties. Autonomous counties could elect not to implement a particular policy that its government deemed in contravention to local customs and had only to seek provincial-level, rather than central-level, approval in order to make the process legally binding. Students within the autonomous counties, regardless of their nationality status, received special consideration in the university admissions process, as will be discussed in detail in the fol-

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

116

11:35 AM

Page 116

Creating the Zhuang

lowing chapter. In addition to the new autonomous counties, fifty-eight autonomous villages were established in November and December 1984. Although the villages were not given legislative powers, they were allowed greater latitude in using innovative approaches to implement policies set by the higher administrative authorities.

The Legislation of Minority Policy Great efforts were made after the declaration of a New Era in minority policy to legislate clearly the rights and obligations of the minorities and of their autonomous governments. In May 1984 the party announced the establishment of the Law of Regional Autonomy. Although nearly all the components of the new law were simply restatements of early legislation— including the 1982 constitution and the General Program for the Implementation of Regional Autonomy for Minorities—the law does seem to have increased the legitimacy of minority demands and increased the minority localities’ willingness to demand autonomy. In addition to the Law of Regional Autonomy, a number of laws were passed that included special provisions for the minorities. Of the 133 laws passed by the People’s Congress between 1979 and April 1992, 33 contained specific regulations on minority issues.10 Included among these, for example, is Article 147 of the Civil Law’s General Rules enacted in April 1985, which sets a maximum two-year prison term for any government worker who violates minority customs. The Law of Regional Autonomy also allows autonomous areas to pass danxing tiaoli, or “separate regulations” to deal with single issues important in their locality. Over fifty-eight of these individual regulations have been passed to address issues dealing with minority language, culture and education, marriage, birth control, and resource management. The Law of Regional Autonomy (see Appendix) outlines the basic principles guiding the establishment of autonomous governments and the basic rights of minorities in the unified state system. Article 15 of the law mandates that each of the autonomous areas must clarify the specifics of its governing system by designing and implementing a Regulation on the Exercise of Autonomy (zizhi tiaoli). The autonomous areas were also awarded the right to pass separate regulations (danxing tiaoli), which had to be passed by the specified higher administrative body—the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress in the case of the five autonomous regions, and the standing committees of the provincial-level people’s congresses in the case of the prefectural and county-level autonomous areas. Article 15 states that “the organization and work of the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall be specified in

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 117

The Expansion of Regional Autonomy

117

these areas’ regulations on the exercise of autonomy or separate regulation, in accordance with the Constitution and other laws.” Although the average Zhuang peasant seems aware of the Law of Regional Autonomy’s stated guarantee of nationality equality, the right to use the Zhuang written script, and the right to have a Zhuang governor, the struggle to legalize specific privileges in a Guangxi Regulation on the Exercise of Autonomy is assumed primarily by the Zhuang cadres and intellectuals. More than a decade after the Law of Regional Autonomy became effective, nationally only 67 of the 157, or 42.6 percent of the local autonomous areas, had promulgated local autonomy laws (zizhi tiaoli).11 To date, none of the five provincial-level autonomous regions’ Regulations on the Exercise of Autonomy have been approved by the State Council. The Guangxi ZAR has approved at least fourteen drafts of the Guangxi Regulation since 1984, which have been submitted to the State Council for approval. All of the drafts have been returned to the GZAR committee for revision, however, leaving the region without a working document clearly defining its relationship with the center. Members of the Guangxi Regulation Draft Committee told me that their drafts had not been passed primarily due to rapidly changing economic reforms. Rather than demonstrating conflict between the center and region, they said, the delay in passing the regulations was caused by trying to make stable laws in an inherently unstable environment. While those I interviewed certainly would not be at liberty to discuss closed-session meetings in detail, they tended to be fairly objective and at times critical of the central government’s minority policy in other areas, both in our discussions and in their published writings. The primary articles of contention in Guangxi’s struggle to clarify the broad guidelines of the Law of Regional Autonomy are Articles 25–35. These articles state that each autonomous area will be allowed, in accordance with the constitution and other relevant regulations, to independently arrange for and administer local economic development strategies (Article 25) and capital construction plans (Article 29), define the ownership and use of natural resources (Articles 27 and 28), arrange the use of products after fulfilling state quotas (Article 31), pursue foreign economic and trade activities (Article 32), administer their own financial system while receiving “preferential treatment” from the central government (Article 33), and grant tax exemptions and reductions with the approval of the “relevant” people’s governments (Article 36). Exactly how each principle has been implemented will be discussed in further detail in Chapter 7. Although Zhuang cadres are working to draft Guangxi’s Autonomous Regulations, many have begun demanding overall reform of the 1984 Regional Autonomy Law. The Guangxi Nationalities Research journal published four articles on reforming the Regional Autonomy Law (RAL) in

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

118

11:35 AM

Page 118

Creating the Zhuang

1994. Among the complaints aired in the articles was that the RAL was written for use in a planned economy and could provide no legal protection for the nationalities under the latest round of economic reforms initiated in the late 1980s. The articles also argued that there was no monitoring or punishment system for enforcing the RAL. One author noted with lament that many autonomous counties were voluntarily forfeiting autonomous status in favor of becoming municipalities, 12 because the policies offered the autonomous areas by the RAL were both no longer relevant and no longer implemented.13 The author of the article also demanded that the State Council be forced to make a judgment on the proposals presented it by the autonomous regions within a specified time limit. Currently, with only a few exceptions, legislation passed by the Guangxi National People’s Congress must be approved by the State Council before it becomes effective. A large percentage of these drafts are not vetoed by the center but stonewalled, which effectively prohibits their implementation. These types of essays, which have been appearing more and more frequently over the past ten years in Zhuang journals, reflect a much more vocal and daring Zhuang leadership than was present in the 1950s or 1960s. Some students of Chinese politics may argue that the increase in critical articles does not really represent an increase in Zhuang mobilization, but merely reflects the political liberalization across all of China that now allows Zhuang demands to be vocalized. An incident that occurred in 1988, however, suggests that the content of Zhuang journals is still being closely censored. The censors have simply changed. Local Zhuang now have more control over the censorship than they had in the past. In 1988 two articles appeared in the Guangxi Nationalities Research journal asserting that the Zhuang have an extremely low level of nationality consciousness.14 The author of “On the Weakness of Zhuang Ideology and Psychological Structure” questioned the very nationality of the most venerated Zhuang folk and party heroes. Given that Wei Baqun and Liu Sanjie never mentioned their nationality, the author asks, how are we to know that they were not Han? The article offers several historical and cultural factors inhibiting the development of Zhuang consciousness. Shortly after the article appeared, provincial authorities threatened to shut down the journal. All copies of the issue were recalled, and the editors of the journal were warned not to publish articles that belittled the Zhuang. Other Zhuang scholars complained that they dare not publish articles that argue that Zhuang should abandon efforts to promote their own language. Another scholar lamented that he could not publish an article discussing components of Zhuang culture, including alcoholism and traditional moralism, that slowed development in Zhuang areas. Incidents such as these, in which provincial authorities intervene to assure that Zhuang receive only glowing reports in the local press, are coupled

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 119

The Expansion of Regional Autonomy

119

with vituperous articles by Zhuang leaders criticizing the local populations’ lack of minority consciousness and assertiveness. Many of the most active Zhuang, for instance, do not blame the failure to pass the Guangxi Regulations on the central government. Rather, they contend that the Zhuang are not asserting the rights and privileges the central government has offered them. Qin Naichang, for example, laments that the Law of Regional Autonomy has not brought the same level of economic development to the minority areas as have the regulations on the Special Economic Zones. He contends: The most fundamental reason for this is that people’s awareness of their autonomous rights is not strong, which hinders their utilization of regional autonomy. For example, [without a strong sense of their own autonomy] they cannot bravely implement new legislation to suit the special conditions of their autonomous areas or revise central directives devised to be applied uniformly throughout the country, without special consideration of minority needs. Nor can they handle the internal affairs within the autonomous areas using the powers originally granted the autonomous governments, without first giving in to the urge to submit everything for central government approval. Nor do they utilize the special autonomous rights legislated in the Law of Regional Autonomy to carve out special flexible policies not specifically granted by the central government, etc. All of these amount to the self-abandonment of national autonomous rights [which the central government originally awarded].15

Xu and Qin contend that both the ethnic cadres and the broader population are largely responsible for not demanding the rights constitutionally awarded them: “Within some of the autonomous areas, there has not been enough propaganda work and education regarding national minority autonomous rights. Some cadres within the provinces and some of the masses do not give the cooperation and support they should, thus affecting the implementation of autonomous rights.”16 A 1989 article appearing in the central Minorities Research magazine also places much of the blame on local cadres for not fully utilizing the potential given them by the Law of Regional Autonomy: A Guangdong cadre spoke well in saying “We’re given Special Economic Zone policies, but you’re given Regional Autonomy policies. You have more authority than we do through these policies. You should be utilizing them more enthusiastically than we are.” In the past, we haven’t fully utilized all of the policies given us and have passed by a number of development opportunities. This should be a lesson to us. . . . The coastal Special Economic Zones do not have as much autonomy as the minority areas, yet their economic development has been much faster than ours. One of the reasons is that they have not been content with the powers and special policies which the central government has given them. Rather they apply themselves to creating flexible policies themselves which suit the unique economic conditions of their area. The Guangdong cadres

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

120

11:35 AM

Page 120

Creating the Zhuang

think the more vague the central government’s policies are, the better they are for Guangdong and the better they can be creatively implemented. The minority cadres, in contrast, complain that the central government policies are too imprecise and therefore difficult to implement. 17

The Law of Regional Autonomy, though never fully implemented, in theory clearly granted the ethnic cadres important political authority. The central government is clearly aware of the increase in Zhuang activism. One official at the central Nationalities Affairs Commission in Beijing assured me in March 1995 that the government was “quite pleased with increased Zhuang political participation and their increased demands for economic investment.” He added that “as long as they don’t try to take away other groups’ rights or increase tensions among the minority nationalities, we’re happy to see them standing up for their rights and becoming more involved in their own development.” The government is now allowing greater scholarly discussion of differences among the Zhuang, however, which may contribute to a weakening of ethnonationalism initiated by the middle-level Zhuang elites. Zhixi divisions, for example, are now openly acknowledged, although they were entirely denied as significant categories of identification during the 1950s and 1960s, when Zhuang ethnic identification was being consciously manipulated from the top down. Whereas the central government focused on building Zhuang solidarity in the 1950s through the 1980s, and therefore downplayed any divisions among the group members, today these differences are beginning to be discussed openly by Zhuang scholars and officials. The limits to further Zhuang mobilization under this new cadre corps will be discussed in more detail in the final chapter.

Decentralization: From the Center to the Localities By 1984 most of the nationalities organizations and autonomous territories had been reestablished and the party’s pre–Cultural Revolution nationality theory widely disseminated throughout the country. A nationwide campaign to increase popular awareness of minority issues had been launched, and the importance of the nationality issue confirmed in the 1982 PRC constitution. While this work was being conducted, a broader nationwide reform movement was launched to decentralize the tasks of the party and government. The emphasis on the importance of minority participation coupled with the increased legislation on nationality rights and the decentralization of government began an important devolution of power from the central government to Zhuang. As will be demonstrated in Chapter 7, however, this increased political power has occurred as Zhuang economic power has decreased. The tension between rising political aspirations and

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 121

The Expansion of Regional Autonomy

121

diminishing ability to amass the economic means to utilize it contributed to increased middle-level activism toward the end of the 1980s. One of the first decentralizing reforms that had a major impact on Zhuang-center interaction came with the central leadership’s announcement of a major overhaul of the nomenklatura system in 1984. The center announced that it would only directly oversee the appointments, transfer, and dismissal of cadres at or above the vice ministerial and vice governor level and the presidents of key universities and colleges. The number of positions directly monitored by the center thus fell from 13,000 to 5,000, according to People’s Daily reports.18 After 1984 each level of the local administration was able to exercise personnel jurisdiction only one level down the administrative hierarchy, rather than the two-level control they had exercised earlier. Prefectural appointments were therefore officially made by provincial authorities, which by law had to be drawn from the local population to reflect the ethnic composition of the province; that is, if 33 percent of the Guangxi population was Zhuang, as close to 33 percent as possible of the government should be Zhuang. In addition to granting the lower administrative bodies greater power to appoint personnel, measures were taken in the early eighties to allow local officials to remain in their home provinces or counties. Until the mid1980s the vast majority of top-ranking provincial authorities were not from the areas over which they governed. In 1981, for example, only 43 percent of the 58 provincial party secretaries and governors were natives of the province to which they were assigned.19 By 1989, 70 percent of the top provincial positions were held by natives of the province. Although the exact number of minority party and government cadres in Guangxi in 1949 is not publicly available, the central Nationalities Affairs Commission estimates that the number of minority cadres, including middle school and primary school teachers, rose by more than forty times between the creation of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and 1988 and more than doubled between 1966 and 1988. By 1988 minority cadres made up 33 percent of the region’s overall cadre force. More than 4 million minority nationals were admitted to the Communist Party by 1988, accounting for 35 percent of the regional total.20 Of the four main branches of government (the party, government, Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, and the people’s congress) in the regional areas, 40.7 percent were nationalities. With Deng Xiaoping’s ascension to power, the central authorities began to hail the importance of separating party and government functions. A number of important steps were taken to decrease the overlap in party and government activities. First, the party gradually began to abolish its departments that had corresponding departments within the government, and in 1987 it announced that many party core groups would be eliminated.

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

122

11:35 AM

Page 122

Creating the Zhuang

Though efforts to dismantle party organs were halted after 1989, at least portions of the United Front Work Department and the Nationalities Work Core Group were abolished by 1992. Sources who told me the party was limiting its direct involvement in the daily operations of minority work nonetheless believed that many of the party personnel were simply shifted into the NAC. The party’s efforts to reestablish the privileges initially awarded the minorities in the 1950s and early 1960s, together with the decentralization reforms launched more broadly throughout the country, increased the Zhuang’s political autonomy. The primary goal of minority policy during the New Era, however, was to facilitate economic equality among the nationalities, and this new emphasis on economics, combined with rising political power and declining economic equality, led to a rise in Zhuang cadre activism in the 1990s.

Notes 1. Zhonggong zhongyang tongzhanbu, Minzu wenti wenxian huibian (Beijing: Zhonggong zhongyang dangxiao chubanshe, 1991), 21–23 [The Central Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Bureau, A Collection of Articles on the Nationality Question (Beijing: The Central Academy of the Chinese Communist Party Press, 1991)]. 2. Guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui, zhonggong zhongyang wenxian yanjiushi, Xin shiqi minzu gongzuo wenxian xuanbian (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 1990), 5–13 [The Central Nationalities Affairs Commission and the Central Chinese Communist Party’s Collections Research Office, Selected Essays on Minority Work During the New Era (Beijing: The Central Collections Press, 1990)]. 3. Guojia minwei zhengce yanjiushi, Guojia minwei minzu zhengce wenjian xuanbian 1979–1984 (Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1988), 3–9 [Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Policy Research Office, Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Minority Policy Documents Collection 1979–1984 (Beijing: Central Nationalities Institute Press, 1988)]. 4. Ibid., 7. 5. People’s Daily, 5 July 1980. 6. Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Policy Research Office, Selected Essays, 8. 7. Ibid., 9. 8. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang bianxiezu, Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1985), 394 [The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Board, The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1985)]. 9. Ibid., 387. 10. Yang Houdi (ed.), Zhongguo minzu fazhi jianghua (Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1993), 12 [Discussing the National Minority Legal System (Beijing: Central Nationalities College Press, 1993)].

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 123

The Expansion of Regional Autonomy

123

11. Xiu Dao, “Shilun woguo minzu quyu zizhi zhengce de nixiang fei minzuhua,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 4. [“The De-Nationalization of China’s Regional Autonomy Policy,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. Yang Houdi concludes that 110 had passed local autonomy laws by April 1992. Yang Houdi, Discussing, 13. 12. There are a number of criteria—including population size, proportion of population involved in nonagricultural enterprises, level of infrastructure—that must be met before an area can claim municipal status. A muncipality is more likely to receive investment funds from the provincial and national government than is a county capital. 13. Guo Hongsheng, “Minzu quyu zizhifa de xiuding zai bixing,” Guangxi minzu xueyuan xuebao 4 (1994): 7 [“Needed Reforms of The Regional Autonomy Law,” Journal of The Guangxi Nationalities Institute 4 (1994)]. 14. Liang Tingwang, “On the Disjointedness of the Zhuang Culture,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 4 (1988): 1–7; Lan Jianning, “Lun zhuangzu sixiang yishi, xinli jiegou ji qizhong de beiruo chengfen,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 4 (1988): 7–16 [“On the Weakness of Zhuang Ideology and Psychological Structure,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 4 (1988)]. 15. Xu Jieshun, Qin Naichang, Minzu zizhiquan lun (Nanning: Guangxi jiaoyu chubanshe, 1991), 159 [Nationality Autonomy Theory (Nanning: Guangxi Educational Press, 1991)]. 16. Ibid., 172. 17. Wu Guorui, “Guanyu zizhiquan jiqi xingshi yu baozhang de sikao,” Minzu yanjiu 2 (1989): 6 [“Thoughts on Autonomous Rights and Their Implementation and Protection,” Nationalities Research 2 (1989)]. 18. People’s Daily, 23 July 1983. 19. Gong Ting and Chen Feng, “Institutional Reorganization and Its Impact on Decentralization,” in Jia Hao and Lin Zhimin, Changing Central-Local Relations in China: Reform and State Capacity (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1994), 79. 20. Wei Chunshu, Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi (Beijing: Danddai zhongguo chubanshe, 1992), 348 [Contemporary China’s Guangxi (Beijing: Contemporary China Publishers Press, 1992)].

Kaup-5.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 124

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 125

6 Culture: The Creation and Promotion of the Zhuang Cultural Heritage

As Zhuang political autonomy increased in the 1980s, ethnic demands by activists rose for greater protection of Zhuang political and economic rights. Similar processes have been occurring in the cultural arena. The central government has channeled numerous resources into developing Zhuang historiography and literature, raising educational levels in Zhuang areas, and promoting the Zhuang language. Each of the main policies in these three areas was initially promoted by the central government. The impact of state policy has had significant, though varied, effects on different segments of the Zhuang population. By examining each policy area in turn, we shall see that the party’s cultural policy has had a radically different impact on the Zhuang peasantry than on the middle-level cadres and intellectuals. Before examining the specific policies, however, it is useful to understand the principal guidelines informing the party’s cultural policy in Zhuang areas. The cultural rights of minorities were listed in the party’s earliest documents on nationality theory and given constitutional validity beginning in 1954. Four provisions in the 1952 General Program of the People’s Republic of China for the Implementation of Regional Autonomy for Minority Nationalities clearly summarize the central government’s policy on the minorities’ right to cultural autonomy. Articles 16 and 17 state: Article 16: The autonomous organ of a national autonomous region may adopt the spoken and written language of the nationality (or nationalities) of the region for developing their culture and education. Article 17: The autonomous organ of a national autonomous region may take necessary steps to train cadres from among the nationalities in the region who have a highly developed sense of patriotism and close contact with the local population.

125

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

126

11:35 AM

Page 126

Creating the Zhuang

Articles 21 and 33 broadly defined the government’s responsibility to foster educational and cultural growth in the minority areas: Article 21: The autonomous organ of a national autonomous region may take necessary and appropriate steps to develop the culture, education, arts, and health services of the various nationalities inhabiting the region. Article 33: The people’s governments of higher levels shall assist the national autonomous regions in their political, economic, cultural, and educational development, as well as in the expansion of health services.

These four articles clearly articulate the government’s intention to allow the minorities to develop their own “cultural heritage,” including the right to research their own histories and to publish their own literature. The minorities are also allowed to develop their own artistic traditions, use their own language, and educate their people in accordance with “local conditions and needs.”

Zhuang Historiography and Literature As discussed in earlier chapters, after recognizing the Zhuang and deciding to grant them regional autonomy, the central party and government launched a concerted campaign to build Zhuang solidarity. In addition to the collection of Zhuang heroes and the rewriting of their biographies to emphasize their Zhuang ethnicity, the government sponsored a number of large research projects to publish both Zhuang histories and collections of Zhuang folktales. The campaign began almost immediately after the decision was made to recognize the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture and continued on a mass scale until the late 1980s, with a tenyear hiatus during the Cultural Revolution. One of the first key projects to compile historical documents on the Zhuang came in the mid-1950s when central government work teams were sent to conduct village studies and collect historical documents for inclusion in a series of anthologies entitled Investigation of the Guangxi Zhuang Nationality’s Society and History. Individual series were published for each Chinese minority, and seven volumes eventually were compiled on the Zhuang. The project began shortly after the CCP took control of the country, and in 1956 the central party dispatched several ethnologists to Guangxi to work on the project. In 1958 the project was extended, and the Central Nationalities Institute also became involved in compiling a threepart series on A Brief History of the Minorities, A Brief Annal of the Minority Nationalities, and The Situation of Regional Autonomous Areas. Again, each minority group had its own three-part series.

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 127

Culture

127

The government also sponsored a number of projects to compile literary anthologies of Zhuang works. Two major editions published toward the end of the 1950s and early 1960s were An Outline History of Guangxi’s Zhuang Literary Figures and Literature,1 published in 1959, and Guangxi Zhuang Literature,2 published in 1961. Though there were practically no references to the Zhuang prior to the decision to grant them an autonomous prefecture in 1952, afterward the Guangxi papers ran frequent lead articles on Zhuang culture and history.3 The Guangxi and Yunnan newspapers published long articles on practically every aspect of Zhuang life, in what seems to have been an effort to increase awareness of Zhuang issues and to present the government’s views on key aspects of Zhuang society. Although the majority of articles tended to focus on Zhuang language issues, a number of articles appeared featuring broader introductions to “the Zhuang,” expositions on the origins of the Zhuang people, and descriptions of important archaeological discoveries proving the “rich heritage of the Zhuang people.”4 Again, the political purpose behind these essays on Zhuang culture seems clear from the tone of the works. Fei Xiaotong’s 1952 article in New Construction provides a clear example of non-Zhuang government representatives publishing histories of the Zhuang in order finally to “understand who this minority is.”5 Fei’s introduction states: Guangxi has a type of people called “local people” who are widely spread across the province. With the exception of a few counties bordering Guangdong, there is not a single county which doesn’t have these “local people.” . . . In areas where “local people” make up the majority of the population and have a relatively high social position, and in areas where they live amongst Miao or Yao people, “local people” refuse to acknowledge that they, just like the Miao and Yao, belong to a minority nationality. They rather refer to themselves as “Han who speak the Zhuang language.” . . . There are also [some “local people”] who call themselves Han, and yet recognize that they are different than Han from the outside. They call outside Han “guest people.” From this we can recognize that . . . [these people] are a nationality group, but exactly what to call them remains a problem. Since the language they speak is generally called Zhuang, we recommend calling them Zhuang. The Zhuang are a relatively large Chinese southern minority, but we still know little about them. I want to present some findings and opinions here, and hope that scholars with more expertise on nationality history will offer us their assistance, and in this way move towards a better understanding of these people.

Despite the acknowledged ambiguity of his subject, Fei Xiaotong then proceeds to expound upon the history and culture of the Zhuang. His essay clearly is designed to resolve the debates about which groups should be

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

128

11:35 AM

Page 128

Creating the Zhuang

considered part of the Zhuang nationality, and to begin convincing the public, scholars, and the Zhuang people that the Zhuang are a separate nationality with their own cultural heritage and history. The government also established a Guangxi Literature and Arts Association in May 1954 and named a non-Zhuang as chairman of the group. Of the following five chairmen, the third and fifth were Zhuang.6 Although government-sponsored research on Zhuang culture stopped during the Cultural Revolution, the 1980s witnessed a surge in Zhuang cultural studies. The initial cultural projects in the early 1980s were almost entirely government funded, and instigated by the central and provincial authorities, but by the end of the 1980s a number of nongovernmental Zhuang research activities began to be conducted by the Zhuang themselves. One of the first post–Cultural Revolution projects on nationality culture was the promotion of a five-volume series on minority issues. On 24 January 1980 the central government hosted a major conference in Beijing on the project. The conference was attended by representatives from seventeen provinces, different branches within the autonomous areas, and eighty-four scholars. The five-volume minority issues series was announced in 1979 and was designed to build on the three-volume series on minority affairs begun in 1958. The conference made no secret of the fact that the project had a political purpose. The summary report of the conference stated that the publication of the five-volume series is an important component of minority work and research on the minorities. It is also a key project in the development of minority culture, and [a tool] to develop minority self-respect, increase inter-nationality exchanges and mutual understanding, propagate minority policy, strengthen nationality unity and the unity of the country, and to promote the Four Modernizations in minority areas.7

Toward the end of the 1980s dozens of books on Zhuang culture began to be published. These works included general histories of the Zhuang, compilations of essays on Zhuang culture, and collections of folktales and songs. Furthermore, sponsorship of these research projects seemed to shift gradually. The creation of the Guangxi and Yunnan Zhuang Studies Associations in the early 1990s united the many scholars and officials who had research experience on the Zhuang, and these nongovernmental organizations began actively to promote their own research agenda. In 1991 individuals interested in Zhuang affairs formed the Guangxi Zhuang Studies Association “to promote the Zhuang culture, economics, and politics.” Over 270 Zhuang joined the association, most of whom were either government officials or Zhuang scholars. Enrollment was by invitation only, as opposed to the Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association, which

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 129

Culture

129

was formed two years later, claimed a membership of nearly five hundred, and welcomed members from all walks of life. A number of the Yunnan association members report that although the government did not “actively go against the association, it didn’t offer us any financial support whatsoever.” Some said they felt the government was “worried that the Zhuang would get too powerful.” The chair of the Politics and Law Department of the Yunnan Nationalities Affairs Commission, He Zhengting, was instrumental in organizing the Yunnan group and petitioning the government for recognition. The group plans to publish fifteen books, including studies on the religious texts of each of the main Wenshan Zhuang branches, and has just published a major pictorial entitled The Yunnan Zhuang. Much of the Zhuang Studies Association work has not materialized due to a severe lack of funds.

Education in Zhuang Areas Educational levels in Zhuang areas remain far below the national average and, perhaps more revealing, below Han levels within the same geographic areas. Scholars and policy analysts differ in their explanations of why the Zhuang remain so far behind the Han in educational attainment. The most common explanations blame the difficulties the Zhuang experience in learning primarily in the Han language. The rate of illiteracy among the Zhuang population, for example, far exceeds that of the Han. Although sources differ on the exact percentage of Zhuang who are illiterate, by all accounts they fall far short of the Han in literacy rates. One Guangxi source states that 31.6 percent of Guangxi Zhuang over the age of twelve are illiterate, as compared to 16.4 percent of the national average.8 Nearly 47 percent of the female Zhuang population over the age of twelve, and 15.73 percent of the male population, are illiterate or semi-illiterate according to the 1982 census figures. Though these figures are high compared to the Han population, the average rate of illiteracy among the minorities is 42.54 percent. Fourteen of China’s fifty-six nationalities have higher rates of illiteracy than the Zhuang. Over 40 percent of the Zhuang in the Baise area are illiterate, whereas illiteracy rates exceed 50 percent in Longlin, Sanjiang, Bama, Napo, Linglun, Leye, Xilin, and Tiane Counties. The illiteracy rates of those over thirty in one sample Zhuang village exceed 85 percent. Only 2.7 percent of the women over thirty in the village are semiliterate, whereas the remainder are totally illiterate.9 In another article the director of the Guangxi National Minorities Languages Committee Research Department, Meng Yuanyao, notes that only 47.5 percent of the primary school students in Baise Prefecture passed the language section of the middle school entrance

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

130

11:35 AM

Page 130

Creating the Zhuang

examination in 1984; 16.2 percent of the villages and townships had a passing rate of less than 20 percent. In 1987 eight out of twelve villages in one county had a passing rate of less than 10 percent. In one of these villages, 119 students sat for the middle school exam, and only 4 passed. The average test score in this village was only 23.9 points. The great percentage of peasant Zhuang remain illiterate or only semiliterate, Meng concludes, despite five years of primary school.10 High illiteracy rates are likely to continue because primary school matriculation rates are low. Although kindergarten entrance rates throughout the region average 95.1 percent, only 80 percent of kindergarten-age Zhuang children enter school. Kindergarten entrance rates in Tian’e County did not exceed 75.5 percent in the early nineties. The average primary school dropout rate in Zhuang areas also exceeds the regional average. A study of several counties in western Guangxi found that over 75 percent of the Zhuang children dropped out before graduating from the fifth grade. Those remaining in school often are unable to pass the final primary school examinations. Over 98 percent of the primary school students in Napo County failed the primary school final examinations in 1985. In 1982 only 2 percent of Hechi Prefecture’s primary school students passed the language and math junior-middle-school entrance examination. Mashan County was not much better, with only 8 percent.11 With such low numbers of children attending primary school, it is not surprising that the percentage of Zhuang attending college is far below the Han percentage. According to the 1990 census, the national rate of college students was 1,422 per 10,000, but only 791 in Guangxi. These figures clearly represent discrepancies among the Zhuang and Han and not simply regional discrepancies, as evidenced by the fact that Zhuang and Han within the same county reflect similar patterns. For example, although over 29 percent of the citizens of Guangxi’s Gui County are Zhuang, only 61 of the 786 (7.8 percent) students in the county who passed the college entrance examination from 1979 to 1985 were Zhuang.12 The lack of positive role models who have successfully risen through the educational ranks may also demoralize young Zhuang, who, already strapped for tuition funds, may fail to believe that they can successfully gain the education needed to extricate themselves from their current financial difficulties. Although local officials and residents complain of some Zhuang parents in poorer areas refusing to allow their children to attend school, few studies have been conducted to date on the cultural factors limiting Zhuang school attendance. Moreover, similar complaints are leveled against poor parents generally, regardless of ethnic background. As one might expect, these low levels of education are reflected in the labor force. Of the 257,391 people in Guangxi with a postsecondary education or higher, only 65,867 are minorities, or 0.73 percent of the minority

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 131

131

Culture

population; 1.37 percent of the Han in Guangxi have received postsecondary or higher education. The rate of illiteracy among employed workers is also much higher in the minority population: 16.37 percent of employed minorities are classified as illiterate or semiilliterate, as compared to 8.37 percent of the Han labor force. In other words, there are half as many higher-educated working minorities and twice as many illiterate workers as compared to the Han. The average years of education received by the minorities is also significantly lower than among the Han labor force, with the minority average clocking in at 6.33 years and the Han at 7.52 years of education (see Table 6.1).13 Though Zhuang educational levels in Guangxi remain below those of the Han, they have nonetheless increased substantially. In 1950 only 23.38 percent of the students attending full-day schools in Guangxi were minorities. By 1988, although they made up only 39.07 percent of the region’s population, they accounted for 40.64 percent of Guangxi’s student population. These figures, though representing an obvious improvement, do not take into account the age distribution differences between the minorities and the Han. The minorities have a younger population than the Han and should therefore account for a higher percentage of the school age population. Of the Zhuang population 51.37 percent was below the age of twenty in 1982, whereas only 46.08 percent of the total Chinese population was below twenty.14 In the same year 38.86 percent of the Zhuang population was below the age of fourteen, compared to 33.18 percent of the Han. Given the obvious discrepancies between the Zhuang and Han educational levels, training minority cadres and educating the broader minority population have been key components of minority policy since the CCP first assumed power in 1949. The government’s first priority was to train a corps of minority cadres to facilitate the party’s administration and to serve as the middlemen between the central government and the as yet not integrated minority regions. The government also implemented a number of special policies to improve educational opportunities for minorities at

Table 6.1 Educational Levels in Guangxi Labor Force, 1990 (percentage) Secondary and Secondary Middle Primary Postsecondary Professional School School Minorities Han Guangxi Average

0.73 1.37 1.12

8.44 11.36 10.22

24.60 30.44 28.15

49.85 48.45 49.00

Illiterate Average and Semi- Years of Illiterate Schooling 16.37 8.37 11.50

6.33 7.52 6.87

Source: Liu Baofen, “Guangxi shaoshu minzu zai jingji huodong zhong de xianzhuang fenxi” 2 (1993): 7–12 [“An Analysis of the Changing Economy of Guangxi’s Minority Nationalities,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)].

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 132

132

Creating the Zhuang

the primary, secondary, and postsecondary levels. These new educational opportunities, combined with the ongoing struggle to promote the Zhuang language, have created a group of Zhuang, trained in public schools, with an increased sense of ethnic consciousness. By briefly examining the main government initiatives in cadre schools and the public school system, then examining the efforts to promote the Zhuang language, this chapter illustrates that the progress made in education has served to integrate the Zhuang at the grassroots level, while inspiring greater Zhuang ethnic nationalism among those who have risen to higher levels within the educational system.

Minority Cadre Education One of the party’s first priorities upon assuming power in the minority areas was to train a corps of cadres who could effectively relate to the nationalities and inspire the local population to comply with party directives. Without local contacts, the party could not communicate with the native inhabitants due to language barriers. Few uneducated Zhuang could speak Mandarin, which drove the party to cooperate with the “bad element” upper strata of Zhuang society until a group of young cadres could be trained. On 24 November 1950 the Central People’s Government approved a “Tentative Proposal for the Training of Minority Cadres” and passed a proposal to begin preparation of the Central Nationalities Institute, which opened that same year and was followed by a number of regional Nationalities Institutes.15 An expanded session of the Central Communist Party Politburo in February 1951 placed the training of nationality cadres on its list of key points. In December 1951 the second session of the Central Nationalities Affairs Commission pronounced the training of minority cadres the decisive crux of minority policy. Guangxi sent its first class of 219 minority students to the SouthCentral Nationalities Institute for a year of training in August 1951. The following year Guangxi opened its own institute and began training 150 students. Over the years the program has expanded exponentially and now educates nearly 3,000 students each year, 90 percent of whom are minorities, and 64 percent Zhuang.16 In addition to the students attending fouryear degree programs, there is also a special class for minority cadres. These student cadres study between six months and two years. In addition to the major Nationalities Institutes, a number of special programs were established to train Guangxi’s minority cadres, including institutes in Guilin and in the Youjiang Soviet area in Duan County. After the Cultural Revolution the government channeled even greater effort into training a mass minority cadre corps. In 1974 the Guangxi Minority Cadre

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 133

Culture

133

School opened its doors in Wuming and by 1990 had graduated over 8,000 students. Minority cadre schools were also opened in Nanning, Liuzhou, Baise, and Hechi, as well as in the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture. Each of the facilities offered degrees of various lengths, targeting cadres from all administrative levels. In addition to needing Zhuang cadres to fill administrative positions within the government and party, the government needed minority teachers to aid with the broader campaign to improve educational opportunities throughout the province. Given that few of the rural Zhuang could speak the Han language, Zhuang teachers were desperately needed to teach the public school curricula. Though the content of most of the public school classes tended to be broadly unified and determined by the central government,17 classes were taught in whichever language was dominate in a given locality. In 1950 there were reportedly only 522 minority teachers in schools offering full-day classes.18 This number had increased by 219 times to more than 115,100 full-time teachers in 1988. Whereas in 1950 only 1.22 percent of teachers were members of a national minority, by 1988 35.6 percent were. Despite the significant growth in the number of Zhuang cadres over the past fifty years, cadres and intellectuals already in office have begun demanding greater representation. Although early post-Liberation literature notes the necessity of training cadres to disseminate party policy, these new calls by Zhuang in the late 1980s demand more minority cadres in order to strengthen Zhuang autonomy, not in order to promote the central government’s agenda. A book written by the director of the Guangxi Nationalities Institute reminds its readers that “if regional autonomous organs do not have minority cadres, there is no difference between autonomous and non-autonomous areas. Minority areas will possibly exist in name only, and we will lose the basic meaning of being ruler in our own home.”19 The author goes on to note that although 31.1 percent of the regional-level bureaus’ (bu wei ban ting ju) chairmen and vice chairmen were nationalities, only 23.1 percent of the chairmen and vice chairmen of the offices (chu) within these regional departments were Zhuang. Middlelevel leadership, the author concludes, is weak, which bodes poorly for future Zhuang representation. The educational level of minority cadres falls far below the national average. Only 10.13 percent of the nationality cadres in Guangxi have a postsecondary degree or higher as compared to the average 19 percent of cadres countrywide. Only one of Guangxi’s eleven prefectural and prefectural-level municipality CCP general secretaries was Zhuang. Another Zhuang author warns that there are too few Zhuang in office. “Because of this,” he states, “there is no way to implement autonomous rights.” 20

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

134

Page 134

Creating the Zhuang

Popular Education When the CCP assumed power in Guangxi, educational levels were much lower in the province than the national average. Illiteracy rates in Zhuang areas were estimated at over 80 percent.21 In addition to training minority cadres, the party also sought to improve the general level of education throughout the minority areas. None of the goals of the party could be accomplished with an illiterate, uneducated, non-Han-speaking population. Educational reform was mandatory. During the first few years of the CCP’s reign, eradicating illiteracy and developing educational opportunities for the public were two of the primary goals of educational work. Devising and using a Zhuang-written script was one of the primary tools for fighting illiteracy. The government opened winter-term classes in December 1950 to teach both peasants and village-level cadres to read. The program was specifically designed to improve literacy, not to focus on disseminating political doctrine.22 The students were given only two months of instruction, and the project aimed for the very limited goal of teaching each student between 150 and 200 Chinese characters. In August 1958 the scope of the project was expanded, and peasants were trained for two years in the school, whereas cadres received a year of instruction. The content of the courses changed radically, as might be expected, during the Cultural Revolution. Although the schools remained open, they concentrated on spreading the party’s political message and on “pronunciation,” rather than on reading skills. The government reports that adult illiteracy rates have fallen in the four predominately Zhuang prefectures of Nanning, Baise, Liuzhou, and Hechi from 21.45 percent in 1982 to 14.46 percent in 1990.23 In March 1953 the Guangxi government held a meeting on minority education and issued “An Outline for Implementing Minority Education Work.” The committee listed improving primary education as the province’s most important task in the crucial field of education. The outline recommended building upon and improving the existing network of primary schools rather than building new programs. Recognizing that minority students were predominately coming from underprivileged families and that their labor was often required at home, the government announced that greater flexibility would be allowed in scheduling classes in minority areas. In hopes of increasing enrollment, rather than requiring students to attend class for full days, schools offered students the option of attending morning, afternoon, or evening courses. Where it was deemed more practical, schools offered classes every other day. Some areas were to develop mobile school programs, in which the teacher and class would shift location periodically to equalize the travel burden in areas where students had to walk miles over rough terrain to reach school.

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 135

Culture

135

The proposal also recommended establishing remedial elementary schools and increasing the number of “learning centers” in areas that could not afford to build facilities meeting the national standards required for “official” schools. The minimum number of students required to establish a school was lowered to ten in an effort to bring schools to the more sparsely populated minority areas. Higher salaries were offered to teachers from outside the locality, thus encouraging them to come to minority areas. These government policies were intended to increase both student matriculation rates and the number of minority teachers within the school system. In 1956, 34.79 percent of elementary students were Zhuang. The number rose to 36.64 percent by 1979 and fell slightly again to 35.96 percent in 1986.24 In 1956, 30.36 percent of primary school teachers were Zhuang. This number rose to 35.16 percent in 1979 and again to 36.46 percent in 1986. Great strides were also made in middle school education. In 1949 middle schools were primarily found only in the county capitals rather than at the village level. The county capitals of Baise, Yishan, Liuzhou, and Nanning had first-rate key-point middle schools administered by the province,25 but many counties were without them. By 1984 all counties had at least one middle school. The percentage of Zhuang students attending middle school has risen steadily since 1949, as well as the percentage of Zhuang continuing on to high school. In 1956, 26.26 percent of Guangxi’s middle school students were Zhuang, 27.35 percent in 1979, and 28.96 percent in 1986. The number of Zhuang middle school students going on to high school increased from 21.17 percent in 1979 to 24.07 percent in 1986.26 At the key-point township middle schools, the government has established a number of “minority boarding classes” for the nationality students. In these classes the government pledges to help defray the costs of education by offering scholarships to minority students. These fellowships initially covered all cost-of-living expenses, including tuition and issuance of food and blankets. The program reportedly began to be cut back beginning in the mid-1980s. In 1988 there were 387 of these minority boarding classes and over 21,300 participating students. In addition to the funds in the provincial budget allocated for primary and middle school education, Guangxi also grants counties with large minority populations a special education stipend for construction of educational facilities (jijian zhuankuan). The Guangxi government awarded 11 million yuan to these areas in 1983 in addition to the educational funds within the Guangxi overall budget, and the central government matched the autonomous region’s funds.27 The provincial government also allocates one million yuan annually to help subsidize students in the special minority classes, including the preparatory classes and midcareer classes.

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

136

11:35 AM

Page 136

Creating the Zhuang

Despite the extra funds awarded minority areas, the school districts are clearly still severely lacking in funds. Nearly every village I visited had classrooms with crumbling walls and several village youngsters who were forced to drop out of primary school for lack of tuition. Within many of the minority schools I visited, the teachers and students complained that the mandated government stipends were not reaching them. Villagers often rolled their eyes and said, “Yeah, sure” when I mentioned the special scholarships that the government supposedly supplies minority students. “We haven’t seen any of those,” recounted several nationality members from different villages throughout western Guangxi. Similar successes and remaining problems can be found in the highereducation reforms implemented for minorities after 1949. Only 10.32 percent of the students in institutes of higher learning in 1956 were Zhuang. This figure had risen to 16.89 percent in 1979 and to 26.78 percent in 1986.28 The central government and the Guangxi government have pursued several broad policies to increase minorities’ enrollment in institutes of higher learning. First, they have established a number of institutes specifically for minority students. In these programs the vast majority of students are minorities. Second, within the nonminority schools the government has set up several programs, or “minority classes,” specially for minority students. Third, the government adjusts the scoring of national university admissions tests for the minorities. In addition to the Guangxi Nationalities Institute and the minority cadre training centers already mentioned, the government opened a number of special higher-education schools for minority students, most of whom were Zhuang. Five minority teachers colleges were opened to prepare educational workers to teach in the nationality areas. The Youjiang Nationalities Medical College was founded in 1958, predominately to train minorities for work within the province. In 1990 the school had 937 students, 693 (74 percent) of whom were Zhuang. Within the nonminority institutes, the government also offers different types of “minority classes” (minzu ban) such as the “preparatory classes” (yuke ban) in postsecondary institutes. In June 1980 the central government passed a resolution “Regarding the 1980 Decision to Establish Minority Classes in a Number of Key National Postsecondary Schools,” which called for the creation of these minority classes. In 1982 Guangxi opened its first class and by 1986 had eleven classes in operation. Minority students whose scores were higher than those required for admission to technical schools but were short of the points required for university admission were selected to join one year of classes to prepare them for full university classes. By 1988 more than 4,000 students had gone through the program,29 and there were 670 students attending the classes in 1993 alone.

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 137

Culture

137

A second type of minority class recruits students who agree to return to specific minority villages or counties upon graduation. These classes are set up in two-year postsecondary professional schools. The size and number of the classes vary based on the specific needs of the minority counties requesting personnel. In 1988 there were twenty such classes operating in Guangxi, training one thousand students.30 The students receive tuition differentials and cost-of-living subsidies, but are required to return to minority areas after graduation. Guangxi has developed complex regulations granting minorities and those living within minority areas affirmative-action-type preferential enrollment benefits. The government allows certain groups to add points to their university admissions test scores. Within Guangxi eleven minority groups, excluding the Zhuang, are allowed to add twenty points to their test scores.31 Any minority nationality living within Guangxi’s five major cities—Nanning, Liuzhou, Guilin, Wuzhou, and Beihai—may add only five points rather than the twenty points they would ordinarily enjoy in the countryside. Zhuang living within the cities may also add five points to their score. Students living within the thirteen autonomous counties, whether they be minorities or Han, may add twenty points to their score. Anyone living within the thirty-six counties labeled as original revolutionary base areas, mountainous counties, border areas, and poverty-stricken counties may add ten points to his or her test scores, regardless of the student’s nationality. Minorities other than the eleven that are granted twenty points and who do not live in the thirteen autonomous counties or the thirty-six specialty counties receive seven bonus points. This in effect applies primarily to the Zhuang. In addition to receiving bonus points, a policy of “dropping points” (jiangfen isqu) has helped guarantee that at least a minimum number of students from each minority area will be admitted to institutes of higher learning. In 1995, for example, at least ten students had to be accepted from each of the thirteen minority counties and thirty-six specialty counties. The students with the top ten scores were admitted to university regardless of how low those scores actually were.

The Impact of Education on Zhuang Ethnic Consciousness Ironically, the cadres, teachers, and students trained by the government in the public higher-education schools have developed a stronger sense of ethnic identity than those outside the formal educational system or in the lower levels of the schooling system. Zhuang cadres and students repeatedly told me that before attending the Nationality Institutes or other postsecondary training centers established by the party and the NAC, they were

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

138

11:35 AM

Page 138

Creating the Zhuang

uninterested in Zhuang issues. One top Zhuang scholar at the Central Nationalities College in Beijing said she did not even know which nationality she was before applying for college. “One of my high school teachers told me I should apply to the Nationalities Institute,” she recounted. “I didn’t even know that the Zhuang were considered a nationality. I remember asking, ‘But do I qualify as a minority?’” Once arriving at the university, however, and coming into contact with other nationalities, she said, she “began to think: Why is it that the country’s largest minority is so underresearched and cares so little about its own history? That’s when I first became involved in Zhuang issues.” The most vocal advocates of Zhuang interests are invariably the very cadres the party has trained. These Zhuang cadres are also more likely than uneducated peasants to send their children to Zhuang-language schools. Researchers at the Yunnan Nationalities Institute Research Center found similar patterns among other nationalities, including the Dai, of minority cadres being more interested in sending their children to ethnic schools. The expansion of educational opportunities in Zhuang areas has had a split effect on Zhuang ethnic consciousness. In the lower levels of the school system, Zhuang tend to attend schools in their own locality. Therefore, they do not come into contact with new nationalities and are not daily reminded of their ethnicity, as those who attend the Nationalities Institutes are. To do well in the public school system, however, the students have to master the Han language and a set curricula on which they are then tested. Zhuang students are given extra points on the university exam, but they must be prepared to take a nationwide standardized exam that is not offered in the Zhuang language. Education remains the primary means of social and economic upward mobility in China, and of escaping from the poverty of the countryside. Zhuang students and their families, therefore, have an intense interest in excelling in the Han-language examinations. Through unified examinations, theoretically any student can rise to the top ranks of the educational system. The educational system, therefore, has proved an important integrating force now that Zhuang peasants have access to schools and hope of benefiting from the education. The unified examination system has made the average Zhuang less willing to learn the Zhuang language and more interested in joining in the privileges that education has to offer.

Zhuang Language Promotion The fact that cadres trained under the CCP’s educational system are more interested in developing and promoting the Zhuang language is particularly significant, as the Zhuang language is perhaps the primary marker of

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 139

Culture

139

Zhuang ethnicity, and language promotion is seen by both the government and Zhuang alike as the key rallying point around which to build Zhuang ethnic solidarity. Invariably, the answer to the question, How are Zhuang different from any other people? is answered with one sentence: “We speak a different language.” This is true whether the answer is given in the southern Zhuang dialect, the northern Zhuang dialect, or any of the more than two dozen major Zhuang dialects spoken throughout western Guangxi and eastern Yunnan. A Zhuang county Nationalities Affairs Commission director told me that “a nationality’s use of its own written script is a symbol of its autonomy. It reminds everyone that this is an independent nationality with its own autonomous region.” Many NAC cadres and Zhuang scholars told me that Zhuang history has been misinterpreted by centuries of Han historiography. Without a written script, they repeatedly asserted, the Zhuang cannot “recapture” their history or preserve contemporary Zhuang culture. As with so many of the nationality policies promoted in Guangxi in the 1950s, language promotion was instigated and implemented by the central government in order to integrate the Guangxi minorities. The Zhuang themselves were not particularly interested and certainly were not demanding promotion of the Zhuang script. As the government realized its integrationist goals toward the end of the 1980s, it gradually became less interested in Zhuang language development and began phasing out many of the programs it had initiated. Demands for language reform were then taken over by the corps of Zhuang scholars and officials who had been indoctrinated by party propaganda stressing the importance of the Zhuang language and fostering a sense of Zhuang ethnic pride. As the loci of Zhuang interest promotion shifts from the center to the middle-level cadres, many of the autonomous rights guaranteed by the constitution or granted by party proclamations cannot be effectively implemented because the new advocates do not have the requisite political and economic resources. Both Western and Chinese scholars often assert that the Zhuang had no written script before the Communist Party dispatched a team of language experts to Zhuang areas in the early 1950s and created a Zhuang written script in 1955. Although their language, like their people, was not unified, the Zhuang did have several means of recording language. Zhuang characters, referred to as “Square Zhuang Characters” (fangkuang zhuangzi) or “Native Script” (tusu zi), were developed during the Tang dynasty and began to be widely used during the Song and Yuan dynasties. By the Ming and Qing dynasty they were in common use. Many Zhuang scholars assert that Square Zhuang Characters are still commonly used in the countryside, and appear quite offended by claims that they are not.32 Most Square Zhuang Characters are derived from Chinese characters and were transmitted by those who had had some formal education in the predominately

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

140

11:35 AM

Page 140

Creating the Zhuang

Han schooling system. Han characters corresponding to Zhuang phonetic sounds were placed on top of the Han character representing the word’s meaning. For example, the Zhuang pronunciation of the word field is na. To write this word, the Zhuang would take the Chinese character pronounced na and place it on top of the Chinese character representing field, which is read in Mandarin Chinese as tian. The characters were often written differently in different regions as a reflection of regional dialects. The Zhuang written script was used in legal documents and contracts, religious texts, and folk literature and songs. The party’s policy on linguistic freedom for the minorities, like the rest of its nationality policy, was formulated largely before it had a firm grasp of the complexities of the southwest. As discussed in Chapter 2, the Zhuang language is very complex, and there are several dialects that can be mutually unintelligible. Around the time that the party decided to establish the Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture, it dispatched work teams to research the languages spoken by the western Guangxi people and to classify them into broader and larger categories. The delegation sent by Beijing to Guangxi in 1952 was headed by Beijing University professor Ai Jiahua. Most of the team’s top leadership were not Zhuang natives of Guangxi. The team worked to convince local leaders that a unified Zhuang script was necessary. On 23 July 1954 the WGZAP announced the formation of the Western Guangxi Autonomous Prefecture Research Leading Group on the Zhuang Written Script. Zhuang national Qin Yingji chaired the committee, with two Han and one Zhuang serving as vice chairs of the twenty-six-member committee. In 1955 the committee formally announced the creation of a phonetic Zhuang script based on the Latin alphabet. An article by Zhang Jun, one of the language team members, recalls the resistance the team met from the peasantry and local cadres: Just as anything new encounters suspicion and resistance from the strength of old social customs, so the promotion of the Zhuang script inspired all types of discussion and questions. “The Zhuang are an ancient nationality. For centuries the Zhuang have used the Han script. Must we create a new script?” . . . “Can we really call this strange squiggly script which looks like a chicken’s intestines a script?” “Han characters can be used far and wide. Would a new script be as useful?”33

The current director of the National Minorities Language Committee also acknowledged that much resistance to the script remains. “The Zhuang have been studying Han written script for fourteen hundred years,” he noted, “so it’s natural that after a few decades of promoting the Zhuang written script, both peasants and many cadres are not yet fully convinced of its utility.” All of the “doubts” that Zhang Jun documents and the

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 141

Culture

141

descriptions of Zhuang language promotion I collected in interviews clearly indicate that the impetus for language reform came from the central government rather than from the Zhuang themselves. Certainly there were some Zhuang who joined the government in advocating the script, and the few Zhuang already possessing a strong sense of their Zhuang identity, such as scholar and teacher Huang Xianfan, leaped at the chance to promote a written script for the Zhuang. These cadres were the exception, however; the broad majority of Zhuang were indifferent, or even resistant, to the script when it was first proposed. Once the work team created the script, it began a wide campaign to promote Zhuang use in the countryside. In March 1956 the Western Zhuang Autonomous Area government established the Western Guangxi Zhuang School to teach government workers and instructors the new script. Eleven hundred students received six months of training in the first class at the Zhuang School. One hundred of these came from Yunnan and Guizhou.34 Those trained were dispatched in small work teams to teach the peasants and to “eradicate illiteracy.” The government now acknowledges that there were “excesses” in the movement. Peasants recount that the work teams often set up roadblocks and refused to let farmers pass to market before demonstrating proficiency in the Zhuang script. By 1965, 40,000 cadres reportedly had received formal Zhuang language training, and more than 2.9 million Zhuang had attended Zhuang language classes at the county level or lower. Within the first ten years after the establishment of the new script, more than 10 million copies of over 350 different publications appeared in Zhuang, and 370 issues of the Zhuang language newspaper had been published.35 Once the Zhuang script was officially approved by the State Council in 1957, the central government allocated an annual fund of 5 million renminbi to the Minority Nationalities Language Commission to promote the script. The commission’s duties included translating Han books, television broadcasts, and movies into Zhuang; overseeing the Eradicate Illiteracy Campaign; promoting the script in schools; and collecting nationality folklore and literature in its original language. The commission, along with many of the offices dealing with nationality issues, was disbanded during the Cultural Revolution, and all efforts to promote the Zhuang script were suppressed. In 1958 the Guangxi NAC established a translation bureau in the Guangxi Movie Factory. Working with fourteen Zhuang students and teachers at the Zhuang Language Academy, the bureau translated fourteen movies. Frustrated by the poor reception the movies received outside of Wuming, the bureau dissolved in 1960 and did not resume work until 1973. In June 1974 the bureau aired a newly dubbed film in Donglan, Bama, and Fengshan Counties. All of these counties do not speak the standard Wuming dialect used to dub the film, however, and the film was

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

142

11:35 AM

Page 142

Creating the Zhuang

therefore not well received. From 1974 to 1978 the bureau tried a new approach. Rather than using the Wuming dialect, the bureau trained personnel from the county-level movie companies to dub the texts into their local dialect. Eight films were dubbed this way, with more than thirty-three different versions. In 1978 the committee ceased its translation efforts, and any further translating work had to be assumed at the county level.36 In 1982 the provincial government approved the establishment of a twenty-member Zhuang editorial division within the Guangxi television station. Whereas earlier broadcasts in the Zhuang language were generally simply translations of broadcasts prepared by the major divisions within the station, the Zhuang editorial division proposed to “revolutionize” Zhuang broadcasting by developing its own programs. The program on “Minority Arts,” for example, used to be excerpted from the Guangxi Arts Program. By the mid-1980s more than 80 percent of the minority arts program was filmed by the Zhuang Editorial Board itself.37 From 1952 to 1966 the Guangxi People’s Press published 1,728 books for public consumption. Of these 450 were published in the Zhuang language. By 1990 more than 173 million books were sold in Guangxi, earning more than 200 million yuan. Not including textbook purchases, the per capita book purchases were 1.7 in 1990. In January of 1984 the Guangxi Minority Nationalities Language Commission began operating the Guangxi Minority Languages and Literature Printing Factory. The presses produced more than 1.4 million books over the next five years, representing over 120 separate titles written in the Zhuang language.38 The Zhuang Language Newspaper (Zhuangwen bao), later renamed the Guangxi Minority Newspaper (Guangzi minzu bao), began publication in July 1957. It is the only newspaper published in Zhuang. It started as a biweekly paper and gradually began publishing once, twice, then three times a week. By the time it was shut down by the Cultural Revolution, it had printed 1,028 issues.39 The paper was reopened in August 1982 and by September 1991 had printed 739 additional issues. The paper is distributed to township and village offices. Though I occasionally saw the paper displayed on news racks in the county offices I visited, nearly all of the people in the offices said they rarely, if ever, read the Zhuang paper and much preferred the Han-language papers. Efforts to promote the Zhuang written script were revived in 1984 after being completely shut down during the Cultural Revolution. Language committees were reestablished along with new experimental Zhuang language schools in twenty-two counties in Guangxi. Over the next four years the number of counties experimenting with Zhuang more than doubled to fifty-two. The central government once again offered its 5 million yuan annual grant to the Guangxi Minority Nationalities Language Committee. From 1984 to 1986, Zhuang language promotion reached what the Language Committee director Meng Yuanyao calls “its second high tide.”

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 143

Culture

143

The Guangxi Nationalities Institute recruited its first class of students for its newly established Zhuang language department in 1984. School officials admit, however, that students express little interest in majoring in Zhuang. Students worry that they might be relegated to life employment in Zhuang areas and not be selected for work in the more economically booming Han areas both in and outside Guangxi. Due to the high inflation in Guangxi, the central government funds initially given to the autonomous region to promote the Zhuang language in the 1950s were no longer sufficient to support the schools by the mid eighties. The central government has shown little willingness to increase the budget. By 1988 county governments were required to subsidize the Zhuang language schools if they wanted to keep them running, and as a consequence, more than half the schools closed. In 1992 the National Minorities Language Committee’s grant was transferred to the Ministry of Education, which took over language promotion. The Guangxi Ministry of Education has only one person who handles the Zhuang language program. Shifting the funds from a committee devoted entirely to minority language affairs to a ministry concerned with broader educational concerns regionwide indicates the declining importance accorded language promotion by the province’s top leadership. Although the Language Committee has not yet been officially disbanded, a major component of its organizational mission was dismantled. Retiring committee members are no longer replaced, and the organization has reportedly been targeted for dismantlement, though this has not yet been officially announced. Finding enough funding for Zhuang language promotion has been one of the most difficult obstacles to the language’s extended use. The Zhuang script cannot be effectively promoted simply by teaching people to sound out the alphabet. Without books to read and opportunities to reinforce what they have learned, students quickly forget how to read and write. Despite the impressive figures on the number of books published in Zhuang, I did not once see a Zhuang book for sale the entire time I was in Guangxi and Yunnan. Government buildings and street signs use both Han characters and Zhuang, though less than a handful of the Zhuang I met could read the signs. One of the NAC officials I met who was most intent on promoting the Zhuang language pointed to a Vietnamese sign in Wenshan and told me it was Zhuang. Many Zhuang counties remain dependent on the government for basic subsistence needs. The costs of feeding the population, building infrastructure, developing industry, providing schooling, and so forth, unfortunately already far exceed provincial and county funds. Channeling scarce funds into experimental Zhuang language schools by necessity receives low priority. The central government initially invested a large amount of funding into language promotion as a means of quickly eradicating illiteracy. As formal schooling opportunities increased in Zhuang areas and as the party began to realize that eliminating illiteracy would be

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

144

11:35 AM

Page 144

Creating the Zhuang

neither quick nor cheap, it gradually moved to channel funds into the mainstream, national school system. Without outside support, the provincial and prefectural governments do not have the means of effectively promoting the Zhuang language. As I heard from more than one NAC official, “We have autonomy, but without the means to implement it, it is nothing but empty promises.” Although Zhuang peasants did not actively demand a written script in the 1950s, they were perhaps more willing to accept it then than they are now. Immediately following the Communists’ triumph, there was what Meng Yuanyao terms a “spirit of euphoria” among a large percentage of the Zhuang peasantry. After being told by the party that they had been “liberated” and “finally recognized” as a “proud and glorious nation,” many Zhuang began slowly to conceive of themselves as part of the Zhuang nationality and to be willing to partake in whatever advantages this might offer. For many of the peasants in remote regions, the Eradicate Illiteracy Campaign using the Zhuang script was the only chance at education they had. As Meng recalls, the peasants did not have firm opinions on how they should be educated. “You just had to tell them what was of use, and they accepted it as useful.” Today the situation is quite different. Although the percentage of Zhuang children without access to primary education remains higher than the national average, educational opportunities are much greater in the early nineties than in the fifties. The percentage of Zhuang who can speak Mandarin has also increased with greater access to schools and improved communication and transportation. Many Zhuang, therefore, are less eager to study their own language than in the 1950s. Zhuang peasants, concerned primarily with how to feed themselves or break from the poverty of the countryside, often are unwilling to “waste their time” learning a script that has no application nationally. NAC officials and Zhuang scholars often complain that the peasants are not willing to learn the language. Those who have studied the language say they quickly forget it, as there is little opportunity to put it to use. In 1988 the Guangxi Minority Languages Commission and the Guangxi People’s Television Network jointly sponsored the Guangxi Zhuang Language Broadcast School. Three half-hour programs, designed to bring basic education to the Zhuang masses, were broadcast each morning on the Guangxi Television station.40 The programs began broadcasting 1 April 1988, but ceased running by March 1993. The numerous dialects within the Zhuang language also complicate the promotion of the Zhuang written language. The current phonetic script is based on the Wuming County dialect. Wuming sits near the dividing line between northern and southern Zhuang dialect areas and is near the capital. The Wuming dialect, however, is neither northern nor southern and is spoken nowhere outside the county. The differences between Wuming

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 145

Culture

145

speech and the many different dialects cannot be systematically correlated. Students outside Wuming must learn long lists of vocabulary words used nowhere other than in Wuming. Most of the primary school students I spoke with in Wuming’s neighboring county, Mashan, said that their Zhuang language class was much more difficult than either Chinese or math. Interestingly, most of the published materials on Zhuang language promotion stress that these dialect differences are not significant and can easily be overcome. Almost all of the county-level cadres I spoke to, however, acknowledged the difficulties of using a unified script. Of all the published reports on bilingual education, none suggest that the Zhuang language should not be used, though many make just this suggestion in interviews and conversations. The articles, instead, rave about the success of all the experimental Zhuang language classes in which students study Zhuang in first and second grade before gradually phasing Chinese into their curriculum. According to published sources, the students in all of these classes score better on national Chinese and math tests. In interviews at three experimental schools, however, none of the teachers, administrators, or students viewed Zhuang as a tool for excelling in other subjects, and several teachers acknowledged that the students in Zhuang classes performed slightly below the Chinese language students. One interviewee became quite concerned that he would suffer political ramifications for telling me that students in the Chinese language classes outperformed those in the Zhuang classes. Whenever higher-level officials tour the schools, he said, the school administration presents only glowing reports of the experimental classes’ success. The history of Zhuang language promotion clearly demonstrates that the script was called for and created by the central government. The overwhelming support for the Zhuang script appearing in published articles and interviews with middle-level cadres suggests that Zhuang cadres have taken over the demand for Zhuang language reform. A leading linguistic scholar in Guangxi who is Zhuang and has published extensively on Zhuang language promotion berated “officials” for failing to promote the Zhuang language. He criticized the Education Ministry’s cutback of Zhuang language programs. “They claim that they are trying to concentrate their efforts and reduce costs without diminishing the effectiveness of the program, but that’s just a rationale. The real reason is the Ministry of Education just doesn’t place enough emphasis on this issue.”41 Although the initiative for language promotion seems to have originated at the center, by the latter part of the eighties the initiative had clearly shifted to the Zhuang intellectuals and cadres. Qin Guosheng, a linguist at the Guangxi Nationalities Institute, applied for, and was awarded in 1995, a thirty-thousand-yuan grant from the central Ministry of Education to develop Zhuang language textbooks. The project was entitled “Improving

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

146

11:35 AM

Page 146

Creating the Zhuang

Zhuang Bilingual Teaching Skills and Improving the Quality of Primary Education in Zhuang Areas.” Involved in language promotion for several decades, Qin said that the current textbooks used in Zhuang schools are generally simply direct translations of Han course books. Moreover, there is currently no standardized text for teaching the Zhuang language. Textbooks are generally written by the individual schools that offer Zhuang language courses. No consideration had been given to writing books that would cater to the Zhuang culture or include Zhuang history. In May 1995 Qin and his selected research team traveled to eleven counties to study the current status of Zhuang language studies. As long as the Zhuang language is perceived merely as a symbol of Zhuang ethnic nationalism and has little practical use for the average peasant, it will remain difficult to promote. As educational opportunities increase in the Zhuang countryside, Zhuang students have a growing incentive to learn the Han language and not “waste their time” learning a “backward language,” as so many of the peasants I interviewed pointed out. The economic reforms over the past decade have also decreased Zhuang initiative to learn a Zhuang written script. Students are now interested in learning English or Han, so that they can participate in the opening market. Economic reforms have had a significant impact on nearly every aspect of Zhuang life, and it is economic policy that the next chapter addresses.

Notes 1. Liu Jiezhu, Guangxi zhuangzu wenren wenxueshi gaiyao (Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu kexue gongzuo weiyuanhui, 1959) [An Outline History of Guangxi’s Zhuang Literary Figures and Literature (Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Scientific Work Committee and Zhuang Literary History Compilation Office, 1959)]. 2. Guangxi zhuangzu wenxue (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1961) [Guangxi Zhuang Literature (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1961)]. 3. A comprehensive bibliography of writings on the Zhuang lists the first postOctober 1949 article specifically on the Zhuang as appearing on 5 November 1952 in the Guangxi News. See Xie Qiguang, Lingwai zhuangzu huikao (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1989), 872 [A Collection of Essays on the Zhuang Within and Outside of Lingnan (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1989)]. 4. Zhang Yingning, “Guangxi zhuangzu de jiandan jieshao,” Guangxi ribao (5 November 1952) [“A Brief Introduction to the Guangxi Zhuang,” Guangxi Daily News (5 November 1952)]; Fei Xiaotong, “Guanyu guangxi zhuangzu lishi de chubu tuikao,” Xin jianshe 1 (1952), 59–72 [“An Investigation on the Beginnings of the Guangxi Zhuang’s History,” New Construction 1 (1952)]; Ke Guanqiong, “Guangxi zuoyoujiang liuyu xinshiqishidai guiwu jianjie,” Wenwu cankao ciliao 6 (1956) [“A Brief Introduction to the Neolithic Artifacts of the Guangxi Right and Left River Basin Areas,” Cultural Artifact Reference Materials 6 (1956)].

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 147

Culture

147

5. Fei Xiaotong, Investigation, 60. 6. Fan Qixu, Qin Naichang (eds.), Zhuangzu baike cidian (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993), 462 [The Zhuang Encyclopedia (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993)]. 7. Guojia minwei zhengce yanjiushi, Guojia minwei minzu zhengce wenjian xuanbian 1979–1984 (Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1988), 294 [Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Policy Research Office, Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Minority Policy Documents Collection 1979–1984 (Beijing: Central Nationalities Institute Press, 1988)]. 8. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 29. 9. Wei Yiqiang, “Guanyu zhuangyuwen shiyong he fazhan de jige wenti,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 1 (1986), 24 [“A Few Questions Regarding the Use and Development of the Zhuang Script,” Minority Culture Research 1 (1986)]. 10. He Minghui, Meng Yuanyao, “Tan zhuangwen zai kaifa zhuangzu ertong zhinengzhong de zuoyong,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 26–28 [“The Use of Zhuang Script in Developing the Intellect of Zhuang Children,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. 11. Wei Yiqiang, “A Few Questions,” 24. 12. Su Yongqin, “Tuixing shiyong zhuangwen dayi,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 1 (1986): 11, 14 [“Answers to Questions on Zhuang Language Promotion,” Nationalities Culture Research 1 (1986)]. 13. Liu Baofen, “Guangxi shaoshu minzu zai jingji huodongzhong de xianzhuang fenxi,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 10 [“An Analysis of the Changing Economy of Guangxi’s Minority Nationalities,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. 14. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 26. 15. Nine more Nationality Institutes were opened after 1950: the Northwest Institute in Lanzhou, the Southwest Institute at Chengdu, the South-Central Institute at Wuhan, the Guangdong Institute at Guangzhou, the Guangxi Institute in Nanning, the Yunnan Institute in Kunming, the Guizhou Institute at Guiyang, the Qinghai Institute at Xining, and the Tibet Institute at Xianyang. 16. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 264. 17. Some adjustments were allowed in the curriculum to include subjects particularly relevant to a given area. Animal husbandry, for example, was part of the curriculum in parts of Guangxi. While the government made a mass effort to increase lessons on the minorities’ contribution to the Communist Revolution, the histories nonetheless continued to be written by the central government. Several Zhuang scholars are today arguing that the course curriculum should be adjusted to make it more meaningful to Zhuang students, as will be discussed in the section on Zhuang language promotion. 18. Wei Chunshu, Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi, vol. 2 (Beijing: Danddai zhongguo chubanshe, 1992), 145 [Contemporary China’s Guangxi (Beijing: Contemporary China Publishers Press, 1992)]. 19. Xu Jieshun, Qin Naichang, Minzu zizhiquan lun (Nanning: Guangxi jiaoyu chubanshe, 1991), 189 [Nationality Autonomy Theory (Nanning: Guangxi Educational Press, 1991)]. 20. Nong Caiwen, “Chongfen fahui zhuangzu ganbu zai minzu quyu zizhizhong de zuoyong,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1992): 13 [“Thoroughly Develop the Use of Nationality Cadres Within Autonomous Regions,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1992)]. 21. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 233.

Kaup-6.Final

1/7/10

148

11:35 AM

Page 148

Creating the Zhuang

22. Ibid., 279. 23. Ibid. 24. Ibid., 233. 25. Ibid. 26. Ibid., 234. 27. Wei Chunshu, Contemporary, 2: 143. 28. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 234. 29. Wei Chunshu, Contemporary, 2: 145. 30. Ibid., 144. 31. The highest cumulative test score varies from year to year based on the performance of the students of the given year but in recent years has tended to be in the 550–800 range. 32. Gu Youshi, for example, a researcher at the Guangxi Nationalities Institute, states that these characters are commonly used throughout Guangxi. 33. Wang Jun, “Zhuangwen chuangzhi 30 zhounian de huigu,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 2 (1987): 3 [“Looking Back on 30 Years of Zhuang Language Promotion,” Nationalities Culture Research 2 (1987)]. 34. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang bianxiezu, Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1985), 370 [The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Board, The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1985)]. 35. Wang Jun, Looking Back, 1–4. 36. Fan Qixu and Qin Naichang, Zhuang Encyclopedia, 473. 37. Ibid., 574. 38. Ibid., 570–571. 39. Ibid., 572. 40. Ibid., 300. 41. Personal interview, May 1995.

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 149

7 Economics: Development and Disparity

The Chinese government recognizes that income inequalities among China’s nationalities are pronounced and could potentially become explosive. Developing the minority areas economically has been a central concern of the Chinese Communist Party since it first began mentioning minorities in the 1920s. At a speech in 1989, Jiang Zemin affirmed that improving the minorities’ standard of living “is not only a question of economics. It is also a political issue.” He stated that “eliminating poverty in minority areas is of the utmost importance in ensuring stability, strengthening nationality unity and protecting the unity of the fatherland.”1 Thorough examination of the intricate adjustments made in economic policy in even one township would be difficult to cover in a single chapter. A complete sketch of the numerous and subtle shifts in the central government’s economic policies toward the people living in the vast Zhuang territory would require a full-volume study. This chapter will briefly touch on only four of the main areas that have hindered Zhuang economic development and the government attempts to mitigate their damaging impact. In sketching the development of infrastructure, trade, industry, and the investment base, the most persistent feature of Zhuang-state interaction once again becomes apparent. As the central government unilaterally granted the Zhuang preferential development policies, the Zhuang gradually began to perceive of themselves as a unique nationality with rights of their own. After offering numerous policies specifically designed to aid the minorities, the government began to abandon many of these preferential policies toward the end of the 1980s. It was then that the Zhuang middle-level cadres began to vocalize their own demands for greater Zhuang privileges. The Chinese Communist Party accords the development of the minority areas such importance that it is reluctant to lose its monopoly on the discourse of how these areas should be developed. Although the Chinese press runs articles on minority economics almost daily, many of them

149

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 150

150

Creating the Zhuang

condemnatory of current policies, the government still does not allow publication of economic statistics divided by ethnic categories. 2 Although hundreds of studies on minority economics (which have been appearing with ever greater frequency since 1979) compare the level of development between the autonomous regions and the nonautonomous provinces, never do they compare the economic standing of the Zhuang to the Han, or to any of the other nationalities. Though not precise, comparing Guangxi to the rest of China does provide a valuable indication of the disparity between the Zhuang and Han economies. Until the mid-1990s, Guangxi consistently fell in the lowest 10 percent of the national average in almost all economic indexes (see Table 7.1). In 1984, for example, Guangxi’s agricultural and industrial output was the third lowest of all the provincial-level administrative units in the country, amounting to only 48.9 percent of the per capita national average.3 Though Guangxi holds 3.67 percent of China’s population, it produces only 1.78 percent of the country’s agricultural and industrial output, and only 1.04 percent of the country’s fiscal revenue. In 1980 Guangxi’s per capita gross national product (GNP) was 178 yuan lower than the national average. By 1990 the difference had increased to 668 yuan.4 Although statistics comparing Guangxi with the rest of China offer valuable insight into the economic standing of the Zhuang, even more revealing are comparisons between western and eastern Guangxi. Over 90 percent of Guangxi’s Zhuang live in the four prefectures and two cities in western Guangxi. Western Guangxi is predominantly mountainous and,

Table 7.1 Guangxi’s Per Capita Economic Indicators Compared to National Indicators, 1993

Population Gross domestic product (yuan) Agriculture (yuan) Industry (yuan) Service (yuan) Total industrial output (yuan) Total agricultural output (yuan) Local fiscal revenue (yuan) Total investment in fixed assets by state-owned units (yuan) Of total, basic capital construction (yuan) Utilized foreign capital (U.S.$) Exports (U.S.$)

Guangxi

China

43.8 million 1,318 526 431 358 1,339 765 138.4

1.17 billion 2,055 499 988 568 3,182 780 359.6

Source: Guangxi Nianjian, 1994, 797.

Guangxi’s Provincial Rank (of 30) 10 26 10 27 26 26 16 25

213

451.2

27

120 5.5 25.5

257 164.8 65.2

26 11 16

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 151

Economics

151

though rich with natural resources, has a weaker infrastructure and less arable land than does eastern Guangxi. Most of the province’s arable land is concentrated in the Guangxi Basin in the Han-dominated southeastern section of the province. Though western Guangxi makes up nearly 60 percent of Guangxi’s total landmass, it produces only 45.42 percent of its agricultural output (see Table 7.2). The region is continually subject to major natural disasters, including both drought and floods. These comparisons of eastern and western Guangxi clearly indicate that the Zhuang fall far below the Han average in most economic indexes. Zhuang areas, like the rest of China more generally, have nonetheless experienced significant development over the last fifty years, and the region is by far the most prosperous of the five provincial-level autonomous regions. Guangxi’s access to the sea has provided it opportunities denied the landlocked autonomous regions. Both urban and rural per capita income is significantly higher in Guangxi than in other minority regions, with Guangxi’s urban per capita income of 4,289 yuan per year outstripping that of the closest competitor, Xinjiang, at 3,059.5 Likewise, Guangxi’s per capita rural income of 1,446 yuan per year, though low by national standards, exceeds that of the next-closest autonomous competitor, the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, which has only 1,208 yuan per year. Guangxi boasts nearly double the gross domestic product of any of the other autonomous regions, as well as three times the export earnings of the other autonomous regions. Agricultural production rates in Guangxi nearly quadrupled, whereas industrial production rates rose by more than 108 times betwen 1950 and 1989.6 Dozens of new industries have come into the area, and Guangxi has established trade relations with numerous foreign countries. Whereas in 1949 several counties had no roads connecting them with outside areas and no postal service, today all counties have paved roads, telephone connections, and television lines. Many villages today have these same amenities, and nearly all administrative villages at least have access to electricity, something unheard of throughout much of Guangxi in 1949. When the government first took control of the country, it acknowledged the low rates of economic development in minority areas. The government blamed the appalling conditions found throughout the nationality areas not only on the harsh geographical settings of these regions, but on centuries of “exploitative” policies promoted by the pre-CCP governments. By promoting preferential economic policies in the minority areas to compensate for these purported injustices, however, the government has increased the minorities’ awareness of the discrepanices in wealth between the nationalities and the Han. Poverty is not a new phenomenon by any means in Guangxi. Perceiving this poverty as a result of disciminatory policies against the minorities, however, is a direct product of the CCP’s minority policy. The

Kaup-7.Final

Table 7.2 Western Guangxi Versus Eastern Guangxi Economic Indicators, 1993 Industrial Output, 1993 (billions)

Total Agricultural and Industrial Output (billions)

Industrial Output as % of Total Output

Land Mass (1,000 sq. km.)

Population (millions)

1.65 5.35 2.65 3.80 3.65 3.52

1/7/10

Agricultural Output, 1993 (yuan billions)

Western Guangxi 14.27 5.57 2.47 4.51 4.40 .91

15.31 10.80 10.70 7.88 7.13 3.61

93.22 51.58 22.78 57.23 62 25.13

5.2 29.7 10.2 26.8 33.5 36.3

3.888 23.329 3.669 51.368 45.42

5.35 32.09 6.19 86.71 37

9.24 55.42 9.86 138.08 40.1

51.99

23.6 141.7 17 237.3 59.71

58.7 37.96

20.61 44.11 46.72

Eastern Guangxi Yulin Prefecture Wuzhou Prefecture Guilin Prefecture Qinzhou Prefecture Beihai City Guilin City Fangcheng City Wuzhou City Eastern average Eastern total Provincial average Provincial total Eastern % of provincial total

9.88 5.563 3.981 3.47 2.25 1.119 .975 .801

22.82 5.267 5.291 4.8 4.76 6.925 .605 4.154

32.7 10.83 9.272 8.27 7.01 8.044 1.58 4.955

3.505 28.039 3.669 51.368 54.58

6.828 54.622 6.194 86.712 62.99

10.333 82.661 9.863 138.08 59.9

Source: Compiled from The Guangxi Yearbook, 1994, 635–687.

70 percent 48.6 57.06 58 68 86.09 38.3 83.83 63.74 58.7

23.4 19.8 23.6 10.6 3.3 4.1 6.3 4.5 12 95.6 17 237.3 40.29

9.3592 3.6064 3.3849 2.97 1.3033 1.2644 .718 .896 23.5022 44.1117 53.28

Page 152

Western average Western total Provincial average Provincial total Western % of provincial total

1.038 5.228 8.261 3.37 2.73 2.702

11:35 AM

Liuzhou City Nanning Prefecture Nanning City Liuzhou Prefecture Hechi Prefecture Baise Prefecture

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 153

Economics

153

party shifted the focus of its minority policy after 1979 almost exclusively to economic issues, which further increased the Zhuang’s awareness of Zhuang-Han disparities. Examination of development policy in infrastructure, trade, industry, and investment clearly indicates how the centrally mandated policies have increased Zhuang ethnic consciousness and their demands for more preferential development assistance.

Infrastructure Guangxi’s harsh geographical setting has severely impeded the development of its transportation and communication infrastructure. The Zhuang economy revolved around small-scale self-sufficient farming well until the middle of this century. Less than 1 percent of the Zhuang population was engaged in nonagricultural labor in 1949. Due to the practically nonexistent infrastructure, farmers rarely traded with villages outside immediate walking distance. Close to half of the capital cities of minority counties were inaccessible by road in 1949.7 After years of devastation by civil war and the war against the Japanese, what little infrastructure Guangxi had built was in shambles when the CCP took control of the area. One of the CCP’s first priorities was to repair the roads, railroads, and waterways in order to restore a degree of normalcy to the war-racked land. The CCP’s earliest road construction efforts in Guangxi were designed to open as many areas as possible, as quickly as possible.8 Rather than building new roads in areas that already had an infrastructural or industrial base, new routes were designed to connect the region’s most isolated areas, with a particular focus on connecting minority areas. The main slogan of the time was, “First get through, then redo” (xian tong hou shan). Roads were built into several of the minority counties, making these areas accessible by car for the first time in history. By 1952 more than 16,800 kilometers of new postal routes were established into formerly closed villages.9 Roads were laid, for example, to connect Tian’e, Lingyun, Leye, Fengshan, Rongshui, Jinxiu, Ziyuan, and Zhaoping with the outside after centuries of isolation. During the Great Leap Forward, the emphasis remained on opening the more remote areas and on connecting as much territory as possible in the infrastructural system. From 1949 through the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, Guangxi concentrated on equalizing the discrepancies between infrastructure in the eastern and western areas. More than 10,000 kilometers of road were built during the Great Leap Forward. These roads were constructed during the height of mass movements, however, by peasants without supervision from trained engineers or construction workers. Many of the roads were barely passable and soon fell into total disrepair.

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

154

11:35 AM

Page 154

Creating the Zhuang

Road construction ground to a halt with the start of the Cultural Revolution, and resumed in force in 1970. From 1973 to 1978, however, the goals of road constuction, and consequently the location of new road development, changed. During this period roads were built to ensure national defense. Construction and repair of roads for nonmilitary use slowed to a standstill during this time. After 1979 the impetus behind road construction changed yet again, and roads were developed throughout China in order to facilitate the most rapid economic development possible. Guangxi’s internal road construction mirrored the national strategy. Road construction was to concentrate on the main economic arteries and most productive regions first, rather than on expanding the more backward regions’ access to the outside. In 1984 the Guangxi Autonomous Region’s government announced that road construction would be concentrated in the eastern, more developed areas. More than 756 million yuan was invested in Guangxi road construction between 1981 and 1988, the highest rate in the history of modern China, facilitating the construction of 3,830 kilometers of new road.10 According to government reports, 98 percent of the village and township headquarters can be reached by car, and 67 percent of the administrative villages (cun) are now accessible. The government hopes to reach 100 percent of village township centers by road before the end of the year 2000. The number of roads increased more than ninefold betweeen 1949 and 1988, leaving a reported 35,400 kilometers of road completed by 1988. The number of motor vehicles increased dramatically from 600 in 1935 to 110,280 in 1988. More than 128 million tons of freight was shipped by motor vehicle in 1988, and more than 257 million passengers traveled by motor vehicle. This was a more than 1,421- and 1,223-fold increase, respectively. Roads in Guangxi’s forty-nine poorest counties have increased by 12.6 times since 1949, with a total of over 17,900 kilometers running through them by the end of the 1980s.11 The areas with the densest population of Zhuang, however, remain more remote and disconnected from the remainder of the province. The number of trunk roads in the western areas are far fewer than in the east, and the traffic flow much less concentrated. The main trunk routes radiating west from Nanning have an average daily flow of less than one thousand vehicles. The main trunk routes leading to the south from Nanning to Pingxiang and Beihai average twice that flow. The roads to the north and northeast average still higher, with two thousand to five thousand vehicles.12 Even these figures do not convey the true disparity in the transportation facilities in the west and east. Roads in the east are generally of much higher quality, facilitating smooth traffic flows along level highways. Even along the main trunk routes in the west, traffic often moves at painfully slow speeds. A hundred-kilometer trip often takes up to four hours.

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 155

Economics

155

The pace of railroad development, like road construction, has been uneven, at times favoring the eastern portion of the province and at others the western portion. Immediately after officially taking charge of Guangxi, the Communists began repairing the existing two railroads, which had been destroyed by the Japanese. The first rail lines built by the new regime were designed both to stabilize the border and to begin developing the minority areas.13 Construction for the new Laibin-Zhennanguang line began in October 1950, and by December track had been laid from Laibin to Nanning. Within a year after the construction began, Laibin was connected to Pingxiang, Guangxi’s most southwestern city on the border with Vietnam, in the heart of Zhuang territory. After the United States sent its Seventh Fleet into the Taiwan Strait in 1950, the central CCP began developing the Zhenjiang port in Guangdong as a means of “breaking the American lock” on the area.14 A central work team arrived in Guangxi in August 1954 to explore possible sites for a railroad connection between central Guangxi and the new port. A month after the team arrived, ground was broken for the Lifang-Zhenjiang rail link. Railroad construction continued in the 1980s, and by 1988 there were 2,292 kilometers of rail, nearly triple the amount in 1949; 31.52 million tons of cargo were shipped by rail and more than 32.71 million passengers traveled by rail. This represented a more than fortyfold increase in freight, and a more than twenty-seven-fold increase in the number of passenger trips.15 There are direct rail routes from Nanning to Canton, Zhanjiang, Chongqing, and Beijing. Through these main transit stations, Guangxi is now connected to all of the major rail lines. In late December 1990 ground was broken for a major new rail line connecting Nanning to Kunming in Yunnan Province, and parts of the line became operative in 1998. The railroad is designed to open up extensive markets in southwestern China that currently have no access to the sea. Once the new line is completed, Sichuan, Guizhou, and Yunnan will all be able to ship their goods by rail to Beihai port through Nanning. The opening of the new line will also facilitate the shipment of Yunnanese coal to coal-deficient regions in Guangxi, further propelling their economic development.16 The government has also initiated waterways development projects. There are more than forty navigable waterways in Guangxi, making up a 4,520-kilometer network of passageways that can transport boats. More than 2,800 kilometers have been opened since 1949. More than 43,000 tons of cargo were shipped along these waterways in 1988, and more than 60,000 passengers traveled the routes in privately owned vessels. This represents a more than eightfold increase in passenger travel and a 72.8 increase in freight. Altogether, including both private and publicly owned boats, more than 16.49 million tons and 15.66 million people

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

156

11:35 AM

Page 156

Creating the Zhuang

traveled along the waterways. This represents a 46- and 119-fold increase, respectively.17 The waterways run throughout most of the province and connect Guangxi to several neighboring provinces. More than sixty-three counties have waterways. From Nanning, it is possible to travel east to Liuzhou, Guangzhou, and Hong Kong, and west to Baise County. From Liuzhou one can travel north to Chongan and east to Wuzhou. The civil aviation routes flowing to and from Guangxi have also increased greatly over the past four decades. Guilin serves as the hub of the air routes, with over twenty routes and an international connection to Japan, though Nanning now also has links with Beijing, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Kunming, Xiamen, Guilin, Hong Kong, and Vietnam. Though there have been major improvements to the region’s infrastructure since 1949, serious bottlenecks in transportation continue to hinder Guangxi’s further development. For example, the construction of new rail lines has not kept pace with the increase in passenger and freight turnover volume along the lines during the first ten years of reform.18 The density of railroads and highways in Guangxi is less than half that of the coastal areas.19

The Development of Trade in Zhuang Areas The trade industry was extremely underdeveloped in Zhuang areas when the CCP took control of them. Less than 1 percent of the Zhuang population was engaged in the nonagricultural sector. What little trade interaction there was in Zhuang areas was conducted among neighboring villages. The majority of households, however, were almost entirely self-sufficient, producing their own soap, dye, clothing, and shelter. The vast majority of Guangxi’s trade is conducted in the eastern, Handominated areas. In 1931 over 80 percent of Guangxi’s trade was processed through Wuzhou, which is situtated in the east at the juncture of the three main rivers in Guangxi: the Xun, Xi, and Gui Rivers. Zhuang scholar Huang Xianfan noted that though Zhuang commerce was not developed anywhere in the province, it was relatively more prevalent in areas where only Zhuang lived than it was in those areas where Han and Zhuang lived intermixed. In these mixed areas the Han dominated trade.20 During the Nationalist government’s rule, Guangxi experienced major trade imbalances. Guangxi imported most of its manufactured products and exported primarily natural resources, agricultural goods, and handicrafts. Between 1927 and 1931, for example, over 90 percent of Guangxi’s exports were agricultural by-products.21 By 1941 Guangxi trade imbalances had reached dangerous proportions, with exports not reaching even 14 percent of imports.22

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 157

Economics

157

The CCP is well aware of the abysmal performance of Zhuang trade and has initiated a number of special programs to spur the growth of minority trade. Soon after assuming power, the party hosted the first National Meeting on Minority Trade in August 1951. Zhou Enlai announced his approval of the policies proposed at the meeting, thereby indicating the importance accorded the meeting by the central government.23 A number of policies were experimented with throughout the fifties, and in 1963 the State Council passed the “three protections policy” (san zhaogu), which was to become one of the cornerstones of minority trade policy. Under the new policy the price of products produced primarily in minority regions or deemed essential to the livelihood of nationalities was subsidized by the state. Minority enterprises were allowed to keep 20 percent of their profits, and the national Department of Trade provided 50 percent of the investment capital for wholesale enterprises, and 80 percent for retail enterprises as compared to 6 percent and 30 percent in nonminority areas.24 Although the Three Protections Policy has not been formally abolished, and there are periodic reminders from the State Council that it should be enforced, the minorities report that it has been effectively dissolved.25 The investment capital has been severely cut back. Price subsidies have also been decreased by at least half in a number of counties, and authorities are allegedly considering cutting the program altogether. Although in 1980 the government increased the profits that minority industries could retain from 20 percent to 50 percent, a 1989 Minority Economics journal article argued that even with the raised profit base, the preferential benefits accrued to minority industries had been undercut by tax reforms in the early 1980s.

Industrial Policy in Zhuang Areas In addition to having a poorly developed trade industry, the Zhuang areas also lag in light industry development. Significant progress has been made in the development of Guangxi’s heavy industry, but the uneven division between light and heavy industrial development has led to significant fiscal problems for the Zhuang under the post-Mao market reforms. Large-scale industry was minimal in the first half of this century. The largest factory in the 1940s employed only slightly over five hundred workers.26 Privately owned industry was predominately concentrated in Liuzhou and Nanning until the war with Japan erupted in 1937. With the Japanese invasion, refugees from outside the province began arriving in Guangxi and established a number of factories in the Guilin area.27 Of course, industry was not completely absent in Zhuang areas. Paper production was a major Zhuang industry in the first half of the century.

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

158

11:35 AM

Page 158

Creating the Zhuang

Duan, Longshan, and Nama had particularly active paper industries, and Guode County also had a factory that produced paper for the local market.28 There were also a number of porcelain factories in Qinzhou, Beiliu, and Binyang Counties. Guangxi also exported a number of minerals outside the province. Mineral exports in 1935 accounted for nearly 10 percent of Guangxi’s total exports that year. The province exported 3.5 million Guobi of minerals in 1935 and by 1937 was exporting 25.5 million.29 By mid-1937 there were sixty-three gold mining companies operating in Guangxi, with mines in ninety-one cities covering 311,000 mu. Most of these mines were in Tianyang, Yongning, Shanglin, Xiangdu, and Cangwu Counties.30 Due to the extremely low level of development in Guangxi in 1949, and the poor investment base, which will be discussed more fully later in this chapter, Guangxi was largely dependent upon central government investments to build its industry; 40.2 percent of all state investment between 1949 and 1989 in basic construction was poured into heavy industry, with only 14.4 percent and 7.9 percent allocated to agriculture and light industry, respectively.31 In addition to direct capital investment, the government also sought to bring more industry to the region through a system of “horizontal linkages” (heng xiang lianhe). The program, formally announced in 1979, assigned each developed region a “little brother” province. Under the program the advanced (xianjin) region would send technical personnel and government officials to the lesser-developed region, and a number of minority personnel would be sent to the advanced region for training. Guangxi was assigned Shanghai and Jiangsu Provinces. During the first eight years of the program, more than one thousand exchanges were established between work units, schools, and political organs in Guangxi and Jiangsu. More than eighteen hundred professionals and technicians were sent from Jiangsu to train fifty-seven hundred technicians working in industries in Guangxi.32 In 1986 the Guangxi government announced “20 Rules” to encourage more horizontal linkages. From 1986 on, any non-Guangxi work unit wishing to build a factory or store, or rent land, could do so at a 40 percent price reduction. Units investing in any of the forty-nine poorest counties in Guangxi were given a 60 percent reduction in price. All new outside investment would be relieved of construction taxes. Outside companies were allowed to keep 5–10 percent higher profits than local companies. Those companies involved in foreign export could keep 5 percent of the foreign exchange owed the local government. To encourage technological exchanges and personnel training, any outside company that contributed to a Guangxi company earning higher profits would be allowed to keep 10–30 percent of the improved yield.33

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 159

Economics

159

Guangxi also followed the central government’s example and began mandating horizontal linkages between counties in the more developed southeastern regions and the less developed southwestern region. From a macro perspective, the policy has successfully encouraged a large number of technical and personnel exchanges and brought much-needed technical assistance into the poor northwestern areas, but there are several indications that the policy has been resisted by many at the grassroots level. Many of the peasants and workers I interviewed in Guangxi complained that the cadres and workers who came on short-term contracts to the northwest, and were predominately Han Chinese, treated them condescendingly. The Zhuang complained that the short-term workers had no attachment to the area and were thus not committed to developing it. They often came to extract as much as possible from the area, many informants complained, and exhibited little enthusiasm in their work. The Han who came to work on these one- to three-year contracts, in contrast, complained to me that Zhuang peasants often resisted their attempts to develop the area. “They’re so damn intent on holding on to their natural resources that they refuse to see the benefits of selling some of their resources to jump-start the economy,” said one Han engineer from Guilin. After being stationed in western Guangxi as a deputy magistrate (keji fu xianzhang) for a year, he had become disillusioned with the development prospects for the minority areas. “Sure, they might not be getting as high a price for their resources as they might if they developed it entirely on their own. But they don’t realize that all of the income they are forgoing now could be used to invest in new enterprises and infrastructure, which could ultimately bring them phenomenally higher profits. If they sit around and wait for years until they can afford to mine or otherwise utilize their natural resources, they will have missed the accumulated benefits from early development.” Qin Naichang also alluded to the grassroots-level resentment toward the Han outsiders in a 1993 article on the disparities between eastern and western Guangxi. “In recent years, the exchange work has proceeded slowly, and many exchanges have ceased completely. The most important reason is that many localities simply see this as a political duty and completely ignore the mutual benefits which can be derived from it. It is this which saps the life from the program.”34 Although government investment and horizontal linkages have led to significant development in the nonagricultural sector, the vast majority of Zhuang remain in the countryside laboring in the fields (see Table 7.3). Only 3 percent of Guangxi’s total Zhuang population lives in the six regional municipalities, and only 7.1 percent lives in county-level cities or larger. Guangxi’s key cities are largely Han populated. In 1990 Nanning had the highest minority population, with 33.39 percent. Liuzhou had only

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

160

11:35 AM

Page 160

Creating the Zhuang

Table 7.3 Comparison of Employment Structure in Guangxi, 1990 (percentage)

Minorities Han

First Sector

Second Sector

Third Sector

89.19 79.76

3.79 8.65

7.02 11.59

Source: Liu Baofen, “Guangxi shaoshu minzu zai jingji huodong zhong de xianzhuang fenxi,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 7–12 [“An Analysis of the Changing Economy of Guangxi’s Minority Nationalities,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)].

13.68 percent minorities; Guilin, Wuzhou, and Beihai followed, with only 5.27 percent, 0.84 percent, and 0.45 percent respectively. In 1988, although 79.3 percent of the population lived in rural areas, they earned only 55.7 percent of the provincial income, whereas the 20.7 percent of the population living in the cities earned 44.3 percent of Guangxi’s income.35 Though per capita earning figures divided by ethnic group are not publicly available, an examination of prefectural earnings offers some indication of the relatively poor earning power of the Zhuang compared to their Han counterparts (see Table 7.4). The high urban wages in the western counties represent an even greater disparity between the Han and Zhuang than in other counties, as most of the high wage earners are Han on short-term contracts.

Investment in Zhuang Areas Though Zhuang areas have abundant natural resources and have received some government investment funds, they still lack the capital investment needed to utilize the resources thoroughly. Shortly after consolidating its position in Guangxi, the CCP announced that minorities should be given extra investment funds and should be allowed greater autonomy in determining how their budgets would be allocated. In 1954 the Government Administrative Council announced that minorities would be awarded greater control over their local budgets than nonminority areas.36 In 1956 the central government mandated that reserve funds allocated to Xinjiang, Tibet, and Inner Mongolia be 1 percent higher than other areas. In 1958 the central government increased the base expenditure budgets of autonomous prefectures 7–8 percent, and those of autonomous counties 4–5 percent. Provided they did not contradict the national tax laws and were approved by the State Council, tax collection measures could also be determined by the autonomous areas’ governments. Autonomous areas were allowed to set their own local tax rates or not to collect taxes at all in order to encourage local enterprises. The autonomous governments could also set the

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 161

161

Economics

Table 7.4 Comparison of Western and Eastern Guangxi Per Capita Rural and Urban Income, 1993 Western Guangxi Urban Per Capita Wages (yuan)

Eastern Guangxi Rural Household Per Capita Income (yuan)

Urban Per Capita Wages (yuan)

Hechi Prefecture Nanning Prefecture Baise Prefecture Nanning City Liuzhou Prefecture Liuzhou City

3,459 2,865 3,250 n.a. 3,066 3,742

519 727 483 922 764 966

Guilin Prefecture 3,082 Yulin Prefecture 2,987 Wuzhou Prefecture 2,957 Qinzhou Prefecture 2,761 Guilin City 3,543 Wuzhou City 3,479 Beihai City 4,001 Fangcheng City 3,128

Western average Provincial average Western average as percent of provincial average

3,276.4 3,255.38

730.17 872.71

100.6

83.67

Eastern average 3,242.25 Provincial average 3,255.38 Eastern average as percent of provincial average 99.6

Rural Household Per Capita Income (yuan) 906 1,032 993 903 872 946 1,445 740 979.63 872.71 112.25

Source: Compiled from the 1994 Guangxi Yearbook, 635–687.

local fiscal budget and personnel quotas, provided they obtained the State Council’s approval. If expenditures surpassed revenue, the central government agreed to carry the difference. In December 1963 the government announced that reserve funds for the budgets of minority regions would be increased 5 percent annually. The proposal also granted the autonomous regions 5 percent emergency reserve funds as compared to the 3 percent promised nonautonomous provinces. All of these policies were hailed as special privileges to compensate the minorities for centuries of exploitation by corrupt Han under the old feudal regime. Though the policies were not consistently implemented, overall they did offer minorities privileges denied nonautonomous areas. In 1980, however, after hailing the minorities’ right to greater fiscal reserves and budgetary autonomy, the party began to replace many of these preferential policies with reforms designed to increase local autonomy universally throughout the country. The new “Divide Revenue, Divide Responsibility, No Change for Five Years” policy in 1980 effectively dismantled the earlier system awarding autonomous areas higher reserve funds. Under the new policy reserve and emergency funds were no longer calculated separately when devising the budgetary allocations. Zhuang writers Xu Jieshun and Qin Naichang berate the policy for blindly lumping

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

162

11:35 AM

Page 162

Creating the Zhuang

minority and Han regions together. They note that, under the new policy, in 1987 Guangxi received only 39.96 million renminbi in reserve funds and 59.89 million in emergency funds. Under the former system these funds would have been 138.43 million and 160.15 respectively, a combined loss of 198.73 million yuan.37 In addition to the changes designating which level of government controls the fiscal budget, since 1979 there have been significant changes in investment policies. The Zhuang investment base has decreased in relation to that of the Han as a result of both the central and the Guangxi regional governments’ investment policies. The central government’s policies have affected the Zhuang investment base both directly and indirectly. Direct central investment in the region has always been much lower than the per capita national average. During the First Five Year Plan, none of the 156 large-scale development projects were placed in Guangxi. From 1950 to 1987 Guangxi received 27.904 billion yuan in capital investment funds. This figure represented only 1.5 percent of the national investment funds, despite government promises of bringing the minority areas to the same economic levels as the Han areas.38 Investment has actually fallen since the Dengist reforms were implemented, as it has been channeled into the coastal provinces. In 1988 the per capita investment reached only 50.7 percent of the national average, and this had fallen to 40 percent by 1989. This reduction in central investment comes with a simultaneous drop in Guangxi’s ability to meet its own budgetary requirements. Whereas Guangxi actually had a fiscal surplus in the 1950s, by the 1980s local revenues amounted to only 66.8 percent of the total budgetary allocations.39 Though similar patterns have occurred in some of the poorer non-Han provinces, within Guangxi many people now interpret the decline in budgetary reserves as a result of disciminatory central government policies. The central government has shifted its investment in state-owned enterprises in Guangxi from direct grants to bank loans that must be repaid. Table 7.5 clearly indicates the drop in Guangxi’s share of direct investment during the first ten years of the reforms. The central government’s decentralization measures have also greatly weakened the Zhuang investment base. Under the Maoist command economy system, Guangxi’s abundant natural resources were extracted and sold at below market value to supply the coastal areas’ industries with ample raw materials. The government then taxed the coastal regions at high rates, and the revenues were dispersed throughout the country, with the minority regions receiving high subsidies to keep their local budgets going. Under the decentralizing reforms, localities are now allowed to keep a higher percentage of their earnings. Although this does allocate greater fiscal authority to the localities in relation to the center, the areas with large concentrations of extractive industries are disadvantaged in relation to the productive manufacturers.40 The decentralization measures initiated since

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 163

163

Economics

Table 7.5 Guangxi’s Total Fixed-Assets Investment by State-Owned Enterprise Compared to the National Average (percentage) The Sixth Five Year Plan (1981–1985) Sources of FixedAssets Investment

National Average

Total investment 100 Of which: Direct central allocation 31.5 Foreign investment 6.01 Domestic loan 17.5 Local investment and other 44.96

Guangxi Compared to National Guangxi Average 100

The Seventh Five Year Plan (1986–1990)

National Average

Guangxi Compared to National Guangxi Average

100

100

30.55

–0.95

17.29

14.34

–2.95

2.43 26.44

–3.58 +8.94

8.39 23.09

4.63 35.23

–3.76 +12.14

40.58

–4.38

51.25

45.8

–5.45

Source: Hong Puzhou (ed.), Research on Guangxi’s Economic and Social Development Strategy (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1990), 118.

1979 have reduced the center’s capacity to redistribute resources and have allowed the coastal areas to retain far larger extra budgetary funds in absolute terms.41 Guangxi’s geographic location has also impeded its struggle to obtain central investment funds. Located along the Vietnam border, Guangxi is the only autonomous region with access to the sea. The development of Beihai port since 1984, and the CCP announcement in 1992 that Beihai would serve as the “window” bridging southwestern and eastern China, led to significant growth in the early 1990s. Guangxi’s proximity to Vietnam served as a hindrance to its development, however, until bilateral trade relations were reestablished in 1989.42 Under Mao Zedong’s early leadership, economic investment was distributed to develop the hinterlands, but the central government was wary of investing large sums of money in industrial projects that would be vulnerable to attack should the Indochina conflict spill across the border. This concern was developed into a formal development strategy in the sixties and early seventies known as the “Third Front Policy.” Under this policy new industry was concentrated in the remote hinterlands, away from the borders with the Soviet Bloc and the Southeast Asian nations. During the Cultural Revolution 43 percent of state investment in capital construction was concentrated in the Three Fronts area, from which much of Guangxi was excluded.43 Although many provinces in China fall clearly into “coastal-interior” or “eastern-western” categories, Guangxi’s location in central southern China has led the central government to include it under different regional

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

164

11:35 AM

Page 164

Creating the Zhuang

categories in nearly every Five Year Plan. Most of Guangxi was classified under the nebulous “Second Front” during the Three Fronts development plan and thus received little central investment. Under the Seventh Five Year Plan (1986–1990) the central government divided the country into eastern, central, and western zones, with the bulk of investment allocated to the eastern coastal provinces. Under this plan Guangxi was grouped together with the western provinces, many of which earlier were included in the Third Front, from which Guangxi was excluded. Less than ten years later the central government announced a readjustment of investment priorities away from the eastern zones and toward the western zones. Guangxi suddenly found itself classified as part of the “coastal” zone and therefore once again outside the area designated to receive mass government capital investments. The Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region’s own investment policies have also exacerbated differences in Zhuang-Han development. In 1984 the Guangxi Regional Government announced the creation of a “Southeastern Regional Cooperative,” which included the five regional municipalities44 and the four eastern prefectures. A “Western Regional Cooperative” was also established for the four western prefectures.45 Following the central government’s model of developing areas with an existing infrastructural base, the Guangxi government pursued an economic plan designed to develop the Southeastern Regional Cooperative area first. In the latter eighties the western counties’ percentage of regional investment dropped from 80.6 percent of that awarded the east in 1984, to only 60.04 percent in 1988. Gross agricultural and industrial output in the eastern region increased by 11.6 percent annually between 1984 and 1988, whereas it increased only 8.8 percent in the west. The per capita rates showed even more pronounced differences, with the eastern region’s production increasing 44.2 percent over the four-year period while the western region’s increased only 30.5 percent. Whereas the western per capita production was 55.2 percent of that of the eastern region in 1984, it amounted to only 49.8 percent in 1988.46 In May 1988 the Guangxi Regional Party announced new guidelines for development. The province would be divided into three main areas. The first, the Southeastern Guangxi Open Coastal Belt, would comprise Qinzhou, Yulin, and Wuzhou Counties; Beihai and Wuzhou Cities; and the Fangcheng Port. Following the development pattern announced nationwide in 1986, this relatively developed region would receive the bulk of new investment. Development of this region would spur development throughout the province. 47 Nanning, Liuzhou, and Guilin formed the second region, which was to focus on export products to support the economic trade in the first region. The third region, the northwestern region, would first develop the “necessary conditions” before attempting major foreign trade efforts.

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 165

Economics

165

Rather than establishing contacts with foreign countries, the northwestern region was told to establish “horizontal linkages” with the first region and slowly develop a monetary base through better utilization of its natural resources. This development strategy increased the development gap between the eastern and western portions of the province. Guangxi also had great difficulty attracting foreign investment during the first decade of the reforms. More than 90 percent of foreign investment projects were concentrated in the eight coastal provinces from 1979 to 1987. 48 What foreign investment Guangxi was able to attract was overwhelmingly concentrated in the Han-populated eastern area. Yulin Prefecture, to offer but one example, utilized 78.64 million dollars of foreign capital in 1993, whereas Zhuang-populated Baise Prefecture received only 4.05 million dollars in foreign investment.49

The Ethnic Response Early government acknowledgment of the special economic needs of the minorities increased the Zhuang’s awareness of the ethnic component to their economic straits. The increase in Zhuang-Han economic disparity since 1978 has been particularly galling to the ethnic leadership, given the central government’s pledges to improve the minority economies and to guarantee them special protections. Since the Nationalities Affairs Commission first announced the beginning of the “new era in minority work” in 1978, the government has been stressing the minorities’ right to economic equality. Though official statements stress that inequalities cannot be eliminated overnight, the ultimate goal of obtaining “mutual prosperity for all the nationalities” has been increasingly stressed throughout the reform era, even as inequalities continue to increase.50 This emphasis on economic equality has increased the Zhuang’s belief that they deserve special privileges and has spurred them actively to demand preferential policies. As one Zhuang source states: “The government should stop viewing the development of minority areas as a burden and recognize that it is their responsibility to repay us. To repay us for both centuries of exploitation and for our current contribution to the economic well-being of the state” (emphasis added).51 The primary Zhuang criticism of the economic reforms has been against what one minority scholar terms “the denationalization of nationality policy.”52 Articles began appearing in the minority press53 in the mid-1980s attacking the government’s use of a “single knife policy” and its incorrect application of a “single implementation system” for the Han and non-Han areas.54 Another minority author argued that “while there are similarities between minority areas and underdeveloped regions, the government should

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

166

11:35 AM

Page 166

Creating the Zhuang

not simply deal with minority development issues by lumping them together with broader development plans for ‘Western Areas,’ ‘Mountainous Regions’ or ‘Border Economic Zones.’ . . . It is essential to recognize the difference between minority economics and regional economics.”55 Zhuang insistence on government recognition of the ethnic sources of poverty in Guangxi indicates a major increase in Zhuang political mobilization. The Zhuang did not begin to view their poverty as a reflection of Zhuang-Han disparity until after the post-Mao reforms began. As one Zhuang cadre stated, “When I was growing up, I knew my village was poor, but I thought that was simply because we were ignorant and lived in a bad location. Now I know it’s because we are Zhuang. We face a whole set of unique cultural and educational challenges the Han do not.”56 Prior to the reforms, many Zhuang did not think to compare their poverty to the Han wealth in the east. Rather, the Zhuang primarily viewed their poverty as a result of local factors or as reflections of zhixi differences. One interviewee explained, for example, that his village’s relative wealth was influenced by the fact that his and the neighboring village were from different zhixi: “We were Nong and they were Sha, so we thought they were dirty and less educated. They were lazy, too, which explained their backwardness.” Today the same villagers seem barely to notice their differences. Instead, both villages contend that they, and the rest of their ethnic compatriots, have been denied the material wealth amassing in eastern Guangxi and coastal China. The reforms have given the Zhuang leadership concrete issues around which to rally ethnic opposition and strengthen Zhuang internal solidarity. Zhuang vituperations have been particularly strong against the skewed pricing system, the center’s explicit favoring of the eastern areas, and the reductions in preferential policies for minorities. Zhuang activists have seized upon economic justifications to argue for Zhuang language reforms and greater Zhuang representation in the government. Price reforms over the past decade have made the minorities increasingly aware that they have not received the full benefits of their rich natural resources. Qin Naichang, director of the Guangxi Nationalities Research Institute and former member of the Guangxi Zhuang Nationalities Affairs Commission, has become one of the leading Zhuang spokesmen for greater Zhuang economic and political rights. Although he is highly respected and works closely with party and state officials, he has been critical of many official policies. In 1990 he scathingly attacked the government’s exploitation of the minorities’ natural resources: “Not only has the central government not taken the interests of the nationalities into account when developing our natural resources, but it has forced them to make such huge sacrifices that their self-governance and self-strengthening capabilities have been all but destroyed. If the polices continue as they are,

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 167

Economics

167

strengthening the national autonomous areas’ economy and their ability to stand on their own will be nothing more than empty words.”57 The central government has never renounced its ownership of all the natural resources within Chinese borders. Article 118 of the 1982 constitution simply states that “in exploiting natural resources and building enterprises in the national autonomous areas, the state shall give due consideration to the interests of those areas.” Minorities do not have an official claim to ownership of the resources within their autonomous zones. As Zhuang ire over the skewed pricing system builds, however, they are demanding greater control of their own natural resources. An article appearing in the Guangxi Nationalities Research journal in 1990 directly blamed the central government for repressing minority development. “The government has not established a market which can benefit areas producing natural resources,” the author stated. “Minorities therefore cannot directly participate in the market economy as the rightful owners of their natural resources, and thus cannot reap the benefits which such participation would bestow on them.”58 The skewed pricing system has led some within the Zhuang leadership to expand their resentment of government policy to include broader resentment of the Han: Minority interests are inevitably sacrificed when natural resources are extracted without market price compensation. For years now, we’ve been unilaterally chanting the [official] slogan “Han and Minorities Cannot Exist Without One Another.” In a system which is not based on the free exchange of commodities, however, rather than saying “The Han and Minorities Cannot Exist Without One Another,” we should be chanting “The Han Cannot Exist Without the Minorities’ Natural Resources and the Minorities Must Just Sit Back and Supply All with No Compensation.” State-owned enterprises harm the minorities in every aspect of their natural resource development strategies, including their taxation, hiring, and division of revenue policies.59

Xu Jieshun and Qin Naichang contend that the reforms have had a doubly negative impact on the minorities by phasing out the preferential policies initially offered the nationalities and by granting the eastern areas privileges denied the Zhuang. “Under these type of conditions,” they write, “even if the minority areas could in fact fully implement their autonomous rights (which they cannot), they would still not have the type of preferential policies offered to the Coastal Open Cities and the Special Economic Zones. The result is regional economic development disparity and minority inequality as these eastern areas are pushed forward and the minority areas are held back by increasingly tight reins . . . minority areas must be given more autonomy than normal local governments receive” [emphasis added].60 The authors argue that the state must adopt a plan of “favoring the

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

168

11:35 AM

Page 168

Creating the Zhuang

minority areas rather than favoring the developed areas or favoring the coastal areas.”61 These types of Zhuang demands have been increasing since the mid1980s and show little sign of stopping. Given the numerical strength of the Zhuang, and the apparent growth of Zhuang activism, the question becomes, Will the Zhuang continue to mobilize and become a potential challenge to state power in southern China?

Notes 1. Guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui, zhonggong zhongyang wenxian yanjiushi, Xin shiqi minzu gongzuo wenxian xuanbian (Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 1990), 428 [The Central Nationalities Affairs Commission and the Central Chinese Communist Party’s Collections Research Office, Selected Essays on Minority Work During the New Era (Beijing: The Central Collections Press, 1990)]. 2. Numerous NAC officials said they were not allowed to conduct studies that compared the economic standings of different minority groups. Most studies are based on geographical divisions, and studies comparing the different minority groups are not published, the NAC officials reported. The government viewed these types of studies as “too sensitive” according to these sources. 3. Li Bingdong (ed.), Guangxi dangdai jingjishi (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1991), 244 [Contemporary Guangxi’s Economy (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1991)]. 4. Guangxi People’s Broadcasting Station in Standard Chinese, 1130 gmt, 12 January 1993. 5. Guangxi nianjian (Nanning: Guangxi nianjianshe, 1997), 620 [Guangxi Yearbook (Nanning: Guangxi Yearbook Editorial Board Press, 1997)]. 6. Fan Qixu, Qin Naichang (eds.), Zhuangzu baike cidian (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993), 149 [The Zhuang Encyclopedia (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993)]. 7. Wei Chunshu, Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi, vol. 2 (Beijing: Danddai zhongguo chubanshe, 1992), 511 [Contemporary China’s Guangxi (Beijing: Contemporary China Publishers Press, 1992)]. 8. Ibid., 495. 9. Ibid., 511. 10. Ibid., 494. 11. Ibid., 493. 12. The Institute of Geography et al. (eds.), The National Economic Atlas of China, vol. 3 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994), notes, 99. 13. Wei Chunshu, Contemporary, 2: 498. 14. Ibid. 15. Ibid. 16. Zhou Zhongguai, “Wei daxibeinan kaibi tongxiang beibuhai de guangkuang tongdao,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1993): 1–7 [“For the Betterment of the Greater Southwest, Open the Great Route Toward Beihai,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1993)]. 17. Wei Chunshu, Contemporary, 2: 492.

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

11:35 AM

Page 169

Economics

169

18. Hong Puzhou (ed.), Guangxi jingji yu shehui fazhan zhanlue yanjiu (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989), 115 [Research on Guangxi’s Economic and Social Development Strategy (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1989)]. 19. Ibid. 20. Huang Xianfan, Zhuangzu tongshi (Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1988), 489 [Overview of the Zhuang (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1988)]. 21. Ibid., 480–481. 22. Ibid. 23. Yang Houdi (ed.), Zhongguo minzu fazhi jianghua (Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1993), 98 [Discussing the National Minority Legal System (Beijing: Central Nationalities College Press, 1993)]. 24. Ibid. 25. Li Yiran, “Dui xian jieduan minzu yiwu daihuan zhengce jiqi fazhan tujing de tantao,” Minzu jingji 1 (1989): 34 [“Regarding Preferential Policies in Minority Trade and Other Development Paths in the Current Era,” Minority Economics 1 (1989)]. 26. Huang Xianfan, Overview, 450. 27. Ibid., 454–459. Lists the names, location, capital investment, and products of the main factories in the province. 28. Ibid., 459. 29. Ibid., 469. 30. Ibid., 470. 31. Chen Qingde (ed.), Zhongguo shaoshu minzu jingji kaifa gailun (Beijing: Minzu chubanshe, 1993), 73 [General Discussion on Developing China’s Minority Nationalities’ Economies (Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1993)]. 32. Wei Chunshu, Contemporary, 2: 359. 33. Li Bingdong, Contemporary, 253. 34. Qin Naichang, “Gui xibei yu gui dongnan jingji fazhan de chaju wenti ji jiejue de tujing,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1993): 32 [“The Problem of and Path to Resolving the Gap in Economic Development Between Northwest and Southeast Guangxi,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1993)]. 35. Zhang Lizheng, Guangxi jingji zhengce yanjiu (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1991), 171 [Research on Guangxi’s Economic Policy (Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1991)]. 36. Ye Jintang, “Guanyu minzu difang caizheng dizhiquan de jige wenti,” Guangxi shaoshu minzu jingji wenji (Nanning: Guangxi minzu shiwu weiyuanhui, 1987), 290 [“A Few Questions Regarding Nationality Regions’ Fiscal Autonomous Rights,” in Guangxi Minority Nationalities Economics Collected Articles (Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission, 1987)]. 37. Xu Jieshun and Qin Naichang, Nationality Autonomy Theory (Nanning: Guangxi Educational Press, 1991), 112. 38. Ibid., 218. 39. Chen Qingde, General Discussion, 79. 40. Dali Yang, “Reforms, Resources, and Regional Cleavages: The Political Economy of Coast-Interior Relations in Mainland China,” Issues and Studies 29, no. 9 (September 1991): 48. 41. Ibid., 52. 42. Brantly Womack, “Sino-Vietnamese Border Trade: The Edge of Normalization,” Asian Survey 34, no. 6 (June 1994): 495–512. 43. David S. G. Goodman (ed.), China’s Regional Development (London: Routledge, Chapman and Hall, 1989), 9.

Kaup-7.Final

1/7/10

170

11:35 AM

Page 170

Creating the Zhuang

44. Fangcheng City became the sixth prefectural municipality in 1993. It was earlier the Fangcheng Multinational Autonomous County. 45. Zhang Lizheng, Research, 325. 46. Ibid., 334. 47. Li Bingdong, Contemporary, 252. 48. Dali Yang, “Patterns of China’s Regional Development Strategy,” China Quarterly 122: 247–248. 49. Guangxi Yearbook 1994 (Nanning: Guangxi Yearbook Editorial Board Press, 1994), 665, 676. 50. The Central Nationalities Affairs Commission, Selected Essays, 427. 51. Xu and Qin, National Autonomy, 239. 52. Xiu Dao, “Shilun woguo minzu quyu zizhi zhengce de nixiang fei minzuhua,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 1–6 [“The De-Nationalization of China’s Regional Autonomy Policy,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. 53. Over the past two decades a number of new journals dealing specifically with minority issues have begun publication. Most of the contributors are members of the minority nationality group about which they write. Guangxi Nationalities Research is the main journal of Zhuang affairs. 54. Xu and Qin, National Autonomy, 239. 55. Chen Qingde, General Discussion, 54. 56. Interview, Guangxi Nationalities Institute, June 1995. 57. Xu and Qin, National Autonomy, 234. 58. Fan Zhengqiang, “Ziyuan shichang yu minzu jingji,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1990): 1 [“The Market for Natural Resources and Minority Economics,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1990)]. 59. Ibid. 60. Xu and Qin, National Autonomy, 234, 238. 61. Ibid., 240.

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 171

8 The Rise (and Fall?) of Zhuang Ethnic Nationalism

After more than fifty years of the Chinese Communist Party’s rule, the political identity of the people living in western Guangxi and eastern Yunnan has been radically transformed. The predominately self-sufficient agriculturists living within remote and isolated village communities in 1949 have now begun to participate in a modernizing integrated market economy. The 16 million people who lived in segregated villages surrounded by stony mountains, many of whom had never heard the term “Zhuang,” today boast of their membership in China’s largest minority nationality. In the chaotic years immediately following the CCP’s assumption of power in southwestern China, officially recognizing the Zhuang as a unique nationality and granting them one of the country’s only five provincial-level autonomous units seemed like the best, perhaps the only, means of integrating the diverse southern peoples into a unified Chinese state system. By awarding the Zhuang autonomy, the party believed, it could both increase their commitment to the PRC and aid in developing their political, cultural, and economic position within that unified state. The creation of the Zhuang nationality as it exists today was a product of the central party and government’s hegemonic policy to integrate the Chinese nation. Did the CCP underestimate the potentially divisive role its minority policy could play in Guangxi? Has it now spurred Zhuang ethnic nationalism in a manner it may not be able to control? Several key structural changes occurred during the first forty years of the CCP’s reign that fundamentally altered the political, social, and economic context of Zhuang-state relations. The state’s recognition of the Zhuang created a new category around which newly activated elites could rally popular support. Whereas “Zhuangness” held little importance in the pre-1949 era, after receiving state support and an assortment of preferential policies, Zhuang elites found this new organizational structure a viable means of garnering local support in their interactions with the central government. As educational opportunities increased

171

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

172

11:36 AM

Page 172

Creating the Zhuang

for the Zhuang and the economic structure of the PRC changed after 1979, ethnic elites began to appeal to Zhuang symbols to achieve instrumentalist objectives. The relative importance of the primordial, instrumentalist, structural, and hegemonic approaches to understanding ethnic-state relations varied as the policies inspired by each affected the others. As the Zhuang gained increasing political autonomy through the 1980s, they began demanding ever greater preferential treatment from the government. A 1989 article coauthored by Qin Naichang, the director of the governmental Guangxi Nationalities Research Institute and member of the Guangxi Zhuang Studies Association, forcefully argued that “economic and cultural inequalities still exist” and called on the Zhuang to “wake up” and take more of a leadership role throughout Guangxi. A few Zhuang activists even argue that the Zhuang should seek independence from the PRC and unite with fellow members of the greater Tai nationality to form The Greater Tai Federation (Datai zhuyi). What is the likelihood that this movement will expand? In short, what are the prospects for future Zhuang mobilization and Zhuang-state interaction? Will rising Zhuang-state tensions contribute to the disintegration of the People’s Republic of China along ethnonationalist lines, as occurred in the Soviet Union? The rapid breakdown of the former Soviet Union was largely unpredicted by analysts. Could a similar ethnic explosion occur within the PRC? While a detailed comparison of the two systems is beyond the scope of this study, several key differences between the two systems’ nationality contexts merit brief examination before assessing the likelihood of future Zhuang antistate activity. First, the historical legacy of state-nationality relations is markedly different in the Soviet Union and the PRC. Several of the areas formally incorporated into the Soviet Union as union republics had modern histories of independent statehood, including the Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, and Belorussia. Their incorporation into the Soviet Union was achieved through diplomatic skill and force, theoretically as equal and independent states in a federal system. The constitution of the USSR technically awarded each of the unions the right to secede freely. Within the PRC only Tibet and the small Ili territory in western Xinjiang have histories of independent statehood within the last two centuries. The minority areas were incorporated into the PRC as autonomous administrative units within a centralized state, without the right to secede. Although the Soviet Union republics clearly were not allowed to leave the USSR until after 1991, nonetheless the federal system “provided an organizational context, a political legitimacy, and a cultural impetus for the assertion of group interests, values, and demands and even served to shape group identities.”1 The congruence between regional divisions and ethnic divisions further politicized ethnic issues in the Soviet Union while limiting their

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 173

The Rise (and Fall?) of Zhuang Ethnic Nationalism

173

occurrence in the PRC. In the Soviet Union all fifteen of the highest levels of local administration (the union republics) were based on ethnicity, each with a separate titular minority. Only five of China’s provincially ranked administrative units are ethnoterritorial units. The central government in the Soviet Union was operated in the Russian Soviet Federated State Republic, and central decisions were associated with Russian decisions. The vast majority of dictates by the PRC’s central government are not interpreted by the localities, or indeed by the minorities, as ethnic concerns. The overlap between regional and ethnic divisions was accentuated in the Soviet Union and weakened in the PRC by the distribution of the minority population within the country and within the ethnoterritorial units. The non-Russian nationalities accounted for over 48 percent of the Soviet Union’s population, whereas non-Han make up only 8 percent of the PRC’s total population. Such a huge difference in the relative proportional weight of the nationalities greatly affects the potential power of the groups and their willingness to mobilize against the state. The minorities were much more concentrated in the USSR than in the PRC, representing a larger percentage of the population within their autonomous areas and having fewer members living outside these autonomous areas. Within the Soviet Union the total population represented by the titular group within each of the fourteen non-Russian union republics ranked from 49.4 percent to 88.7 percent, with a median of 69.3 percent and a mean of 69.6 percent.2 Although there were large numbers of nationalities living outside their own union republics, they represented just over 15 percent of their respective nationalities on average.3 In China, by contrast, with the exception of Tibet, titular minorities account for less than half the population within their autonomous regions. The Mongols, for example, though accorded their own autonomous region, account for less than 18 percent of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region’s population, whereas the Zhuang make up less than 34 percent of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. On average, only 62 percent of each nationality’s members live within their autonomous administrative units, as compared to 84 percent in the Soviet Union.4 Chinese minorities are largely concentrated along the frontier regions and tend to live in singlenationality villages, but these villages tend to be interspersed with other nationalities’ villages within single counties, prefectures, or provincial-level administrative divisions. Demographic concentration does not, of course, guarantee ethnic cohesion, nor does its absence preclude ethnic mobilization. In areas such as China and the Soviet Union, however, where communication channels and transportation infrastructure remain relatively weak, demographic concentration greatly facilitates interaction among members of the same minority group who would otherwise have difficulty communicating across broad distances.5

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

174

11:36 AM

Page 174

Creating the Zhuang

Although these factors likely dampen the Chinese nationalities’ propensity to rebel, they by no means assure their peaceful acceptance of all state policies. The 1980s saw a rapid rise in ethnic nationalist activity throughout the country. Zhuang areas were no exception, and the contrast between Zhuang activism in the 1980s and 1990s and Zhuang inertia in the 1950s is pronounced. Despite the growing rise in Zhuang ethnic sentiment, several key factors appear likely to restrict further Zhuang mobilization and to make the likelihood of a Zhuang secession movement almost nonexistent. Internal divisions among the Zhuang limit their ability to coalesce as a viable political force. Even were these divisions overcome, however, the Zhuang would likely still lack the resources to challenge effectively the Chinese central government.

Internal Divisions Among the Zhuang The internal divisions among the Zhuang limit both their ability to view their political demands in common terms and their willingness to cooperate as a single force. At least five primary factors divide the Zhuang internally. First, localism continues to override nationalism among a great percentage of the Zhuang. This localism plays different roles at different levels of analysis and at different times in the Communist era. Within Guangxi county-level loyalties play a central role, whereas at the provincial level the division between the Yunnan Zhuang of Wenshan and the Guangxi Zhuang limit a potentially wider pan-Zhuang movement. Second, the rural and urban Zhuang have very different conceptions of what it means to be a Zhuang, and what Zhuang interests are. The remaining three divisions have been addressed previously and include continuing zhixi divisions, dialect differences, and the competing views of the Zhuang’s place in the Chinese state held by people with different levels of education. The role that localism plays as opposed to nationalism in influencing a person’s political views is extremely difficult to pinpoint with precision. This difficulty arises not only from the empirical difficulty of interviewing a wide enough survey pool, but in the complexity of the term localism itself. Nonetheless, the relationship between Zhuang in different provinces and between counties within Guangxi suggests that citizens are more concerned with local issues than with nationality issues. Perhaps the clearest example of provincial divisions can be seen in the relationship between the Guangxi and Yunnan Zhuang Studies Associations. The Guangxi association views itself as a selective scholarly organization, which invites only the top Zhuang scholars who have already distinguished themselves through their publications. A few unpublished government cadres have

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 175

The Rise (and Fall?) of Zhuang Ethnic Nationalism

175

been invited to join the organization, but save for a few exceptions, they are viewed instrumentally by the intellectuals in the organization as a means of smoothing relations with other work units and government organs rather than as positive contributing scholars.6 The Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association, on the other hand, actively encourages as many Zhuang government and party cadres as possible to participate. The Yunnan association views itself less as a scholarly organization and more as a body that “promotes self-confidence among the Zhuang and seeks to improve their economic, political, and cultural position.”7 A large number of Zhuang Nationalities Affairs Commissions members in Wenshan were active members of the organization, including those without a university degree or publications. This type of membership seems much rarer in the Guangxi organization. In addition to having different visions of their organizational mission, the two associations rarely sponsor joint projects, though they do on occasion. Certainly there is some private communication among members, but few cooperative projects are organized at the association level. Those Zhuang I met in Yunnan who were most interested in Zhuang activities and scholarship generally referred to themselves as “Yunnan Zhuang” rather than simply “Zhuang.” Many Yunnan scholars complained of the domineering attitude of the Guangxi organization’s members and asserted that Guangxi Zhuang have not preserved the nationality’s culture as the Yunnan Zhuang have. The Guangxi Zhuang, I was told, did not conduct practical fieldwork but preferred archival research on rather esoteric topics.8 However, whenever the Guangxi Zhuang did want to do fieldwork, several Yunnanese told me, they came to Wenshan Prefecture in quest of “true Zhuang.” Many Guangxi Zhuang likewise complained of organizational barriers to cooperation with the Yunnan Zhuang. The branch divisions in Wenshan, one Guangxi Zhuang scholar informed me, made it “difficult” to work with the Yunnanese. While traveling in Yunnan, I was constantly asked to help the Zhuang locate their fellow Zhuang in the United States. These American Zhuang, it was hoped, might be able to start a U.S. Zhuang Studies Association and lure investment into the region. The Wenshan Zhuang repeatedly pointed out that a group of Miao nationals (the second-largest minority group in Wenshan) living in California had an active Miao Studies Association, which sponsored international exchanges and had recently promised to build a primary school in a Miao village. During my three months in Guangxi, I was able to find addresses for several Zhuang living in the States. When I told my contacts in Yunnan of my discovery, however, they were less than enthusiastic: “Those are Guangxi Zhuang,” one Kunming Zhuang told me. “Yunnan Zhuang are interested in Yunnan Zhuang. Guangxi Zhuang are interested in Guangxi Zhuang.”

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

176

11:36 AM

Page 176

Creating the Zhuang

Localism also divides the Zhuang within Guangxi and within Yunnan. The Zhuang students I met in Nanning at the Guangxi Nationalities Institute, and in Beijing at the Central Nationalities Institute, said they were not willing to speak the Zhuang language with other Zhuang who were not from their own locality. The students in Nanning would not speak Zhuang with classmates from neighboring counties, but usually only with those from within their particular county. “It just feels weird,” one student explained. “It’s just easier to speak Han to them than to awkwardly try to use Zhuang.” These same students instantly switched to their local Zhuang dialect, however, when they met someone from their own county. The use of the local dialect was clearly viewed as a type of bonding experience that separated the two speakers from surrounding listeners. Whenever I was with Zhuang in the city who ran into other Zhuang from their locality, they would beam and explain that they were laoxiang, which can be loosely translated as “village brothers.” There was no similar response when Zhuang speakers from other areas were heard conversing. Students in Beijing also hosted parties for their classmates from the same province. Han and Zhuang alike were invited to Guangxi functions organized by the students. The students had never hosted a party solely for Zhuang, however. The central government hosted a Zhuang Sanyuesan celebration in Beijing each year, however, and then Zhuang students found themselves celebrating primarily with fellow Zhuang. The strength of localism over nationalism was also clearly revealed in a set of interviews I conducted on election preferences. Respondents in predominately Zhuang villages and counties stated that they would rather see a Han native of their locality elected to a leadership post than a Zhuang from outside their county. “Of course, if we had a choice of electing a Zhuang or a Han from our county, it would be best to elect the Zhuang if all other things were equal,” one respondent explained. He indicated, however, that he would rather have a well-educated Han from the county as leader than a Zhuang from the area with minimal schooling. Zhuang ethnic consciousness clearly has grown over the past fifty years, but it appears to remain a weaker force than localism in shaping a citizen’s political identity. In addition to the limitations to Zhuang mobilization posed by localism, the division between urban and rural Zhuang also presents some problems for expanding the Zhuang movement. Urban Zhuang who are not cadres in departments directly dealing with nationality issues tend to know very little about the situation of the rural Zhuang. Urban Zhuang often assert that “there is no difference” between Han and Zhuang. The majority of urban Zhuang workers assert that Zhuang all speak Mandarin, wear Han clothing, and have educational levels comparable to the Han. This lack of information about their rural compatriots extends to cadres in departments not directly researching nationality issues, or so contend a large percentage of NAC members and Zhuang scholars.

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 177

The Rise (and Fall?) of Zhuang Ethnic Nationalism

177

Zhuang born in the cities tend to be even further removed from Zhuang concerns than those who moved to the urban areas from their village homes. I met very few second-generation urban Zhuang who could speak the Zhuang language. A number of urban Zhuang said their village relatives refused to speak Mandarin to them and ignored them completely unless they spoke Zhuang. Even these Zhuang with close ties to their village families did not use Zhuang within the municipalities, however, either at home or with other Zhuang friends. I met several married couples who did not use Zhuang even when alone, and even though they were both from the same area. Speaking Zhuang does not prove strong ethnic consciousness, nor does the inability to speak it necessarily demonstrate the reverse, but given that most Zhuang agree that their language is the main marker of Zhuang ethnicity, the unwillingness to use it or to teach it to one’s children seems to indicate a certain lack of activism. Zhuang within the cities, then, appear poor sources of support for the Zhuang cadres pressing for nationality rights. Ironically, in the countryside, where Zhuang issues are more pressing, the peasantry seems little concerned with improving the status of the Zhuang nationality per se. The average peasant, with little access to information from nongovernmental sources, and concerned primarily with guaranteeing a subsistence living, does not appear to blame government minority policy for the area’s depressed development. When asked to define the differences between the Han and the Zhuang, most peasants answer that the Zhuang speak a different language, wear different clothes, live in valleys in the countryside, sometimes live in stilted houses, and are generally poorer than the Han. When asked why they were poorer, Zhuang rarely, if ever, blamed government policies for their economic straits. A few interview respondents alluded to the ethnic origin of their poverty, by recounting how the Han had pushed them into less fertile regions centuries ago. Most, however, simply accept that they live in infertile areas and that their poor geographic location is primarily to blame for their “backwardness.” Unless the interviewees knew that I was specifically researching the Zhuang, they rarely mentioned ethnicity when discussing their economic situation. Those who knew I was interested in ethnic issues, however, generally blamed the Zhuang, rather than the Han, for the low level of development in Guangxi. Several villagers from different areas said that the Zhuang do not have any initiative. “The Zhuang are incredibly scared of losing face,” one Zhuang villager told me. “Some of them go away to school and then just come back to the village. They’re too afraid of failing to go out and try to succeed beyond the village. Or maybe they do venture out, and turn around and run home at the first sign of failure.” Zhixi divisions also continue to divide the Zhuang. Zhixi play little role in shaping political identity in Guangxi, though they continue to divide the Yunnanese group. Though the Zhuang activists I met in the Yunnan Zhuang

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

178

11:36 AM

Page 178

Creating the Zhuang

Studies Association took great pride in their own zhixi, they nonetheless sought to downplay the differences among the groups when interacting with them in public. Although privately many Zhuang intellectuals and cadres told me the virtues of their particular zhixi in relation to the others, they emphasized that all of the zhixi belonged to the greater Zhuang nation. Within the countryside, however, zhixi affiliations continue to play a significant divisive role among the Zhuang. Villagers from different zhixi do not associate as closely with those from outside branches. The language barriers among the different zhixi play one of the leading roles in keeping the zhixi apart. Though there is greater interaction and even intermarriage among members of different zhixi today than in 1949, some Zhuang villagers still do not clearly understand that members of other zhixi also belong to the Zhuang nationality. The inability of the government and Zhuang cadres to develop a functioning written script has also contributed to a split among the Zhuang who have obtained different levels of education. Were there a unified Zhuang script and were students able to take their university examination in the Zhuang language, the Zhuang might be more willing to use their own language as a means of distinguishing themselves from the Han and as a means of limiting certain opportunities to those who speak their language. As the Zhuang language currently stands, however, there is little incentive for the peasant student to learn a written Zhuang script that will have limited applicable use. The peasantry is not interested in sacrificing their time or material opportunities to make a symbolic show of support for the Zhuang language. Zhuang cadres and intellectuals, however, view the Zhuang written script as just that—a symbol of Zhuang autonomy. The primary force behind the promotion of the Zhuang written script today comes from higher-educated Zhuang who believe that the Zhuang culture is in danger of dying out if its heritage is not protected through the Zhuang language. Given the integrative strength of the PRC’s educational system, however, the Zhuang elites, at this time, appear to have little hope of convincing the peasants of the merits of learning the Zhuang written language.

The Means to Mobilize Against the State The legislation of minority policy and the reforms designed to decentralize the central government and central party’s power in the 1980s increased Zhuang political autonomy, as discussed in Chapter 5. Many Zhuang officials complain that they are now simply “free to be poor.” The increased disparities in wealth between the Han and the Zhuang encourage the Zhuang to voice their discontent with the government on the one hand, whereas on the other it decreases the Zhuang leadership’s ability to mobilize the Zhuang as a political unit.

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 179

The Rise (and Fall?) of Zhuang Ethnic Nationalism

179

The urgent need for greater investment funds in Zhuang areas and the greater freedom to interact with outside countries have encouraged Zhuang activists to use their ethnicity as a means of attracting outside investment. Having difficulty attracting foreign investment to the area, the Zhuang are trying to locate fellow ethnics overseas. Several Zhuang in official positions specifically asked me to help them find overseas Zhuang who might be willing to invest in Guangxi or Yunnan, or at least to help increase overseas interest in the Zhuang nationality. In addition to their lack of funds, Zhuang are also lacking the means to mobilize due to limitations imposed by four other factors. First, the state imposes strict limitations on the type and extent of Zhuang mobilization. Second, the Zhuang cannot offer their people an alternative set of benefits that even begins to approach those that integration into the Chinese state can offer. Third and fourth, the Zhuang lack what I call both “interest group consciousness” and “interest advocacy experience.” Although the Zhuang have been encouraged to think of themselves as a single nationality with a “long and glorious” heritage, the CCP nonetheless places strict limitations on the type of interest group mobilization in which the Zhuang may engage. Political slogans may be painted along school walls, for example, that read “Nationalities Unite and Stand Up! Become Progressive and Prosperous Through Education!” No signs specifically urging the “Zhuang” to stand up would be allowed, however, as I was assured by county officials in charge of propaganda. The Zhuang are also limited by their relative weakness vis-à-vis the Chinese state. Zhuang may group together under the guidance of the state’s minority policy, but they are much less likely to challenge the party openly. Although the Zhuang are still disadvantaged economically and educationally compared to the Han, they are much more likely to benefit from fuller integration into the state than greater separation from it. Many of the Zhuang I met were extremely proud of their ethnicity and took care to point out the many ways in which Zhuang were a distinct people. The Zhuang still lack, however, what I term “interest group consciousness.” When pressed to explain in interviews how being Zhuang influenced their political behavior and needs, few could give a response. Many of those interviewed responded that the Zhuang are granted a proportionate number of representatives in the People’s Congress and that the governor of Guangxi must be drawn from among Zhuang ranks. When asked what these “representatives” were representing, however, my respondents were again at a loss. The director of one county’s NAC became quite agitated when asked if the Zhuang had any group interests (gongtongti de liyi). “The Zhuang and Han are exactly the same!” was the adamant response I received. As a whole, the Zhuang seem proud of their heritage and somewhat wary of outsiders, though they do not have a clear agenda of political demands.

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

180

11:36 AM

Page 180

Creating the Zhuang

Finally, the Zhuang are inhibited from further mobilization by a lack of interest-advocacy experience. The Zhuang leadership still lacks experience in mobilizing the resources at its disposal to strengthen its political position. For example, although middle-level Zhuang cadres and Zhuang intellectuals are increasingly making demands for preferential treatment from the central government, there is no attempt to mobilize popular Zhuang support for these demands. The Zhuang Studies Associations, which claim to promote Zhuang solidarity and interest in the nationality, have not yet published works for popular consumption. Most of their writings are scholarly articles or compilations of Zhuang folklore translated into Han Chinese. The lack of effort to mobilize popular support is clearly a combination of inexperience in interest-group politics and of tight political controls on just such activity. Even cadres who most actively petition for policies to benefit the Zhuang demonstrate a certain lack of experience. I spent nearly two hours with the vice director of a prefectural NAC in Guangxi discussing the urgent need to increase use of the Zhuang script. Dialect differences do not pose much difficulty for learners of the script, which can be learned in a matter of days, he told me. When asked to write a simple sentence in Zhuang, however, the vice director struggled for several minutes, then presented the phrase with several misspellings. The director of the Minority Nationality Language Committee in one county also hailed the virtues of the Zhuang script, though she had never actually studied it herself. These advocates of the Zhuang written script had not even mastered the language themselves, much less sought to teach it to their children, neighbors, and fellow Zhuang. Given the numerous obstacles to further Zhuang mobilization, it seems unlikely that Zhuang-state interaction will turn violent anytime in the near future. The CCP’s strategy to recognize the Zhuang in order to integrate them into the Chinese state seems to have been successfully administered. The Zhuang will likely continue to make demands for greater integration into the Chinese state as they struggle to close the gap in economic and educational levels with the Han majority. The players who are most active in promoting Zhuang interests are the officials and intellectuals trained by the party and the state educational system. These key players have begun to join nongovernmental organizations that are closely monitored by the state, such as the Zhuang Studies Association. For the most part, however, these players are making their demands to the central government from within one of the thousands of local government organizations administered as part of the unified Chinese state system. And they are demanding greater inclusion, rather than independence, from the Chinese state. The CCP took a risk in promoting the development of a largely state-created nationality. It appears to be a risk that has paid off.

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 181

The Rise (and Fall?) of Zhuang Ethnic Nationalism

181

Notes 1. Gail Lapidus, “Ethnonationalism and Political Stability: The Soviet Case,” in Rachel Denber (ed.), The Soviet Nationality Reader: The Disintegration in Context (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1992), 425. 2. Walker Connor, The National Question in Marxist-Leninist Theory and Strategy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984), 303. 3. Ibid. 4. Takashi Sugimoto, The Political Stability of Ethnic Regions in China: A Methodological Study (Tokyo: International Institute for Global Peace, April 1993), 4. 5. Donald Horowitz has argued that “the strength of a secessionist movement and the heterogeneity of its region are inversely related.” Donald L. Horowitz, Ethnic Groups in Conflict (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), 267. Emizet and Hesli found that the concentration of a nationality within its own ethnoterritorial unit “was a powerful indicator of the disposition to secede.” Kisangani N. Emizet and Vicki L. Hesli, “The Disposition to Secede: An Analysis of the Soviet Case,” Comparative Political Studies 27, no. 4 (1995): 530. Daniel Treisman, however, found no correlation between the concentration of ethnic populations and the secessionist movements in the 1990s. Daniel S. Treisman, “Russia’s ‘Ethnic Revival’: The Separatist Activism of Regional Leaders in a Postcommunist Order,” World Politics (January 1997): 232. 6. Private communications, Guangxi, March–July 1995. 7. Several members of the Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association used this phraseology in independent interviews and casual conversations. 8. I did not find these allegations to be true.

Kaup-8.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 182

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 183

APPENDIX

The Law of Regional Autonomy, 1 October 1984

Preface The People’s Republic of China is a unitary multinational state created jointly by the people of all its nationalities. Regional national autonomy is the basic policy adopted by the Communist Party of China for the solution of the national question in China through its application of MarxismLeninism; it is an important political system of the state. Regional national autonomy means that the minority nationalities, under unified state leadership, practice regional autonomy in areas where they live in concentrated communities and set up organs of self-government for the exercise of the power of autonomy. Regional national autonomy embodies the state’s full respect for and guarantee of the right of the minority nationalities to administer their internal affairs and its adherence to the principle of equality, unity, and common prosperity for all its nationalities. Regional national autonomy has played an enormous role in giving full play to the initiative of all nationalities as masters of the country, in developing among them a socialist relationship of equality, unity, and mutual assistance, in consolidating the unification of the country, and in promoting socialist construction in the national autonomous areas and the rest of the country. The system of regional national autonomy will have a still greater role to play in the country’s socialist modernization in the years to come. It has been proved by practice that adherence to regional national autonomy requires that the national autonomous areas be given effective guarantees for implementing state laws and policies in the light of existing local conditions; that large numbers of cadres at various levels and specialized personnel and skilled workers of various professions and trades be trained from among the minority nationalities; that the national autonomous areas strive to promote local socialist construction in the spirit of self-reliance and hard work and contribute to the nation’s construction as a whole; and

183

Kaup-Appendix.Final

184

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 184

Appendix

that the state strive to help the national autonomous areas speed up their economic and cultural development in accordance with the plans for national economic and social development. In the effort to maintain the unity of the nationalities, both big-nation chauvinism, mainly Han chauvinism, and local national chauvinism must be opposed. Under the leadership of the Communist Party of China and the guidance of Marxism-Leninism and Mao Zedong thought, the people of various nationalities in the autonomous areas shall, together with the people of the whole country, adhere to the people’s democratic dictatorship and to the socialist road, concentrate their efforts on socialist modernization, speed up the economic and cultural development of the national autonomous areas, work toward their unity and prosperity, and strive for the common prosperity of all nationalities and for the transformation of China into a socialist country with a high level of culture and democracy. The Law of the People’s Republic of China on Regional National Autonomy is the basic law for the implementation of the system of regional national autonomy prescribed in the Constitution.

Chapter 1: General Principles Article 1. The Law of the People’s Republic of China on Regional National Autonomy is formulated in accordance with the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China. Article 2. Regional autonomy shall be practiced in areas where minority nationalities live in concentrated communities. National autonomous areas shall be classified into autonomous regions, autonomous prefectures, and autonomous counties. All national autonomous areas are integral parts of the People’s Republic of China. Article 3. Organs of self-government shall be established in national autonomous areas as local organs of state power at a particular level. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall apply the principle of democratic centralism. Article 4. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall exercise the functions and powers of local organs of state as specified in Section 5 of Chapter 3 of the Constitution. At the same time, they shall exercise the power of autonomy within the limits of their authority as prescribed by the Constitution, by this Law and other laws, and implement the laws and policies of the state in the light of existing local conditions.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 185

The Law of Regional Autonomy

185

The organs of self-government of autonomous prefectures shall exercise the functions and powers of local state organs over cities divided into districts and cities with counties under their jurisdiction and, at the same time, exercise the power of autonomy. Article 5. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas must uphold the unity of the country and guarantee that the Constitution and other laws are observed and implemented in these areas. Article 6. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall lead the people of the various nationalities in a concentrated effort to promote socialist modernization. On the principle of not contravening the Constitution and the laws, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall have the power to adopt special policies and flexible measures in the light of local conditions to speed up the economic and cultural development of these areas. Under the guidance of state plans and on the basis of actual conditions, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall steadily increase labor productivity and economic results, develop social productive forces, and gradually raise the material living standards of the people of the various nationalities. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall inherit and carry forward the fine traditions of national cultures, build a socialist society with an advanced culture and ideology and with national characteristics, and steadily raise the socialist consciousness and scientific and cultural levels of the people of the various nationalities. Article 7. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall place the interests of the state as a whole above anything else and make positive efforts to fulfill the tasks assigned by state organs at higher levels. Article 8. State organs at higher levels shall guarantee the exercise of the power of autonomy by the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas and shall, in accordance with the characteristics and needs of these areas, strive to help them speed up their socialist construction. Article 9. State organs at higher levels and the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall uphold and develop the socialist relationship of equality, unity, and mutual assistance among all of China’s nationalities. Discrimination against and oppression of any nationality shall be prohibited; any act which undermines the unity of the nationalities or instigates national division shall also be prohibited.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

186

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 186

Appendix

Article 10. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall guarantee the freedom of the nationalities in these areas to use and develop their own spoken and written languages and their freedom to preserve or reform their own folkways and customs. Article 11. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall guarantee the freedom of religious belief to citizens of the various nationalities. No state organ, public organization, or individual may compel citizens to believe in, or not to believe in, any religion, nor may they discriminate against citizens who believe in, or do not believe in, any religion. The state shall protect normal religious activities. No one may make use of religion to engage in activities that disrupt public order, impair the health of citizens, or interfere with the educational system of the state. Religious bodies and religious affairs shall not be subject to any foreign domination.

Chapter 2: Establishment of National Autonomous Areas and the Structure of the Organs of Self-Government Article 12. Autonomous areas may be established where one or more minority nationalities live in concentrated communities, in the light of local conditions such as the relationship among the various nationalities and the level of economic development, and with due consideration for historical background. Within a national autonomous area, appropriate autonomous areas or nationality townships may be established where other minority nationalities live in concentrated communities. Some residential areas and towns of the Han nationality or other nationalities may be included in a national autonomous area in consideration of actual local conditions. Article 13. With the exception of special cases, the name of a national autonomous area shall be composed of the name of the locality and the name of the nationality and the administrative status, in that order. Article 14. The establishment of a national autonomous area, the delineation of its boundaries, and the elements of its name shall be proposed by the state organ at the next higher level jointly with the state organ in the relevant locality, after full consultation with representatives of the relevant nationalities, before they are submitted for approval according to the procedures prescribed by law.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 187

The Law of Regional Autonomy

187

Once defined, the boundaries of a national autonomous area may not be altered without authorization. When an alteration is found necessary, it shall be proposed by the relevant department of the state organ at the next higher level after full consultation with the organ of self-government of the national autonomous area before it is submitted to the State Council for approval. Article 15. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall be the people’s congresses and people’s governments of autonomous regions, autonomous prefectures, and autonomous counties. The people’s governments of national autonomous areas shall be responsible to and report on their work to the people’s congresses at corresponding levels and to the administrative organs of the state at the next higher level. When the people’s congresses at corresponding levels are not in session, they shall be responsible to and report on their work to the standing committees of these people’s congresses. The people’s governments of all national autonomous areas shall be administrative organs of the state under the unified leadership of the State Council and shall be subordinate to it. The organization and work of the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall be specified in these areas’ regulations on the exercise of autonomy or separate regulations, in accordance with the Constitution and other laws. Article 16. In the people’s congress of a national autonomous area, in addition to the deputies from the nationality exercising regional autonomy in the administrative area, the other nationalities inhabiting the area are also entitled to appropriate representation. The number and proportion of deputies to the people’s congress of a national autonomous area from the nationality exercising regional autonomy and from the other minority nationalities shall be decided upon by the standing committee of the people’s congress of a province or an autonomous region, in accordance with the principles prescribed by law, and shall be reported to the standing committee of the National People’s Congress for the record. Among the chairman and vice chairmen of the standing committee of the people’s congress of a national autonomous area shall be one or more citizens of the nationality exercising regional autonomy in the area. Article 17. The chairman of an autonomous region, the prefect of an autonomous prefecture, or the head of an autonomous county shall be a citizen of the nationality exercising regional autonomy in the area concerned. Other posts in the people’s government of an autonomous region,

Kaup-Appendix.Final

188

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 188

Appendix

an autonomous prefecture, or an autonomous county should, whenever possible, be assumed by people of the nationality exercising regional autonomy and of other minority nationalities in the area concerned. The people’s governments of national autonomous areas shall apply the system of giving overall responsibility to the chairman of an autonomous region, the prefect of an autonomous prefecture, or the head of an autonomous county, who shall direct the work of the people’s government at their respective levels. Article 18. The cadres in the departments under the organs of selfgovernment of a national autonomous area should, whenever possible, be chosen from among citizens of the nationality exercising regional autonomy and of the other minority nationalities in the area.

Chapter 3: The Power of Autonomy of the Organs of Self-Government Article 19. The people’s congresses of national autonomous areas shall have the power to enact regulations on the exercise of autonomy and separate regulations in the light of the political, economic, and cultural characteristics of the nationality or nationalities in the areas concerned. The regulation on the exercise of autonomy and separate regulations of autonomous regions shall be submitted to the standing committee of the National People’s Congress for approval before they go into effect. The regulations on the exercise of autonomy and separate regulations of autonomous prefectures and autonomous counties shall be submitted to the standing committees of the people’s congresses of provinces or autonomous regions for approval before they go into effect, and they shall be reported to the standing committee of the National People’s Congress for the record. Article 20. If a resolution, decision, order, or instruction of a state organ at a higher level does not suit the conditions in a national autonomous area, the organ of self-government of the area may either implement it with certain alterations or cease implementing it after reporting to and receiving the approval of the state organ at a higher level. Article 21. While performing its functions, the organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall, in accordance with the regulations on the exercise of autonomy of the area, use one or several languages commonly used in the locality; where several commonly used languages are used for the performance of such functions, the language of the nationality exercising regional autonomy may be used as the main language.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 189

The Law of Regional Autonomy

189

Article 22. In accordance with the needs of socialist construction, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall take various measures to train large numbers of cadres at different levels and various kinds of specialized personnel, including scientists, technicians, and managerial executives, as well as skilled workers from among the local nationalities, giving full play to their roles, and shall pay attention to the training of cadres at various levels and specialized and technical personnel of various kinds from among the women of minority nationalities. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas may adopt special measures to provide preferential treatment and encouragement to specialized personnel joining in the various kinds of construction in these areas. Article 23. When recruiting personnel, enterprises and institutions in national autonomous areas shall give priority to minority nationalities and may enlist them from the population of minority nationalities in rural and pastoral areas. When recruiting personnel from the population of minority nationalities in rural and pastoral areas, autonomous prefectures and autonomous counties must report to and secure the approval of the people’s governments of the provinces or autonomous regions. Article 24. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas may, in accordance with the military system of the state and practical local need and with the approval of the State Council, organize local public security forces for the maintenance of public order. Article 25. Under the guidance of state plans, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall independently arrange for and administer local economic development. Article 26. Under the guidance of state plans, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall work out the guidelines, policies, and plans for economic development in the light of local characteristics and needs. Article 27. Given the prerequisite of adherence to the principles of socialism, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall, in accordance with legal stipulations and in the light of the characteristics of local economic development, rationally readjust the relations of production and reform the structure of economic administration. In accordance with legal stipulations, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall define the ownership of, and the right to use, the pastures and forests within these areas.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

190

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 190

Appendix

Article 28. In accordance with legal stipulations, the organs of selfgovernment of national autonomous areas shall manage and protect the natural resources of these areas. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall protect and develop grasslands and forests and organize and encourage the planting of trees and grass. Destruction of grasslands and forests by any organization or individual by whatever means shall be prohibited. In accordance with legal stipulations and unified state plans, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas may give priority to the rational exploitation and utilization of the natural resources that the local authorities are entitled to develop. Article 29. Under the guidance of state plans, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall independently arrange local capital construction projects according to their financial and material resources and other specific local conditions. Article 30. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall independently administer the enterprises and institutions under local jurisdiction. Article 31. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall independently arrange for the use of industrial, agricultural, and other local and special products after fulfilling the quotas for state purchase and for state distribution at a higher level. Article 32. In accordance with state provisions, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas may pursue foreign economic and trade activities and may, with the approval of the State Council, open foreign trade ports. National autonomous areas adjoining foreign countries may develop border trade with the approval of the State Council. While conducting foreign economic and trade activities, the organs of self-government of the national autonomous areas shall enjoy preferential treatment by the state with regard to the proportion of foreign exchange retained by them and in other respects. Article 33. The finance of a national autonomous area constitutes a particular level of finance and is a component of state finance. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall have the power of autonomy in administering the finances of their areas. All revenues accruing to the national autonomous areas under the financial system of the state shall be managed and used by the organs of selfgovernment of these areas on their own.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 191

The Law of Regional Autonomy

191

The revenues and expenditures of national autonomous areas shall be specified by the State Council on the principle of giving preferential treatment to such areas. In accordance with stipulations concerning the state financial system, if the revenues of a national autonomous area exceed its expenditures, a fixed amount of the surplus shall be delivered to the financial department at a higher level. Once fixed, the amount to be delivered may remain unchanged for several years. If the expenditures of a national autonomous area exceed its revenues, a subsidy shall be granted by the financial department at a higher level. A national autonomous area shall, in accordance with state stipulations, lay aside a reserve fund for expenditure in its budget. The proportion of the reserve fund in its budget shall be higher than that in the budgets of other areas. While implementing its fiscal budget, the organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall arrange for the use of extra income and savings from expenditures at its own discretion. Article 34. In accordance with the principles set by the state and in the light of local conditions, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas may work out supplementary provisions and concrete procedures with regard to the standards of expenditure, the sizes of the staff, and the quotas of work for their respective areas. The supplementary provisions and concrete procedures worked out by autonomous regions shall be reported to the State Council for the record; those worked out by autonomous prefectures and autonomous counties shall be reported to the people’s governments of the relevant provinces or autonomous regions for approval. Article 35. While implementing the tax laws of the state, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas may grant tax exemptions or reductions for certain items of local financial income, which should be encouraged or given preferential consideration in taxation, in addition to items on which tax reduction or exemption requires unified examination and approval by the state. The decisions of autonomous prefectures and autonomous counties on tax reduction and exemption shall be reported to the people’s governments of the relevant provinces or autonomous regions for approval. Article 36. In accordance with the guidelines of the state on education and with the relevant stipulations of the law, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall decide on plans for the development of education in these areas, on the establishment of various kinds of schools

Kaup-Appendix.Final

192

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 192

Appendix

at different levels, and on their educational system, forms, curricula, the language used in instruction, and enrollment procedures. Article 37. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall independently develop education for the nationalities by eliminating illiteracy, setting up various kinds of schools, spreading compulsory primary education, developing secondary education, and establishing specialized schools for the nationalities, such as teachers’ schools, secondary technical schools, vocational schools, and institutes of nationalities to train specialized personnel from among the minority nationalities. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas may set up public primary schools and secondary schools, mainly boarding schools and schools providing subsidies, in pastoral areas and economically underdeveloped, sparsely populated mountain areas inhabited by minority nationalities. Schools where most of the students come from minority nationalities should, whenever possible, use textbooks in their own languages and use these languages as the media of instruction. Classes for the teaching of Chinese (the Han language) shall be opened for senior grades of primary schools or for secondary schools to popularize putonghua, the common speech based on Beijing pronunciation. Article 38. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall independently develop literature, art, the press, publishing, radio broadcasting, the film industry, television, and other cultural undertakings in forms and with characteristics unique to the nationalities. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall collect, sort out, translate, and publish books of the nationalities and protect the scenic spots and historical sites in their areas, their precious cultural relics, and their other important historical and cultural legacies. Article 39. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall make independent decisions on local plans for developing science and technology and spreading knowledge of science and technology. Article 40. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall make independent decisions on plans for developing local medical and health services and for advancing both modern medicine and the traditional medicine of the nationalities. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall see to a more effective prevention and treatment of endemic diseases, provide better protection for the health of women and children, and improve sanitary conditions.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 193

The Law of Regional Autonomy

193

Article 41. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall independently develop sports, promote the traditional sports of the nationalities, and improve the physical fitness of the people of the various nationalities. Article 42. The organs of self-government of the national autonomous areas shall strive to develop exchanges and cooperation with other areas in education, science and technology, culture and art, public health, sports, etc. In accordance with relevant state provisions, the organs of self-government of autonomous regions and autonomous prefectures may conduct exchanges with foreign countries in education, science and technology, culture and art, public health, sports, etc. Article 43. In accordance with legal stipulations, the organs of selfgovernment of national autonomous areas shall work out measures for control of the transient population. Article 44. In accordance with legal stipulation, the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall, in the light of local conditions, work out measures for family planning. Article 45. The organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall protect and improve the living environment and the ecological environment and shall prevent and control pollution and other public hazards.

Chapter 4: The People’s Courts and People’s Procuratorates of National Autonomous Areas Article 46. The people’s courts and people’s procuratorates of national autonomous areas shall be responsible to the people’s congresses at corresponding levels and their standing committees. The people’s procuratorates of national autonomous areas shall also be responsible to the people’s procuratorates at higher levels. The administration of justice by the people’s courts of national autonomous areas shall be supervised by the Supreme People’s Court and by people’s courts at higher levels. The work of the people’s procuratorates of national autonomous areas shall be directed by the Supreme People’s Procuratorate and by people’s procuratorates at higher levels. Members of the leadership and of the staff of the people’s court and of the people’s procuratorate of a national autonomous area shall include people from the nationality exercising regional autonomy in that area.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

194

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 194

Appendix

Article 47. In the prosecution and trial of cases, the people’s courts and people’s procuratorates of national autonomous areas shall use the language commonly used in the locality. They shall guarantee that citizens of the various nationalities enjoy the right to use the spoken and written languages of their own nationalities in court proceedings. The people’s courts and people’s procuratorates should provide translation for any party to the court proceedings who is not familiar with the spoken or written languages commonly used in the locality. Legal documents should be written, according to actual needs, in the language or languages commonly used in the locality.

Chapter 5: Relations Among Nationalities Within a National Autonomous Area Article 48. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall guarantee equal rights for the various nationalities in the area. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall unite the cadres and masses of the various nationalities and give full play to their initiative in a joint effort to develop the area. Article 49. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall persuade and encourage cadres of the various nationalities to learn each other’s spoken and written languages. Cadres of Han nationality should learn the spoken and written languages of the local minority nationalities. While learning and using the spoken and written languages of their own nationalities, cadres of minority nationalities should also learn putonghua and the written Chinese (Han) language commonly used throughout the country. Awards should be given to state functionaries in national autonomous areas who can use skillfully two or more spoken or written languages that are commonly used in the locality. Article 50. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall help other minority nationalities living in concentrated communities in the area establish appropriate autonomous areas or nationality townships. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall help the various nationalities in the area develop their economic, educational, scientific, cultural, public health, and physical culture affairs. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall give consideration to the characteristics and needs of nationalities living in settlements scattered over the area.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 195

The Law of Regional Autonomy

195

Article 51. In dealing with special issues concerning the various nationalities within its area, the organ of self-government of a national autonomous area must conduct full consultation with their representatives and respect their opinions. Article 52. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall guarantee that citizens of the various nationalities in the area enjoy the rights of citizens prescribed in the Constitution and shall educate them in the need to perform their duties as citizens. Article 53. The organ of self-government of a national autonomous area shall promote the civic virtues of love of the motherland, of the people, of labor, of science, and of socialism and conduct education among the citizens of the various nationalities in the area in patriotism, communism, and state policies concerning the nationalities. The cadres and masses of the various nationalities must be educated to trust, learn from, and help one another and to respect the spoken and written languages, folkways, and customs and religious beliefs of one another in a joint effort to safeguard the unification of the country and the unity of all the nationalities.

Chapter 6: Leadership and Assistance from State Organs at Higher Levels Article 54. The resolutions, decisions, orders, and instructions concerning national autonomous areas adopted by state organs at higher levels should suit the conditions in these areas. Article 55. State organs at higher levels shall provide financial, material, and technical assistance to national autonomous areas to accelerate their economic and cultural development. In making plans for national economic and social development, state organs at higher levels should take into consideration the characteristics and needs of national autonomous areas. Article 56. The state shall set aside special funds to help national autonomous areas develop their economy and culture. The special funds set aside by the state and its provisional grants to the nationalities may not be deducted, withheld, or misappropriated by any state agency, nor may they be used to substitute for the normal budgetary revenues of national autonomous areas.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

196

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 196

Appendix

Article 57. In accordance with the state policy for trade with the minority nationalities, state organs at higher levels shall give consideration to the commercial, supply and marketing, and medical and pharmaceutical enterprises in national autonomous areas. Article 58. State organs at higher levels shall rationally review or readjust the base figures for the financial revenues and expenditures of national autonomous areas. Article 59. While distributing the means of production and means of subsistence, state organs at higher levels shall give consideration to the needs of national autonomous areas. While making plans for the state purchase of industrial and agricultural products and other local and special products of national autonomous areas and for state distribution of such products at a higher level, state organs at higher levels shall give consideration to the interests of the national autonomous areas and the producers, and set reasonable base figures for state distribution at a higher level or a reasonable ratio between the amount to be purchased and the amount to be kept. Article 60. In matters of investment, loans, and taxation and in production, supply, transportation, and sales, state organs at higher levels shall help national autonomous areas in the rational exploitation of local resources to develop local industry, transportation, and energy and to advance and improve the production of goods specially needed by minority nationalities and of traditional handicrafts. Article 61. State organs at higher levels shall enlist and support economically developed areas in pursuing economic and technological cooperation with national autonomous areas to help the latter areas raise their level of operation and management and their level of production technology. Article 62. While exploiting resources and undertaking construction in national autonomous areas, the state shall give consideration to the interests of these areas, make arrangements favorable to the economic construction there, and pay proper attention to the productive pursuits and the life of the minority nationalities there. Enterprises and institutions affiliated to state organs at higher levels but located in national autonomous areas shall give priority to local minority nationalities when recruiting personnel. Enterprises and institutions affiliated to state organs at higher levels but located in national autonomous areas shall respect the power of autonomy of the local organs of self-government and accept their supervision.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 197

The Law of Regional Autonomy

197

Article 63. Without the consent of the organ of self-government of a national autonomous area, no state agency at a higher level may change the affiliation of an enterprise under the administration of the local government. Article 64. State organs at higher levels shall help national autonomous areas train, from among local nationalities, large numbers of cadres at various levels and specialized personnel and skilled workers of different professions and trades; in accordance with local needs and in various forms, they shall send appropriate numbers of teachers, doctors, scientists, and technicians as well as managerial executives to work in national autonomous areas and provide them with proper benefits. Article 65. State organs at higher levels shall help national autonomous areas speed up the development of education and raise the scientific and cultural levels of the people of local nationalities. The state shall set up institutes of nationalities and, in other institutions of higher education, nationality-oriented classes and preparatory classes that enroll only students from minority nationalities. Preferred enrollment and preferred assignment of jobs may also be introduced. In enrollment, institutions of higher education and secondary technical schools shall appropriately set lower standards and requirements for the admission of students from minority nationalities. Article 66. State organs at higher levels shall intensify education among cadres and masses of the various nationalities in the government’s policies concerning nationalities and frequently review the observance and implementation of these policies and relevant laws.

Chapter 7: Supplementary Provisions Article 67. This Law has been adopted by the National People’s Congress and shall go into effect on 1 October 1984.

Kaup-Appendix.Final

1/7/10

11:36 AM

Page 198

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 199

BIBLIOGRAPHY

English-Language Sources Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origins and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso, 1991. Armstrong, John. Nations Before Nationalism. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982. Barlow, Jeffrey G. “The Zhuang Minority in the Ming Era,” Ming Studies 28 (1989): 15–41. ———. “The Zhuang Minority Peoples of the Sino-Vietnamese Frontier in the Song Period,” Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 18, no. 2 (September 1987): 250–269. Barth, Frederik (ed.). Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of Cultural Differences. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1969. Befu, Harumi (ed.). Cultural Nationalism in East Asia: Representation and Identity. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993. Benson, Linda. The Ili Rebellion: The Moslem Challenge to Chinese Authority in Xinjiang. London: M.E. Sharpe, 1990. Benson, Linda, and Ingvar Svanberg. The Kazaks of China: Essays on an Ethnic Minority. Sweden: Ekblads, Vastervik, 1988. Bhabha, Homi K. (ed.). Nation and Narration. London: Routledge, 1990. Blum, Susan D. “Ethnic Diversity in Southwest China: Perceptions of Self and Other,” Ethnic Groups 9 (1992): 267–279. Brass, Paul (ed). Ethnic Groups and the State. London: Croom Helm, 1985. ——— Ethnicity and Nationalism: Theory and Comparison. New Delhi; Newbury Park, Calif.: Sage, 1991. Breuilly, John. Nationalism and the State. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982. Brown, Melissa (ed.). Negotiating Ethnicities in China and Taiwan. Berkeley: Berkeley Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, 1996. Burns, John P. Political Participation in Rural China. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. ———. “Strengthening Central CCP Control of Leadership Selection: The 1990 Nomenklatura,” The China Quarterly (1994): 458–491. Chang, Maria Hsia. “China’s Future: Regionalism, Federation, or Disintegration,” Studies in Comparative Communism 25, no. 3 (September 1992): 211–227.

199

Kaup-Bib.Final

200

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 200

Bibliography

Chesneaux, Jean. “The Federalist Movement in China, 1920–1923.” In China’s Search for a Political Form, ed. Jack Gray. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969. Chiang Kaishek. China’s Destiny and Chinese Economic Theory. New York: Roy, 1947. Chung, Jae Ho. “Beijing Confronting the Provinces: The 1994 Tax-Sharing Reform and Its Implications for Central-Provincial Relations in China,” China Information 9, nos. 2–3 (winter 1994–1995): 1–23. ———. “Studies of Central-Provincial Relations in the People’s Republic of China: A Mid-term Appraisal,” The China Quarterly (1995): 487–509. Clarke, Samuel R. Among the Tribes of South-West China. Taipei: Chinese Association for Folklore, 1984. Clarkson, Jesse. A History of Russia. New York: Random House, 1961. Cohen, Abner. “Variables in Ethnicity.” In Charles F. Keyes, “Towards a New Formulation of Ethnic Group,” Ethnicity 3, no. 3 (September 1976): 202–213. Cohen, Ronald. “Ethnicity: Problem and Focus in Anthropology.” Annual Review of Anthropology 7 (1978): 379–403. Connor, Walker. “A Nation Is a Nation, Is a State, Is an Ethnic Groups, Is a . . . ,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 1, no. 4 (1978): 379–388. ———. Ethnonationalism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994. ———. “Nation-Building or Nation-Destroying?” World Politics 24 (1972): 319– 355. ———. The National Question in Marxist-Leninist Theory and Strategy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984. ———. “The Politics of Ethnonationalism,” Journal of International Affairs 27, no. 1 (1973): 1–21. Crackdown in Inner Mongolia. An Asia Watch Report. United States: Human Rights Watch, 1991. Deal, David. “National Minority Policy in Southwest China, 1911–1965.” Ph.D. diss., University of Washington, 1971. Denber, Rachel (ed.). The Soviet Nationality Reader: The Disintegration in Context. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1992. Deutsch, Karl W. Nationalism and Social Communication. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1966. Dikotter, Frank. The Discourse of Race in Modern China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992. Dittmer, Lowell, and Samuel Kim. China’s Quest for National Identity. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993. Diuk, Nadia, and Adrian Karatnycky. The Hidden Nations: The People Challenge the Soviet Union. New York: William Morrow, 1990. Dreyer, June Teufel. China’s Forty Millions. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1976. Duara, Prasenjit. Rescuing History from the Nation: Questioning Narratives of Modern China. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995. Eberhard, Wolfram. China’s Minorities: Yesterday and Today. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982. Edgar, J. H. “The Marches of the Mantze.” World Missionary Conference 1910 (Edinburgh Conference Report). 7 volumes. New York: n.d. Falkenheim, Victor C. Citizens and Groups in Contemporary China. Michigan: Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1987. Farmer, Wilmoth Alexander. Ada Beeson Farmer: A Missionary Heroine of Kuang Si, South China. Atlanta, 1912.

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 201

Bibliography

201

Fletcher, Joseph. “The Heydey of the Ch’ing Order in Mongolia, Sinkiang and Tibet.” In The Cambridge History of China: Late Ch’ing 1800–1911, vol. 10, ed. John K. Fairbank. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978. Franklin, Bruce (ed.). The Essential Stalin: Major Theoretical Writings 1905–1952. Croom Helm: London, 1973. Friedman, Edward. “Reconstructing China’s National Identity: A Southern Alternative to Mao-Era Anti-Imperialist Nationalism.” Journal of Asian Studies 53, no. 1 (February 1994): 67–91. Geertz, Clifford (ed.). Old Societies and New States: The Quest for Modernity in Asia and Africa. New York: Free Press, 1963. Gellner, Ernest. Nations and Nationalism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983. Gitelman, Zvi. The Politics of Nationality and the Erosion of the USSR. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992. Gladney, Dru. Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People’s Republic. Cambridge, Mass.: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1991. ———. “Representing Nationality in China: Refiguring Majority/Minority Identities.” Journal of Asian Studies 53, no. 1 (February 1994): 92–123. Glazner, Nathan, and Daniel Patrick Moynihan (eds.). Ethnicity: Theory and Experience. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975. Goldstein, Melvyn, and Cynthia M Beall. Nomads of Western Tibet: The Survival of a Way of Life. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990. Goodman, Bryna. Native Place, City, and Nation: Regional Networks and Identities. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. Goodman, David S. G. (ed.). China’s Regional Development. London: Routledge, Chapman and Hall, 1989. ———. Groups and Politics in the People’s Republic of China. Great Britain: University College Cardiff Press, 1984. Grunfeld, A. Tom. The Making of Modern Tibet. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1996. Hao, Jia, and Lin Zhimin. Changing Central-Local Relations in China: Reform and State Capacity. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1994. Harrell, Stevan (ed.). Cultural Encounters on China’s Ethnic Frontiers. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1995. ———. “Linguistics and Hegemony in China,” International Journal of Sociology of Language 103 (1993): 97–114. Heberer, Thomas. China and Its National Minorities: Autonomy or Assimilation? New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1989. Hechter, M. Internal Colonialism. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975. Highlights of Tibetan History. Beijing: New World Press, 1984. Hobsbawm, Eric J. Nations and Nationalisms Since 1780. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Horowitz, Donald L. Ethnic Groups in Conflict. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985. Hsueh, Tien-tung, Li Qiang, and Liu Shucheng (eds.). China’s Provincial Statistics 1949–1989. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1990. Hudson, G. F. “The Nationalities of China.” In St. Anthony’s Papers. London: Chatto and Windus, 1960. Hutchinson, John, and Anthony D. Smith (eds.). Nationalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. Institute of Geography et al. (eds.). The National Economic Atlas of China. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. Israeli, Raphael. Muslims in China: A Study in Cultural Confrontation. London: Curzon Press, 1978.

Kaup-Bib.Final

202

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 202

Bibliography

Kao, Ting Tsz. The Chinese Frontiers. Taipei: Chinese Scholarly Publishing Company, 1980. Karklins, Rasma. Ethnic Relations in the USSR: The Perspective from Below. Boston: Allen and Unwin, 1986. Kedourie, Elie. Nationalism. 4th ed. Cambridge: Blackwell, 1994. Kozlov, Viktor. The Peoples of the Soviet Union. Translated by Pauline M. Tiffen. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988. Kunstadter, Peter (ed.). Southeast Asian Tribes, Minorities, and Nations. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967. Laitin, David. “Hegemony and Religious Conflict: British Imperial Control and Political Cleavages in Yorubaland.” In Bringing the State Back In, ed. Peter Evans. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. Lampton, David M. Paths to Power: Elite Mobility in Contemporary China. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1989. ———. Policy Implementation in Post-Mao China. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987. Lary, Diana. “Communist and Ethnic Revolt: Some Notes on the Chuang Peasant Movement in Kwangsi 1921–31,” China Quarterly (January-March 1972): 126–135. ———. Region and Nation: The Kwangsi Clique in Chinese Politics 1925–1937. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974. ———. “The Tomb of the King of Nanyue—The Contemporary Agenda of History: Scholarship and Identity,” Modern China 22, no. 1 (January 1996): 3–28. Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of Christian Missions in China. Taipei: Cheng New Publishing Company, 1966. Lattimore, Owen. Pivot of Asia: Sinkiang and the Inner Asian Frontiers of China and Russia. Boston: Little, Brown, 1950. Launay, Adrien. Histoire des Missions de China: Mission du Koung-si. Paris, 1903. Lebar, F., G. Hickey, and J. Musgrave. Ethnic Groups of Southeast Asia. New Haven, Conn.: Human Relations Area Files, 1964. Lee, Chae-Jin. China’s Korean Minority: The Politics of Ethnic Education. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1986. Lee, Robert H. G. The Manchurian Frontier in Ch’ing History. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1970. Lenin, V. I. The Right of Nations to Self-Determination: Selected Writings. New York: International Publishers, 1951. Levich, Eugene William. The Kwangsi Way in Kuomintang China, 1931–1939. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1993. Li Tieh-tseng. Tibet, Today and Yesterday. New York: Bookman, 1960. Liu, Kwang-Ching (ed.). American Missionaries in China: Papers from Harvard Seminars. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard East Asian Research Center, 1966. Louvet, Louis-Eugene. Les missions catholiques au XIX siecle. Lyon: Lille and Paris, n.d. Lukic, Reneo, and Allen Lynch. Europe from the Balkans to the Urals: The Disintegration of Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. Ma, Yin. Questions and Answers About China’s Minority Nationalities. Beijing: New World Press, 1985. Mackerras, Colin. China’s Minorities: Integration and Modernization in the Twentieth Century. Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1994. Mao Zedong. Selected Works of Mao Zedong. Vol. 3. Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1967.

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 203

Bibliography

203

McLellan, David. Karl Marx: Selected Writings. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977. McMillen, Donald H. Chinese Communist Power and Policy in Xinjiang, 1949– 1977. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1979. Michels, Robert. Political Parties: A Sociological Study of the Oligarchical Tendencies of Modern Democracy. Translated by Eden and Cedar Paul. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1999. Miller, David, and Alan Ryan (eds.). On Nationality. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. Milton, Esman J. Ethnic Politics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994. Moming. “Explosive Independence Movement in Inner Mongolia,” Zhengming, July 1990. Moseley, George V. H. The Consolidation of the South China Frontier. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973. Moser, Leo J. The Chinese Mosaic: The Peoples and Provinces of China. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1985. Motyl, Alexander J. The Post-Soviet Nations: Perspectives on the Demise of the USSR. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992. ———. Thinking Theoretically About Soviet Nationalities: History and Comparison in the Study of the USSR. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992. ———. Will the Non-Russians Rebel? State, Ethnicity, and Stability in the USSR. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987. Nagel, Joane. “Constructing Ethnicity: Creating and Re-creating Ethnic Identity and Culture,” Social Problems 41, no. 1 (February 1994): 152–176. ———. “Resource Competition Theory,” American Behavioral Scientist 38, no. 3 (January 1995): 442–458. ———, and Susan Olzak. “Ethnic Mobilization in New and Old States: An Extension of the Competition Model,” Social Problems 30, no. 2 (December 1982): 127–143. Olivier, Bernard Vincent. The Implementation of China’s Nationality Policy in the Northeasten Provinces. San Francisco: Mellen Research University Press, 1993. Olzak, Susan, and Joane Nagel. Competitive Ethnic Relations. Orlando, Fla.: Academic Press, 1986. Palmer, Katherine. “Mao Zedong and the Sinification of China’s Minority Policy,” Southeastern Review of Asian Studies (January 1996): 1–20. ———. “Nationalities and Nationality Areas.” In Regional and Economic Handbook: China. Chicago: Fitzroy and Dearborn, 1997. Ramsey, S. Robert. The Languages of China. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987. Ray, Rex. Cowboy Missionary in Kwangsi. Nashville, 1964. Renan, Ernest. Qu’est-ce qu’une nation. Translated by Ida Mae Snyder. Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1882. Rothschild, Joseph. Ethnopolitics: A Conceptual Framework. New York: Columbia University Press, 1981. Rudelson, Justin Jon. Oasis Identities: Uyghur Nationalism Along China’s Silk Road. New York: Columbia University Press, 1998. Rywkin, Michael. Moscow’s Lost Empire. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1994. Scalapino, Robert A. Elites in the People’s Republic of China. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1972. Schoppa, R. Keith. Chinese Elites and Political Change: Zhejiang Province in the Early Twentieth Century. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1982. Schram, Stuart (ed.). Mao’s Road to Power: Revolutionary Writings 1912–1949. Vol. 1. New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1992.

Kaup-Bib.Final

204

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 204

Bibliography

Schwartz, Ronal D. Circle of Protest: Political Ritual in the Tibetan Uprising. London: Hurst, 1994. Seton-Watson, H. Nations and States: An Enquiry into the Origins of Nations and the Politics of Nationalism. London: Methuen, 1977. Seymour, James D. China: The Politics of Revolutionary Reintegration. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1976. Shepherd, John R. “From Barbarians to Sinners: Collective Conversion Among Plains Aborigines in Qing Taiwan, 1859–1895.” In Christianity in China: From the Eighteenth Century to the Present, ed. Daniel H. Bays. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996. Shils, Edward. “Primordial, Personal, Sacred and Civil Ties,” British Journal of Sociology 8 (1957): 130–145. Simon, Gerhard. Nationalism and Policy Toward the Nationalities in the Soviet Union: From Totalitarian Dictatorship to Post-Stalinist Society. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1991. Skinner, G. William (ed.). The City in Late Imperial China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1977. Smith, Anthony. The Ethnic Origin of Nations. New York: Basil Blackwell, 1986. Snow, Edgar. Red Star over China. New York: Random House, 1938. Solinger, Dorothy J. Regional Government and Political Integration in Southwest China, 1949–1954. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977. Sugimoto, Takashi. The Political Stability of Ethnic Regions in China: A Methodological Study. Tokyo: International Institute for Global Peace, April 1993. Sun, Hongkai. “Language Recognition and Nationality,” International Journal of Sociology of Language 97 (1992): 9–22. Sun Yat-sen. Memoirs of a Chinese Revolutionary: A Programme of National Reconstruction for China. New York: AMS Press, 1970. Sutton, Donald S. “Consuming Counterrevolution: The Ritual and Culture of Cannibalism in Wuxuan, Guangxi, China, May to July 1968,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 37, no. 1 (January 1995): 136–172. Tajfel, Henri. “Experiments in Intergroup Discrimination,” Scientific American 223 (November 1970): 96–102. ———. “Intergroup Behavior, Social Comparison, and Social Change.” KatzNewcomb Lectures, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, mimeograph, 1974. Taylor, David, and Malcolm Yapp (eds.). Political Identity in South Asia. London: Curzon Press, 1979. Tong, James. “Fiscal Reform, Elite Turnover, and Central-Provincial Relations in Post-Mao China,” The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs 22 (July 1989): 1–28. Townsend, James R. Political Participation in Communist China. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968. Treisman, Daniel S. “Russia’s ‘Ethnic Revival’: The Separatist Activism of Regional Leaders in a Postcommunist Order,” World Politics (January 1997): 212–249. Tung, Fei Hsiao. Toward a People’s Anthropology. Beijing: New World Press, 1981. van den Berghe, Pierre L. The Ethnic Phenomenon. New York: Elsevier, 1981. ———. “Race and Ethnicity: A Sociological Look,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 1, no. 4 (October 1978): 402–407. van Walt van Paag, Michael C. The Status of Tibet, History, Rights, and Prospects in International Law. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1987.

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 205

Bibliography

205

White, Dob. “The Position and Role of Minority Languages and Their Writing Systems in China,” International Journal of Sociology of Language 97 (1992): 47–57. Whiting, Allen S. Sinkiang: Pawn or Pivot? Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1958. Whitney, Joseph B. R. China: Area, Administration, and Nation Building. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970. Wiens, Herold. Han Chinese Expansion in South China. Hamden, Conn.: Shoe String Press, 1967. Womack, Brantly. “Sino-Vietnamese Border Trade: The Edge of Normalization,” Asian Survey 34, no. 6 (June 1994): 495–512. Wu, Aitchen K. Turkistan Tumult. London: Methuen, 1940. Wyatt, David K. Thailand: A Short History. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984. Yang, Dali. “Patterns of China’s Regional Development Strategy,” China Quarterly 122 (June 1990): 230–258. ———. “Reforms, Resources, and Regional Cleavages: The Political Economy of Coast-Interior Relations in Mainland China,” Issues and Studies 29, no. 9 (September 1991): 43–69. Yi, Zheng. Scarlet Memorial: Tales of Cannibalism in Modern China. Translated by T. P. Sym. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1996. Young, Crawford. The Politics of Cultural Pluralism. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1976.

Chinese-Language Sources Bai Sipei (zhuren). Minzu diqu dang de jianshe tongsu duben. Kunming: Yunnan minzu chubanshe, 1993. [Reader on the Building of the Chinese Communist Party in Minority Areas. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993.] Bao Guoqing. “Minzu diqu de guannian xinli beijing yu xiangzhen qiye,” Guangxi Minzu Yanjiu 1 (1993): 1–11. [“Background on Nationalities’ Thinking and Township Enterprises,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 1 (1993). Chen Qingde (zhuren). Zhongguo shaoshu minzu jingji kaifa gailun. Beijing: Minzu chubanshe, 1993. [General Discussion on Developing China’s Minority Nationalities’ Economies. Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1993.] ——— Minzu jingjixue. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1994. [Nationalities Economics. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1994.] Chen Tiejun (zhuren). Yunnan xianyu jingji de lilun yu shixian. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993. [The Theory and Practice of Yunnan’s Local Economics. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993.] Chen Zhulin. “Lun zhuangwen fangan,” Zhongguo shaoshu minzu yuyan wenzi shiyong he fazhan wenti. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan minzu yanjiusuo he guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui wenhua xuanchuansi (zhubian). Beijing: Zhongguo zangxue chubanshe, 1993, 37–47. [“A Discussion of the Zhuang Written Script Plan,” in Questions on China’s Minority Nationalities’ Languages Usage and Development. Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Nationalities Research Institute and the Chinese Nationalities Affairs Commission Cultural Propaganda Office (eds.). Beijing: Chinese Tibetan Studies Press, 1993.]

Kaup-Bib.Final

206

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 206

Bibliography

Chen Zuomao. Guangxi shaoshu minzu wenxuan mulu. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989. [Bibliography of Articles on Guangxi’s Minority Nationalities. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1989.] Chuxiong yizu shuiwuju he shuiwu xuehui. Lun minzu diqu shuishou. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993. [Chuxiong Yi Nationality County Tax Bureau and the Chuxiong County Tax Studies Association. Talks on Minority Nationality Taxation. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993]. Deng Liqun, Ma Hong, and Wu Heng (zhubian). Dangdai zhongguo de minzu gongzuo. Beijing: Dandai zhongguo chubanshe, 1993. [Contemporary China’s Minority Work (Volumes 1 and 2). Beijing: Contemporary China Press, 1993.] Dong Mengxiong (zhubian). Yunnan jindai difang jingjishi yanjiu. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1991. [Research on the History of Yunnan’s Modern Local Economies. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1991]. Fan Qixu, Qin Naichang (zhubian). Zhuangzu baike cidian. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993. [The Zhuang Encyclopedia. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993]. Fan Zhengqiang. “Ziyuan shichang yu minzu jingji,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1990). [“The Market for Natural Resources and Minority Economics,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1990)]. Fei Xiaotong. “Guanyu guangxi zhuangzu lishi de chubu tuikao,” Xin jianshe 1 (1952). [“An Investigation on the Beginnings of the Guangxi Zhuang’s History,” New Construction 1 (1952).] Feng Dazhen (zhubian). Weihu zuguo tongyi baohu shehui wending. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993. [Protect the Unity of the Fatherland and Preserve Nationality Stability. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993]. Feng Shen. “Guangxi jiefang hou shouci shaoshu minzu shehui lishi diaocha,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 1 (1991): 142–145. [“The First Investigation on the Minority Nationalities’ Society and History After Guangxi’s Liberation,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 1 (1991)]. Gu Youshi, Fan Honggui (zhubian). Zhuangzu lungao. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989. [Collected Essays on the Zhuang. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1989]. Guangxi minwei. Guangxi minzu quyu zizhi wenjian ziliao huibian. Neibu ziliao, 1988. [Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission. Collected Documents of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, 1988. Internal publication only]. Guangxi minzu yanjiusuo. Guangxi minzu lishi yu wenhua yanjiu, 1–4. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe (1988–1991). [Guangxi Nationalities Research Institute. The Culture and History of Guangxi’s Nationalities (Volumes 1–4) Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1988–1991]. Guangxi nianjian. Nanning: Guangxisheng zhengfu tongjichu, 1935, 1947. [Guangxi Yearbook. Nanning: Guangxi Statistics Office, 1935, 1947]. ———. Nanning: Guangxi nianjianshe, 1994. [Guangxi Yearbook. Nanning: Guangxi Yearbook Editorial Board Press, 1994]. Guangxi zhuangzu wenxue. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1961. [Guangxi Zhuang Literature. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1961]. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu bianjizu (zhubian). Guangxi zhuangzu shehui lishi diaocha, 1–7. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1984–1987. [Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Committee (ed.). Investigation of the Guangxi Zhuang Nationality’s Society and History (Volumes 1–7). Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1984–1987]. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang bianxiezu. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu gaikuang. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1985. [The Situation of the Guangxi

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 207

Bibliography

207

Zhuang Autonomous Region Editorial Board. The Situation of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1985]. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu jihua weiyuanhui, Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu jingji weiyuanhui (zhubian). Guangxi quqing. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1985. [Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Statistical Department and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Economics Department (eds.). Guangxi Regional Character. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1985]. Guo Hongsheng. “Minzu quyu zizhifa de xiuding zai bixing,” Guangxi minzu xueyuan xuebao 4 (1994). [“Needed Reforms of The Regional Autonomy Law,” Journal of The Guangxi Nationalities Institute 4 (1994)]. Guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui, zhonggong zhongyang wenxian yanjiushi. Xin shiqi minzu gongzuo wenxian xuanbian. Beijing: Zhongyang wenxian chubanshe, 1990. [The Central Nationalities Affairs Commission and the Central Chinese Communist Party’s Collections Research Office. Selected Essays on Minority Work During the New Era. Beijing: The Central Collections Press, 1990]. Guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui zhengce yanjiushi (zhubian). Zhongguo gongchan zhuyao lingdaoren lun minzu wenti. Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1994. [The Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Policy Research Office (ed.). The Chinese Communist Party’s Leading Figures Discuss the Nationality Question. Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1994]. Guojia minwei zhengce yanjiushi. Guojia minwei minzu zhengce wenjian xuanbian 1979–1984. Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1988. [Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Policy Research Office. Central Nationalities Affairs Commission Minority Policy Documents Collection 1979–1984. Beijing: Central Nationalities Institute Press, 1988]. Hao Shiyuan. “Mao zedong dui jiejue zhongguo minzu wenti de lishi gongxian,” Minzu yanjiu 5 (1993). [“Mao Zedong’s Historical Contribution to Resolving the Nationality Question,” Nationalities Research 5 (1993)]. He Minghui, Meng Yuanyao. “Tan zhuangwen zai kaifa zhuangzu ertong zhinengzhong de zuoyong,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 26–28. [“The Use of Zhuang Script in Developing the Intellect of Zhuang Children,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. He Zhengting. “Yunnan zhuangzu zuyuan yu chengwei xintan,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1991): 83. [“A New Examination of the Origin of the Yunnan Zhuang and their Terms of Self-Address,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1991)]. Hong Puzhou (zhubian). Guangxi jingji yu shehui fazhan zhanlue yanjiu. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989, 1990. [Research on Guangxi’s Economic and Social Development Strategy. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1989, 1990]. Hu Zhongan (zhubian). Minzu quyu zizhifa xue. Beijing: Zhongyang minzu daxue chubanshe, 1994. [Regional Autonomous Law. Beijing: The Central Nationalities College Press, 1994]. Huang Chenghuan (zhubian). Guangxi zhuangzu gemingshi. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1994. [The Revolutionary History of the Zhuang People. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1994]. Huang Huikun (zhubian). Cong yueren dao tairen. Kunming: Yunnan minzu chubanshe, 1992. [From the Yues to the Thais. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1992]. Huang Wanlun (zhubian). Zhongguo shaoshu minzu diqu chengzhen jingji yanjiu. Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1994. [Research on China’s Minority Nationalities Local Township Economies. Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1994].

Kaup-Bib.Final

208

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 208

Bibliography

Huang Xianfan. Zhuangzu tongshi. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1988. [Overview of the Zhuang. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1988. Huang Yulu (zhubian). Zhongyang Donglanxian zuzhishi ciliao 1921–1949. Zhongyang Donglanxian: Donglanxian weidangshi bangongshi, 1989. [The Central Donglan Organization’s Historical Records. Donglan County: Donglan Branch of the Chinese Communist Party’s History Office, 1989. Internal publication only]. Jin Anjiang (zhubian). Shaoshu minzu diqu xingzheng guanli. Guiyang: Guizhou minzu chubanshe, 1991. [The Administrative Organization of Minority Nationality Areas. Guiyang: Guizhou Nationalities Press, 1991]. Jin Binggao (zhubian). Minzu lilun tonglun. Beijing: Zhongyang minzu daxue chubanshe, 1994. [General Discussion of Minority Theory. Beijing: Central Nationalities College Press, 1994]. Ke Guanqiong. “Guangxi zuoyoujiang liuyu xinshiqishidai guiwu jianjie,” Wenwu cankao ciliao 6 (1956). [“A Brief Introduction to the Neolithic Artifacts of the Guangxi Right and Left River Basin Areas,” Cultural Artifact Reference Materials 6 (1956)]. Lan Jianning. “Lun zhuangzu sixiang yishi, xinli jiegou ji qizhong de beiruo chengfen,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 4 (1988), 7–16. [“On the Weakness of Zhuang Ideology and Psychological Structure,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 4 (1988)]. Li Bingdong (zhubian). Guangxi dangdai jingjishi. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1991. [Contemporary Guangxi’s Economy. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1991]. Li Chanfu. “Guangxi puji guomin jichu jiaoyu yundong shiqi de zhuangzu jiaoyu, Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 13–18. [“Zhuang Education During the Era of the Guangxi Movement to Popularize National Primary Education,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. Li Chanfu, He Longqun. “Zhuangzu jiaoyushi luelun,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1994): 86–94. [“A Brief Statement on the History of Zhuang Education,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1994)]. Li Fuqiang. “Zhuangzu de wenhua chuandi,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 59– 69. [“The Transmission of Zhuang Culture,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. Li Jiaxiu. “Minzu diqu jingji fazhan zhuangkuang de shuliang fenxi,” Minzu jingji 1 (1989): 9–16. [“A Statistical Analysis of the Nationality Areas’ Economic Development,” Nationalities Economics 1 (1989)]. Li Jingyang. “Fazhan minzu jingji youguan de jingji fagui jianjie,” Minzu jingji (1987): 101–102, 107. [“A Brief Introduction to Economic Laws Relating to the Development of Nationalities’ Economies,” Nationalities Economics (1987)]. Li Kechang (zhubian). Lun minzu diqu shuishou. Kunming Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993. [Tax Collection in Nationality Areas. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993]. Li Rui, He Qun. “Minzu yishi chutan,” Minzu Yanjiu 2 (1991): 1–6. [“On Nationality Consciousness,” Nationalities Research 2 (1991)]. Li Yiran. “Dui xian jieduan minzu yiwu daihuan zhengce jiqi fazhan tujing de tantao,” Minzu jingji 1 (1989): 34–36. [“Regarding Preferential Policies in Minority Trade and Other Development Paths in the Current Era,” Minority Economics 1 (1989)]. Liang Min. “Tantan zhuangwen fangan,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 2. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1987, 10–12. [“Discuss the Zhuang Written Script Plan,” Nationality Culture Research 2. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1987].

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 209

Bibliography

209

———. “Zhuangwen fangan de lishi yange,” Zhongguo shaoshu minzu yuyan wenzi shiyong he fazhan wenti. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan minzu yanjiusuo he guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui wenhua xuanchuansi (zhubian). Beijing: Zhongguo zangxue chubanshe, 1993, 28–36. [“The Historical Progression of the Zhuang Written Script Program,” in Questions on China’s Minority Nationalities’ Languages Usage and Development. Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Nationalities Research Institute and the Chinese Nationalities Affairs Commission Cultural Propoganda Office (eds.). Beijing: Chinese Tibetan Studies Press, 1993.] Liang Tingwang (zhubian). Zhuangzu fengsu zhi. Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1987. [Zhuang Culture. Beijing: Central Nationalities Institute Press, 1987]. Liu Baoten. “Guangxi shaoshu minzu zai jingji huodongzhong de xianzhuang fenxi,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 7–12. [“An Analysis of the Changing Economy of Guangxi’s Minority Nationalities,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. Liu Derong (zhubian). Zhuangzu minjian gushe. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1988. [Zhuang Folktales. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1988]. Liu Jianping. “Guangxi zhuangzu xiguanfa chutan,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 4 (1990): 63–71. [“The Guangxi Zhuang’s Customary Law,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 4 (1990)]. Liu Jiezhu. Guangxi zhuangzu wenren wenxueshi gaiyao. Guangxi zhuangzu zizhiqu kexue gongzuo weiyuanhui, 1959. [An Outline History of Guangxi’s Zhuang Literary Figures and Literature. Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Scientific Work Committee and Zhuang Literary History Compilation Office, 1959]. Liu Yufen. “Guangxi shaoshu minzu zai jingji huodongzhong de xianzhuang fenxi,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993). [“An Analysis of the Changing Economy of Guangxi’s Minority Nationalities,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. Lu Xiuyang. Donglan geming genjudi. Donglan: Zhonggong donglanxian weidangshi bangongshi, 1990. [The Donglan Revolutionary Base Area. Donglan: The Chinese Communist Party’s Donglan Branch Party History Office, 1990]. Lu Xiuyang. Donglan nongmin yundong 1921–1927. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1986. [The Donglan Peasant Movement 1921–1927. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1986]. “Lun zhuangzu wenhua de duanlie xianxiang,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 4 (1988): 1–7. [“On the Disjointedness of the Zhuang Culture,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 4 (1988)]. Mo Yueyun. “Lun zhuang, yaozu renmin dui baise qiyi de liechu gongxian,” Minzu yanjiu 1 (1991): 91–97. [“On the Outstanding Contribution of the Zhuang and Yao People to the Baise Uprising,” Nationalities Research 1 (1991)]. Nong Caiwen. “Chongfen fahui zhuangzu ganbu zai minzu quyu zizhizhong de zuoyong,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1992). [“Thoroughly Develop the Use of Nationality Cadres Within Autonomous Regions,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1992)]. Peng Yingming. “Minzu quyu zizhifa xiugai zhi wo jian,” Guangxi minzu xueyuan xuebao 4 (1994): 8–9. [“My Thoughts on Reforming the Law of Regional Autonomy,” Guangxi Nationalities Institute Journal 4 (1994)]. Qian Jiaju. Guangxi sheng jingji gaikuang. Liwu yin shuguan 31 (1936), 63. [The General State of the Guangxi Province’s Economics. Liwu Book Distributors 31 (1936)].

Kaup-Bib.Final

210

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 210

Bibliography

Qin Guosheng (zhubian). Zhuangzu. Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1984. [The Zhuang. Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1984]. Qin Naichang. “Gui xibei yu gui dongnan jingji fazhan de chaju wenti ji jiejue de tujing,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1993). [“The Problem of and Path to Resolving the Gap in Economic Development Between Northwest and Southeast Guangxi,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1993)]. Qin Xiaohang. “Zhuangzu zucheng ‘Zhuang,’ ‘Nong,’ ‘Lang’ laiyuan xintan,” Minzu yanjiu 1 (1990): 38–40. [“A New Examination of the Origin of the Zhuang Use of the Terms ‘Zhuang,’ ‘Nong,’ and ‘Lang,’” Nationalities Research 1 (1990).] Shao Zhizhong. Zhuangzu wenhua chongzu yu zaisheng. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1994. [The Reorganization and Rebirth of Zhuang Culture. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1994]. Shi Jianeng. “Fenshuizhi yu minzu diqu xiancheng jingji de fazhan,” Zhongnan minzu xueyuan xuebao 1 (1995): 26–29. [“The Division of Taxes and the Development of the Local Economy in Minority Areas,” The South-Central Institute of Nationalities Journal 1 (1995)]. Su Jianhui (zhubian). Mingqing shiqi zhuangzu lishi yanjiu. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1993. [Studies in Zhuang Ming and Qing History. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1993]. Su Yongqin. “Tuixing shiyong zhuangwen dayi,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 1 (1986): 10–17. [“Answers to Questions on Zhuang Language Promotion,” Nationalities Culture Research 1 (1986).] Tong Dao. “Shilun woguo minzu quyu zizhi zhengce de nixiang fei minzuhua,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1993): 1–6. [“The De-Nationalization of China’s Regional Autonomy Policy,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1993)]. Tujia Tianchengzhi. “Guangxi zhuangzu yaozu yu hanzu zhengzhi ji wenhua guanxi de bijiao yanjiu,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1991): 60–71. [“Comparing the Zhuang, Yao, and Han Nationalities’ Government and Culture,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1991)]. Wang Fulin (zhubian). Zhongguo minzu tongji nianjian 1949–1994. Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1994. [Statistical Yearbook of China’s Nationalities 1949– 1994. Beijing: Peoples’ Press, 1994]. Wang Jun. “Zhuangwen chuangzhi 30 zhounian de huigu,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 2 (1987). [“Looking Back on 30 Years of Zhuang Language Promotion,” Nationalities Culture Research 2 (1987). Wang Ningsheng (zhubian). Zhongguo xinan minzu de lishi yu wenhua. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1989. [History and Culture of China’s Southwestern Nationalities. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1989]. Wei Chunshu. Dangdai zhongguo de guangxi. Beijing: Danddai zhongguo chubanshe, 1992. [Contemporary China’s Guangxi. Beijing: Contemporary China Publishers Press, 1992]. Wei Jianfeng. “Jiasu minzu diqu jingji fazhan zhilu, kuoda gaibian kaifang,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 1 (1993): 11–16. [“Expand Market Reforms to Speed the Development of the Nationalities’ Economy,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 1 (1993).] Wei Yiqiang. “Guanyu zhuangyuwen shiyong he fazhan de jige wenti,” Minzu wenhua yanjiu 1 (1986): 18–26. [“A Few Questions Regarding the Use and Development of the Zhuang Script,” Minority Culture Research 1 (1986)]. Wenshan zhuangzu miaozu zizhizhou gaikuang bianxiezu. Wenshan zhuangzu miaozu zizhizhou gaikuang. Kunming: Yunnan minzu chubanshe, 1986. [The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture Editorial

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 211

Bibliography

211

Board. The Situation of the Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture. Kunming: Yunnan Nationalities Press, 1986]. Wu Guorui. “Guanyu zizhiquan jiqi xingshi yu baozhang de sikao,” Minzu yanjiu 2 (1989). [“Thoughts on Autonomous Rights and Their Implementation and Protection,” Nationalities Research 2 (1989)]. Wu Yangxiong. “Bufen minzu diqu dui fenshui de fanying,” Minzu jingji 3 (1994): 45–48. [“Reaction of Selected Nationality Areas Toward the Division of Taxes,” Nationalities Economics 3 (1994).] Xie Benshu (zhubian). Yunnansheng bu tong leixing minzu diqu fenlei zhidao yanjiu. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1991. [Leading Research on Various Forms of Minority Area Divisions. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1991]. Xie Qiguang. Lingwai zhuangzu huikao. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1989. [A Collection of Essays on the Zhuang Within and Outside of Lingnan. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1989]. Xu Jieshun, Liu Xiaochun, Luo Shujie (zhubian). Nanxiang chunse: yige zhuangzuxiang shehui wenhua de bianqian. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1990. [Nanxiang Chunse: The Transformation of Culture and Society in a Zhuang Village. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1990]. Xu Jieshun, Qin Naichang. Minzu zizhiquan lun. Nanning: Guangxi jiaoyu chubanshe, 1991. [Nationality Autonomy Theory. Nanning: Guangxi Educational Press, 1991]. ———. “Zhuangzu minzu yishi qianlun,” Xueshu luntan 6 (1989). [“A Brief Discussion on Zhuang Nationality Consciousness,” Academic Forum 6 (1989)]. Yang Houdi (zhubian). Zhongguo minzu fazhi jianghua. Beijing: Zhongyang minzu xueyuan chubanshe, 1993. [Discussing the National Minority Legal System. Beijing: Central Nationalities College Press, 1993]. Yang Zhihui. Minzu wenxian tigao. Kunming: Yunnan jiaoyu chubanshe, 1990. [Bibliography of Minority Articles. Kunming: Yunnan Educational Press, 1990]. Yang Zuolin (zhubian). Minzu diqu jingji fazhan tongsu jianghua. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993. [A General Discussion of Minority Economics. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993]. Ye Jintang. “Guanyu minzu difang caizheng dizhiquan de jige wenti,” Guangxi shaoshu minzu jingji wenti. Nanning: Guangxi minzu shiwu weiyuanhui, 1987. [“A Few Questions Regarding Nationality Regions’ Fiscal Autonomous Rights,” Guangxi Minority Nationalities Economics Collected Articles. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission, 1987]. Yuan Shaofen (zhubian). Dangdai zhuangzu tansuo. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1989. [A Brief Exploration of the Contemporary Zhuang. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1989]. Zhang Huiling. “Zhuangzu chuantong shengchanxing wenhua yu jingji xiandaihua,” Minzu jingji 3 (1994): 55–58. [“Economic Modernization and Traditional Zhuang Views on Production,” Nationalities Economics 3 (1994).] Zhang Kewu (zhubian). Minzu ganbu de peiyang he jiaoyu. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1994. [The Training and Education of Nationality Cadres. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1994]. Zhang Lizheng. Guangxi jingji zhengce yanjiu. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1991. [Research on Guangxi’s Economic Policy. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1991]. Zhang Shengzhen (ed.). Guangxi zhuangyu diming xuanji. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1988. [Selected Place Names in the Zhuang Language. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1988].

Kaup-Bib.Final

212

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 212

Bibliography

———. Zhuangzu tongshi. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1998. [History of the Zhuang. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1998]. Zhang Yingning. “Guangxi zhuangzu de jiandan jieshao,” Guangxi ribao (05/11/52). [“A Brief Introduction to the Guangxi Zhuang,” Guangxi Daily News, November 5, 1952]. Zhao Jinghua, Cui Yonghong, Tang Wuhua, Liang Jingsong, Guangxiqu minwei wenjiaochu (ed.). “Guangxi minzu jiaoyu yanzhong huapo,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 2 (1994). [Guangxi NAC Culture and Education Department (ed.) “The Slippery Slope of Guangxi’s Nationality Education,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 2 (1994)]. Zheng Dongfeng. “Minzu shanqu caiyuan jiegou tiaozheng wenti chutan,” Zhongnan minzu xueyuan xuebao 2 (1994): 31–33. [“A Preliminary Investigation on Adjusting the Fiscal Revenue Structure in Minority Mountainous Areas,” Guangxi Nationalities Institute Journal 2 (1994)]. Zhonggong guangxi dangwei xuanchuanbu (zhubian). Mao zedong yu guangxi. Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 1993. [Mao Zedong and Guangxi. Nanning: Guangxi People’s Press, 1993]. Zhonggong zhongyang tongzhanbu. Minzu wenti wenxian huibian. Beijing: Zhonggong zhongyang dangxiao chubanshe, 1991. [The Central Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Bureau. A Collection of Articles on the Nationality Question. Beijing: The Central Academy of the Chinese Communist Party Press, 1991]. Zhongguo renmin zhengzhi xieshang huiyi yunnan sheng wenshan zhuangzu miaozu zizhizhou weiyuanhui wenshi ciliao yanjiu weiyuanhui. Wenshan wenshi ciliao 1–10 (1985–1993). [The Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture People’s Political Consultative Conference Committee on Historical Records. Historical Records of Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture 1–10 (1985–1993)]. Zhongguo renmin zhengzhi xieshanghui yunnan sheng guangnanxian weiyuanhui wenshi ciliao yanjiu weiyuanhui. Guangnan xian wenshi ciliao 1–6 (1986– 1993). [The Guangnan County People’s Political Consultative Conference Committee on Historical Records. Historical Records of Guangnan County 1–6 (1986–1993)]. Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan minzu yanjiusuo he guojia minzu shiwu weiyuanhui wenhua xuanchuan si (zhubian). Zhongguo shaoshu minzu yuyan wenzi shiyong he fazhan wenti. Beijing: Zhongguo zangxue chubanshe, 1993. [Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Nationalities Research Institute and the Chinese Nationalities Affairs Commission Cultural Propaganda Office (eds.). Questions on China’s Minority Nationalities’ Languages Usage and Development. Beijing: Chinese Tibetan Studies Press, 1993]. Zhou Guangda (ed.). Minzuxue gailun. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1992. [An Outline Discussion of Nationalities Studies. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1992]. Zhou Ruihai, Han Guai (eds.). Minzu quyu zizhi zizhi jianming duben. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1993. [A Basic Reader on National Regional Autonomy. Kunming: Yunnan Peoples’ Press, 1993]. Zhou Zhongguai. “Wei daxibeinan kaibi tongxiang beibuhai de guangkuang tongdao,” Guangxi minzu yanjiu 3 (1993): 1–7. [“For the Betterment of the Greater Southwest, Open the Great Route Toward Beihai,” Guangxi Nationalities Research 3 (1993)].

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 213

Bibliography

213

Zhou Zongxian. Nanfang minzu lungao. Nanning: Guangxi minzu chubanshe, 1986. [Southern Nationalities. Nanning: Guangxi Nationalities Press, 1986]. Zhu Zhenjun. “Quanguo shaoshu minzu pinkunxian caizheng zhuangkuang diaocha baogao,” Minzu jingji 1 (1993): 37–43, 67–68. [“A Report on the Situation in the Nation’s Minority Poverty Counties,” Nationalities Economics 1 (1993).] ———. “Woguo minzu diqu jingji fazhan wenti yu duice yanjiu,” Minzu jingji 2 (1994), 12–18. [“Research on Economics and Development in Our Nation’s Minority Areas,” Nationalities Economics 2 (1994).

Kaup-Bib.Final

1/7/10

11:37 AM

Page 214

Kaup-Index.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 215

INDEX

activism: assessing, 12; changing, 1, 174; economics influence, 122; middle-level, 75, 121; origins, 14; response to economic policies, 165–168. See also mobilization activists: Mongol, 2; Zhuang, 3; statistical studies, 12 agricultural and industrial output, 150, 164 Ai Jiahua, 140 all-circles congresses, 79 ancestor worship, 44 Anderson, Benedict, 7, 19 Anglo–Tibetan Lhasa Convention, 60 anthropology: cultural, 6; studies, 6, 7 Anti-Rightist Campaign, 102 Asian Mongol Freedom Front, 2 assimilation, 11, 25, 54, 62 autonomous areas: compared to SEZs, 119; created in 1980s, 115; established for non-Zhuang, 84; reestablished after Cultural Revolution, 114 aviation routes, 156 Baise, 129; education, 135; foreign investment, 165; illiteracy, 134; landholding, 85; minority institutes, 133; Uprising, 94–100 Baiyue, 27 Bai Zongxi, 3 Bama Country, 13, 28, 129, 141 Beijing, 2, 89; meetings in, 128 Benson, Linda, 6, 59 Bhabha, Homi, 7

bilingual education, 2, 145 Black Sha, 40 Border Education programs, 61 branch divisions. See zhixi Brass, Paul, 15, 17, 18 Budai, 41, 89 Buddhism, 44, 57 budget controls, 10 Buyi, 3, 41, 88, 89, 90 Cantonese, 30, 46, 52 Catholicism, 44 censorship, 118 census, 33, 34, 87, 88, 91, 129, 130 Central Nationalities College, 12, 138 Central Nationalities Institute, 132 Chae-Jin Lee, 6 Chiang Kaishek, 59, 62 China’s Forty Millions, 5 Common Program (1949), 78 communes, impact on interethnic relations, 102 competition theories, 17 Connor, Walker, 15 Constitution of the People’s Republic of China (1954), 78 Court of Colonial Affairs, 61 Cultural Revolution, 11, 74, 102, 103–106, 142; documentation of, 102, 104; educational priorities, 134; increase of Zhuang ethnic consciousness, 103; interethnic fighting, 105; investment policy, 163; lack of reference to Zhuang, 103; overturning, 75, 112; reassessed,

215

Kaup-Index.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 216

216

Index

113; sent down workers, 105–106 cultural rights: constitutionally guaranteed, 125–126 Dai, 3, 89, 138 Daoism, 44 Daxin, 33, 90; disputes over Zhuang classification, 115 Deal, David, 11 decentralization, 1, 120, 122, 162 Declaration on the Polish Question (1865), 63 demands for nationality recognition, 73 demographics, 56–57 Deutsch, Karl, 15, 19 dialects, 29, 37, 58, 139, 140, 144 discrimination, 26, 96 Dong, 32, 37, 84; nationality, 3 Donglan, 141; ethnic identity, lacking, 96; fieldwork, 13; Han immigration, 95; Peasant Rebellion, 83, 94–100 dress. See zhixi Dreyer, June, 5, 11 Eberhard, Wolfram, 5, 27, 28 economic development, 29, 32, 35, 74, 76, 102, 167, 149–168; autonomous areas compared to SEZs, 119; eastern and western Guangxi compared, 152; Guangxi compared to nation, 150; and industrial development, 157–160; infrastructural development, 153–156; investment, 160–165; local control over, 117; meetings after Cultural Revolution, 114; rise in ethnic activism, 165–168; trade, 156–157 economic inequality, 2, 10 education: affirmative action, 137; college matriculation, 130; funding, 135–136; impact on minority consciousness, 138; literacy campaigns, 134; middle schools, 135; minority cadres, 137–138; policy, 129–138; post-secondary, 136–137; primary school matriculation, 130; teacher training, 133, 136 educational levels, 11, 125, 134; Guangxi labor force, 130; improvements, 131; influence on

minority consciousness, 132 ethnic cadres: number of, 2, 121; promotion after Cultural Revolution, 113; recruitment, 9, 113; underrepresentation, 84 ethnic conflict, 2 ethnic elites, 6, 17, 18, 20, 172 ethnic identity, 5, 74. anthropological studies, 6; changeable, 7; of elites, 9, 137; heroes, 94; lack of, 4; origin, 77; state manipulated, 7, 52, 120. See also minority consciousness Fei Xiaotong, 84, 90, 127 festivals, politicization of, 100–101 First International Zhuang Studies Symposium, 13 Fletcher, Joseph, 58 foreign involvement, 60 Four Modernizations, 101, 112, 128 gaitu guiliu, 36 Geertz, Clifford, 16, 17, 54 General Program, 78, 79, 80, 86, 116, 125 geographical setting, 29–32 Gladney, Dru, 6, 59 Great Leap Forward, 101, 102, 103, 153 Guangdong, 155; Christian converts, 44; infrastructure pre-1949, 34; migration from, 30, 40; migration to, 26; role in decision to recognize Zhuang, 52; Wei Baqun travels, 97; Zhuang population, 26 Guangnan, 13, 38, 45 Guangxi, eas-west differences in, 30–31, 34, 153–154; imperial control of, 35–36; per capita income, 151 Guangxi Clique, 3 Guangxi Literature and Arts Association, 128 Guangxi Minority Cadre School, 133 Guangxi National Minorities Languages Committee, 129 Guangxi Nationalities Affairs Commission: classification teams, 115; growing activism, 115 Guangxi Nationalities Research Journal, 117, 118, 167; focus of, 11

Kaup-Index.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 217

Index Guangxi Nationalities Research Institute, 11, 86, 104, 114, 166 Guangxi Regulation on the Exercise of Autonomy, 117 Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region: establishment, 4, 91, 93; establishment phases, 82 Guangxi Zhuang Language Broadcast School, 144 Guilin: Baise Uprising involvement, 97; infrastructure, 156; migration to, 157; minority institutes, 132; PLA capture, 83; split development plan, 164; teachers college, 106 Guiping, 31, 32 Guizhou: language training, 141; migration from, 27; minorities related to Zhuang, 89; minority policy pre-1949, 62; nationality classification teams, 88, 89; railroads, 34, 155; Wei Baqun travels, 97 Gu Youshi, 85 Han Dynasty, 27, 35 Han migration, 36, 45, 56 Han-Zhuang interactions (pre-1949), 47 Harrell, Steven, 6, 54 Hechi, 13, 32, 130; illiteracy, 134; minority institutes, 133; Zhuang population, 31 Hechter, Michael, 18 hegemonic theories, 16, 19, 20, 172 He Zhengting, 40, 129 historiography, 3, 8, 10, 98, 100, 125, 139 horizontal linkages, 158, 159, 165 Huang Xianfan, 43, 141, 156 Hudson, G. F., 51, 53 Hui nationality, 6, 32, 67; Mao’s views, 66; recognized early, 67 Hunan, 30, 32, 66, 67; migration from, 27; railroads, 34 Hundred Flowers Campaign, 102 indigenization policy, 65 infrastructural development, 153–156; aviation routes, 156; railroad construction, 155; roads, 153–155; waterway construction, 155

217

infrastructure, 29, 34, 47, 56, 73, 151, 153 Inner Mongol Autonomous Region, 2, 173; Han migration to, 56 Inner Mongolia, 6, 67, 151; investment policy, 160; lost autonomy in Cultural Revolution, 114 instrumentalist theories, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, 172 integration, 3; administrative, 34; central goal, 74; desired by grassroots, 10; economic, 75, 171; educational, 9; geographical barriers, 29; inter-nationality, 44; lack of, 25; language barriers, 37; political studies focus on, 6; religious divisions, 41; traditional government barriers, 35; tusi-imposed barriers, 36; zhixi-imposed barriers, 37 investment policy, 160–165, 179; preferential, 10 Islam, 57, 58 jimi, 35 jinshi, 36 Kunming, 33; infrastructure, 155, 156 Kurds, 1, 93 Laitin, David, 19 Lamaism, 57 landholding patterns, 45, 85 land redistribution, 85 Lao nationality, 3 Lary, Diana, 10, 52, 53, 94, 95, 96, 97 Lattimore, Owen, 5 Law of Regional Autonomy, 116–118; economic articles, 117 legends, 27, 38, 42, 95 limits on Zhuang mobilization: lack of funds, 179; lack of interest advocacy experience, 180; linguistic divisions, 178; localism, 174–176; rural-urban divide, 176–177; zhixi divisions, 178 Lingnan, 26, 27, 36, 52 linguistic freedom, 78, 79 Liuzhou, 83; education, 135; illiteracy, 134; minority institutes, 133; split development plan, 164; Zhuang population, 31 Li Weihan, 93, 104, 111

Kaup-Index.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 218

218

Index

localism, 8, 25, 42, 44, 174–176 London Conference of the First International, 64 Long March, 68 Longzhou, 33; Nong Zhigao control, 35 MacKerras, Colin, 6, 11 Maguai. See Toad Festival Manchus, 92; GMD policy, 62; Mao’s views, 66; recognized early, 61 Manifesto of the First National Congress (GMD), 62 March Third Festival, 101 Marxist nationality theory, 18, 63–64 Mashan, 130, 145 McMillen, Donald, 6 Meng Yuanyao, 129, 142, 144 Miao, 32; autonomous areas, 84; mission work among, 44; mountian range, 29; population distribution, 45; recognized early, 61, 67; support from America, 175 Miao Studies Association, 175 Ming Dynasty, 10, 30, 35, 36, 45, 95; use of Zhuang square charcters, 139 minority consciousness, 2, 119; influence of educational levels, 132, 138; weakness criticized, 118–120. See also ethnic identity minority differences, northwest and southwest, 55–61 Minority Nationalities Language Commission, 12, 142; duties, 141 Minority Works Party Core Group, 114 mobilization, limits on, 10 Mo Junliao, 46 Mongol and Tibetan Affairs Bureau, 61 Mongolia, 2, 36, 68; Cultural Revolution gerrymandering, 114; ethnic identity, 67; GMD policy, 61, 62; GZAR established, 51; Mao’s views, 66; minority in Inner Mongolia, 56; recognized early, 61, 67; religion, 55, 57; secession movements, 1, 55; written script, 58. See also Inner Mongolia Mongol National Revolutionary Party, 67 Moseley, George, 32, 52, 53, 86

Nanning: education, 135; illiteracy, 134; infrastructure, 154–156; minority institutes, 133; PLA capture, 83; split development plan, 164; Zhuang population, 31 Napo, 13, 33, 129, 130 nationalism narratives, 7 Nationalist policy, 55–63; northwest focus, 55; recognition of nationalities, 61 Nationalities Affairs Commission, 80; central, 120; classification work, 89, 90; controls on research, 12; and Cultural Revolution, 104, 106, 114; establishment, 80; focus on unity, 77; interviews with, 12; lack of interest group consciousness, 179; language promotion, 141; minority cadre education, 132; official responsibilities, 80; research assistance, 13; statistical studies, 12 Nationalities Work Party Core Group, abolished in 1992, 122 nationality: defined, 15; formation, 14, 15, 18, 19, 20; unity, CCP top priority, 76–77, 87. See also northwestern nationalities; southwestern nationalities nationality classification, 6, 20, 54, 88; after Cultural Revolution, 115; mistakes of, 89 nations: origins of, 5 natural resources, 31, 93, 165; development, 159; difficulty extracting, 160; exports, 156, 162; ownership of, 117, 166, 167; Western Guangxi, 93; Zhuang activism increased to control, 167 New Era of minority work, 111; primary goals, 111–112 nomenklatura, 9, 112, 121 Nong, 37; clan, 27; dress, 40, 41; lack of Zhuang consciousness, 38; origins, 38, 40; tensions with Sha, 38, 40, 166; of Vietnam, 3 Nong Zhigao, 35, 40, 53 northwest and southwest minority differences, 55–61 northwestern nationalities, 5, 65; CCP early focus on, 65; CCP focus on, 65–69

Kaup-Index.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 219

Index objectivist theorists, 14, 15 Olivier, Bernard, 6 Phases of Zhuang-State Political Interaction (fig.), 75 political representation, 9 Political studies, 6 Pollard, Samuel, 44 polyanimist religions, 41, 57 population: density, 29; distribution, 31–34 poverty, 137, 138, 144, 149, 151; alleviation, 12; ethnic origins, 166, 177; prevalence in minority areas, 10 primordial theories, 16–20, 54, 172 propaganda: affects on cadres, 139; Baise Uprising, 100; controls on, 179; encouraging Zhuang consciousness, 20; and GMD, 64, 68, 74; promoting nationality policy, 119; Wei Baqun honored, 94 Protestantism, 44 Qian Jiaju, 85 Qin Guosheng, 145 Qin Naichang, 119, 159, 161, 166, 167, 172 Qin Yingji, 87, 140 Qing Dynasty: ethnic fighting, 46; gaitu guiliu, 36; Han migration, 45, 56; tusi, 36, 46, 96; use of Zhuang square characters, 139 Statistical Yearbook of Minorities, 11 statistics, 11, 12 structuralist theories, 16, 18, 19, 20, 172 subjectivist theorists, 14 Sun-Joffee agreement, 62 Sun Yatsen, 61, 97 Tai, 29, 37; nation, 3, 4; nationalism, 172 Taiping Rebellion, 44, 76 Tang Dynasty, 26, 35, 60, 139 Tartars, recognized early, 61 taxes, 2, 36, 96, 100, 158, 160 Third Front Policy, 163 Three Protections Policy, 157 Tianyang, 13, 33, 158 Tibet: British interests, 60; Cultural Revolution, 103; demographics, 56,

219

173; divisions within, 57; GMD policy, 61–62; GZAR established to justify, 51; investment policy, 160; Mao’s views, 66; recognized early, 61, 67; religion, 43, 55; secession movements, 1, 55, 60; statehood, 172; tensions with center, 60; written script, 58 Toad Festival (Maguai), 42 trade, 156–157 Tu, 37, 38, 90; dress, 41; origins, 38 tusi, 35, 36, 40, 45, 95, 96 Uighur, 2, 56, 58, 59; religion, 55, 57; written script, 58 United Front Work Department, 80, 93, 122; and Cultural Revolution, 104, 111 Vietnam: hinders Guangxi development, 163; Nationalist base, 83 waterway construction, 155 Wei Baqun, 83, 94–100, 118; early Marxist training, 97; museum, 98 Wei Guoqing, 98, 104 Wei surname, 27 Wenshan Zhuang-Miao Autonomous Prefecture, 29; demographics, 32, 33, 45; establishment, 9; ethnic cadres, 84; fieldwork, 13; lack of Zhuang consciousness, 38; minority institutes, 133; nationality classification work, 90; relations with Guangxi, 174; religion, 42, 44; tusi, 40 Western Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Prefecture, 4, 82, 86, 87, 91, 126, 140; united with eastern Guangxi, 92–93 Wiens, Herold, 5, 27 work teams: centrally dispatched, 82, 84; classify groups against local wishes, 91; differences among, 88; eradicate illiteracy work, 141; label classes, 85; language classification, 140; nationality classification, 88; politically influenced, 89; publications, 126; report violence in 1950s, 46; Western Guangxi Zhuang

Kaup-Index.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 220

220

Index

Autonomous Prefecture creation, 87 written script, 37, 55, 58, 139, 140 wugong, 43 Wuming, 33, 44, 85, 133, 141, 144 wupo, 43 Wuzhou, 31, 156, 164 xiafang movement, 105 xianpo, 43 Xinjiang, 2, 6, 56, 58, 59, 151; Cultural Revolution, 103; GMD policy, 61; GZAR established to justify, 51; investment policy, 160; Mao’s views, 66; secession movements, 55; statehood, 172 Xu Jieshun, 161, 167 Xu Songshi, 27 Ya Meiyuan, 98 Yao, 29, 32, 45, 46, 53, 95; autonomous areas, 84; Baise Uprising, 98, 99; discriminated against, 96; ethnic cadres training, 100; lack of reference to, 100; population distribution, 45; recognized early, 67; Wei Baqun views on, 98 Yao-Zhuang interactions, 45–46 Yi, 32, 58, 61; population distribution, 45 Yili Rebellion, 59 Yishan, education, 135 Yuan Dynasty, 27, 36, 139 Yuan Shikai, 61 Yunnan Province: demographics, 32, 33, 56; foreign involvement in, 60; historical publication, 11; language training, 141; nationality classification, 88, 90; natural resources, 31; poverty counties, 10; railroads, 155; relations with

Guangxi, 30, 174, 175; topography, 29; zhixi, 37, 38 Zhang Jun, 140 Zhang Zhizhong, 59 zhixi, 5, 37–41; origins of, 40; poverty, 166; primary loyalty to, 38, 83; relations with other zhixi, 45; resistance to Zhuang classification, 90; weaken Zhuang mobilization, 174, 177 Zhou Enlai, 89, 91, 92, 157 Zhuang: activists, 3; cultural studies, 128, decision to recognize, 86; dialects, 37; exclusion from minority policies, 85; first references to, 26; heroes, 94; illiteracy, 129; intellectuals, 2, 3, 145; officials, 2; origins, 25–29, 40, 96; peasant attitudes, 4; physical characteristics of, 28; resistance to classification, 89–91; scholars, 11, 12, 27, 28, 37, 85, 118, 120, 128, 139; self-address, 41, 46, 99; self references, 26, 28; unwillingness to be recognized, 84, 87 Zhuang language promotion, 138–146; “second high tide,” 142; funding, 143; translations of Han broadcasts, 142 Zhuang Studies Associations, 2, 11, 180; divisions between, 174–75; Guangxi Zhuang Studies Association, 2, 128, 172, 175; Yunnan Zhuang Studies Association, 2, 13, 128–129, 178 Zhuang written script, 3, 29, 117, 134, 139–140, 146, 178; central funding, 141; publications, 142; resistance to, 140; square. See also written script characters, 139 Zhuang-Yao relations, 95

Kaup-ATB.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 221

ABOUT THE BOOK

Managing ethnic nationalism within the People’s Republic of China has become increasingly challenging. As new reforms widen economic disparities between minorities and the Han majority, even the most assimilated of minorities, the Zhuang, have begun to demand special treatment from the central government. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officially recognized the 16 million Zhuang as China’s largest minority nationality in the early 1950s, granting them regional autonomy. Prior to this, however, the Zhuang did not share a common ethnic identity. Katherine Palmer Kaup explores why the CCP in effect created the Zhuang nationality. Why did it launch a massive propaganda campaign to increase nationality consciousness? How is the party now responding to the Zhuang’s assertive political demands? This pioneering study unveils the unique culture of the Zhuang people, showing at the same time the CCP’s skillful balancing of ethnic and regional loyalties over the past fifty years to integrate the diversity of China’s ethnic mosaic. Katherine Palmer Kaup is assistant professor of political science at Furman University.

221

Kaup-ATB.Final

1/7/10

11:38 AM

Page 222